Boosting internal engagement with sustainability

Every year we publish our annual digital sustainability report. For us this is much more than an exercise in data disclosure. In fact, we use our performance update as one of our biggest opportunities to engage Virgin Media people with the business’s sustainability work.

We are regularly asked how our approach to reporting works for us, and having pressed ‘go’ on our report at the beginning of August, here’s an insight into how we make the most of the annual reporting cycle from an engagement perspective:

In 2010 we were one of the first businesses to stop producing hard copy sustainability reports. Over time we have developed our sustainability website: virginmedia.com/sustainability to be a one-stop-shop for everything sustainability at Virgin Media. It’s a portal that allows us to provide regular updates through stories which we promote internally and externally as well as comprehensive annual updates.

The assets on the website star our people. We are inundated with requests to participate in these every year. This is a great employee engagement opportunity and this year we had over 20 employees starring in videos and human infographics. These people go on to be some of our biggest sustainability advocates internally.

All of the assets in our report are designed to standalone so we can slice and dice them for use on internal and external communication channels. This means that the upfront cost of creating them provides a much longer term engagement benefit.

Every year we challenge ourselves to ensure our sustainability communications drive awareness and engagement with Virgin Media’s sustainability strategy, projects and performance. Last year we created human infographics for the first time and this year we challenged ourselves to go a step further.

Having reviewed the latest trends for communication we settled on creating a world first for corporate sustainability communications – a 360° immersive video that allows viewers to jump into our world and experience how we are growing in a way that’s good for people and the environment.

We used the video to launch our annual digital report externally and it received really positive press coverage, being heralded by Edie as “revolutionizing CSR reporting”. The video has now received over 1,000 views on youtube.com/vmsust which is more than any other video we have produced.

Internally the 360 video has also been a big hit. We’ve taken a stand on a roadshow around our biggest sites with google cardboard headsets. Some of the feedback we have received includes “Great use of technology and social media to raise awareness”.