BY JESSICA ULLIAN / PHOTOGRAPH BY HEMANT CHAWLA

[Editor’s note: The interviews and writing for this story were completed before the coronavirus pandemic.]

When Subhrakant Panda’s parents founded a mining and production company in Eastern India in the 1960s, being a responsible corporation wasn’t a choice, it was a necessity.

The region was remote, and people in the surrounding areas had little access to basic services like healthcare or education. Subhrakant (Questrom’93) recalls visiting the district with his father and learning how providing those services was mutually beneficial: local residents got jobs and a livelihood, and a growing corporation got a trained workforce.

“Their outlook was that you have to live in harmony with the surrounding community,” says Subhrakant of his parents. He’s now managing director and CEO of the company they founded, Indian Metals & Ferro Alloys, Ltd. (IMFA).

Long before India became the first country, in 2014, to require major corporations to give 2 percent of net profits to charity, IMFA and its corporate social responsibility (CSR) arm were building schools, health clinics, and job-training institutes in 200 villages throughout Odisha, the coastal state along the Bay of Bengal where the company operates. More recently, the foundation has focused its efforts on training and supporting women entrepreneurs, and improving water access in remote locations.

For many companies, CSR isn’t as vital to their survival—and it has shown. Too often, companies eager to burnish their reputations start their CSR process by identifying what they see as a key problem, then swooping in with a fundraiser and a photo op to solve it. The result: a one-time effort that alleviates some problems, but isn’t sustainable.

It doesn’t have to be that way, according to Shaifalika Panda (Questrom’92), CEO of IMFA’s CSR arm, the Bansidhar and Ila Panda Foundation (BIPF), which is named for Subhrakant’s parents. For decades, the company had been creating infrastructure in the surrounding villages. But when Subhrakant and Shaifalika—who met at BU—decided they wanted to support grassroots-driven, sustainable programs that rely on user buy-in to survive, the corporation shifted its model and established the foundation. Now, with nine years of growth behind them, the Pandas have cracked the code to creating CSR that benefits both the company and the community.

To build an effective CSR division, Shaifalika says, there are a couple of key steps to starting on the right foot: ask, honestly, what your company is prepared to do. Then, ask your community what it needs—and be prepared to listen to the answer.

“First, you need to make a decision: do you want to fund, or do you want to get on the ground and implement? Because it’s not really everybody’s cup of tea,” she says. “Then, you see so many companies make their first misstep trying to address what they think the need is. When you give people what they need, rather than what you think they need, it’s always received more successfully.”

Shaifalika estimates that more than 250,000 people have used BIPF’s services in the past year, and says the company allocates 5 percent of its net profits—more than $1 million annually—to the community. She says the foundation’s success is intertwined with IMFA’s long history in Odisha.

Bansidhar Panda founded the company after completing his engineering studies in the United States, establishing the first plant in the village of Therubali in 1961. By the time Subhrakant—who had followed in his father’s footsteps, getting his education in the United States and then returning to India to grow the company—became managing director in 2006, IMFA had become the country’s largest producer of ferro alloys, with three plants in Odisha and around 6,000 employees. When Shaifalika, who previously had her own entrepreneurial career importing luxury interiors, joined the company, she often accompanied her husband in visiting the plants to get a sense of the surrounding communities.

The company’s impact was obvious, she says, but the focus was “charitable and reactive.” IMFA was funding support systems in response to the community’s needs, not creating sustainable models for change and sufficiency.

The Pandas made a decision: they wanted to be on the ground, not simply fund other programs. The next step was to start asking what the needs on the ground were, and how the foundation, officially established in 2011, could be most effective. Shaifalika, who studied marketing and international management at Questrom, went to the Swedish Institute in Stockholm to dive deeper into sustainable CSR practices. From there, the Pandas began a series of needs assessment surveys in the surrounding communities. They discovered that many of the issues were common to isolated, rural villages around the world: access to healthcare, clean water, and education were paramount.

“We decided that we should narrow down the programs we invest in—skill development, education, healthcare, women’s  empowerment, and water sanitation,” she says. “It’s still a very broad base, but if you want to bring about holistic change, you cannot look at one without the others.”

You see so many companies make their first misstep trying to address what they think the need is. When you give people what they need, rather than what you think they need, it’s always received more successfully. —Shaifalika Panda

They also learned that one group felt particularly disenfranchised. The women of Odisha’s villages were struggling, and when they struggled, the villages did, too. The needs assessments consistently revealed how central women would be to the success of any other initiatives: they were in charge of fetching clean water for their families, maintaining standards of health and hygiene, and ensuring their children could attend school; they felt responsible for creating a better future for their families; they wanted a voice in family and village affairs, but worried their lack of education would limit their ability to be heard. Their participation, Shaifalika says, was critical to bring about “intergenerational change to the lives of people at the village level.”

The foundation established five core focus areas—healthcare, education, livelihood, water and sanitation, and advocacy and appreciation— and added a new initiative: Project Unnati. Unnati, which means development or improvement in Bengali, emphasized sustainable skill-building and financial literacy for women, and offered them an opportunity to lift their families out of debt or poverty.

But Project Unnati itself needed to follow the CSR model of assessment, strategic design, and transparent workflow to ensure its viability and sustainability. To implement the plan successfully, BIPF used what’s known as a self-help group model, which brings women together to form a self-sustaining financial resource they can use to grow their incomes at the household level. Over a multiyear period, participating women are educated in foundations of credit and savings, and then offered livelihood training in a variety of agricultural opportunities, including cultivation practices and animal husbandry. There’s also a focus on health and wellness care for young girls and new mothers. Since its founding, Project Unnati has helped establish 107 self-help groups—comprising more than 1,200 members—that are fully functional and connected with banks for ongoing credit and businessbuilding opportunities.

Much as his parents did, Subhrakant has approached corporate social responsibility through a pragmatic lens, connecting the dots between a thriving village and a robust plant. “When you set up a commercial venture,” he says, “it has to be done efficiently and profitably.”

That kind of outlook is actually key to establishing and maintaining a robust CSR division, says Caroline Flammer, cofaculty director of Questrom’s social impact program and an associate professor of strategy and innovation. Flammer’s research has shown that, beyond boosting a company’s public reputation, CSR helps create a culture that encourages employee satisfaction and retention. Identifying CSR projects that are mutually beneficial, she says, strengthens both the company and the systems or communities where they operate.

“Firms can play a critical role in addressing climate change, poverty, inequality, global health, and other grand challenges related to society and the natural environment,” she says. “An effective CSR strategy is one that allows firms to enhance their competitiveness and long-term profitability, while having a positive impact.”

As IMFA prepares to enter its seventh decade, BIPF’s first is drawing to a close. The healthcare centers originally opened by Bansidhar and Ila Panda have expanded, serving 188,000 people since 2017; the water and sanitation initiatives have benefited 37,000. In the last two years, the foundation has opened four community education centers, focused on improving literacy among women and teenage girls, and, in 2019, opened a coeducational school in the city of Choudwar.

For Subhrakant, the most meaningful response has come from the people in Therubali, where his father first opened the plant. “If you go back to where the company was set up in the ’60s, they have extremely fond memories of my parents,” he says. “And more often than not, the dialogue I would hear is, ‘It’s very nice that you are carrying on what your parents started.’”

To Shaifalika, that reaction affirms one final foundational piece of effective CSR: it must be a value from the very top of the company, upheld by leadership both operationally and financially. BIPF is named for the IMFA founders who wanted to establish a company that worked in harmony with the community. A truly successful venture, she says, demands no less.

“It takes a lot of commitment—it’s literally running a separate organization,” she says. “And whatever decision they make, it has to be driven from the top to bring that change.”