By Jessica Cheam

FOR package delivery firm FedEx, people are the priority - and this philosophy is a key reason it picked up a major social responsibility award here last night.

The United States-based company has a host of employee-centric practices at all its operations, including those in Singapore. They involve internal annual staff surveys to promote internal communication, as well as internal awards which recognise the performance, leadership, vision and creativity of employees.

Volunteerism is also encouraged. FedEx here has a popular initiative where local employees go to Batam to help build houses for the underprivileged.

All this and more make up FedEx's corporate social responsibility (CSR) commitment. Its practices have helped it to be consistently named among the '100 Best Companies To Work For' by Fortune magazine for a decade.

And last night, they also helped the firm to win the top honour for Best Workplace Practices at the inaugural Global CSR Awards held at Raffles Hotel.

FedEx's Singapore and Indonesia managing director Ramesh Kumar Singam said its practices are based on the firm's 'People-Service-Profit' philosophy - a major factor in the company's success.

'This philosophy is based on the premise that if we take care of our people, they will take care of our customers, and that will take care of our profit.'

CSR refers to a concept where corporations consider the interests of society by taking responsibility for the impact of their activities on individuals and communities, as well as the environment.

FedEx, known too for its environmental efforts such as using cleaner, hybrid vehicles, also picked up a silver award in the environment category last night.

Mr Ramesh credited the firm's vision for the awards last night. 'At FedEx, we understand the world faces big challenges, that a sustainable business is intrinsically linked to a sustainable society.'

The awards, organised by event firm The Pinnacle Group International, seek to recognise the value of CSR programmes by firms with operations throughout Asia. The awards attracted about 40 nominations, said Pinnacle's director Melvin Chan. There are four award categories, with a gold, silver and bronze winner for each.

Other winners included palm oil firm Kulim (Malaysia), which won for Best Environmental Excellence, and drug maker Merck Thailand, for CSR Leadership.

Best Community Programme went to the Philippines' No. 2 telco Globe Telecom, of which SingTel is a large shareholder. Its CSR initiatives included providing free Internet access for the country's public high schools and enabling teachers to request educational material via SMS.

Its head of community relations Jeffrey Tarayao said that as 'CSR becomes part of the whole company, it also becomes more meaningful for the society'.

Singapore Environment Council executive director Howard Shaw, the guest of honour, commended 'industry leaders with the bold vision to embrace CSR'. 'These leaders...recognise that good CSR practices are instrumental to long-term business sustainability and a healthy bottom line.'

Even in the midst of 'global economic utter doom and gloom, I hope any economic resurgence or recovery will bring with it a pillion rider embracing a refreshing new set of business values', he said.

The awards were held in conjunction with the inaugural Global CSR Summit held at Raffles Hotel, which ends today.

This article was first published in The Straits Times on January 15, 2009.