Companies and organizations weaken when it comes to the common good

The ranking is compiled every two years by the University of St. Gallen in cooperation with the Leipzig Graduate School of Management. The SonntagsZeitung publishes the results published on September 22 in the current issue. In each case, 15,000 inhabitants throughout Switzerland are surveyed.

The top positions are naturally occupied by organizations with a public welfare-oriented service mandate: Rega, Spitex, Pro Senectute, Paraplegic Foundation, Red Cross, AHV, Pro Infirmis, Suva, Reka, Salvation Army and Caritas.

Migros, the first profit-oriented company, is ranked 12th. The retailer is held in high esteem by the population, not least because of its cooperative organization and the Migros Culture Percentage. Its main competitor, Coop, is ranked 19th, while other cooperatives such as Volg (17th), Mobiliar (18th) and Landi (22nd) also perform well. Geberit is the first purely private company to appear on the list, in 28th place.

According to the inventors of the Common Good Atlas, it is not enough for companies to run their core business successfully and efficiently, thus paying wages, suppliers and taxes. "The concept of value creation must be expanded beyond the purely economic," says Peter Gomze, ex-rector of the HSG and patron of the project, to the SonntagsZeitung. And study leader Timo Meynhardt: "Without social acceptance, the efficient completion of the core business will no longer be possible in the future".

A kind of warning to companies that score poorly in the public's favor and seem to have little credit when it comes to their commitment to the common good. For example, Marlboro ranks last, Nestlé plummets compared to 2017, and the media brand View is ranked 105, in direct company with controversial companies such as Syngenta, Tamoil and Glencore.

In general, it can be seen that the contribution to the common good in Switzerland has become smaller. Only ten organizations - including the Swiss soccer champions BSC Young Boys and the major bank Credit Suisse - improved their performance compared to 2017. In contrast, other companies - in addition to Nestlé - are really dropping off. Raiffeisen, for example, or tech giants such as Amazon, Facebook or Apple. "Executives should see this decline as a warning that requires at least as much attention as the regularly threatened shrinkage of the workforce," says Timo Meynhardt to the SonntagsZeitung.

GemeinwohlAtlas 2019: Key facts

• Switzerland is still very concerned about the common good in Switzerland. As in the 2017 survey, 73 out of 100 respondents are concerned that too little attention is paid to the common good in Switzerland.
• In general, the Swiss population penalizes large corporations in particular; these have particularly lost ground in the ranking compared to 2017.
• It is astonishing that the perceived contribution to the common good of most organizations has fallen. Besides Nestlé (-14.89%), Coca Cola (-13.17%) and FC Basel (-10.00%) in particular have suffered massive losses.
• The winners of the year are BSC Young Boys (+7.27%) and Credit Suisse (+5.19%). Furthermore, Lidl (+2.36%) and Aldi (+1.96%) can report slight improvements compared to the GemeinwohlAtlas 2017.
• Once again, the top group is made up primarily of public or cooperative organizations or nonprofit organizations with a Swiss background.