The story of WBA’s Alliance – crossing the ‘200’ mark
Four years ago, the World Benchmarking Alliance (WBA) was officially launched at the side-lines of the UN General Assembly, born from a common belief that the private sector can strongly contribute to, as well as benefit from, the global ambition of the SDGs and that corporate performance benchmarks are powerful levers for change. Right from the beginning, we knew that creating partnerships, in the spirit of SDG17 was critical to our work, and to bring about the desired waves of change.
From this realisation, rose the idea for the WBA ‘Alliance’. What is the Alliance, you ask? Our multi-stakeholder Alliance is a community of change-makers, made of up organisations from around the world working towards Agenda2030 in their own, unique ways. WBA Allies represent organisations working at global, regional, and local levels to shape the private sector’s contributions to achieving the SDGs. All the organisations that are a part of this play a significant role in helping WBA become a truly effective global organisation and drive system transformation to achieve the SDGs. The Alliance ultimately helps us ensure our consultations and benchmarks are used by companies, investors, policy-makers and civil society; and create meaningful centres of impact, as an extension of their influence.
Year-on-year growth:
From 66 organisations when the Alliance was formalised in 2018, this global and inclusive community currently stands at 200+ organisations, and growing every single day. We have organisations from around the world, representing diverse voices and stakeholder groups. Find the latest list of Allies here, and take a look at how we grew below:
As the Chair of our Supervisory Board, Paul Druckman said at our annual Allies Assembly, “the Alliance is WBA”.
Where do we go from here?
Grow an inclusive community: For us, the constant call to action is to continue to foster an inclusive growth in this community. We strongly believe that the Alliance is built with, for, and by all the organisations in it, and thus invite everyone in it to help us grow this dynamic movement. In the upcoming years, we want to continue to making the Alliance as inclusive as possible as we believe the strength of the Alliance comes from including those with influence over business and those impacted by business. This means we seek to strengthen the Alliance with currently under-represented stakeholder groups (financial institutions and business/industry platforms) and regions (Africa, Latin America, and central and southeast Asia). We would welcome any suggestions you may have on organisations that could bring in this voice.
How do Allies step in: As the Alliance continues to grow and evolve, we would like to foster a movement that operates with more of a bottom-up, outside-in approach, rather than a top-down, inside-out one. We would love for our Allies to consider what role(s) – shaper, user, amplifier, or influencer – you will play in the Alliance and how we can support you in using your expertise, networks, and influence to drive corporate behavior change.
Leverage the strength of collective action: Our ability to deliver impact depends on how all of us in the Alliance, and those around us, use WBA’s data to mobilise corporate action and hold companies to account. In 2021, we’ll be working on collective engagements and actions, based on our systems, to drive cross-sector action on the issues that matter most. Watch this space to know more on how we will work together collectively.
Want to know more about joining the Alliance? Read here or contact the Alliance team at WBA:
Marc Robin, Engagement Manager, m.robin@worldbenchmarkingalliance.org
Aparna Trichur, Communications Lead – Allies, a.trichur@worldbenchmarkingalliance.org
Pratik Desai, Strategic Engagement Lead, p.desai@worldbenchmarkingalliance.org