'In a recent survey from SAS, a consultancy, and Thomson Reuters just 12 per cent of investors interviewed considered annual reports to be both insightful and objective. Barely a quarter felt annual reports clearly articulated the strategy of the business.

Almost all respondents wanted greater segmental and divisional information, more disclosure of hedging and derivative exposure and better understanding overall of potential risks.'

The full article

This year's report needed to communicate three things: the foundations for growth that the company has been laying, the results they’d achieved and their success at taking advantage of market conditions. Have a look at the finished work to see our response.

CorpComms DigiAwards

Best online Annual Report:

• Home Retail Group Annual Report & Review ’10
• Sainsbury’s Annual Report & Review ’09

Communicate Digital Impact Awards

Best use of video:

• Home Retail Group Annual Report & Review ’10
• Sainsbury’s Annual Report & Review ’09

Best online Annual Report:

• Home Retail Group Annual Report & Review ’10

We are really chuffed with the news, and have our fingers crossed for the winners’ announcements in late September.

We’ve created the SAS Corporate Website Forum. Founding members include; Aviva, Diageo, GlaxoSmithKline, Standard Chartered and Tate & Lyle. The forum offers two distinct benefits – the first is access to a unique benchmarking project that enables the members to compare their own website usage traffic data with other members in the group on an ongoing basis. The data analysis is conducted by SAS analysts.

The second benefit is the opportunity to network with the ten other members at quarterly lunches which look at new elements of the traffic data, and also feature an additional discussion topic, informed by a presentation from an independent expert. The next meeting’s focus for analysis is the ‘About us’ section (how are visitors using this section), and the next topic for discussion is, of course, social media and its role and value as part of a broad online corporate communications strategy.

The Forum met for the first time back in May, and is now due to meet again in September.

The awards, now in their 32nd year, recognise and reward graduate recruiters for creative and innovative campaigns that attract the best graduate talent to their organisations. They are designed to highlight best practice in terms of graduate recruitment and to ensure standards within _­the industry remain high.

We received encouraging news from our latest institutional investor research – investors are finally seeing improvements in corporate reporting. A survey among 50 global fund managers and brokers by SAS with Thomson Reuters revealed that nearly 90% feel initiatives to encourage disclosure have made reports more useful, a significant increase on 2008.

Less encouragingly however, there remains a stark disconnect between the perception of the annual report’s role and the reality of what is being delivered. More than half of those questioned see the role of the annual report as a provider of valuable insight to help assess the future potential of the business and yet only half of investors feel annual reports in general provide an interesting insight into a company’s investment proposition.

It is clear that in the minds of investors there remains a significant gulf between excellent and poor company reporting in the UK. Here we offer some practical tips to help narrow the gap:

1. Clearly articulate your strategy and measurement of that strategy

Only 28% of investors surveyed feel annual reports clearly articulate the strategy of the business. Investors are demanding a clearer statement of strategy and greater use of KPIs in the measurement of company performance.

In particular they are signalling the need for better linkage of elements in reporting such as, for example, through the alignment of market context to strategy; strategy to KPIs; performance against those KPIs and future expectations of performance; risk to any forward-looking statements. There is increasing disparity between those companies that ensure their strategy runs through their narrative reporting to form a cohesive investment story and those that purely do the minimum to comply.

2. Demonstrate value

There is a genuine desire among investors to understand where value is coming from within the business at both a macro and micro level. Investors score companies very averagely on their ability to give meaningful insights into the future prospects of the business through their communications. It is telling that the most frequently used sections of companies’ websites by investors are ‘press and media’ and ‘about us’ over the IR section.

Investors, especially fund managers, are looking for nuggets of information that their peers might not be party to on which to base their investment decisions. This could be due to the investors’ face-to-face meetings with management and IR teams becoming more standardised and professional and therefore less likely to include those ‘off the cuff’ insightful remarks of days past. At a micro-level greater segmental/ divisional information in terms of enhanced disclosure on an individual business unit level scored 4.8 out of 5 in terms of need.

3. Use the web to its full advantage

Our research reveals the most useful ongoing source of company information among investors to be the online annual report which interestingly scored higher than the actual IR website. Specifically companies must deliver the information in the format the audience wants – the searchable PDF for example is the most popular report format over both printed and HTML reports.

Additionally outside of specific publications, 80% of investors use webcasts and 90% use the corporate website frequently to support investment decisions – an increase of a third from 2008. To ignore these two important opportunities to communicate with investors would be foolish. However, investors’ usage of email news alert serves as a warning in this regard. Usage has decreased 22% over the past 2 years, with the obvious conclusion to draw being due to the increased flood from companies who are not succinctly targeting the information they send out to their investor audiences.

4. Don’t assume that because you include something, investors can find it

When asked what could make corporate reporting more useful the majority of investors cited better navigation and signposting as a priority (scoring a 3.6 score out of a possible 5). Surprisingly this figure was up 16% on 2008 signaling that some companies have yet to focus on the linkages between print and online reporting, pagination and report structure, and links between corporate reports and other company communications such as the IR and corporate websites and results announcements.

Better linkage of elements in reporting and clearer links to the website for further information also rated highly among the professional investors consulted. Company communications should work with each other complimenting and supporting one another in message, tone and content. Even if internally they might be owned by different individuals, consistency is key.

5. And finally...be authentic

The investors consulted believe management are generally ineffective at communicating with honesty and credibility through the annual report and corporate website. Just shy of half of those questioned feel the writing in annual reports is too corporate and led by PR departments.

With investor trust at an all-time low and cynicism rife, companies must focus on communicating with investors in a open and transparent way in the tone of the communications they are producing; the content of the reports such as market context and commentary and forward-looking information; and the level of disclosure for example around divisional information and exposure to risk.

Above all, the feedback from this year’s research demonstrates that all the communications produced by companies are widely used by investors. From the printed annual report to the corporate website to specific elements such as webcasts, investors are engaging with companies through a variety of channels. The challenge going forward will be to ensure a clear, consistent, insightful investment story is communicated across all touch points in a transparent and authentic manner.”

I must admit I ventured off to the annual AGR Conference in Newport for the umpteenth time with more than a hint of cynicism – but then as a northerner who’s nudging forty I venture into most things with cynicism, so don’t read too much into that. How do I feel sitting on the train coming back from Newport? Well, to be honest, I can’t help feeling unusually positive about the experience, although I’m not totally sure why. It’s even more surprising given that the overall picture for graduates, higher education, and to a lesser extent graduate recruiters is looking pretty bleak – particularly with George Osborne in his current mood. So, why do I feel uplifted? Was it the obligatory C-list comedian taking the mickey out of our profession (which like most professions seems ridiculous to outsiders), or was it the pudgy Elvis impersonator? Well I’m not ashamed to admit that I really enjoyed both, but there was definitely more to it than that.

Was it the content and the learning? Well, as with most conferences the days were over-padded with ‘networking’ time between exhibition stands, but there were some good sessions and discussions that I really enjoyed and learned from. I listened to Howard Davies (whose CV defies belief – what drives people like that to be so relentlessly busy and successful?) talk eloquently about the higher education sector; a fellow agency gave a really well thought out presentation on the subject of research; and there was a lively, informed debate around the role and value of social media in one of the sessions I attended. The content and presentation of The AGR Summer Survey, were also impressive and interesting, as was the discussion afterwards (for us graduate recruiters and agencies anyway). So, I guess on the whole, even though I missed quite a bit of stuff through the usual calls to the office, I learned something and have come away with a mix of interesting questions and ideas.

But I’m not sure it’s the learning that’s behind my positivity. At a time when more and more professional and personal interactions seem to be digital, there was something reassuring about a good old-fashioned conference. There seemed to be a sense of kinship and optimism – ‘Dunkirk spirit’ almost - in what continue to be difficult conditions, with the ominous threat of more difficult conditions ahead. And I may be imagining it but it seems to me that the quality of the average graduate recruitment client and agency-side professional has gone up in the last 18 months or so. Have the recession and redundancies sorted the wheat from the chaff, or have they forced all of us to be simply better at our jobs for fear of losing them? I’m not sure, but either way it adds up to a promising future for graduate recruitment, particularly when you add the fact that major graduate recruiters seem to have recognised that closing down graduate programmes, as they did after the last economic meltdown, is a recipe for disaster. On the whole it seems that the graduate recruiting profession is pretty well equipped to meet the predictably unpredictable challenges ahead.

Jason Frank is a director at SAS with ten years experience in UK and global graduate recruitment marketing for the likes of BT, Freshfields, KPMG, BDO, Lovells, and many more. jfrank@sasdesign.co.uk

“It’s been interesting to be both a participant in, and an observer of, the changes that have taken place across the functional “people” disciplines over the past 20 years. The territorial boundaries between human resources, branding, marketing, corporate and internal communication have shifted relentlessly but never so much as in recent years.

With cost-cutting driven to the limit in most industries, attention has shifted to the people agenda as a source of value creation and efficiency gain – both Harvard Business Review and The Economist have recently put it in the top three drivers of strategic growth.

The antiquated notion of individual functions having sole ownership of captive audiences internally or externally has become risible in all but the most Neolithic of companies. And yet how many of our businesses still operate in precisely that manner? Breaking up people agenda tasks into manageable chunks is one thing; trying to then erect barriers between those pieces to define fiefdoms is where the problems begin.

While some organisations have tackled the multi-disciplinary approach, few have gone far enough in truly sharing accountability and ownership – often, it would seem, because of the lack of political will to elevate certain functions above others in the real or perceived organisational hierarchy.

All of this adds up to one thing: we live in the most vibrant and exciting time to be an HR professional. When else has the profession had more of a mandate, or had more evidence, to make important, meaningful and value-adding contributions in areas that have not traditionally been viewed as HR.

The biggest barrier facing us is our own behaviour. It’s probably not unfair to say that, for whatever reasons, many HR and talent practitioners have fallen into a service culture mentality and a “competence trap”. This isn’t going to result in anything other than us doing more of what we already do – only a little bit better. Competence might look professional, but we must go further.

Business, markets, ideas, people and society are moving faster than that. We need to move faster. We need to shift from competence to confidence – where we aren’t just supporting the business by providing support and service from the HR function, but are actually helping shape it from the front.

This is all easy for me to say. I don’t work in HR. But from the outside looking in, I’m often struck by the lack of joined-up thinking in organisations. Of course, some are better at it than others. Yet we still encounter respected, prestigious organisations where HR and marketing are communicating to employees about similar topics at the same time but with no common core idea, message or alignment.

It’s understandable: the core principal of twentieth century business management is division of labour among specialists but HR can, and should, act as the glue that holds the whole thing together and gives it its shape.”

‘A recent survey from SAS and Thomson Reuters also gives a sense of the changes that investors want made.

Just 12 per cent of those interviewed considered annual reports to he both insightful and objective. Barely a quarter felt that annual reports clearly articulated the strategy of the business.

Crucially, almost all respondents wanted greater segmental and divisional information, more disclosure of hedging and derivative exposure and better understanding overall of potential risks.’

Download the full PDF article

Slaughter and May’s graduate brochure has been shortlisted for an award by the Association of Graduate Recruiters. The brochure was entered in the ‘Literature’ category and is up against four others also shortlisted for the award. The winner will be announced by the 7th July at the AGR’s Annual Conference, so fingers crossed.