South West law firm building purpose and impact with B Corp

Having celebrated one year since its B Corp Certification, leading South West law firm Stephens Scown joins with other members of the B Corp community to celebrate B Corp Month this March. 

A rapidly growing number of businesses have made the commitment to being a force for good as part of the B Corp community. With the theme of B Corp and the commitment to balancing people, planet and profit being a journey not a destination, Stephens Scown has set a number of goals to achieve in the coming months to drive its purpose and impact further. 

The firm’s B Corp goals for 2023/2024 are based around the five key assessment areas of: governance, workers, community, environment and customers, with some key goals already achieved and more that the firm has in its sights.

Verity Slater, Board partner who spearheaded Stephens Scown’s B Corp accreditation has just been nominated for a Legal 500 ESG Private Practice Champion.

Verity says: “Achieving our B Corp accreditation was no easy task and took a tremendous effort, but has really helped to embed across the Firm the importance of ensuring that all our practices are in line with B Corp principles going forward. Setting this year’s goals has been a great way to continue to drive towards further positive impact and has set us in a strong direction for this year’s priorities.”

As an employee-owned firm, Stephens Scown already has a strong score in the Governance section but aims to further improve this through the inclusion of social or environmental goals in formal written performance evaluation, provide Board members with an annual conflict of interest questionnaire and external publication on our website of our Board of directors for company transparency. 

The firm is also already well on the way to achieving its people goals, including improving the green credentials of its auto-enrolment pension scheme and undertaking an annual employee satisfaction survey, ensuring good data on employee satisfaction. The last employee satisfaction survey came back with a score of 96% of colleagues feeling ‘happy at work’ and an impressive 99% of respondents saying the firm was well run. Following a pause to carry out a full audit of its Employer Value Proposition, Stephens Scown is once again taking part in the Sunday Times employee satisfaction survey, which if it meets certain criteria, will be revealed as part of a prestigious list of the UK’s Best Places to Work in June 2024. 

The greatest number of goals the firm has relates to the communities in which it operates, as an area where it can improve its impact the greatest, which aligns with Stephens Scown’s Giving Back programme goals. Plans include increasing engagement with the EDI survey to improve the data the firm holds on this, setting diversity improvement goals that are regularly reviewed by the Board, increasing the number of employees who do volunteering to 25% or above, screening / evaluating suppliers for social and environmental impact and undertaking at least eight pro bono projects in this year. 

With the firm’s target of achieving Net Zero by 2025 just around the corner, there will also be a strong focus on reducing its impact on the environment. This included seeking to have our new Taunton office meet high environmental standards, more accurate measurement of its Scope 3 carbon footprint, preparation of a plan to further reduce its carbon footprint and sharing its half yearly Net Zero updates with the firm, reducing its Scope 1 and Scope 2 carbon footprint by at least 2.5% and reviewing the firm’s cloud storage company and their carbon reduction plan.

Verity says: “With client experience hugely important to us as one of the firm’s strategic pillars, we maintain our commitment to delivering above and beyond for our clients, pushing the levels of client service through innovative new systems and processes and recently the creation of a new client delivery team. Through raising awareness of the values of joining the B Corp community, we have also set up a team of B Corp Champions who support clients with their own sustainability journeys and I am delighted with the enthusiasm and innovation shown across the firm in this regard.

“With our B Corp Champions driving sustainability at the firm, we are in a strong position to build on our environmental and social goals as we continue to drive forward on our B Corp journey.” 

You can find out more about the many ways Stephens Scown can help businesses and individuals here and about all its goals for 2023 / 2024 in its first impact assessment report here.