Companies are corporate citizens and as such have special responsibilities to the communities where they operate – and to society as a whole.

Energy companies are an integral part of communities throughout the UK –from offices and substations, to power stations, windfarms and overhead line networks.

Building the trust of communities and being a good corporate neighbour is therefore essential to ScottishPower.

We have a strong employee presence in the community too, with hundreds of meter readers visiting homes across the country nearly every day of the year.

Communities can benefit economically from a company’s presence - from employment and purchasing local goods and services. There can also be negative impacts too, from works traffic, noise, or even competition for parking space.

It is important that companies manage these impacts and build and maintain a relationship of trust with their communities. Often, we rely on the goodwill of communities to run our businesses effectively, or plan and build new developments.

Most companies today choose to give something back to the community and society, but it is rarely entirely philanthropic.

Companies tend to focus much of their community investment on cause related marketing programmes that deliver both business and community benefits, or by establishing partnerships that link community causes with the goals of the business.

Others are engaging their employees in community based volunteering programmes, simultaneously creating business benefit from employee development and community benefits from sharing their skills and resources.

Stephen Dunn, Impact Leader