Report to Society 2024

Governance

Dialogue with stakeholder groups

Dialogue with stakeholders is proximity in action

Savings banks maintain an intensive dialogue with the people and companies in their region. There are many points of contact and interaction. Whether it’s consultations at the savings bank, customer events, joint work in networks and committees, memberships in projects and initiatives or the promotion of events in sport, culture and customs – the many opportunities for dialogue for the savings banks as businesses and for many of their employees in the context of voluntary activities are an expression of a strong, lived rootedness on site.

Regular customer surveys also offer every savings bank the opportunity to gain an accurate picture of the concerns, interests and wishes of the people and companies in its business area. In this way, products and services can be further developed in line with changing customer requirements. At the same time, emerging issues that are important for people or the respective region can be addressed at an early stage.

In the course of the CSRD sustainability reporting planned for 2024, many savings banks were given an additional opportunity to reflect their own positions and activities in a thematically focussed manner in their communication with stakeholder groups and at the same time to specifically include the views and interests of the individual stakeholder groups. Many banks held dedicated dialogue events with private and corporate customers, representatives from politics and business and civil society. Such focus group dialogues were used by Sparkasse Krefeld, Sparkasse Mainfranken Würzburg and Berliner Sparkasse, for example, to compare their own assessment of reportable sustainability aspects with the information needs of the respective stakeholder groups.

At these and many other dialogue events held by the savings banks, it became clear that even where different points of view or perspectives on individual topics came to light and were discussed intensively, all participants rated the exchange and the transparency created as particularly valuable. The invitation to dialogue alone was interpreted by many participants as a sign of appreciation and proof that the savings banks take people’s concerns and the interests of the region seriously and include them in their decisions.

The 17 global sustainability goals
serve as reference points for many savings banks in their dialogue with their stakeholders

Exchange and transparency: impetus for sustainable development

Many of these dialogues often result in further activities that lead to a more permanent exchange between the savings banks and their stakeholder groups. Nassauische savings bank, for example, drew up a “Guideline for Communication with Stakeholder Groups” based on its first stakeholder dialogues. It formulates key points that outline the company’s own business philosophy as well as principles and formats for dialogue. This creates an orientation framework that is helpful for all parties in order to recognise current developments, changing circumstances or emerging problems at an early stage and address them in a targeted manner.

Other institutions also use specially created advisory boards for customers or representatives of business and society, such as Haspa, Sparkasse Dortmund or Stadtsparkasse Remscheid. On the one hand, these are used to obtain direct feedback on products and services. Above all, however, as a platform for suggestions and impulses, they offer the opportunity to exchange views on the changing expectations, requirements and needs of people and companies and to be able to react to them at an early stage.

The savings banks have a mandate to make a positive contribution to social and economic development in the regions. This also includes listening to what moves people in the region and contributing our own positions to the social dialogue. On this basis, dialogue with important stakeholder groups will remain a key element in the fulfilment of the savings banks’ public mandate in the future – even if the European framework conditions for corporate sustainability reporting are adjusted once again.