No. 1 Corporate Citizen !

It's not a joke : Corporate Responsibility Magazine gives HP high marks in environment, human rights, employee relations, philanthropy, and more...

HP took the top spot in Corporate Responsibility Magazine’s 100 Best Corporate Citizens list for 2010, rising from fifth place last year. The list is considered the preeminent of its kind.
“Global citizenship is in our DNA at HP. We hold ourselves to very high standards, so we are very pleased and honored to be recognized for our efforts, particularly by this respected source,” said Gabi Zedlmayer, vice president, Global Social Innovation.

Global citizenship is one of HP’s seven corporate objectives, rooted in the company’s founding values and key to success. While this recognition highlights HP’s most recent accomplishments, global citizenship has influenced how it has run its business for more than 70 years.
“Our work in this realm encompasses HP’s commitment to align our business goals with our impacts on society and the planet,” Zedlmayer continued. “We recognize that our actions can make very real differences in the quality of people’s lives around the world, and we will continue to work toward creating a legacy of real and lasting change.”

How the ranking is determined :

The 100 Best Corporate Citizens List is based on more than 360 data points of publicly available information in seven categories, weighted as follows:
Environment — 19.5%
Climate Change — 16.5%
Human Rights — 16%
Employee Relations — 19.5%
Governance — 7%
Philanthropy — 9%
Financial — 12.5%

HP faces strikes in England. Again !

March 22 (Bloomberg and San Francisco Business Times)

The Public and Commercial Services Union said up to 1,000 members working for Hewlett Packard Enterprise Services will take a further four days of strike action in a dispute over pay and job security.

Workers at Hewlett-Packard Co. plants in the north of England plan for four days of strikes, starting next week. The Public and Commercial Services Union, based in London and representing some 300,000 members in the United Kingdom, said as many as 1,000 of its members will strike for four days at HP plants. Workers at some of the sites have already walked off the job for two days earlier this month.

Work stoppages are planned for March 29 and 30 and for April 6 and 7. They'll affect plants formerly run by Electronic Data Systems, which is now owned by HP. The plants are in Newcastle, Washington, Preston, Lytham St. Annes and Norcross.

"There has been growing anger amongst staff since HP took over EDS ... with 3,400 staff already axed across the UK. Staff have been further angered by the imposition of a pay freeze last year and for 2010 despite the company delivering record revenues worth billions of dollars," the union said. Mark Sewotka, the general secretary of the union, said employees at the HP plants felt "betrayed. "Hewlett-Packard bought Plano, Texas-based EDS in 2008 for $13.9 billion and laid off some 25,000 of its workers. Last September, HP renamed the unit HP Enterprise Services. Perennial presidential gadfly H. Ross Perot started EDS in 1962.