The World’s Most Ethical Companies designation recognizes companies that truly go beyond making statements about doing business “ethically” and translate those words into action. WME honorees demonstrate real and sustained ethical leadership within their industries, putting into real business practice the Institute’s credo of “Good. Smart. Business. Profit.”

There is no set number of companies that make the list each year. Rather, the World’s Most Ethical Company designation is awarded to those companies that have leading ethics and compliance programs, particularly as compared to their industry peers. This year, there are 100 World’s Most Ethical Companies. Of these companies, 26 are new to the list in 2010 and 24 companies dropped off from the 2009 list. These “drop offs” generally occurred because of litigation and ethics violations, as well as increased competition from within their industry.

IT CAN PAY TO BE ETHICAL

Investing in ethics is beneficial for any company, even in a recession. The below graph compares the “WME Index,” or all publicly traded 2010 World’s Most Ethical Company honorees, against the S&P 500 and FTSE since 2005.

MEDIA RESPONSIBILITY REPORT

For the first time, in concert with the announcement of the 2010 World’s Most Ethical Companies, Ethisphere has published its first annual Media Responsibility Report. This report discloses the methodologies, editorial approach and financial relationships behind the generation of the annual World’s Most Ethical Companies list.

The 2010 Ethisphere Media Responsibility Report can be found here.

2010 WORLD’S MOST ETHICAL COMPANY SELECTION PROCESS:

1. The Methodology

A methodology committee of leading attorneys, professors, government officials and organization leaders, assisted Ethisphere in creating the scoring methodology for the World’s Most Ethical Companies awards.

2. Candidate Selection

Over the course of the year, companies across the world submitted their applications to become 2010 World’s Most Ethical Companies. Based on these applications, as well as information Ethisphere gathered throughout the year, a list of semi-finalists was created.

3. In-Depth Analysis

At this stage, semi-finalist companies were notified and given an in-depth survey questionnaire to fill out regarding their ethics and compliance program, governance and corporate responsibility.

4. Further Refinement

Ethisphere then conducted data analysis on hundreds of companies based on their responses to the survey, as well as documents and information researched and requested by Ethisphere to confirm survey responses. Every company was then given an EQ score based on the results of the survey and measured against seven distinct categories. These categories were Corporate Citizenship and Responsibility; Corporate Governance; Innovation that Contributes to the Public Well Being; Industry leadership; Executive Leadership and Tone from the Top; Legal, Regulatory and Reputation Track Record; and Internal Systems and Ethics/Compliance Program.

5. The Winners…

The highest EQ scores for each industry became this year’s 2010 World’s Most Ethical Companies.

You can find more in-depth information on the methodology for 2010’s World’s Most Ethical Companies here.

2010 WORLD’S MOST ETHICAL COMPANIES: