1990s: A maturing agenda

Business was driven by a need to address the UK’s decline in the international competitiveness league tables, improve basic skills in literacy and numeracy, and find new talent through a diversified workforce.

Engaging business leaders and rising stars

In 1990, HRH The Prince of Wales established his Seeing is Believing programme; a simple yet effective tool to inspire business leaders to take action in their local communities. It began as a single project and we asked executive search firms to share the business leaders they were tracking in order to produce an invitation list for the first SiB visits.

Each visit was led by a business leader committed to Business in the Community and the relevant topic. Senior business figures and rising stars were taken to look at a social problem in a specific part of the UK and then report back to The Prince.

Rapid growth and new initiatives

This started another period of rapid growth throughout the 1990s. We launched a group of campaigns, including Business in the Environment, Opportunity Now, Race for Opportunity, Global Partners Network, Business Action on Homelessness and Cares.

Content of this page written by Helen Baker, Concise Content