Annual reporting leaders
 

Communicate magazine hosted its influential corporate reporting conference at the Brewery venue in London on 30 September. The high attendance was testament to the dedication of the financial communications industry and the strong line-up of speakers covered a range of pertinent and thought-provoking topics; from integrated reporting to digital investor relations. The half-day event ended with the presentation of the Future Value Strategic Report Accolades.

Leon Milligan, corporate reporting consultant at Emperor Design, said, “The bringing together of the leading figures in the reporting arena inspires new thinking and drives improvements in reporting. This event has again got the cogs turning and I am ever more enthused by the future direction of reporting.”

The opening panel at the Evolution of the Annual Report conference was hosted by Radley Yeldar and the theme was a lack of long-term vision in reporting. Jennifer Sundberg, managing director at Board Intelligence, stressed how important it is for boards to demonstrate that they are thinking about the long term viability of their business.

Emperor hosted another panel on the subject of integrated reporting. Jonathan Labrey, chief strategy officer at the International Integrated Reporting Council, said that his approach to reporting was not annual. He spoke about his organisation’s call for inclusive, integrated and sustainable reporting and said how integrated reporting is proven to have a positive impact on share price.

A representative from Lloyds Banking Group, Caroline McCarthy-Stout, gave some valuable insight on a panel named, ‘Beyond CSR reporting’. McCarthy-Stout had moved from the reporting team to the CSR team, she said, though she confessed that she doesn’t actually like the term CSR, she favours ‘philanthropy’. McCarthy-Stout explained how Lloyds Banking has given precedence to sustainability in its reporting, and overall brand.

The final session at the Evolution of the Annual Report conference had speakers from Britvic, BT and Telecom Italia on the panel; all sharing their own experience of reporting for major brands. The event ended with the Strategic Report Accolades, which were awarded to the brands and agencies who demonstrated a high level of strategy in their annual reports.

 

Future Value Strategic Report Accolade winners:

Strategic leadership

Lloyds Banking Group

Best business model

SABMiller

Best key performance indicators

Barclays

Download the event programme

Presentations