Case study: How Humana creates economic value for its stakeholders
As a leading Nordic care group, Humana is there for people with functional impairment, psychosocial disorders and mental illness as well as for the elderly, with assignments in hundreds of municipalities, 9,000 customers and clients, 18,000 employees and several hundred units in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark. Humana has an ongoing dialogue with its key stakeholders, and creates sustainable value for all. Tweet This!
This case study is based on the 2021 Annual and Sustainability Report by Humana, prepared in accordance with the GRI Standards, that can be found at this link. Through all case studies we aim to demonstrate what CSR/ ESG/ sustainability reporting done responsibly means. Essentially, it means: a) identifying a company’s most important impacts on the environment, economy and society, and b) measuring, managing and changing.
Humana distributes long-term economic value to its stakeholders in various ways: suppliers through the purchase of food, consumables and other products needed for operations as well as various services, employees via salaries, other remuneration and social security contributions, lenders through interest on lent capital, the public sector through taxes and shareholders through dividends. In order to create economic value for its stakeholders Humana took action to:
- create economic value for employees
- create economic value for suppliers
- create economic value for lenders
- create economic value for the public sector
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With this case study you will see:
- Which are the most important impacts (material issues) Humana has identified;
- How Humana proceeded with stakeholder engagement, and
- What actions were taken by Humana to create economic value for its stakeholders
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What are the material issues the company has identified?
In its 2021 Annual and Sustainability Report Humana identified a range of material issues, such as high-quality care services, business integrity, safe and secure working environment, compliance with regulations. Among these, creating economic value for its stakeholders stands out as a key material issue for Humana.
Stakeholder engagement in accordance with the GRI Standards
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) defines the Principle of Stakeholder Inclusiveness when identifying material issues (or a company’s most important impacts) as follows:
Stakeholders must be consulted in the process s of identifying a company’s most important impacts and their reasonable expectations and interests must be taken into account. This is an important cornerstone for CSR / sustainability reporting done responsibly.
Key stakeholder groups Humana engages with:
To identify and prioritise material topics Humana engaged with its stakeholders through the following channels:
| Stakeholder Group | Method of engagement |
| Customers and clients | · Continuous dialogue in operations · Annual customer/client surveys · Surveys specific to operations · Comment function on Humana’s website |
| Contractors in municipality, region and state
| · Procurements · Meetings · Contract follow-ups · Humana’s website · Customer surveys from social services |
| Employees
| · Continuous dialogue in operations · Annual employee survey and performance appraisal · Various manager and meeting forums · Intranet |
| Shareholders and investors | · Annual general meeting · Individual meetings and group meetings with shareholders, investors and the banks’ analysts, for example in connection with interim reports · Investor conferences |
| Authorities
| · Rules and regulations · Reports · Inspections · Reviews · Incident reporting · Inquiries |
| Researchers/ Academia | · Joint meetings and research projects |
| Suppliers | · Procurements · Orders · Purchases · Meetings with suppliers |
What actions were taken by Humana to create economic value for its stakeholders?
In its 2021 Annual and Sustainability Report Humana reports that it took the following actions for creating economic value for its stakeholders:
- Creating economic value for employees
- In 2021, Humana paid SEK 6,333 million for employee salaries and pensions.
- Creating economic value for suppliers
- In 2021, Humana paid SEK 1,362 million to suppliers.
- Creating economic value for lenders
- In 2021, Humana paid SEK 143 million to lenders.
- Creating economic value for the public sector
- In 2021, Humana paid SEK 78 million in corporate tax.
Which GRI Standards and corresponding Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have been addressed?
The GRI Standard addressed in this case is: Disclosure 201-1 Direct economic value generated and distributed
Disclosure 201-1 Direct economic value generated and distributed corresponds to:
- Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
- Targets: 8.1, 8.2
- Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
- Targets: 9.1, 9.4, 9.5
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References:
This case study is based on published information by Humana, located at the link below. For the sake of readability, we did not use brackets or ellipses. However, we made sure that the extra or missing words did not change the report’s meaning. If you would like to quote these written sources from the original please revert to the following link:
https://www.humanagroup.com/contentassets/39756bfa2d1f499a9c398ff2a47e3632/1558664.pdf
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