CSR Crusader

Mary Tribble, president, Tribble Creative Group, Charlotte, N.C.

Around the beginning of the millennium, Mary Tribble, 47, experienced a midlife crisis of sorts. Her business — Tribble Creative Group — was incredibly successful, but she spent many a sleepless night staring at her ceiling, asking herself the age-old question: “Is this all there is?”

“Am I put on this Earth just to plan cocktail parties for beer salesman?” she wondered, “Or am I meant to do something more meaningful?”

About the same time, a flier landed on her desk advertising a two-week walk across the Sahara Desert. “It was totally out of character for me. [Until then, my] idea of a vacation had been lying on the beach,” she says. “But I went, and it was really the first time I experienced any kind of prolonged self-reflection.”

The result was a profound professional and personal change. Upon her return, she masterminded the Forum for Corporate Consciousness, a 2003 event that brought together top CEOs, academics, and speakers to examine issues such as the environment and workplace diversity. She — and, by extension, her business — have been involved ever since in issues involving corporate social responsibility.

The trip also sparked a personal effort to become more deeply involved in her community of Charlotte, N.C. She has sat on the board of Charlotte's Children & Family Services Center, and on the board of the Relatives, a shelter for runaway and homeless youth, and is passionately involved in local environmental issues.

Tribble is also a founding member of the Charlotte Green Team, a group formed with the goal of reducing the environmental footprint of Charlotte's meetings and conventions. Just this past October, the Green Team, with the involvement of Tribble Creative Group, planned the North Carolina Conference for Women, a 2,500-attendee “electronic town meeting” at the Charlotte Convention Center that has become the center's prototype green event.

She also sits on the board of directors of the Catawba Land Conservancy, a nonprofit land trust that permanently protects land, water, and wildlife habitats to enhance the quality of life in North Carolina's Southern Piedmont and Lower Catawba River Basin.

While her community involvement and concern about issues of corporate social responsibility are personal goals, she realizes that there are benefits to her efforts.

“I was listening to a story on National Public Radio in which a president of a small regional bank in New Orleans was talking about the time he met with a representative from an environmental group,” she recalls. “He was rolling his eyes, waiting for the meeting to finish, when the guy from the environmental group pulls out a map of Louisiana, says the wetlands are drying up and that he [the banker] needs to do something about it. And the banker looks at the map, sees Louisiana's coastal towns, and notices that his bank has a branch in just about each town. He realizes that if the wetlands dry up, these towns are going to dry up — and with them, his bank.

“The point is that he ‘got it.’ And for me, when it comes to issues like these, it starts with making a connection with a CEO and getting him to think of these things in ways he hadn't thought of them before.”

A Charity a Minute

Claudette Weston, president, Weston & Associates, Winston-Salem, N.C.

When Claudette Weston's husband, Joel, died in 1984, she had some choices to make. With a couple of kids in college, her thoughts turned to entrepreneurship as a way to make a living. She thought of opening a bookstore or sports bar, but quickly rejected those ideas. Then, after a discussion with her sister, Nancy Holder (who had worked as a corporate meeting planner for R.J. Reynolds), they decided to open their own business: Weston & Associates.

While the decision to get into meeting-planning represented a relatively late change in career, one aspect of her life hasn't changed, even as her business has prospered: her determination to give back.

“I grew up out in the country,” says Weston, 70, whose business is in Winston-Salem, N.C. “My dad died when I was just 9, but I was lucky enough to get some help so I could go to college. And my mom and other folks would always tell me: ‘You need to give back to the community.’

“So, over the years, not only I, but my children as well, have been very involved,” Weston says. “It's something inside me.”

She focused her philanthropic endeavors to honor her late husband. Each year, the Joel A. Weston Jr. Memorial Award honors a Forsyth County (N.C.) nonprofit, health, or human-service organization that has demonstrated organizational excellence. The recipient receives a $10,000 endowment. She also established a scholarship at the Babcock School at Wake Forest University.

When she's not giving money or scholarships away, Weston is spending an extraordinary amount of time with local organizations and charities. These include the North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund, The North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission, the United Way, the Forsyth County Board of Social Services, and WinstonNet, a nonprofit Winston-Salem community technology initiative.

Ask her to list the issues she's involved with and she admits, “It's way too many. My kids keep yelling at me: ‘You're running a business; you're running a business!’”

She estimates that during an average week, she spends a full day working on nonprofit activities. And while her children admonish her for taking too much time, she does know when to step back.

“The other day, within a 10- to 20-minute period, I had about four things land on my desk that I needed to take care of. One client wants to hold a shareholders meeting in New York, another wants to look at five hotels for a meeting he's scheduled for next June. When that happens, I really have to get on the phone and say, ‘I wish I could come to the library board meeting tonight, but I can't.’”