To our stakeholders,

I am pleased to confirm that Out of the Box reaffirms its support of the Ten Principles of the United Nations Global Compact in the areas of Human Rights, Labour, Environment and Anti-Corruption.

In our 2018 annual Communication on Progress, we are sharing our actions and we commit to continually improve the integration of the Global Compact and its principles into our business strategy, culture and daily operations, in addition to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

The SDG 17: Partnerships for the goals, is at the heart of our core business since we facilitate Cross Sector Partnership and enable NGOs to work with the government, businesses and their communities and help them maximise their impact and get closer on achieving the SDGs.

Sincerely yours,

Nadine El Achi
Managing Director

Out of the Box highly respects and supports the Universal Declaration of Human rights, and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

As our Dignity at Work Policy Out Of The Box is committed to protecting the dignity and respect of all those who work within the organisation. In particular, we are committed to ensuring that the organisation is free from any form of bullying or harassment at work and that the work environment has an atmosphere of respect, safety and equality. No bullying or harassment within the organisation or in connection with the work of the organisation will be tolerated. We are committed to encouraging a positive working environment for our employees.

Out Of the Box has:

- Conducted trainings and awareness for all employees about the importance of human rights.
- Created an employee suggestion box that encourages all employees to offer their input, comments, complaints and suggestions to help improve performance and
quality of their work, and the company’s.
- Implemented employee satisfaction surveys annually.
- Out of the Box has always had an open door policy where employees are free to address any issue or suggestion to the Managing Director or Country Director at
anytime.
- Any Human Rights violation will be dealt with immediately and very seriously, as it is laid down in our Dignity at work Policy:

All employees have the right to make a complaint if they feel they have been bullied and/or harassed.

- All complaints will be taken seriously and will be handled with fairness, sensitivity and with due respect for the rights of both the complainant and the alleged
perpetrator.

- Employees who make or participate in an investigation of a complaint will not be subject to victimisation of any kind for doing so. During any investigation into a
complaint, the principles of natural justice will be adhered to.

- Those involved in the complaint must maintain confidentiality on the subject.

- At all times, every effort will be made to ensure that all complaints are dealt with in a timely manner.

- External assistance may be necessary to deal with complaints in some circumstances so as to ensure impartiality, objectivity and fairness in an investigation.

- We have annual evaluations for all employees.
- At Out of the Box no human right violation has been reported to date.

Some of the projects Out of the Box has worked on related to Human Rights and the SDGs are:

SDG 3: Good Health
SDG 4: Quality Education
SDG 5: Gender Equality
SDG 8: Good Jobs and Economic Growth
SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities

Projects:

1-
Location: Uganda, Burundi & Rwanda
Client: The Finnish NGO Foundation For Human Rights

Out of the Box supported this INGO in 2 of the Human Rights Defenders projects implemented by Defend Defenders in Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi in measuring the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact, and sustainability of the projects, in addition to recommending some action to enhance the capacity of human rights defenders and the effectiveness of their legitimate work in Burundi and Rwanda.

2-
Location: Lebanon
Client: Lebanon Family Planning Association for Development and Family Empowerment - LFPADE

Out of the Box facilitated 10 economic empowerment trainings for 300 women in the urban areas of southern Lebanon which developed the capacity of the participants and enabled them to create and develop small businesses.

3-
Location: Lebanon
Client: Spanish Red Cross and Lebanese Red Cross

Evaluation of the “Medical care and social assistance to Syrian refugees and host communities in Sidon (urban and surrounding areas) through LRC Saidon center and outreach services”

Out of the Box supported the Red Cross to understand the effectiveness and efficiency of this project and measure its impact, viability and sustainability. In addition Out of the Box identified lessons learned and proposed suggestions for future interventions.

4-
Location: Ethiopia
Client: Ethiopia Save the Children

Out of the Box worked with Save the Children to evaluate their three year project ‘Improving Maternal Newborn and Child Health’ in North Gondar Zone of Amhara region, Ethiopia” This involved:

- Assessing the progress made towards the overall goal and objectives of the project based on the project log frame and achievements for each specific result and
indicator.
- Assessing the effectiveness of the project in meeting the needs of boys, girls, men and women in the community.
- Identifying lessons learnt and good practices from the project which could be applied to future and other on-going projects.

5-
Location: South Sudan, South Africa, Thailand, India, Lebanon
Client: Misean Cara

This project is one of the projects Out of the Box is working on currently. It focuses on 6 education projects by 6 member organisations for migrants, refugees and displaced populations in 5 different countries.

Out of the Box is supporting Misean Cara to assess the effectiveness of these projects in supporting the realisation of equal educational rights of migrants, refugees and/or internally displaced people.

At Out of the Box we work not only in Lebanon and Kenya where our offices are located, but the whole middle east, Africa and Europe, therefore in addition to our fixed employees we have a network of consultants working on projects all over the world based on their expertise.

We respect all employees, and we treat everyone in a professional manner regardless of gender, race, religion, nationality, age, sexual orientation, sexual identity or expression or any other protected characteristic. All employment decisions are made without discrimination and based on valid job requirements. 

We believe health and safety are very important and we are entirely committed to providing a safe and healthy working environment for our employees which we believe is important for protecting human rights as well.

Out of the Box have no tolerance for child labor and support the elimination of forced labor.

- Out of the Box follows all Lebanese and Kenyan Labour laws wherever applicable.

- All employees are and should be above 21 years. We make sure of the right information based on their passport and other official documentation.

- Out of the Box has created an employee suggestion box that encourages all employees to offer their input, comments, complaints.

- Out of the Box has conducted trainings and awareness for all employees about labour rights and policies. We have made it clear that we expect all our employees adhere to the labour standards.

- Any labor violation can be reported directly to the Managing Director in Lebanon or Country Director in Kenya and will be dealt with immediately.

- We make sure not to work with any clients we suspect have violated any of the labour policies.

- If any employee works on a weekend for a certain project (which occurs only with certain clients on few occasions for specific reasons) they are compensated through
time off in lieu.

- The benefit of Out of the Box being a small company is that we have been able to have one to one meetings and employee satisfactory evaluations annually with our employees through a range of one to one interviews, team meetings, and surveys with our international network of consultants that we work with.

- Employees belonging to 5 Nationalities work with us regardless of our international network of consultants.

- 70% of our employees are women.

- Ages in our company range between 25 and 55 years old.

- 0% complaints of any of labour violations.

At Out of the Box we strongly believe and know that we have an obligation to the environment and work on certain practices to be more environmentally friendly through our day to day work as well as creating awareness and informing the public about climate change through our awareness social media campaign.

- We have conducted trainings and awareness for our employees on environmental practices.

- We make sure all employees reduce the usage of water and power in our offices, through making sure all air conditions, heaters, lights, computers, printers etc are switched off when not being used.

- Recycling bins are in place in all our offices.

- Usage of Led lights in the office.

- We strongly encourage communication via email, to avoid printing unnecessary paper.

- Climate change awareness social media campaign.

The senior managers are in charge of making sure that employees are minimising the use of resources such as electricity, water and paper, as well as taking part in initiatives supporting environmental awareness.

Out Of The Box is committed to the highest standards of ethics, honesty, openness and accountability. We wish to support a culture of honesty and opposition to fraud in all its forms. As an organisation, we take a zero-tolerance approach to any form of corruption, bribery and extortion: in the course of our business activities we do not endorse any form of fraud or corruption from either our own staff or those acting on our behalf.

Our staff has been trained on policies covering corruption, and bribery, and how to report any improper business or behaviour.

At Out of the Box we take anti-corruption and anti-bribery very seriously. If we have ever have a case where an employee was taking part in bribery or an incident involving corruption then the employee will be fully investigated and the higher management will be immediately involved as per our Fraud and Whistleblowing Policy:

Actions arising from Fraud Investigations:

-Disciplinary Procedures:
1- Persons who are judged guilty of fraud have committed gross misconduct and will be dealt with in accordance with the Out Of The Box HR Employee Procedures.
2- In addition where appropriate Out Of The Box will refer significant fraud to the local law enforcement agencies with a view to initiating criminal prosecution. The final
decision whether or not to prosecute should be taken by the Managing Director and Country Director.

- Changes to systems of controls:
The fraud investigation is likely to highlight where there has been a failure of supervision and/or a breakdown or absence of control. The course of action required to improve systems will be documented and implemented once the investigation report is finalised.

- Recovery of Losses:
Where Out Of The Box has suffered loss, full restitution will be sought of any benefit or advantage obtained and the recovery of costs will be sought from individual(s) or organisations responsible for the loss.

- Monitoring and Review:
The Managing Director / Country Director will monitor the effectiveness and review the implementation of this Policy, regularly considering its suitability, adequacy and effectiveness. Any improvements identified will be made as soon as possible.

- Out of the Box has not been involved in any legal cases, or events related to corruption and bribery.

- We have an external audit that audits our finances and reports directly to the Managing Director.