You can’t solve a problem without seeing it

Seeing is Believing is based on a simple principle: you can't solve a problem without seeing it. The program provides business executives with an opportunity to engage first-hand with community—to better understand pressing social issues, and to look at new and expanded solutions.

Seeing is Believing focal areas include:

• Poverty and Homelessness
• Employability
• Youth-at-Risk

How the Program Works

Seeing is Believing Tour – A Host CEO takes up to 12 senior executives on a half-day study tour of 3-4 community organizations. Delegates listen to personal stories from clients and learn about the urgent needs of marginalized people and the social service agencies that support them.

Individual and Collaborative Action – At the end of the tour, executives discuss how their business can take action, and explore potential opportunities to work collaboratively.

Network – Participants become part of CBSR’s Seeing is Believing Alumni network showcasing responsible business leaders who continue to raise the quality of leadership, authenticity and innovation.

The Goal - To identify actions that business can undertake to solve some of our most pressing social issues. Examples include: offer job coaching, employment and work placements, develop employee coaching, mentoring and volunteer programs, bring business expertise and resources to community agencies, support social enterprise or invest in deprived areas as part of core business.

UK History

In 1990 the Seeing is Believing program was pioneered in the UK by HRH, The Prince of Wales and the organization, Business in the Community (BITC) - as a practical way to bring corporate executives face-to-face with pressing social issues – and to help business leaders engage in innovative solutions.

In its first year, business leaders were taken on a tour of Halifax, a small mill town that had seen a desperate decline in jobs and opportunities. The Prince believed it was vital to involve the private sector and persuaded executives to visit Halifax and see the issues for themselves, and to take action on what needed to be done.

Today, in the UK, more than 5,000 business leaders have participated in over 400 visits to inner city schools, homeless hostels, prisons, housing estates and community organizations. To learn more click here.

In Canada

Inspired by the difference Seeing is Believing has made in the UK, CBSR, in global partnership with Business in the Community, brought the program to Canada in 2005. The Seeing is Believing Program enjoys the patronage of the Governor General of Canada, and HRH The Prince of Wales.