As founder and CEO of San Junipero, one of the worlds largest IT Hardware companies, Clint had travelled widely and considered himself to be worldly-wise, but nothing prepared him for the what he saw during his visiting a clinic in Kolwezi, Congo as part of his SAP Executive Social Sabbatical with an African healthcare Social Enterprise.
He guessed the boy was no older than his grandson, maybe 9 years tops! As Fumu, the surgeon, cut away his trousers it was clear he would never walk again. The poor lad had been working in the Acme Cobalt Mine when his clothes had got caught in the conveyor belt. The doctors said it was not uncommon.
Back home in Detroit Clint has a visit from Adaire to discuss his Sabbatical. He tells her about the incident and how he is on a mission to eradicate child labour from his supply chainHe has totally re-written the objectives of his purchasing organisation, but he is being told there is no way of knowing if they are using Cobalt mined by children … “we don’t have the tools to trackthis!”
xAdaire tells him about SAP’s partnership with Made in the free world, and how they are working with large companies to develop a framework to comply with new Australian Modern Slavery Act using the technology, know-how and best practices of SAPShe arranges for a demo of SAP’s Supplier Risk Dashboard and commits SAP resource and expertise to help him deliver on his mission to solve this problem.
Through SAP’s local Social Enterprise intermediary Congo Cobalt Co-op (CCC) is found, a network of small Owner-operated Cobalt mines which are free from child labour. San Junipero and SAP staff volunteer to coach these companies on how to sell directly to corporates through SAP's Business Network. San Junipero updates it’s T1 supplier onboarding and renewal process to allow audit of the supply chain.
With so much positive publicity San Junipero’s CHRO says that attracting the best and brightest young talent has never been easier.Clint was looking forward to the Town Hall meeting in Detroit, but it soon became clear that whilst proud of what San Junipero had done in the Congo, many staff felt there were Challenges closer to home which had been ignored.Clint committed to running a competition for employees to suggests the next initiative.
Environmental concerns and high local unemployment came out the areas to focus on,fortunately his GPO were now skilled at quantifying which projects would make the biggest difference. They chooses to support Detroit Upcycle a minority owned social enterprise where unemployed Auto-workers are upskilled to extract rare earth materials from old computer equipment. Corporate customers can get a discount on new San Junipero hardware by recycling their old equipment through Detroit Upcycle.
Clint has stayed in touch with Fumu, the surgeon, who helped him organise sponsorship of the injured lad’s education. Clint could tell Fumu was excited when he called, and he could guess why! Earlier that day Clint had seen on the Supplier Risk Dashboard News -feed that with falling sales Acme Cobalt Mine has been losing money for months now, and has now been bought out by CCC … now the preferred supplier for many of the world’s biggest cobalt users!
It’s late December 2025, and the business is reporting record breaking sales, stock price and brand value. The company has always had a reputation for quality, but now Customers and Investors frequently cite the company purposeful mission. He is proud that San Junipero and SAP have lead the way on Child Labour, and thankful to his staff for making him realise that it was not just about doing no harm, and that San Junipero could be a force for good, both globally and locally!
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