62 Q 61. How does communication relate to general stakeholder engagement? As noted, it can be particularly important for an enterprise to engage directly with potentially affected stakeholders about how it addresses its human rights impact. This might be to explain how it is addressing potential impact in general terms or a particular impact that has occurred. For any enterprise with a significant risk of human rights impact, this is just one of the ways in which it should engage with potentially affected stakeholders. Stakeholder engagement should also feature as a part of the enterprise’s efforts to assess its impact and to gain feedback on how effectively it has responded to impact. More generally, it is an important means of understanding the concerns and interests of affected stakeholders and of building effective relationships with these crucial groups on an ongoing basis. QUESTIONS TO ASK Do we have the necessary internal communications and reporting systems to gather all relevant information on how we address our adverse human rights impact? If not, what additional systems do we need? What different groups can we envisage we may need to communicate to and about what types of issues? What means of communication do we need for those different groups, taking account of how they can access information, and what will be the most effective? Should those communications be driven by a set timetable, be in response to particular events or both? What processes do we have in place to make reasoned and defensible judgements on when we should communicate publicly? If our operations or operational contexts pose significant risk to human rights, how do we provide formal public reporting on how we address that risk? If we are not in a context of heightened human rights risk and are not required to report publicly on our human rights performance, would there nevertheless be other benefits to formal public reporting?

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