CDB wears 3rd consecutive crown at National Business Excellence Awards 2018

The jubilant CDB team with their coveted trophy as winner in the NBFI Sector at the NBE Awards 2018 

CDB Senior DGM Innovation and Business Intelligence Hasitha Dassanayake receives the winner’s trophy in the NBFI sector from NCCSL Immediate Past President Thilak Godamanne. Senior Manager Risk Heshan Bandara (far left) and Head of Sustainability Aroshi Ranatunge (far right) are also seen

Enjoying a plethora of wins in 2018, Citizens Development Business Finance PLC (CDB) donned yet another laurel this year at the National Business Excellence Awards (NBEA) 2018, giving it the unprecedented accolade of having won the Non Banking Financial Institutions sector for three years consecutively. 

Organised by the National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka in a bid to recognise businesses that display benchmarked excellence as an integral facet of its success story, this year’s awards heralded a new and more in-depth criteria for evaluating excellence. Now in its 15th year, the NBEA holds fast to its prestige as an accolade that quantifies and qualifies excellence in business, assessed on an expansive platform of a holistic structure. 

MD/CEO Mahesh Nanayakkara stated proudly that CDB has proven unequivocally that it surely is the best of the best in business in Sri Lanka. “While we are extremely honoured to have been accorded for the third consecutive year the accolade of excellence in the NBFI sector, we also realise that with these awards come a greater purpose that we have to fulfil. This purpose is to ensure that we are in constantly improving mode, that our business is always built on a firm grounding of uncompromising values, ethics and principles, that we are accountable for our actions and will remain transparent about everything we do and most of all, that we will be a responsible corporate steward befitting the prestige of this award.” He commended his team for always being the driving force in constantly raising the bar of excellence. 

The NBEA is structured on seven criteria of excellence and with the evaluation criteria more modernised to reflect constantly evolving business paradigms, it is well evidenced that CDB has excelled in each of these criteria due to its unique blend of modernity and convention, innovation and experience. “I am well aware that my team will continue to benchmark excellence in each of these seven criteria,” enthused Nanayakkara, of the criteria that includes excellence in leadership, corporate governance, capacity building, performance management, local and global market reach, CSR and environmental sustainability and financial results.

Just recently, CDB added to its honour roll with three awards at the Best Corporate Citizen Sustainability Awards by Ceylon Chamber of Commerce reiterating its absolute commitment to its responsibilities as a corporate steward. Adjudged one of the Ten Best Corporate Citizens in Sri Lanka and winning the top award for the Under Rs. 15 billion Turnover category, CDB has ensured that it continues its path of People, Planet, and Profit with no compromise. “Our journey has been one of great rewards,” says Nanayakkara of CDB’s over two decade existence. “We have placed our business on a strong foundation of financial stability but that’s not all. For us, our very existence depends very much on our stakeholder engagement and our responsibility towards those stakeholders. We believe strongly in nurturing long term relationships that serve on a win-win formula for us all and in spearheading responsibility in social issues and environmental conservation. That’s the grounding of our business excellence.”