Many large corporations are devoting serious time and money to environmental sustainability programs and various social welfare initiatives that would benefit employees, customers and the community at large. CSR is about building trust. Trust in the brand, the employee, the company to “do the right thing” and trust in the product or service. The task of CSR is to prevent morally guilty practices, which can weaken soci... ... middle of paper ... ...r.com. Ogilvy Public Relations, 2014, 22 Mar 2014.
Protecting the environment has become an important issue in today’s society. There is no longer any doubt that businesses should consider their social responsibility and the impact of their activities on their stakeholders. In addition, firms are beginning to realize that corporate sustainability can prove to be a win win. There are multiple benefits of sustainability linked to costs, revenues, community relations, and more. The decision to strive for sustainability is obvious, but this process is easier said than done.
The incentives for all of the responsibilities mainly correspond to an increase in the bottom line as well as a healthy public image. Therefore, corporations can choose which one of these responsibilities they value the most and apply that to their business strategy while increasing both the bottom line and public image. Due to their power, corporations have the responsibility to operate in the best interest of their stakeholders, the responsibility to protect the environment they use for earning a profit, the responsibility of acting as a global citizen by contributing to the efforts to stop climate change and lastly, . By respecting all of these responsibilities businesses can provide a boost to their bottom line as well as act as a responsible citizen would do in order to protect our environment.
Corporate social responsibility has become a key factor to businesses today, but what is it exactly? Corporate social responsibility also known as CSR is when businesses go outside of their normal responsibilities to give back to the community. It is the way corporations take accountability for its effects on the environment and impact of the society as a whole. Therefore they try to make up for damages, mainly to the environment, that they have made. Businesses dedicate their own money and time to environmental programs and various social welfare initiatives to the community(Mason and John 79).
While the World Business Council for Sustainable Development provides the most universal definition of CSR: it is the continuing commitment by business to behave ethically and contribute to economic development while improving the quality of life of the workforce and their families as well as of the local community and society at large, CSR is an still evolving concept that currently has a multi faced definition, but it is fast becoming a globally successful concept, and being seen as crucial in creating an attractive corporate image, providing competitive advantage and differentiation to the enterprise over its competition leading to business success. The CSR trend has grown to be a methodology that integrates ethical and economic concerns into long term business values and company visions. It creates a direct link to business strategy and operations that help a firm establish better practices that lead to a better society. Vaitkevicus and Stukaite describe CSR as an engagement to improve t... ... middle of paper ... ...Lantos (2002) argues that if a company implements strategic social responsibility, it achieves positive publicity, improves its CI, and receives other benefits. This is why Lantos (2002) states that companies implement CSR in order to benefit from it, not to help stakeholders.
These responsibilities are often communicated to the public by a statement of principles or beliefs. For many business organizations, corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an essential and integral part of their business. Thus, this paper discusses the two CSR views: the classical view and the stakeholder view. Furthermore, I believe that the stakeholder view has brought ethical concerns to the forefront of businesses, and an argument shall be made that businesses would improve both socially and economically if CSR, guided by God’s love, was integrated into their strategic planning. The classical view of CSR is a prominent ideology which business organizations are seen merely as profit-driven organizations.
It is important to understand the importance of corporate social responsibilities. If Corporate Social Responsibility is properly maintained and emphasized by companies, it can benefit the society, economy and corporate sustainability. It can also be cost efficient to companies. also the environment . But above all effect (CSR) varies companies to companies.
Formal (rules and regulations) and informal institutions demand for better environmental and corporate social responsbility from firms. As a result, sustainability has become a key focus for multi national enterprises as it enabled companies to achieve better organizational performance. One of the Human Resources Management(HRM) function consists of assisting in creating and implementing sustainability strategy in various ways. Human Resources(HR) ensures that the employees of a global firm implement the strategy consistently across the globe. A sustaniable human resource management uses various methods and tools to create a global worksforce that trusts the organization and its strategies towards the global sustainability.
“Corporate Social Responsibility is a hard-edged business decision. Not because it is a nice thing to do or because people are forcing us to do it because it is good for our business” – Niall Fitzerald, Former CEO, Unilever This quote came from the sustainability page of Unilever website. This company’s website also has statistics about what the firm is doing to plan for sustainable growth in the future and how they are changing to become more environmentally friendly. Additionally, Unilever has published statistics detailing various safety, environmental, and social performance indicators relative to their industry. Clearly, this is a firm that deeply cares about its environmental and social sustainability efforts and performance.
Corporate sweatshop working is also just as bad for the world because the economy is not being boosted by having the CEO's of companies becoming richer. The economy would be so much stronger if the millions that these CEO's are making is divided and dispersed to the employees who are doing all the work. The economy suffers from both trafficking and corporate sweatshop working. Slavery is the other type of exploitation the world is encountering today. Although, every country in the world today has made it illegal to own and exercise total control over another human being, slavery is still a major problem in the world.