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Corporate social responsibility: Responsibly yours
4 June 2008:
With corporate social responsibility (CSR) now government-monitored – it comes under the 2006 Companies Act, as well as the Pensions Act Amendment – it's clear that many companies have yet to harness this broad topic.
For anyone still at the head-scratching stage, CSR is the management of a company's positive impact on society and/or the environment, says Jo Appleby, a business development executive at Impact International, a company that runs programmes in sustainable enterprise.
"It can cover a multitude of things – from company operations through to the products and services it supplies," she says. "This also extends to how a business interacts with its key stakeholders – ie, the supply chain, customers and, most importantly, employees."
Bigger priority
According to an online survey conducted by the Economic Intelligence Unit on behalf of The Economist magazine (conducted between November-December 2007), 68.9% of the 1,122 respondents – 42% of which were based in Europe – said CSR is now a bigger priority for their business than three years ago, with 25.7% ranking it a 'very high priority'.
The top three effects of implementing CSR-related policies were identified as: having a better brand and reputation (52.9%) making decisions that are better for the business in the long term (42.4%) and being more attractive to potential and existing employees (37.5%).
The obvious benefits of being an organisation that people want to work for – with a better brand and reputation – make CSR a desirable achievement, although the confusion that surrounds it leaves many companies with a non-cohesive programme.
Lesley Muir, who lectures on CSR at the London School of Economics and runs a PR firm, says businesses should divide it into three elements: strategic – enlightened self-interest, which is win-win on both sides ethical – where you make sure the company abides by employment regulations and altruistic – activities such as painting the local school.
According to Muir, some people argue against the altruistic approach because it doesn't add value to the firm, but she claims that strategic goals should underpin all three.
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Source: Personnel Today
