Identify commonalities and differences in the CSR theories and methodologies.

If we retrospect and review the definitions, we will find that CSR theories and methodologies have become more boarder and with the passage of time they have incorporated more areas, intermediaries and have become responsive and sensitive. The major proposition of CSR is based on the pyramid as stated by the Carroll’ model, i.e. legal, ethical, economic and philanthropic. Similarly, the three pillar mode advocates economic, social and environmental. There is not exact, concise and standard definition about CSR and sustainability and with time scholar’s researches has brought changes in the concept of defining CSR.

The similarities that the theories to name i.e. Corporate Social Responsibility (Carroll,1979), The Triple Bottom(Freeman,1984) and Stakeholder Theory(Freeman,1984) shares are the fundament and rudimentary philosophy for their survival, i.e. they need profit.  The other remaining domains like complying legality, ethics, environments can be fulfilled only after its achievement of economic opulence. Than onwards these theories progress to legality, society, and environmentalism. The basis of the CSR steams in giving back to the society since the organization does for, with and along the society, all the theories steam from and with societal interaction. Rather it be an IT behemoth like Google or blue-chip Amazon there CSR dimensions starts from the economic dimension; profitability. Similarly, Bill Gates has pledged a significant portion of his earnings in philanthropy, he along with his wife has founded “Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation” to combat global poverty and illiteracy.

But these theories also have discrepancies, the earlier theory as of Carroll was more myopic for the organization. It covered the three pillars (economic, legal and ethical) but it was more concerned within organization periphery. But with the movement of consumerization, environmentalism and regulatory pressure, the theories have become more heterogeneous. The triple bottom theory goes beyond the organizational dimensions into the planet and people also. And the stakeholder theory emphasizes even greater domains. All the stakeholders, i.e. employee, consumer, competitors, government, national and international partners are acknowledged and rather focus on the stakeholder value maximization rather than the shareholder value maximization. These give company strategic competitive advantages, it enhances corporate performance et cetera. In the contemporary scenario, the focus is made more on the environmental and societal construct. As per (Thiel, 2016) the five distinctions of CSR are voluntariness, responsibility, creation of value, plural objective and respect for man and nature. Some scholars have echoed CSR as an organization being corporate citizen and depicting corporate social performance. Some focus on the philanthropy as the prime objective of CSR whereas some has highlighted legal compliance as the prime one.

Contemporary, the state of California is leaping way ahead when it comes about environmentalism. The state has made it a compulsion for the energy providers to divert their 50% of energy sales through renewable energy by 2030. These dimensions of CSR acted by the government or states if far more way head than the stereotype CSR theories and methodology. The state has come across the bureaucratic couch of just collecting taxes and become more competitive by being more responsible towards immigrants, environments, and employees.

Bibliography

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities and Corporations. New York: Routledge.

Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability: A Review of Google LLC, Environmentalism, Responsible Employer, Lobbyist, Sustainability (Volume-I)

Introduction

“Google “a name that has become pervasive across the continuum and throughout the spectrum is a perfect apotheosis to uncover and dissect the way corporate social responsibility(CSR) is embedded into its strategic mission for sustainability. The hardly earned soft value from this intangibility has exemplified its brand from "corporation" to its "users." Has somebody asked you, “Are you a Googler?”, this proliferation of company name to daily consumer usages projects the declining proximity between the corporation and its customers or either way around – “An extension of the brand into consumer way of life.”

Google LLC. was founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin; it's an impetus and silicon of "Silicon Valley," a philanthropist, a corporate taxpayer and a socially and environmentally responsible business entity. For the third consecutive year, Google tops the list as the most socially responsible company (Strauss, 2016). The credit goes to google hyper-motivated employees. (Nasibov, 2015) has echoed, motivated employee is a boom to the company it makes them satisfied, a performer, productive and creates a conducive working environment.

Discussions

Google, a Responsible Employer

            Reconciling it with the Google, the company makes sure that its employees are well-fed, for that it has 25 different cafés and micro kitchens. The death of an employee, spouse, continues to get half of the salary for the next ten years. If your coding is stressful, you can get pampered from subsidized massage program inside your office. A personal passion is must, google instructs its employee to separate 20% of its working time to get involved in the projects they are passionate of, it has “Google shuttle” and “GFleet” which runs through biodiesel fuel, customize workstation to glamorize you and other many more perks and incentives which come along the most competitively and handsomely paid remuneration. Google, believes the company can’t thrive with the broken heart of its employees.

Google, a Responsible Environmentalist

Alphabet, a parent company of Google, posted $4.7 billion tax in 2016 (Christopher, 2017)  abiding itself as a civilized corporate entity. The company has equally emphasized in the environmentalism; it started preparing and publishing environmental report since 2015. As per Environmental Report, 2016 issued by Google, the company is unequivocally working to reduce its ecological footprints.  The Google data center consumes 50% less energy than a typical data center. Its Mountain View campus has 1.9MW solar panels which generate 3 million kWh clean energy; it has achieved Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification. From 2013 to 2015, the company giant has reduced water usages per employee by 30% at its Bays Area headquarters, and since 2007, the company is net carbon neutral.

Google, a lobbyist for social welfare  

Google is equally responsible towards the community and marginalized people. Google invested $ 28 million to construct 240 housing units in Allston (Godelnik, 2011). Google is the advocate of the free and fair internet, the company along with tech giants like Facebook appealed against Federal Communications Commission(FCC) for repealing the net neutrality rule set by Obama Administration (Moran, 2018). Google balloon project, “Project Loon” is working to provide the internet service to the corner of the worlds where optical fiber and wires are hard to reach, the success will make the internet available to 4 billion peoples who are still away from the connectivity. Except this, the company is working in self-driving cars, augmented realities, Google glass

Drivers for CSR

CSR is a win-win phenomenon. It is not the compulsion, its voluntary and discretionary but public awareness, consumerization has made it isomorphic imitation (Thiel, 2016). CSR gives competitive and comparative edge to the organization and helps to enhance company’s brand image. Being a responsible employer is not only a flow of mercy and miracles from employer to employee, but these activities also come with reciprocation. Employees at Google are highly innovative, the company’s 20:80 rule has propounded features like “Google Gmail," "Google News" and "Google Shuttle" whose pervasive reputation and market coverage cannot be denied. Its environmental concerns have helped to reduce the environmental footprints and have become a bench-marker whom other can follow in the industry. A business who uses Gmail can reduce the Green House Gas(GHG) emission of its email service by up to 98% compared running as email in the local server (Google, 2016).

The innovation like “Project Loon” not only facilitates the unserved and unattained civilization but also provides Google tremendous and gigantic new market of 4 billion population ultimately skyrocketing its advertisement income too. As per Mike Cassidy, project lead of "Project Loon," 10 % internet penetration will increase the GDP by 1.4%. The philosophy of environmentalism has embedded google into the “Green Business” this has not only reduced the cost of doing business but has also helped Google to divert those saved funds to more innovative and useful projects like Google Glass, Self-driving cars, Machine learnings, and Artificial Intelligences.  

CSR and Sustainability

Deloitte, a multinational professional service network which is also one of the big accounting organization of the globe defines sustainability as the responsibility for the impact the organization exerts on surroundings, environments, business, and social terms. It makes the organization aware and ad-hoc of economic reality, relationship with stakeholders and manages itself accordingly to be long-term and sustainable. CSR is not only about the philanthropy, but CSR also revolves in the circular loop where give and take places among the stakeholders, these long-run perspective makes it's sustainable.

A Norwegian sovereign wealth fund uses the current royalties from the natural resources for upcoming generations; this makes the countries approach sustainable (Bansal & DesJardine, 2015). In the same way, the Google’s CSR approach is also sustainable. The green investment made in renewal energies like solar and wind energies by Google has helped to minimize the cost by 50%, these saved funds are channelized into more reliable, renewal sources of energies. The investment made by Google on the employee development has motivated the employee, and these have enhanced the productivity of the overall company. Companies like Netflix, Apple, Google, and Dell are 40% more productive than the average company (Vozza, 2017)

Measuring the CSR

Measuring the impact of CSR can be carried on both quantitative as well as qualitative basis. But it could often be challenging as some dimensions of CSR are hard to quantify. But anyway, the measurement depends upon the objective of the company. It is mundane to link the training and development cost(independent variable) to the profit(dependent variable) of the company whereas it is hard to form empirical evidence for the impact of motivation(qualitative) on profit.

But in the context of Google, the CSR and its sustainability can be measured along numerous factors like, employee satisfaction, increasing market coverage(global), high acceptance from the market, new product introduction and innovation (Key Performance Indicators)and along with its ability to be the part of life, if there is a question like, i.e., Do you know what to eat around in Hollywood? You are going to get the answer; Please Google it. This acceptance and penetration of Google from primitive to super-technical use manifest the Google’s brand loyalty which is also earned by its CSR and sustainability.

                                                 Conclusion

Google is in the row to hit and be the third trillion-dollar US company who is rocking the S & P 500. Its calibration has not bloomed the Wall Street but equally the dwellers of Main Street are excited. This fame and gratification, the company has gained comes from its meticulous rendezvous in understanding and giving to society and trust it has built with its market. Google has abided itself to be a global corporate citizen, caring employer and by responding to community and environment and is one of the most praised and valued companies of this era.

Bibliography

Bansal, T., & DesJardine, M. (2015, January/February). Don’t Confuse Sustainability with CSR. Retrieved from iveybusinessjournal.com: https://iveybusinessjournal.com/dont-confuse-sustainability-with-csr/

Christopher, H. (2017, April 18). What America's Biggest Companies Pay In Taxes. Retrieved from www.forbes.com: https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2017/04/18/what-americas-biggest-companies-pay-in-taxes/#4e013fff2f51

Godelnik, R. (2011, October 7). Google Investing in Low-income Housing – Good Cause, Bad CSR? Retrieved from www.triplepundit.com: https://www.triplepundit.com/2011/10/google-investing-low-income-housing-good-bad-csr/

Google. (2016). Google Environmental Report. California: Google.

Moran, S. (2018, August 31). Investor’s Business Daily: Net Neutrality Advocates Unintentionally ‘Made the Case’ for Regulating Google, Facebook. Retrieved from www.breitbart.com: https://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/08/31/investors-business-daily-net-neutrality-advocates-unintentionally-made-the-case-for-regulating-google-faceboo/

Nasibov, A. (2015, November 3). Impact of Employee Motivation on Performance (Productivity). Retrieved from www.linkedin.com: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/impact-employee-motivation-performance-productivity-anar-nesibov/

Strauss, K. (2016, September 15). 118,947 viewsSep 15, 2016, 10:00am. Retrieved from The Companies With The Best CSR Reputations In The World In 2016: https://www.forbes.com/sites/karstenstrauss/2016/09/15/the-companies-with-the-best-csr-reputations-in-the-world-in-2016/#46d99ec47506

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities, and Corporations. New York: Routledge.

Vozza, S. (2017, March 13). Why Employees At Apple And Google Are More Productive. Retrieved from www.fastcompany.com: https://www.fastcompany.com/3068771/how-employees-at-apple-and-google-are-more-productive

Importance of CSR and practitioners values and beliefs regarding CSR and sustainability

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is the process of giving back to the society. As per (Epstein, 2012) CSR provides room for innovation, cost-saving, brand differentiation, customer engagement, and employee engagement. “Levi Strauss and Co.” has focused on reducing the environmental footprints through revamping its manufacturing process, they have saved more than one billion liters of water. Similarly, in the USA alone 500 million disposable plastic straws are used every day which is literally damaging the environment, Starbucks is stopping the use of disposable plastic straws by 2020 (Caron, 2018). These kinds of activities not only economize the company also enhances the image and brand equity of the company.

Brundtland report on CSR and sustainability focuses on three pillars (environmental, economic and social) emphasizing environment over the economic and social pillar. Most of the time practitioners state sustainability in CSR as homogeneous but I personally feel its heterogeneity could not be denied as it is also impacted by social, cultural, political differences, for example, practitioners in the USA looks CSR and sustainability impliedly, Japanese views as an ethics and harmony, French as creating shared value, and Afghanistan emphasizes on relationship and serving others.

The view towards CSR fluctuates among the age group also, the young generation inclines for the environmentalism whereas the age group 30-45 appreciates shared value as the corporate drive initiatives. Higher level management thinks CSR and sustainability are two different things and can be implemented separately (Thiel, 2016). Actually, it is hard to implement CSR than well it is said, the social, political, economic factors impact the CSR and its philosophy and CSR concepts changes across the country, age groups, and genders. The young generation focuses on the environmentalism whereas the aged generation inclines for shared value. CSR should build up to the values and beliefs of local communities but should not be obliged to follow internationals.

Skeptics opinions that the company does not want to take the social responsibility and they just want to limit themselves with CSR. Advocates stress that the people, society and government should make the company responsible to follow CSR in long-term and in a sustainable way(the companies are just doing greenwashing)

CRS provides competitiveness thorough first mover advantage and improves the relationship with stakeholders. It can drive new norms and expectation for the businesses. Companies who ignore CSR will be laid back as it gets harder for them to get trust from its stakeholders. It should be dynamic as per the changing society. Corporate social responsibility is not only what companies do with their profit, but it’s about how they make it (Floyd, 2013)

In 2009, the bank of Finland performed a research on companies and their listing as a socially responsible company, the sample period was from 1990 to 2014, the company listed as socially responsible had 2% increase in the stock price but those excluded had the loss of 3% in the stock price.

The CSR definitely has positive impact in the company’s performance and also win-win to society, though it is not mandatory, incorporating it within the company’s strategy will provide competitive edge to the company and it should not be seen as the burden of company also, the society, community, and government should also equally reciprocate it.

The CSR should be sustainable and long-term focused, but CSR requires resources in terms of money, time and energy. So, to be sustainable, firstly it has to come across the first tier of Carroll pyramid, i.e. it has to be profitable. Once the company becomes profitable which is also an economic dimension of CSR, it can come across its obligation towards its employees and shareholders. It can abide legally by paying taxes and also can reinvest in the social capitals to build community skills. Google is investing in “Project Loon” through which it uses a hot air balloon to make internet available in the parts of the globe where the optical fibers are hard to reach.

Bibliography

Caron, C. (2018, June 9). Starbucks to Stop Using Disposable Plastic Straws by 2020. Retrieved from www.nytimes.com: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/09/business/starbucks-plastic-straws.html

Epstein, J. (2012, February 21). Six Reasons Companies Should Embrace CSR. Retrieved from www.forbes.com: https://www.forbes.com/sites/csr/2012/02/21/six-reasons-companies-should-embrace-csr/#5de2d9e33495

Floyd, W. (2013, February 20). Is corporate social responsibility profitable for companies? Retrieved from www.devex.com: https://www.devex.com/news/is-corporate-social-responsibility-profitable-for-companies-80354

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities and Corporations. New York: Routledge.

Four gaps in social responsibility in the social domain and the impact which they have in government, business, and local communities.(CSR)

CSR provides competitive and comparative advantage to the company. It is a voluntary or discretionary act but incorporating it into the company strategy gives an added advantage. CSR creates “isomorphic pressure to institutions (Thiel, 2016). Furthermore, the burden of initiating and implementing CSR seem to be solely on the shoulder of businesses, government plays watchdog and regulatory role and communities often maintain their passivity to reciprocate back. These have created a gap while exhibiting social responsibility in the social domain which is listed below. 

Knowledge gap one: Socio-economics as social responsibility:

The socio-economic domains include the factors like consumer, employee and occupational health. The vigilance of the business/corporation lies within this periphery which should be wider than this and it's inadequate.

The lack of well-developed socio-economic domain often becomes liability for the government, business, and local communities. If the company is not paying the remuneration competitive as prevailing in the society, it will have a negative impact in the business as the employees will be de-motivated to work more and might lose their productivity. These will ultimately shrink the economy and government social protection cost may increase.

Knowledge gap two: Social well-being and social development:

The social well-being and development do not encompass the border dimension of sustainability, it only focuses on the sustainability of society, the focus on the social parameters alone creates the limitation to the advancement of the social domain of sustainability.

The focus on the social well-being and social development includes the enhancement of the standard of living, reduction of the poverty level, catering and uplifting the marginalized sector of the society. Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon pledge $2 billion for homeless people and constructing preschool for marginalized people. These act helps to create social-development in the community. Otherwise, the poverty will create social conflict and often increases social crime.

Knowledge gap three: Social responsibility of stakeholders:

For sustainability stakeholder’s participation is a must. The current sustainability science does not include and engage all the affected and responsible stakeholder groups. The stakeholder should also be proactive in the CSR and its sustainability.

Understanding stakeholder is of prime importance, the business of the company may erode if they are not able to acknowledge the stakeholder interest. Lots of Oil refinery in the US got close as they were not able to compensate well their stakeholders. They got strong opposition from the environmentalist. These created a new era of clean and renewal energy.

Unequal social responsibility among the corporation, local communities and government:

The societies role of CSR is not adequately covered by the social domain. And the role of government and business in CSR is deemed to be higher without any reciprocation from the communities.

The responsiveness should come from the individual as well as governmental level. The negative externalities of e-cigarette in high school students has compel the regulator to issue an ultimatum to the e-cigarette producer to handle the issue otherwise the government will ban it.

Bibliography

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities and Corporations. New York: Routledge.

Social Domain in Business and Government , Measuring CSR and its Impact (CSR)

The social domain of the business incorporates the well-being of the communities, institutions and other related intermediaries and stakeholders. The activities of this participants work separately as well as are overlapped. These all create a kind of circularity helping and looping each other. Indeed, both the government and business major motto adds value to the society.

The companies are focusing on the strategic social purpose for shared values and creating social identities, the CSR helps to make the impact sustainable as well as enhance their brand identity and reputation. The core of business should be doing good and fair in its mission, i.e., providing qualitative and healthy product and services to the society and it should being from ethically handling its employee. An unsatisfied internal employee domain of organization could be the whistleblower of the organization which may dampen company image in the social domain.

Contemporarily businesses are going beyond employee-employer relation and providing social entrepreneurship, developing intrapreneurship, employee stock ownership as its positive impacts ultimately reside in the social domain. The CEO of “Chobani”, announced to give 10% ownership in the company stake to all its 2000 employees (Groll, 2016) is an example of how a company can build CSR into its corporate strategy.

The government play vital role to establish and maintains legal forms, policies and programs in the society. Government is self-enforced and voluntary with CSR and its sustainability (Thiel, 2016). It creates a conducive environment which facilitates the smooth running of business, define rules of law to maintain security and assurance. Perhaps in various circumstance government/ regulator makes CSR initiatives mandatory. Back in my country, it was mandatory for banks and financial institutions to invest at least 3% of its total profit in the training and development programs of employees. Government looks after human rights, health, education et cetera but political philosophy, political interaction, and activities play important in shaping CSR methodology. Though each of the entity has their own dimension in society to work, often they get overlap. For example, if natural calamities happen then business and government come side by side to serve the affected locations.

Though the measurement of the CSR impact in the social domain is difficult to measure, still it’s essential. Its philosophies lie in protecting and harmonizing 3P’s (People, Planet, and Profit). Its impact can be measured by analyzing the outcome it had on the economic, social and environmental well-being of the society. Data could be achieved from regulators, researchers, funders and other related stakeholders and also from the company’s own R & D department, it helps to get various financial and non-financial indicator. Oil giant Shell produced sustainability report to see its social impact and the London Benchmarking Group (LBG) scheme calculates the input, outputs, and impact of charitable activities (Balch, 2011). Key Performance Indicators(KPI) could be the basis for analyzing the impact of CSR but often the subjects might not be straightforward and technical. For example, it could be hard to measure the impact of organizations new liberal dress code policy on the productivity of employees. 

Bibliography

Balch, O. (2011, September 2). Measuring social performance is difficult but essential. Retrieved from www.theguardian.com: https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/blog/measuring-companies-social-impact-performance

Groll, M. (2016, April 26). Chobani is Giving Employees Shares in the Greek Yogurt Company. Retrieved from www.nbcnews.com: https://www.nbcnews.com/better/careers/chobani-giving-employees-shares-greek-yogurt-company-n562691

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities and Corporations. New York: Routledge.

Importance of Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability.(CSR)

The four domains of Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR) as stated by Carroll’s in his CSR pyramid in 1979 are economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic and similarly the Three-Domain Model of CSR which is also known as Venn-Model Framework incorporates economic, legal and ethical responsibilities has separate as well as overlapped relation among the domain (Schwartz & Carroll, 2003).

Interesting, Monica Theil has advocated for higher prioritization in social domain as all of the other domain (economic, legal, ethical, philanthropy) initiates and exhibits from and within the society. CSR is the responsibility of the corporations, local communities and government to use the resources from the society in the most ethical and sustainable way so that we create a positive environment for upcoming progeny. It’s the long-term analysis and extrapolation rather than short-term profit orientation. The CSR revolves in a kind of circular loop and is a feedback read system and this circularity should make it sustainable.

Let us have a layman illustration, a company procures resources from the society, processes it, manufactures the product and gives it back to the community. Actually, the stakeholders are transmitting the input wherein the value goes on adding up. If we see it carefully the stakeholders throughout the process exhibits and manifest in other domain as stated above, i.e. economic; profit orientation, legal; pay tax, ethical; proper code of conduct, philanthropy; charities. But in fact, the whole phenomena revolve around the society. Indeed, the stakeholders do, relives and survives in the society which unequivocally emphasizes the importance of the social domain of CSR and sustainability.

President of United States actions, veridiction and their ramification intensifies us to think how important the social domain is. He proudly stepped back “Paris Climate Accord” and is also rolling back all those environment protection initiatives made by Obama administration. Though Trumps motto of “America First” may seem tantalizing for businesses and corporate entities as it harnesses the profit of dying coal companies and oil refineries for a time being, its negative impact on the environment and the well-being of society could not be neglected. It shall come with added health issues and insurance bills which would add up to the government medical budget ultimately.

The social domain advocates the unmet social needs and social issues demanded by the activities and NGO (Thiel, 2016) and if the overall principle of CSR and sustainability if is crafted by focusing on the social domain which comprise a broad scope, i.e. social well-being, human rights, diversity and inclusion, employee relation, taxes, social innovation most of the burning issues are well covered.

All the stakeholder, i.e. individual, corporation and business exists in the society, the social domain is the micro and macro level interaction of all this intermediaries acting and reacting explicitly and impliedly to create the long-term positive impact in the society and all of the remaining areas like economic, legal, cultural, political make sense only on the immensity of social domain.  A company could come up with various environmental protection schemes but if the people dwelling in that community is having economic hardship, then the environmental activism from the company might not make any sense. If society does not thrive than other remaining domains are hinder too.

It is well said that the social domain plays a crucial and critical factor in CSR and its sustainability.

Bibliography

Schwartz, M., & Carroll, A. B. (2003). Corporate Social Responsibility: A Three-Domain Approach. Business Ethics Quarterly, 503-530.

Thiel, M. (2016). The Social Domain in CSR and Sustainability: A Critical Study of Social Responsibility among Governments, Local Communities and Corporations. New York: Routledge.