...“Can Corporate Social responsibility (CSR) give a competitive advantage?" At a time where the UK business industry is more saturated than ever, more and more companies are incorporating social and environmental aspects into their business practices in order to stay competitive. Modern day customers no longer expect the best price and quality, in addition they expect the company to utilise their custom in order to enhance a positive impact on the world around them, because of this, many organisations are prioritising CSR and are ensuring they pursue ethical practices in order to generate a good reputation for being responsible for the procedures they undertake in production and supply. One way in which a company may seek to utilise CSR in order to achieve a competitive advantage is by establishing an affirmative relationship with local authorities. For example, Ben and Jerry’s ice cream company strive for upmost responsibility when it comes to the production of their ice cream products; they only use fair trade produce in production and furthermore they developed a dairy farm sustainability programme in Vermount which is the company’s hometown (James Caan, J.C. (2008). If it were the case that Ben and Jerry’s established a strong relationship with the local authorities due to their exceptional CSR, then it could mean they will be granted more use of local government owned land than competitors, which would lead to an obvious competitive advantage (Ben and Jerry’s website)...
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...ACTIVITIES: A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE IN THE PERCEPTION OF CONSUMERS OF TACLOBAN CITY OBJECTIVES 1. To determine and accurate relationship between CSR activities and the value perceived by consumers 2. To ascertain the effect of CSR to consumer’s buying intention 3. To measure the willingness of consumers to pay a premium being aware of the company’s CSR 4. To determine the change of customer loyalty to company as CSR activities exist in the settings 5. To make an in depth comparison of the consumer’s perception between companies with different CSR levels and that which has none 6. To differentiate the level of customer’s satisfaction on the company with CSR to that of no CSR 7. To identify the contributions of company’s CSR to the development of its competitive advantage 8. To provide companies in the local areas of recommendations of whether or not to employ CSR activities RATIONALE/SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been publicized as an effective management tool to strengthen the company’s performance through the creation of a better image in stakeholder's mind and also because of their responsible behavior in minding the overall welfare of the society. CSR has not been given much attention voluntarily in previous years. Most companies were only surprised by public responses to issues they had not previously thought were part of their business responsibilities. In fact, the undertaking of CSR has been...
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...thesis I would like to contribute on the on-going CSR discussion. I attempt to investigate the real motives why multinational corporations engage in corporate social responsibility activities. The debate in CSR is nowadays still focused on the link between CSR and financial performance. Research lacks real proof of this link and corporations are failing in formulating a business case. So why is it that MNCs are willing to engage in CSR activities. In the following thesis I would like to give an answer on this question. Inhoudsopgave 1. Introduction 5 1.1 Research Purpose 6 1.2 Problem Statement 6 1.3 Sub questions 7 1.4 Structure 7 2. Theory 8 2.1 Definition CSR 8 2.2 Definition Multinational Corporation (MNC) 9 2.3 Theoretical Framework (Garigga & Mele (2004)) 10 2.3.1 Instrumental theories 10 2.3.2 Political theories 12 2.3.3 Integrative theories 13 2.3.4 Ethical theories 14 2.3.5 Propositions 16 3. Methods 18 3.1 Research approach 18 4. Results 19 4.1 Instrumental motive 20 4.2 Political motive 20 4.3 Integrative motive 21 4.4 Ethical motive 22 5. Conclusion & Recommendation 24 5.1 Conclusion 24 5.2 Limitations & Recommendation 27 6. References 28 1. Introduction Corporate social responsibility is becoming more and more important for companies. The last few years there is an increase of interest from companies in CSR and in the implementation of different CSR activities in their day-to-day businesses. In general...
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...The Link Between Competitive Advantage & Corporate Social Responsibility | Business and Society | | There is currently growing interest in corporate social responsibility (CSR) among both companies and managers. It has become an important topic of theoretical concentration and one of the most widely accepted business concepts. The major issues in the field of CSR concern stakeholder analysis and corporate strategic management. Numerous attempts have been made to link CSR and financial performance. While the debate over CSR continues, it reveals that some additional research can be done on the link between CSR and competitive advantage (CA). CSR is understood to be the way firms integrate social, environmental, and economic concerns into their values, culture, decision making, strategy, and operations in a transparent and accountable manner (Berger, 2007). Thereby firms establish better practices within, create wealth, and improve society (Berger, 2007). CSR programs go beyond legal and ethical frameworks to include a wide range of issues for the organization (Berger, 2007). Specifically, CSR programs can impact a wide range of issues managed by the organization including: corporate governance and ethics programs; health, safety, and environment programs; attention to human and labor rights; human resource management policies; community involvement; respect for indigenous groups and minorities; corporate philanthropy and employee volunteering; adherence to principles...
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...Turkey Abstract Universities, especially private ones are in need of strong corporate strategies in order to be successful in the highly competitive education industry. In this respect, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) becomes one of the highly preferred strategies by higher education institutions for gaining a good reputation and a competitive advantage. This study aims to analyze Istanbul Bilgi University, in the context of social responsibility practices. The major finding of the study is that in order for an institution to be successful in CSR strategy, CSR actions has to be internalized and must be supported by the management. Keywords: Corporate social responsibility, higher education, competitive advantage, reputation. 1. Introduction Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is defined through the ethical relationship and transparency of the company with all its stakeholders that has a relationship as well as with the establishment of corporate goals that are compatible with the sustainable development of society, preserving environmental and cultural resources for future generations, respecting diversity and promoting the reduction of social problems (Filho et al. 2010). While CSR points out a way for companies to contribute to the well-being of the society, it also gives the opportunity to create a true competitive advantage and positive reputation for the business world (Smith 2007, Porter and...
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...Communication and IT Business Administration Starbucks with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) “How Starbucks succeeds in a business world with CSR” 15 Credits Master Thesis (FEAD 01) Thesis Advisor: Bo Enquist Co-reviewer Lars Haglund The Authors: Sornchai Harnrungchalotorn Yaowalak Phayonlerd Karlstads universitet 651 88 Karlstad Tfn 054-700 10 00 Fax 054-700 14 60 Information@kau.se www.kau.se ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Acknowledgements Our thanks go first and foremost to our supervisor, Bo Enquist for his insight support and constructive criticisms during our writing of this thesis. Moreover, we would like to thank Samuel Petros S. for recommending the books and the way to conduct this thesis. We also want to thank the librarian at university for helping us to find the books to run this thesis. Page 2 of 41 ABSTRACT In the today‟s business world, there are many strategies being used to run businesses. In the recent past, the topic of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has grown rapidly. People are starting to demand that companies take their social responsibility seriously. Many companies have started to engage in CSR as a strategy in order to gain benefits that can give them an added advantage over their competitors. There have been increasing numbers of companies engaged in CSR to run their businesses. Nowadays corporate social responsibility (CSR) can drive companies to succeed in business by increasing sales volume and brand awareness. We decided...
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...But are their corporate social responsibility statements effective ways of ensuring that multinational entities act ethically? From my point of viewview, CSR statements do not ensure that practices of companies obey the rules of business ethics and I am going to present a few arguments for. Corporate Social Responsibility is fairly recent termterm and maybe that is why there is no consistent definition for it. Most multinational companies use different terms in their reports, for example Shell defines it as ‘sustainable development’, Ford uses the phrase ‘connecting with society’, Diageo prefers the termterm ‘corporate citizenship’. All these expressions, although they have different meanings, are related to Corporate Social Responsibility but because of the proliferation of approaches, every company can put emphasis on something different, creating therefore complexity and confusion. What is more, the socially responsible company not only complies with minimum requirements of the law, but goes a step further and accepts social obligations beyond that. The first argument for, that the CSR statements are not effective ways of ensuring that MNC act ethically is that belongingness to Global CompactCompact is voluntary. Furthermore, the companies cannot be sanctioned for not abiding CSR principles. The only penalty they can suffer from is bad publicity and destruction of image....
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...GHANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY COLLEGE AMRAHIA, GHANA CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) OF ZAIN GHANA, A MARKETING STRATEGY FOR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OR TRULY GIVING BACK TO THE SOCIETY: A CASE STUDY OF ZAIN’S SCHOOL BUILDING PROJECT AT ODUMASI-KROBO. YEBOAH-MANTEY EMMANUEL APRIL 2010 CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) OF ZAIN GHANA, A MARKETING STRATEGY FOR COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OR TRULY GIVING BACK TO THE SOCIETY: A CASE STUDY OF ZAIN’S SCHOOL BUILDING PROJECT AT ODUMASI-KROBO. YEBOAH-MANTEY EMMANUEL A CAPSTONE PROJECT SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF BACHELOR OF DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT DEGREE APRIL 2010 STUDENT’S DECLARATION I hereby declare that this project work is the result of my own original research and where I have use others’ materials, I have fully acknowledged them Signature: ……………………… Date: …………………………… (YEBOAH-MANTEY EMMANUEL) SUPERVISOR’S DECLARATION I hereby declare that the preparation and presentation of this project work was supervised in accordance with the guidelines on supervision of Capstone Project as laid down by Ghana Christian University College Signature: ………………………… Date: …………………… Acknowledgements Table of Contents Declaration I Acknowledgements II Table of Contents III Abstract............................................................................................................
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...THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ON CSR 4 1.1 Changing perceptions, CSR as a must 4 1.2 Stakeholders’ Theory and Social Contract 5 1.3 Carroll Theory 6 1.4 Positive and negative light of CSR 6 1.5 How to implement Corporate Social Responsibility in a MNE ....................................7 2 TIMBERLAND AND CSR 7 2.1 Brief history of Timberland 8 2.2 The path towards CSR at Timberland: “Commerce and Justice” 8 2.3 CSR at Timberland today: the 4 Pillars 9 2.4 Timberland CSR practices: two cases in evidence 10 Case 1: Timberland entering India 10 Case 2: Timberland in China and Vietnam 11 3 TIMBERLAND’S INTERNATIONALIZATION STRATEGY 11 3.1 Timberland’s internationalization process: an overview 11 3.2 Historical context fostering or hampering Timberland’s internationalization 13 3.3 An internationalization theory applied: The Uppsala model 14 4 ROLE OF CSR IN TIMBERLAND’S INTERNATIONALIZATION STRATEGY 15 4.1 Boosting company efficiency by educating workforce 16 4.2 Improving local performances by assessing Code of Conduct compliance 16 4.3 Strengthening international relationships by supporting local development 17 4.4 Spreading global image by involving communities 17 4.5 Financing international expansion by boosting shareholders’ endorsement 18 5 TIMBERLAND VS. COMPETITORS: CSR NURTURING COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE 19 5.1 OLI theory: an application of Timberland’s CSR 19 5.1.1 CSR fostering Timberland’s ownership advantage 19 5.1.2 CSR enhancing Timberland’s...
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...advance public’s concern about energy, climate, environment, sustainability, and corporate responsibility (Marrewijk, 2003). It defines CSR as “the commitment of business to contribute to sustainable economic development, working with employees, their families and the local communities”. As highlighted by Jamaliand Mirshak (2007), the fundamental idea of CSR is that business organizations would have an obligation to fulfil the needs of various organizational stakeholders (Waddock, Bodwell, & Graves, 2002) Corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices or initiatives have been performed by many corporations, particularly as a large number of researchers have demonstrated the benefits of being socially responsible (Berens, van Riel, & van Bruggen, 2005; Luo & Bhattacharya, 2006; Nan & Heo, 2007; Vaaland, Heide, & Gronhaug, 2008). In general, previous studies in Western developed societies have shown a positive relationship between CSR associations and corporate product evaluation. In order to really understand CSR we must root it in a broad understanding of the inter relationship between a corporation and society while at the same time anchoring it in the strategies and activities of specific companies. Successful corporations need a healthy society, while a healthy society needs successful companies, since no social program can rival the business sector when it comes to creating the jobs, wealth, and innovation that...
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... There has been continued debate on the corporate social responsibility (CSR) since 1950s. As reported by D'Amato, Henderson and Florence (2009). On the definition, is that it has undergone transformation. The classical view relating to the role of CSR was first based on the philanthropic perspective after which the shift was directed to the way the corporations relate with the community (Talaei and Nejati n.d). The pioneer to the role of CRS in the society in the early years Shinn (2002) helped encourage the management to have incentives on how to raise both ethics and justice in the community through economization ethics. This however was based on utilization of the available resources though efficiency use and mobilization. The research paper critically analyses on the emerging needs for corporations to have a strong commitment to corporate responsibility and why companies need to be community oriented. Further considerations are based on the programs undertaken by the federal to ensure the policies of corporate social responsibilities are made a meaningful to the society. Shinn (2002) in his paper, towards incorporating the corporate responsibilities in an organization, uses relational theory. It has the originality of linkage between the firm and the environment in which the firm operates. This forms the main objectivity of incorporating CSR in the corporations. Incorporation of the CSR within the firm requires the management of such organizations to be able to...
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...capabilities are creating a competitive advantage. First, a model is made to select the resources from the competences and the unique resources and threshold resources. From these the core competences can be created and implemented in the VRIN-model. Resources Competences Treshold capabilities Treshold resources ● Financial resources ● Suppliers ● Stores ● Equipment ● Staff ● Worldwide stores in more than 60 countries Treshold competences ● Always say yes to the customer ● Personal service Capabilities for competitive advantages Unique resources Tangible ● Coffee ● Located world wide ● Technological resources ( Starbucks app) Intangible ● Brand/Trademark ● Atmosphere ● Word to mouth(online) ● Schooling program ● Loyalty program Core competencies ● Most recognized brand in the coffeehouse industry ● Exceptional customer services achieved through employee motivation ● Focus on high product quality ● Customer loyalty ● High CSR image Table *.* Resources, capabilities and competences of Starbucks With the table above, the core competences can be put in the VRIN-model to see if they have a competitive advantage. Resources and capabilities of Starbucks Is it valuable? Is it rare? Is it hard/costly to imitate? Is it non-substitutable? Competitive implication Located World Wide ( stores in 60 countries) yes yes yes yes Competitive advantage Exceptional customer service yes yes no yes Moderate competitive advantage Brand / Trademark...
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...For many companies Corporate Social Responsibility policy has become a window-dressing of respectability. Discuss with reference to theory and to at least two expamples of companies Corporate Social Responsibility is known as CSR . It is now become popular from the last 10 years. What is CSR and why does it important for the business. The answer is CSR aims to ensure that companies run their business in a ethical way. This mean they need to look at economic and environmental impact and consideration of human benefits. CSR is important to the companies because the demand from labour, consumers and the Government have been increased to be more open about their activities and they can reach the acceptable standards in their business. For the labour, CSR is an important way to increase competitive advantage, protect and raise brand awareness and build trust with consumers and labour. CSR is one of the important way to improve marketing in make the brand become popular in business. The aim of the essay is going to discuss about the rise of CSR policy and an example of Starbucks coffee and Mark & Spensers with their CSR's performance. First of all, The rise of CSR includes five trends to demonstrate the theory of CSR policy. There are Transparency, Knowledge, Sustainability, Globalization and The Failure of the Public Sector. The first trend is Transparency , it deals when most of the companies have become increasingly transparent because of the modern information technology...
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...integrated into a business model. Company responsibilities functions as a built-in, self-regulating mechanism whereby a business monitors and ensures its active compliance with the spirit of the law, ethical standards, and international norms. The term "corporate social responsibility" came into common use in the late 1960s and when many multinational corporations formed the term stakeholder, and organization's activities had a major impact on the stakeholders. There has been different views towards company responsiblities wherein Proponents argue that corporations make more long term profits by operating with a perspective, while critics argue that CSR distracts from the economic role of businesses. Others argue that it is an attempt to pre-empt the role of governments as a watchdog over powerful multinational corporations. CSR is titled to aid an organization's mission as well as a guide to what the company stands for and will uphold to its consumers. There are different approaches towards social responsiblities, they are broadly clasified into two, the primary approach is Philanthropy which includes monitary donations and aids given to other organisations. Where in the other approach is garnering increasing corporate responsibility interest. This is called Creating Shared Value, or CSV. The shared value model is based on the idea that corporate success and social welfare are interdependent Many companies use the strategy of benchmarking to compete...
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...According to Carroll, CSR including economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic elements. In recently, many businesses and associations have taken active interests in introducing corporate social responsibility policies to gain more benefits. CSR continues to play a significant role in meetings and other leisure industry programs throughout 2011. The most typical example for CSR used into meeting industry is sustainability event or green meeting, which incorporates environmental considerations to minimize its negative impact on the environment. CSR might be a competitive distinction for a company compete with other both events corporate and business meeting companies who they with “similar products and services aimed at the same customer group.” As the CSR have been introduced by meeting associations , there is a big environment impact on the whole meeting industry. Regulation in corporate itself will cover each detail of a corporation's operations in different aspects. More and more meeting and conferences will use social awareness as a advertise to win public support in global markets, helping them improve competitive position and innovation. A strong commitment to CSR affect employee attitude. Moreover, businesses and corporate get opportunities to foster the business development from CSR in meeting market. Definition Corporate social responsibility literally is corporation's corporate self-regulation and interaction with...
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