Question

What is corporate social responsibility and why is it important to the larger society?

Select one corporation, company, or organization and discuss how they approach CSR.

How does their approach to CSR impact their brand and image?

Answer 1

Corporate social responsibility also known as corporate citizenship, is basically a business model or management concept which enables the companies to integrate with the society or external ecosystem in a responsible manner. This a model which many corporates are following nowadays in order to make sure that they are contributing something back to the society which helps them in running their business and various operations carried out by the company are not causing any negative impact to the society as well as environment. This can be considered as a declaration that the corporates are always keeping in mind a sustainable business model. This integration can be in various forms such as social, economic, environmental etc.

CSR initiatives are very important to the larger society when we are looking from a long term perspective. Even though it is not mandatory or legal to implement CSR activities, many companies are carrying out in order to make sure that they are connecting to the society and showing them that they have a human touch or humanitarian link which always aims at betterment of the ecosystem attached to it. Few examples which are carrying out by various corporates nowadays are;

1- Carbon print reduction – by usage of renewable energy resources for the fleet operation and planting trees

2- Volunteering – volunteering for various educational activities which helps to mold the future generation

3- Labor practices – doing business considering the wellbeing of the employees and their families

4- Charity – Involvement in various charitable activities

5- Fitness and cleaning drives – Conducting various fitness and cleaning drive along with the common people

CSR activities is basically a giving back to the society through which the corporates can connect to the society, build their brand image, gain trust and confidence from customers and all related stakeholders.

We can look into an example of CSR initiative by one if the world’s largest corporate company.

Amazon: This is one the largest technology based company which deals with various businesses such as;

1- E-commerce

2- Space exploration

3- Cloud computing

4- Entertainment etc.

They make sure that they are doing CSR activities in large scale and these activities have huge impact to the society.

They carry out various CSR activities in multiple domains such as;

1- Reduction of carbon print reduction by using electric vehicles for operations management

2- Education

3- Environmental protection

4- Healthcare

They make sure that they are moving to electric vehicles in large scale to run their operations and they project it to the society in such a manner that it created a good image among the customers and stakeholders associated to it. In a larger view it helps the company to fight climate changes happening mainly because of pollution.

They introduced Amazon smile – through which a percentage of the sales revenue is donated to selected charitable organizations. When it comes to e-commerce Amazon handles packaging in such a way that it reduces wastage and delight the end customer.

Amazon has partnership with various organizations which enables the stakeholders to benefit from the activities, one such as example is Amazon literary partnership with various non-profit literary organizations to provide funding to aspiring writers.

When it comes to disaster management and the relief to various natural disasters, Amazon is committed to donate to all the major natural disasters as a relief.

How does it help to build their brand and image – Above mentioned CSR activities always helped Amazon to build their brand and image. For example during the initial phase they faced controversies regarding the carbon footprint they generate. They are trying to tackle this by incorporating various renewable energy resources for their operation management activities.

When we discuss about Amazon, they are considering the nature and working towards a sustainable development, they are participating in various skill generation activities including educational activities in rural areas of many developing countries, they provide relief to natural disasters, they delight the end customer by delivering the products through e-commerce with minimum waste, and they contribute to charity. All these activities always help Amazon in a positive way.

CSR activities helps Amazon to build a strong connection with customers, society and their employees. This helps them to increase the brand value and trust to the brand from all the linked stakeholders.