Nowadays
corporations adopt globally coordinated strategies. This is the result of the
process through which companies, people and in general societies became more
connected across national and geographic boundaries in the last decades. This
trend is called globalization.
Focusing on
the corporation’s reality, globalization is translated into:
- Outsourcing: Economically speaking, companies find more convenient to outsource a part of their production process in countries where the labor work is cheaper. They adopt a cost strategy to be more competitive in their market.
- Global markets: Companies that decide to operate internationally, by selling their products to customers all around the world.
Global
connections and global societies bring a much more intensified competition
among the businesses in the markets.
To be more
competitive and to extend their life expectancy companies need to pay attention
to the ecosystems, societies and economies. Respecting the environment, the culture
and communities where we live, will absolutely help them
remaining adaptable to changes during the years.
Corporate
sustainability is therefore possible through a corporate social responsibility.
In other words to be sustainable, corporations need to assume a civil or better
socially responsible behavior.
Businesses
have responsibility to society, as well as to their stakeholders. That’s the
reason why CSR exists. There are many ways in which CSR can be defined, but to
keep it short, it is a voluntary set of rules that guides and orients behavior
within an organization or sector in order to promote social, environmental
and/or ethical behavior.
What a
socially responsible company gets in return is a positive impact on its image
and reputation, but also a much more satisfied and consequently productive
workforce, an easier access to foreign markets and a lot more. What should be
described as an evidence is that CSR is possible only if it adds value to the corporate
triple bottom line, which is given by the environment, the economy and the
society.
However practically
there are firms that are known for that and there are studies that can confirm
it. Companies with the best CSR reputation are: Microsoft on top and then many
other businesses such as Google, BMW, Walt Disney Company, but also Apple,
Forbes and so on.
Microsoft was not put by mistake on top of the list, as its activities included
the launch of Microsoft YouthSpark, 1 billion $ contributions to over 18000 non-profits
around the world, 795 $ million in software donated to more than 70000 non-profits
and the establishment of an internal carbon fee to reduce the environmental
impact.
Jona Shehu