Quite a number of projections have been made concerning the relevance of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in the year 2009 especially with the global economic crunch, question has been asked as to why companies who practiced CSR were affected? it has also been said that one of the least relevant roles in these hard times will be that of the CSR practitioner.
First thing that comes to mind is why wasn't CSR effective? why didn't it support the companies in time of crisis? finally why shouldn't it be relevant in these hard times?
Often times the definition and the method by which CSR is practiced within organisations is very different, the most commonly accepted meaning of CSR outside of Europe is community development, corporate social investments or corporate philanthropy. This definition is very limited and will only be relevant to use when organisations are thriving and well i.e. profitable. The greatest benefits businesses derive from practising CSR in this way is the license to operate especially within difficult communities, Brand Value, new markets (and that is only if it is practised as such).
Now because CSR is not approached strategically and is often seen as a add on or a cost to the business, it is usually considered as "fluffy" and of no value to the bottom line. Most CSR practitioners will tell you that they are always fighting for relevance within the organisation. Things are also not made easy as advocates are often demanding that it must be approached with a heart to genuinely give back to the society or to make impact. The reality is that Friedman is right and the business of business is simply to make profit - some of us have had to learn and accept this the hard way.
For CSR to make sense and genuine impact - development experts must recognise the need to make it add value to the business itself in the first place and not be sentimental about the need for CEOs to become philanthropist at heart when they are not. By making CSR add value to the business we can get the best of both worlds - which is genuine drive to make positive social impact by organisations and on the other hand the society itself will benefit from this.
And this why CSR will remain relevant in the year 2009 and beyond. CSR itself is about Corporate positioning, a form of positioning that may assist in guarding the organisation from crisis. It should form part of the regulations that is being looked at as a new corporate structure evolves during this global credit crunch. It must be part of a risk management strategy, where the pulse of different stakeholders are felt intermittently in order to ascertain where things are going wrong with a view to proactively rectifying it.
Take an instance where instead of just looking at CSR as an act of philanthropy, banks have made it mandatory to hold dialogue sessions with different customers from time to time just to know and understand what the issues were and how they could rectify it. These stakeholders would be both internal and external, they would also carry out a highly detailed survey to look into different issues, all of these are to enable the organisation proactively identify the issues which may affect their sustainability in future, then maybe most of the mess may have been avoided.
Sometimes though, its never about the system, management theories put in practice have failed in the past, not because it doesn't have the capacity to succeed but because it was simply not applied with the right intent, and this can be the same for CSR. The point is that CSR must become more technical than it is right now, less fluffy and less sentimental for it to be widely accepted as a relevant part of strategy.
George
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