subject: Details on Corporate Social Responsibility [print this page] Details on Corporate Social Responsibility
Corporate Social Responsibility is a term used for companies and large corporate that self-regulate their impact on the environment and their communities. These companies will build in either departments, task forces, or other groups to monitor what they are going to be doing in terms of being socially and environmentally responsible.
Becoming an organisation that practices corporate social responsibility is actually good for more than just social and environmental reasons, but it is also good for the corporation's bottom line. The trend is moving towards green and clean. If your business isn't operating this way, chances are someone down the road is running a very similar business with green and social business practices. They are cashing in on a program that is going to bring more business and customers to their doors.
Corporate social responsibility is more than just starting a recycling program at the office, although that is a good start. It is about honouring a triple bottom line, people, planet, profit; but not necessarily in that order. The hope is that corporations will take these initiatives seriously and work from a place of integrity for their employees, community, and the world at large, but that might be too daunting of a hope.
There is a lot about corporate social responsibility that connects to the small communities. A large part of the current green movement is going local'. People are looking to connect and buy from businesses that are part of their local economy. By shifting their buying potential from big box stores to locally run businesses they are keeping money in their hometowns. Community development can lead to more sustainable development in people's communities.
One way for a company to really see the impact they are having is to use social accounting. This might not be the way a company want to always run their book keeping, but it is a good method for checking in at least once a year to see how they are working with staying on the corporate social responsibility track. Social accounting looks at the real cost of an item.
This means for an apple you look at the cost of the apple, but also the cost of how you got the apple; gas to drive to the store, human effort to go, get it and come back. If the apple was locally grown the cost is much smaller than if it was grown in Spain. There are many ways to help the environment and your community by incorporating corporate social responsibility.
The ideas behind corporate social responsibility are important as they work as a form of citizen education and also show they are doing their bit.
