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Group: Corporate Social Responsibility CSR and Sustainable Development

Discussion: I Need More Understanding on the Differences that Exist Between CSR and Community Relations

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Corporate Social Responsibility CSR and Sustainable Development 20,000 members Member Information and settingsShare group DiscussionsPromotionsJobsMembersSearch Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Follow Olufemi I Need More Understanding on the Differences that Exist Between CSR and Community Relations Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Member, Publicity Committee at Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Nigeria Top Contributor Like (1) Comment (17) Unfollow Reply Privately16 days ago Comments Birendra Raturi likes this 17 comments Jump to most recent comment Joaquín Lanau Salamero Joaquín Joaquín Lanau Salamero Area Manager at Uponor Hi Olufemi, In my opinion, the key difference is the relations you have with your stakeholders (- community -). From a CSR point of view, you must know your stakeholders´s demands and acting, depending on this information, trying to limit the company impacts in these groups. Community relations, I understand, is related with the interaction betwen the company and its environment, but this does not meaning to have to act. It is only keeping good public relations. Maybe, the reason is the new social demands, years ago, to have good relations with community was very important, and in some cases it was a source of advantage competitive, but since society asks companies one step ahead, CSR rises as the solution for these petitions. I hope I help you, thanks for sharing. Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 13 days ago Birendra Raturi likes this CRISTINA SANTILLANA CRISTINA CRISTINA SANTILLANA Director of Communications at ALGI If you look at the CSR initiatives that exist today (such as BSCI, Sedex, Wrap, FLA) and understand the guiding principles that they are based on (such as the ILO conventions, the Ethical Trade Initiative, the UN Global Compact) then you will see that CSR, by today's definition, relates to responsibility to stakeholders at large but has a very specific focus on the company's own internal community. In other words, a responsibility to labor laws and human rights. A focus on the human resources of an organization. It is about demonstrating that the company is responsible to its external environment and also its internal environment. Key benchmarks that are addressed are child labor, forced labor, harassment, remuneration, and working hours. It requires an organization to show that it has a management system in place to address these issues in a consistent way and that it seeks continual improvement in these areas. The goal behind the CSR movement is to create a common ethic in business practices among buyers and supplier in an effort to reduce impoverished and inadequate working conditions for workers worldwide and to foster sustainability for each organization that adopts these practices. Unlike Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 13 days ago Peter Burgess, Birendra Raturi like this Doris Mwanza Doris Doris Mwanza CEO at Stallion Security Solutions Limited Olufemi, both Joachim and Cristina have given answers which shed light on your question. CSR is just that... RESPONSIBILITY to the immediate social strata in the ways that have been defined over and over again - income, environment, labour, infrastructure, basic health & sanitation, etc. You may also look at it as Companies coming into the domain of communities, often without their consent or knowledge, hence they, to some extent, should have the responsibility of improving the welfare of the immediate communities. Internal social responsibilities to staff and staff conditions of service, as Cristina mentioned, should not be over-looked either. Community relations is basically Public Relations, as Joachim alluded to. Be friendly, give a donation here or there, sponsor a football match, .... it is not as intrinsically comprehensive as the former. Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 13 days ago Birendra Raturi likes this William Rodriguez William William Rodriguez Env. Eng. & Q.A. Mgr. at Mitsuboshi Belting Ltd community relations involves activities in the direct community and many times are social events, fund raisers, etc. csr involves the environment, human rights, enforcing child labor laws, fair working conditions, etc. Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 13 days ago Birendra Raturi likes this Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Olufemi Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Member, Publicity Committee at Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Nigeria Top Contributor Would I be right to say that community relations is the software aspect of relationship management, while CSR is the hardware aspect? Friends, please enlighten me. Just has Joaquin explained, Community relations is the interactions between companies and its environment (just about relationship management which often times are not obvious). In order to sustain such relationship, there is a need to act/respond to community demands. Doris mentioning that CSR is about companies coming into the domain of community equally supports the fact that CSR is acting. Williams further confirming that CSR involves the environment, etc. and Community Relations involve activities in the direct community... also help. Many thanks Christina. If you can, please mail me (oadabale@alumni.smc.edu.ng) further materials on the CSR initiatives and its guiding principles you talked about. Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 12 days ago Birendra Raturi likes this Ewa Swietochowska Ewa Ewa Swietochowska Membership Development Manager at British Polish Chamber of Commerce I dare say we cannot possibly say that a company is socially responsible if there is no transparent communication in place, when it comes to relations with a community, influenced (or affected) by a given company's activities. Hence, I'd feel there is no difference. In my humble opinion both are about working together in an effort to achieve common goal, or mutual benefit - profit for a company's shareholders and benefits for communities, while minimising 'harm to environment'. Like (2) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 11 days ago Colin R T., Birendra Raturi like this Verna Luz Dano Verna Luz Verna Luz Dano Environmental Management and Auditing, Corporate Social Responsibility, Quality Management System Specialist Both community relations and CSR seek to enhance relationships with stakeholders surrounding a company. Community relations lean toward the philanthropic kind of relationship where a company does not expect to get direct and immediate benefit from the support it gives to a community. CSR, on the other hand, lean toward social investment where a company works to answer the question - 'what does the community need that if I help address it, would also address some needs in my business.?' Like (3) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 9 days ago Stephen Sena, Bosun L. and 1 other like this S.K. PANDIT S.K. S.K. PANDIT GROUP HEAD -- CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY at INDIAN TECHNOMAC COMPANY lIMITED Community relations are more generic applicable and relevant to all people. Some people and organisations develop and keep a tab on their community relations , depending on their individual or organisational objectives.You just maintain community relations as an individual or an organisations as you deem fit . Your effort may not be need based . It will be, mostly perception based. CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY is a conscious and deliberate attempt, in some countries even legislative need, for ensuring harmony with the surrounding social, environmental and physical ethos. CSR is also programmed at brand and image building of and organisation, depending on the business and social vision of an organisation. Latest terminology is sustainable development of an organisation in the long run. CSR has to be , as rightly pointed out by Ms. Verna Luz above, based on need assessment of the society/community/country. Like (2) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 9 days ago Verna Luz D., Birendra Raturi like this Tatiana Ramirez NYC Tatiana Tatiana Ramirez NYC Global Business Development: CSR requires you to follow and design a number of internal and external practices, guidelines, standards around 7 dimensions: Customer Relations, Suppliers Relations, Environment, Human Rights, Employee Relations, Community Relations, and Corporate governance. With this in mind a company must set a number of good managerial and financial practices that secure that operations, management, product cycle, employee management, relationship with the environment etc.,run effectively while providing value to the society as a whole, and securing sustainability or the corporation and the society it impacts. At one point all companies will need to certify that they are compliant with certain CSR practices. In short I will say that CSR is a self -regulatory process, that secures that a company is in fact providing value added to the internal and external stakeholders. If a company is new into CSR I advise to go look at the Global contact regulations and later look for more specific certification Community Relations activities are not always self-regulatory processes. An event, an outreach campaign, donations, can or can't be labeled as a CSR. They can be just simple promotional or branding initiatives, which are not ingrained into the management of the company. In the other hand Community and Society Relations is part of the 7 dimensions of a Company CSR. Good CSR Community initiatives are those that are more projects oriented, to add value to specific stakeholders that are relevant to the organization. Hope thais helps, Like (2) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 9 days ago Shanti Yeachuri, Birendra Raturi like this Boštjan Makarovič Boštjan Boštjan Makarovič Chief Consultant at Aphaia, policy and regulation Olufemi we at Aphaia understand community relations as a subgroup of CSR measures, which further consists of environmental, employment and consumer issues. We are planning a webinar on community relations in late March, it will be focusing on Latin America but it might still be interesting for you. Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 8 days ago Birendra Raturi likes this Stephen Sena Stephen Stephen Sena Economic Growth Advisor - leveraging private sector for market-driven development solutions. I agree with Verna...and many others commenting here in the sense that CSR has (at least) two dimensions representing a CSR continuum. The first is 'philanthropic CSR' which is community engagement/support that is not directly related to the business operation or results. Verna and Doris refer to this in their comments. The other is 'strategic', encompassing CSR investments (cash or in-kind) that are directly associated, even connected with the business strategy, mitigating risks and results. So, as Boštjan suggests, community relations is a form of CSR, but it is not the end of the story. Many firms, if not all do 'some' form of philanthropic CSR - giving back to the community. As firms grow, and the business 'stakes' of their community stakeholder engagement increases, they would, I think naturally, want to see more of a 'business' return on this investment. Or, the business simply requires it to mitigate some risk or comply with law/policy. And, that's not necessarily a bad thing as it can deepen and strengthen the giving by aligning the business interest with the community (social) need. Government requirements represent another, non-voluntary dimension of CSR, as in the banking sector in the U.S. and extractive industry in developing countries. Then there is mere greenwashing that leaves you (and the community) wanting. For a deeper dive, you can look to the corporate citizenship resources at http://www.bcccc.net/. I recall a Michael Porter document years ago that made the 'business case' for CSR...you may want to search for that as well. Like (3) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 6 days ago Shanti Yeachuri, Birendra Raturi and 1 other like this Mojdeh Barros Mojdeh Mojdeh Barros Corporate Partnerships / CSR Program Manager I see Community Relations as a subset of CSR strategy. CSR is a more holistic view of corporate (social and environmental) responsibility, it includes its supply chain, value chain, environmental impact of the product (from sourcing to disposal) and so on. It goes beyond pure philanthropy! Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 5 days ago Stephen Sena likes this Stephen Sena Stephen Stephen Sena Economic Growth Advisor - leveraging private sector for market-driven development solutions. Good point, Mojdeh - I was thinking about these aspects since positing my comment. I believe that supply chain, end-of-life, environmental impact, and the like are generally put into the 'Sustainability' rubric. Perhaps 'Philanthropy' and 'Sustainability' are the two ends of the CSR continuum, with Strategy being the means for whatever point the firm is at? Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 5 days ago Mojdeh Barros Mojdeh Mojdeh Barros Corporate Partnerships / CSR Program Manager Stephen, This is a good way of looking at it. There are companies that include sustainability effort as part of their CSR and there are those that separate the two. When I mentioned about supply chain and value chain I was also thinking of how Walmart and Coca-Cola have introduced women empowerment/entrepreneurship programs under the two activities. Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 4 days ago Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Olufemi Olufemi Adabale, ACIS Member, Publicity Committee at Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Nigeria Top Contributor So far, these have been practical engaging discussion. I agree with Verna, Stephen, Mojdeh and many others comments. I’m beginning to see CSR from broad perspectives and the complimentary effort Community Relations plays as well. Despite the differences, I’d learnt that there is a business case for both CSR and Community Relations as a strategic tool for corporate profitability. Or is it arguable that only CSR is strategic to present as a business case, while Community Relations only seek after engaging the community for buy-in/license to operate? Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 2 days ago Alícia Trepat Pont Alícia Alícia Trepat Pont CSR postgraduate student I was lately reading 'Understanding ISO 26000' by Adrian Henriques and in one of its first chapters he points out the following on this matter, I thought I might just share it with you: 'A distinction is often made between CSR and corporate community involvement (CCI). These concepts are sometimes used as synonyms, even though they are substantially different concepts. While CSR can be defined along the lines of the notions of responsibility and accountability, CCI can be described as: *The voluntary engagement of an organisation with society *Often, but not necessarily, having a local community orientation *Being expressed by the deployment of company (human, financial or other) resources *For the purpose of actions that are not necessarily related to the core activities of an organisation *Aiming to improve the quality of society or to strengthen or acceler- ate community development *Without the precondition that it contributes to the economic performance of an organisation The notion of ‘quality of society’ can be defined in very different ways. For example, an organisation engages in CCI when it donates money to a good cause or when it sponsors the local orchestra or sports club, but also when it enables employees to volunteer during work time, or when it enters a strategic partnership with an NGO. Moreover, in the con- text of doing business in developing countries, the creation of employment, enabling knowledge and skills development, and providing access to technology (as part of the emancipation and development of local people) can also be seen as forms of CCI.' 'In general, CCI is about the use of an organisation’s resources, such as knowledge and expertise, office supplies, facilities, money and networks for the purpose of improving the community. CCI does not necessarily need to have a relation with the ‘people’ aspects of CSR, but usually it deals more often with these aspects than with the ‘planet’ aspects. ' Like (1) Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 23 hours ago Olufemi Adabale, ACIS likes this Peter Burgess Peter Burgess Founder/CEO at TrueValueMetrics developing Multi Dimension Impact Accounting Olufemi ... you have sparked a very rich set of comments. At the end of the day, what something gets 'called' is less important than what actually gets done. I argue, therefore, that what we need to understand is what has good impact, and what has less good or even bad impact. Historically, business has been very rigorous about measuring everything to do with money profit and business performance related to profit and productivity ... but the measures with respect to impact on society at large ... impact on people and planet, are either completely absent or quite 'fuzzy'. In my view we need to move towards systems of metrics that will start to handle the accounting for impact as rigorously as we handle the accounting for profit. It can be done, though it is not the easiest thing in the world. My impression from the work that I have already done is that having the corporate world make progress in improving impact (on the externalities) is considerably more important for society than further improvement in profit performance and return to investors. The trajectory of the larger society versus that of investors over a period of several decades (essentially since the 1970s) is something that should be of global concern ... but it is pretty much off the radar in good part because there are no easy rigorous metrics to talk about, However, things are changing. Peter Burgess - TrueValueMetrics Multi Dimension Impact Accounting Delete Edit Comment 14 minutes left to edit