Building Bridges
The advent of corporate social responsibility has been around for some decades now and it has evolved from being simply an act of charity, to a well- thought of philanthropy, to a commitment which an organisation undertakes to enhance the social well-being.
If “no man is an island” , then it is equally true that no business organisation is an island either. That is, enterprises don’t exist in a vacuum. An enterprise exists for the fulfilment of a society’s needs. It owes its very existence to the needs emanating from the society. And, it is members of this society who run these corporations. In this sense, the business organisation is a part of the larger social system. Ergo, in conventional models of a society , the business organisations lie just at the periphery.
If we apply the same logic to an organisational system, the society too lies at the fringes in the scheme of things of an organisation. Most business organisations think of revenue and profit as a necessity, taking care of its human resources as a possibility and including society in its scheme of things as a legality. Yet, the idea has caught on.
Though, apparently CSR is perceived as a ‘giving back to society’ exercise, it is a two way transaction. The intangible benefits a strategically planned and meticulously executed CSR initiative brings to an organisation’s table are much longer lasting than the equivalent allocations in advertising. The pride the employees take in contributing through work to such an organisation also serves as a valuable employee retention tool. The customers also perceive more value in such ethically-conscious brands. Even more significant is the fact that an organisation which regularly contributes to society is likely to be much better attuned to the changing consumer needs and aspirations. The social interface actually contributes to organisational well-being too. In all likelihood, the practice of social responsibility would also nudge the enterprise to be more environmentally-aware, socially accountable in its corporate policy.
Over the period, what was considered an anomaly or one-off example has become a norm for the industry. It is possibly due to this changed way of operation that entrepreneurship is catching up amongst youth. This ‘start-up generation’ does not consider enterprises as solely a medium to earn profit and prosper. The strong social interface embedded in the process has attracted the best minds to choose this as their calling. A prudent use of triple bottom line- People, Planet and Profit interlink can indeed be a game-changer.