Institutional Entrepreneurship and CSR within international SME’s: the added value for SMEs of employee-oriented CSR in foreign subsidiaries

This paper develops propositions on the added value of normatively-based, employee-oriented corporate social responsibility, specifically on the issue whether an individual owner-manager can add value within a foreign subsidiary by means of normatively-based, employee-oriented CSR. We suggest that this emerging research area sheds light on managerial discretion within a foreign environment and on the question if globalisation of business, based on economic rationality, inevitably leads to a race to the bottom or that normative resources - the view of owner-managers on the role of employees within their company - add value as well. Based on five case studies, this study develops propositions about the impact of international employee oriented CSR policies on mutual value creation within multinational SMEs. We detect conditions under which employee-oriented CSR adds value, what the influence is of the host country institutional environment and suggest differences across sectors and investment motives. The results suggest that not only motives but also the skills of the owner/manager as an institutional entrepreneur are critical in dealing with institutional variance. Conference paper bij het: 1st Interdisciplinary Conference on Stakeholders, Resources and Value Creation, Barcelona, 7-8 juni 201