COMMUNICATING SUSTAINABILITY: THE ROLE OF MISSION STATEMENTS

Consistent with the extant management literature, mission statements are crucial for the sustainability and growth of any firms and have been considered to be a tool for the strategic management process. Most of the literature on mission statement provides recommendations in order to determine a high quality mission statement or is focused on the relationship between a high quality mission statement and firm’s performance. Less attention has been given to the impact of mission statements on corporate social performance, notwithstanding one of their principal aim is to communicate the firm’s identity to stakeholders. A mission statement has become an important part of managing the organization-stakeholder relationship: such instrument enables companies to more effectively communicate the relevance of each stakeholder in their strategic orientation. In this vein, the present paper is aimed at investigating the relationship between mission statements and corporate social responsibility. In particular, on the basis on an in-depth study on 193 European firms, we have analyzed if there is an alignment of mission statements with the decisions and actions regarding stakeholders and social issues, searching in particular if there is really a link between the content of a mission statement related to stakeholders and the CSR and environmental performance of a firm