On the CSR perception of millennials : an analysis among School of Management and Law students

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become indispensable in today’s business world and is an integral part of corporate strategy to build stakeholder trust and remain competitive. One particular stakeholder group, Millennials (born 1980-2000), have either recently entered the labor market or will soon do so. Practitioners and academics have thus increased interest in how Millennials perceive CSR: Does CSR impact their buying decisions as customers, or their job decisions as potential or current employees? The research objective was to examine CSR perception of Millennials studying business at ZHAW School of Management and Law (SML). In order to explore this phenomenon comprehensively, it was examined from four perspectives: value concept, CSR attitudes, CSR priorities, and CSR in job decision context. The results were tested on three subgroups: gender, study level, and working experience. Since academic evidence in this particular research field is limited in Switzerland, results of the present study are making vital contributions to businesses as well as learning institutions. Results demonstrated that the person-organization fit is critical to Millennials, as they are not solely motivated by financial rewards. This indicates great potential for companies to attract Millennials through good CSR performance.The findings are applicable to other business schools in the Swiss-German part of Switzerland, since there are no systematic differences between the students. For future studies, it is recommended to examine companies’ needs in this context and mirror them to students’ needs. Also, the number of participants from other universities could be increased as well as testing the relationship of other factors such as culture and/or religiosity with CSR perception could be implemented