The role of corporate strategy in fostering corporate social responsibility

M.Comm. (Business Management)Social responsibility is increasingly becoming important in the undertaking of any business as the general society, investors and other stakeholders increasingly make it a point to keep business accountable with regard to social and environmental impacts business has on the socio-economic environments in which businesses operate. As a result, organisations find themselves having to determine efficient ways to achieve profitability and profit growth while meeting the social and environmental needs of the communities within which they conduct their business. Managers are now pressured to go about their social responsibility agenda without negatively affecting the bottom line while achieving social responsibility goals and objectives. Therefore this body of work aims to investigate and uncover guidelines and ways in which corporate strategy can progress Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), thus providing management and CSR practitioners insights into how strategy can be used to enhance CSR initiatives in their organisations. This is achieved by researching a few organisations by looking at their corporate strategy formulation techniques followed by the assessment of their social responsibility strategy and resulting initiatives. Having conducted the research, ways to link CSR to corporate strategy are identified and the advantages and disadvantages thereof. Recommendations on how organisations can move from dispersed CSR to strategic CSR without losing focus of its strategic objectives as a business are made based on sound research. This will provide CSR managers with insights on how corporate strategy can progress CSR and how to link the two