Managing Corporate Social Responsibility

Managing Corporate Social Responsibility offers a strategic, communication-centred approach to integrating CSR into organizations. Drawing from a variety of disciplines and written in a highly accessible style, the book guides readers in a focused progression providing the key points they need to successfully navigate the benefits and implications of managing CSR.

• Chapters are organized around a process model for CSR that outlines steps for researching, developing, implementing, and evaluating CSR initiatives
• Emphasizes stakeholder engagement as a foundation throughout the CSR Process Model
• Discusses ways to maximize the use of social media and traditional media throughout the process
• Offers international examples drawn from a variety of industries including: The Forest Stewardship Council, Starbucks Coffee, and IKEA.
• Draws upon theories grounded in various disciplines, including public relations, marketing, media, communication, and business

Contents in Detail ix

Acknowledgments xiii

1 Conceptualizing Corporate Social Responsibility 1

2 Strategic CSR 29

3 CSR Scanning and Monitoring 51

4 Formative Research 63

5 Create the CSR Initiative 89

6 Communicate the CSR Initiative 109

7 Evaluation and Feedback 137

8 CSR Issues 153

References 165

Index 177

W. Timothy Coombs, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Nicholson School of Communication at the University of Central Florida. He is the 2002 recipient of the Jackson, Jackson & Wagner Behavioral Science Prize from the Public Relations Society of American for his crisis research. He is author of the award-winning Ongoing Crisis Communication (1999), Today’s Public Relations (with Robert Heath, 2006), and Code Red in the Boardroom: Crisis Management as Organizational DNA (2006).

Sherry J. Holladay, Ph.D., is Professor at the Nicholson School of Communication at the University of Central Florida, Orlando. Dr. Holladay's research interests include corporate social responsibility, crisis communication, activism, and reputation management. Her work has been widely published in journals.
Together, Timothy Coombs and Sherry Holladay are authors of the award winning books It’s Not Just PR: Public Relations in Society (2007, Wiley-Blackwell), PR Strategy and Application: Managing Influence (2010, Wiley-Blackwell) and co-editors of The Handbook of Crisis Communication (2010, Wiley-Blackwell).

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become central to many businesses as they negotiate in an increasingly global marketplace. This book offers a strategic, communication-centred approach to integrating CSR into organizations, founded in stakeholder engagement and dialogue. It is structured around the CSR Process Model, which guides readers through the research, development, implementation, and evaluation of CSR initiatives. Corporate reputations are increasingly dependent upon CSR, which in turn signals the importance of this topic for organizational success and the need to integrate stakeholders into this process. Lively, international examples are used throughout and are drawn from a variety of industries to illustrate the challenges of doing CSR well.

Topics covered include maximizing the use of social media and traditional media; creating strategic initiatives that reflect the organization’s missions and its capabilities; communicating to promote CSR efforts; collaborating with third party organizations; assessing internal and external stakeholder expectations and involving stakeholders in CSR efforts; and managing challenges to an organization’s CSR record. This highly accessible book draws from a variety of disciplines to illustrate how corporate social responsibility should be viewed as an ongoing process grounded in effective communication practices.

“This will become a seminal text that can be used at both undergraduate and graduate levels. It is well-written, incorporates U.S. and European theoretical perspectives on CSR practice, and places it squarely in the domain of strategic communication.”
- Derina R. Holtzhausen, Oklahoma State University

“CSR has become the new mantra of the corporate world. With a strategic and process oriented approach to CSR, this important book provides new research-based insights into the concept, philosophy, and practice of CSR.”
- Winni Johansen, Aarhus University

“Without a sound CSR commitment by management, efforts to communicate CSR are at best facile and at worst manipulative and deceptive. CSR theory reasons that the organization must first be “good” if it is to communicate in ways that can advantage its brand equity and protect it against unwarranted attacks. Coombs and Holladay wisely understand this battlefield and build on it to advance the understanding of what can and must be said to feature businesses’ CSR achievements.”
- Bob Heath, University of Houston