Does Culture Matter? Measuring Cross-Country Perceptions of CSR Communication Campaigns about COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought several challenges to businesses and societies. In response, many corporations have supported local communities and authorities in the management of the pandemic. Although these initiatives, which can be considered forms of corporate social responsibility (CSR), were highly coupled with explicit CSR communication campaigns, little is known about whether these campaigns were effective. Previous research indicates that culture can shape people’s perceptions of CSR initiatives and communications, suggesting that businesses pay attention to careful consideration of cultural norms for effective CSR communication. However, the COVID-19 pandemic as a new CSR setting may challenge earlier findings. This study empirically investigates whether three cultural factors (individualism/collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, and power distance) affect public perceptions measured as recall of and favorability towards corporate COVID-19 response initiatives across six countries. Findings from a representative survey of adults across these countries show that respondents in individualistic and collectivistic countries recall these CSR communication campaigns about these corporate COVID-19 response initiatives quite differently, and these are related to differences in power distance and uncertainty avoidance. However, no difference was found in overall corporate favorability, indicating that cultural factors did not affect levels of favorability towards such initiatives. This, we argue, can be explained by the global dimension of the COVID-19 pandemic, which is the context of these CSR initiatives. This study contributes to CSR communication literature with empirical findings from a global pandemic setting. It offers businesses and managers empirical grounds to understand the communicative impact of COVID-19 response initiatives, which can inform future CSR actions.

Corporate Communications in Contribution to Addressing Environmental Problems: Case Study of an Indonesian State Oil Company

This study aims to explain the corporate communication of state oil companies through CSR in contributing to overcoming the problems of peatland fires and coastal abrasion. This research uses a qualitative approach with case studies. Research findings indicate that Pertamina’s CSR communication targets farmer groups in dealing with peatland fires, namely establishing good relations, strengthening farmer group institutions, and connecting with other stakeholders or groups. Meanwhile, to overcome coastal abrasion, Pertamina empowers fishing groups in meetings, provides training and develops innovations to conserve mangroves. CSR communication to overcome the problem of forest fires and abrasion is carried out by developing ecotourism through community-based tourism (CBT). CSR activities are carried out with a limited area scale, so that it seems only for publication and corporate imagery. However, the company’s communication with CBT can be an effective communication model in making people aware of protecting the environment. The Peat Arboretum and Mangrove Education Center are not only tourist destinations, but also a medium of communication for environmental education for the community. Environmental communication is not only directed to the local community, school students, and youth, but also to visitors, for media coverage and discussions on social media. Corporate environmental communications must be integrated with communication channels and stakeholders to support sustainable environmental development.

Sociology of tribalism for inclusive corporate social responsibility communication in Nigeria

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to deconstruct the term “tribalism” for its application to foster context and industry-based corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication system in Nigeria.Design/methodology/approachThis research used both the qualitative and quantitative research methods of data collection; it is an in-depth survey with multiple data collection settings.Findings(1) There is a pattern of CSR communication across the three industries sampled. (2) CSR across three industrial sectors is much about “donation” and “gift”. (3) CSR functions are now in a stand-alone corporate communication department. (4) CSR communication lacks the participatory mechanism to really involve the host communities' concerns. (5) Across the four organizations, CSR communication is often as financial or annual reports. (6) There is a general feeling and understanding that CSR and corporate communication in corporate organizations in n Nigeria require a more participatory mechanism. (7) CSR policy in Nigeria is till much of legal enforcement and efforts to have a national CSR commission has gone beyond legislation process.Research limitations/implicationsThis research was only able to collect data from four selected organizations representing just three industrial sectors (freight-forward, banking/finance and insurance) in Nigeria. There was no external funding to capture more organizations.Practical implicationsThe first implication of the findings of this study is that, for the practice of CSR and communication by corporate organizations in Nigeria, the system is much a top-down and non-participatory. This means host communities and other stakeholders do not have considerable participation in the organization's CSR and communication process. The companies in this study select or budget for CSR interventions they consider valuable to communities in most cases. This pattern of CSR operation cuts across the four selected organizations in this study. Thus, it could be argued that this pattern is an industrial/national phenomenon because all the respondents indicated that their organizations operate CSR based on what other related companies do in Nigeria. Second, the fact that CSR and communication by corporate organizations in Nigeria are regulatory influenced means many organizations may try to evade CSR activities by not budgeting for it.Social implicationsMeanwhile, in this study, deconstructing the evolutionary perspective which sees tribe as a primitive form of organization and relation characterized by the absence of a centralized collaborative system, it is argued that tribalism can catalyze systemic participation and oneness. In line with this perspective, tribal corporate organizations in Nigeria would model an alliance for CSR and communication system on proximity of operational context, that is, Nigeria. Being part of a tribe, corporate organizations as against the public ones will represent an identity reference for social corporate communication in Nigeria.Originality/valueDespite the theoretical problematic issues raised by the notion of tribe, it is deconstructed in this study to define modes of social organization, and it reflects native perceptions of a changing collective identity. Thus, it is also argued in this study, that there will be an increase in works on tribalism in organization communication and CSR in Nigeria as emerging business and global market will continue to shape the operation environment.

Contextualizing Motivating Language to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): How Leader Motivating Language Affects Employees’ CSR Engagement and Employee–Organization Relationships

Drawing on motivating language theory (MLT), this paper aims to demonstrate the effects of strategic leader speech in the context of internal corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication. Specifically, the study (1) examines how leader motivating language strategies used in CSR communication influence employees’ CSR engagement and employee–organization relationships (EORs) and (2) identifies the mediator explaining the underlying psychological mechanism of the effects. Structural equation modeling was performed on a sample of 406 participants who are full-time and part-time employees in the U.S. The results showed that leader motivating language was positively associated with employees’ CSR engagement and EOR quality. Such relationships were significantly mediated by person–organization (PO) fit. This study advances CSR research and practice by explicating the impact of leaders’ oral communication in constructing employees’ CSR experiences and relationships with the employer.

Social media and CSR communication in European ports: the case of Twitter at the Port of Rotterdam

PurposeThe research objective of the paper is twofold. First, it scrutinises the current state of the art concerning adopting the most popular social media by European port managing bodies (PMBs). Second, it investigates the use of social media in the corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication strategies of European PMBs.Design/methodology/approachThe paper carries out online field research on the use of social media by the top-25 European ports. Then, it provides an in-depth case study of the use of Twitter by the Port of Rotterdam for CSR communication. Finally, a content analysis of the tweets published in the 2017–2019 timeframe is performed.FindingsEmpirical results demonstrate the extensive use of social media by European PMBs to reach a wider array of stakeholders. Uneven approaches emerge considering port sizes and cultural clusters. The content analysis shows that one-third of tweets published by the Twitter account of the Port of Rotterdam address CSR issues, especially green initiatives, advocating the use of social media to communicate CSR.Research limitations/implicationsThe study focuses on the European domain. A broader sample of ports worldwide should be examined to further investigate the drivers affecting PMBs' strategic adoption and use of social media, mainly to communicate CSR.Practical implicationsThe paper provides port managers with insights to strengthen CSR communication. Given the increasing pressure of the public opinion on environmental and social issues, the ability of European PMBs to communicate their CSR commitment through social media represents a key driver when searching for consensus of stakeholders and “licence to operate”.Originality/valueThe paper adds to the existing maritime logistics literature by introducing a promising field of research.

Like It or Not: When Corporate Social Responsibility Does Not Attract Potential Applicants

Companies increasingly recognize the importance of communicating corporate social responsibility (CSR) including their engagement toward employees, the community, the environment and other stakeholder groups to attract applicants. The positive findings on the effect of CSR on applicants’ reactions are commonly based on the assumption that companies send a clear signal about their commitment to CSR. However, communication is always contextualized and has become more ambiguous through the increased availability of information online. External stakeholders including actual and potential applicants are confronted with inconsistencies between the way companies communicate CSR activities and their overall CSR performance. Drawing on signaling theory, this article raises the question of how the interaction between strong CSR communication and low CSR performance influences organizational attractiveness. We propose that low CSR performance dampens the effect of CSR communication on organizational attractiveness. Hence, the inconsistency between CSR communication and CSR performance decreases organizational attractiveness. To test our hypotheses, we scraped 67,189 posts published on corporate Facebook career pages by 58 Fortune 500 companies from the time they began their respective career page until June 2018. Surprisingly, our results show that a low CSR performance strengthens the effect of CSR communication on organizational attractiveness. Thus, inconsistencies between CSR communication and CSR performance seem to lead to positive evaluations among applicants.

Effects of corporate social responsibility communications on community empowerment in Pekanbaru

Community empowerment is one of the goals to be realized through the company's CSR program. The purpose of the study was to analyze the effect of PTPN V's CSR communication in empowering the community in Pekanbaru. The research uses quantitative methods. The population in this study was 528 people. Samples were taken by accidental sampling technique of as many as 250 people analyzed using the SEM (Structural Equation Modeling) test. The data was processed using LISREL 8.7 software. The results of the study indicate that there is an effect of corporate CSR communication on community empowerment. The element of CSR communication that has the most effect on community empowerment is the message element. The elements of communication consist of messages, channels, and communication disturbances that affect community empowerment positively, while communicators and the communication environment have an effect in a negative direction.