Corporate Social Responsibility Standards: Is it Possible to Meet Diverse Customer Requirements?

Andrea Sütőová,Ferdinand Kóča

doi:10.2478/mspe-2022-0007

Abstract

Abstract The purpose of the study is to review the internationally recognised CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) standards, codes of conduct (cross-industry and industry-specific used in electronics, automotive and steel industry) and selected codes and supplier evaluation approaches applied by individual customer organisations. It also aims to identify problems related to CSR compliance demonstration from the view of supplier organization supplying its products for more industry sectors. Literature review, interview with the selected large manufacturing organisation and synthesis of information were conducted to achieve the purpose of the study. The difficulties for supplier organisations during CSR verifications and audits conducted by customers or third parties according to a variety of standards are discussed in the paper. It often results from different structure, terminology and content of the CSR standards and codes. One of the possible solutions is to create and maintain the intelligent database of CSR requirements of customer organisations. There is a lack of studies dealing with the existence of various CSR standards and codes and its impact on suppliers supplying their products to more industry sectors. The paper contributes to fill the knowledge gap and extend the existing literature.

Highlights

The number of suppliers for raw materials and products a company has access to has been growing rapidly in recent years as a consequence of the increased globalisation
We aim to contribute to fill the knowledge gap and extend the existing literature by addressing the following questions: − RQ1: Which corporate social responsibility (CSR) standards and evaluation approaches are used by customer organisations within their supply chain? − RQ2: Which problems arise for supplier organisation during the demonstration its compliance with CSR requirements of customers from various sectors? − RQ3: Which are the possible solutions for supplier organisations to solve the problems related to the demonstration of their CSR compliance? In our paper, we focus on presentation of the problems occurring during the CSR self-assessments and external audits from the view of supplier organisation, which faces diverse CSR customer requirements from different industry sectors
The paper contributes to the current state of knowledge related to challenges and problems associated with CSR verifications and audits from the perspective of supplier organisations, which results from different standards and requirements of customers

Summary

Introduction

The number of suppliers for raw materials and products a company has access to has been growing rapidly in recent years as a consequence of the increased globalisation. Stakeholders' growing interests and more complex globalised business phenomena and relationships have pushed the development and integration of socially responsible practices within organisations in various global and local industries [1, 2]. Organisations, especially those operating in global markets, are increasingly required to balance the social, economic, and environmental components of their business while building shareholder value. Organisation can ask its suppliers for certificates which authenticate the compliance with environmental and social requirements Such standards, and codes can provide valuable criteria for decision-making within selection and evaluation process as well as performance improvements along the supply chain [10]. The compliance with the codes and standards is evaluated by using various self-assessment and audit approaches [11, 12]

Objectives

Results

Conclusion