Abstract
PurposeThis paper aims to present a deep understanding of how social media affects organisations’ sustainability performance, using environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors. Particularly, this paper assumes the existence of a causal relationship between organisations’ sustainability performance and the use of their social media profile (i.e. Twitter).Design/methodology/approachThe authors used a multivariate regression with an explorative approach. Using Thomson Reuters Eikon, the authors composed a sample of 115 public EU companies with a headquarter in Europe operating in the “energy” and “utilities” sectors. The authors collected ESG-related, financial and Twitter-related data covering the period 2016–2019.FindingsThe study findings emphasise the existence of a statistically significant and positive relationship between social media profiles (i.e. Twitter) and companies’ sustainability performance. Findings show that ESG-oriented companies use their Twitter profile more as a tool for achieving a higher level of legitimation rather than for managing their sustainability strategy and related performance. Therefore, social media contribute more to the construction of companies’ CSR identity than the management of analytic aspects of sustainability performance. The longevity of companies’ profiles is the variable mostly showing a causal relationship not only with the general measure of companies’ sustainability performance but also with its pillars and sub-pillars.Originality/valueThis research is original in showing academics, practitioners and policymakers results on the impact of different modalities of interaction (retweets, replies, likes and quotes) between organisations and stakeholders by using social media on sustainability performance.
Highlights
IntroductionDigital transformation radically changed the way public and private organisations operate (Lombardi et al, 2020; Nambisan, 2017; Rippa and Secundo, 2018; Schimperna et al, 2020; Lombardi et al, 2021a), fostering them to adopt new technologies (e. g. social media, mobile, business analytics, Internet of Things, Big data, Advanced Manufacturing/Industry 4.0/5.0, digital-to-physical-transfer, cloud and cyber-solutions, artificial intelligence) to gain significant benefits (Fischer and Reuber, 2011; Greenstein et al, 2013; Fitzgerald et al, 2014; Lardo et al, 2017; Nambisan et al, 2017)
The theoretical and practical contributions of this paper are directed towards the enhancement of social media and corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature showing that the use of social media affects companies’ approach to sustainability mainly as a tool for reaching a higher level of legitimisation, and sustainability performance is a complex and composite result deriving from the effects exercised by some drivers, one among which is social media
Our result shows that the presence of companies on social media platforms contributes to their sustainability performance, the non-relevance of different activities carried out through social media, such as tweets, retweets, mentions, etc., is evident
Summary
Digital transformation radically changed the way public and private organisations operate (Lombardi et al, 2020; Nambisan, 2017; Rippa and Secundo, 2018; Schimperna et al, 2020; Lombardi et al, 2021a), fostering them to adopt new technologies (e. g. social media, mobile, business analytics, Internet of Things, Big data, Advanced Manufacturing/Industry 4.0/5.0, digital-to-physical-transfer, cloud and cyber-solutions, artificial intelligence) to gain significant benefits (Fischer and Reuber, 2011; Greenstein et al, 2013; Fitzgerald et al, 2014; Lardo et al, 2017; Nambisan et al, 2017). One of the main benefits related to social media is the enhancement and communication of CSR practices and related sustainable performances (O’Leary et al, 2004; Abbas et al, 2019), which might lead to a competitive advantage (Gaganis et al, 2019) as well as the improvement of the environmental accounting. Environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues are the leading concerns of sustainable development. The ESG factors are used for measuring and comparing sustainable companies’ performance (Tripathi and Bhandari, 2014; Watson, 2015; Boiral and Henri, 2015). They are an important pillar of corporate social responsibility (CSR), supporting sustainable strategies (Eccles et al, 2013)
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