The moderating role of CEO narcissism on the relationship between uncertainty avoidance and CSR

Abstract

With the ever-increasing growth in the number of US multinational restaurant firms, the need for a better understanding of CSR initiatives enacted in those countries is actively gaining in importance. A firm's CSR is influenced by the cultural context of a given society and, according to the upper echelons theory, the characteristics of its corporate executives. However, there was no empirical evidence on the moderating role of CEO narcissism, a common CEO characteristic in many cases, on the national culture-CSR relationship. This study finds that a firm with more properties in high-UA societies has less involvement in CSR and that CEO narcissism positively moderates the relationship. The results provide a meaningful empirical addition to the upper echelons literature by demonstrating how CEO traits can serve as a boundary condition in examining the impact of uncertainty avoidance, as a contextual factor, on CSR, as an organizational outcome, in the restaurant industry.