Company Approach in CSR Decision Making

Previous research on Corporate Social Responsibility suggests that a company¿s CSR actions can contribute both to external environment such as customers or society, and to the company itself. Not knowing that and how a company can benefit may result in an irrational resource allocation to CSR. While there are theories about business benefits from CSR activities, there appears to be very little literature and no empirical evidence about the way a company determines its CSR efforts, and whether any business benefits are considered. The aim of this study is to achieve a better understanding of the way some companies determine how much and which CSR activities to undertake, and to relate the acquired data to existing theory. This study applies an inductive approach by using qualitative methods such as a literature review and in-depth interviews with CSR related managers of five financial sector companies in the Netherlands in order to investigate the CSR approaches and practices of the selected companies, focusing on the decision process concerning CSR, the business benefits considered and the measurement (if any) used to determine the benefits from CSR.