Assessing the Corporate Social Responsibility Reports Based on Communication Indicators: an ANP Approach

Abstract

CSR reports are intended to communicate the organization's CSR performance to stakeholders. Currently, CSR reports mainly follow well designed guidelines like the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). However, various authors claim CSR reports are becoming more a publicity tool than a communication tool. To help assessing the communication performance of CSR reports, an assessment procedure is proposed based on ANP. ANP allows designing a communication index to rank CSR reports, taken as the alternatives, according to a set of communication indicators, taken as the criteria. In the proposed network, communication criteria were, among others: Relevance, Communication technique, Accuracy, Easiness to find particular data, Layout, etc. Criteria were arranged in four clusters namely: Quality, Reliability, Comprehension and Presentation. In order to test the procedure a set of comparable CSR reports were selected. The assessment model based on ANP and the assessment judgments were carried out by a panel of experts including an expert on communication theory, an expert on environmental NGOs' demands and an expert on consumers' demands. The case studies showed significant differences among the alternatives (the reports), allowing to establish four levels of communication performance: Excellent, Good, Fair and Poor. Logically, the assessment procedure not only allowed ranking the reports but also determining weaknesses and opportunities to improve the communication performance of each CSR report.

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