Corporate Social Responsibility and Family Business in the Time of COVID-19: Changing Strategy?

Abstract

Companies in general and family businesses in particular engage in local collaborations in rather diverse areas through their corporate social responsibility activities. The COVID-19 pandemic has made these contributions to community improvement more apparent, suggesting a paradigm shift. This conceptual paper proposes a reflection about the evolution of the corporate social responsibility activities linked to family businesses in emergencies and from the socioemotional wealth perspective. The contribution of this paper is twofold. Firstly, it provides an in-depth reflection on the evolution of philanthropy, posing the following questions: are we witnessing a reinvention of corporate social responsibility within the framework of family businesses because of the global pandemic; does this new trend deserve support, given the fundamental role that family businesses have played in this situation; and if so, what should such support consist of, and what is the optimal channel for articulating it? Secondly, the paper proposes a theoretical framework from the socioemotional wealth perspective to advance research about corporate social responsibility carried out by family businesses. Business families are more likely to implement strategies that promote ethical behavior and CSR activities in their companies. The pandemic situation has created new possibilities for developing CSR.

Mobilisation of survivability capital – family firm response to the coronavirus crisis

“…Family business reactions to the COVID-19 pandemic A growing body of research explores the family effect on the businesses' responses to pandemic threats (e.g. Amore et al, 2020;Kraus et al, 2020;Zainal, 2020;Zajkowski and _ Zukowska, 2020;Marja nski and Sułkowski, 2021;Rivo-L opez et al, 2021;Soluk et al, 2021).…”

Nepotistic Hiring and Poverty From Cultural, Social Class, and Situational Perspectives

“…This side can become especially prevalent in high employment threat situations. For example, during the pandemic, corporate strategies shifted to mimic family businesses, specifically with regard to community-focused actions ( Rivo-López et al, 2021 ). The preference for in-group favoritism might bring with it a reliance on practices like nepotism and it is likely that the usage of such tactics might have become more popular under COVID-19.…”

Corporate Social Responsibility in Times of Crisis: Covid-19

“…Mahmud et al 33 quote specific measures taken by companies to protect employees (on a sample of the top 25 companies in the USA), and these are nine mechanisms such as work at home / remotely (60%), cleaning conventions and hygiene protocols (56%), health elevated quarantine (24%), and social distancing and travel restriction practices (36%), as well as offer, paid leave and sick leave with health benefits (48%), premium/bonus (16%), employee volunteering benefits (36%) and employee assistance programs (20%). In the home office segment, Parker 34 considers that such a management strategy reflects the choice of priorities between health and safety at work over the company's financial returns, while Jakulevičienė and Gailiūtė-Janušonė 35 argue that those companies that have previously provided opportunities for a better work-life balance by allowing their employees the opportunity to work remotely could adapt much more easily and quickly to the changing working conditions created by the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting quarantine. Gürlek and Kılıç 36 on a sample of 100 world hotels identified five categories of CSR for employees, namely: health and safety, employee assistance program, career planning, salary, and rewards, the most important of which is health and safety, which includes training of its employees on how to protect themselves.…”