Top‐down and bottom‐up strategies for the implementation of corporate social responsibility: A qualitative survey of an internationalITservices company

Abstract

Despite a large body of research on corporate social responsibility (CSR), there has been little research on the actual implementation of CSR strategies in companies.Therefore, this article examined top-down and bottom-up approaches for implementing sustainability at company level. For our survey, we chose a large IT services company, which is one of the global leaders in the Software as a Service (SaaS) business. Based on theoretical foundations, namely the Social Identity Theory and the Social Exchange Theory, six interviews were conducted with employees and managers of the company. Our results show that the company's vision and values strongly influence the employees' sustainable work activities and behavior. In addition, the employees also have options for shaping the sustainability strategy within the framework they are given. Concluding, the article shows the advantages of integrating both top-down and bottom-up approaches, and identifies options for companies implementing sustainability.

Insights into employee perspectives on corporate social responsibility policies and practices: Embeddedness, participation, and meaningfulness through work

“…Indeed, when analyzing the presence of correlations between variables, we found a positive and significant relationship between managerial responsibilities and the presence of CSR policies and practices, which suggests a greater importance given, by higher levels of management, to the CSR policies and practices implemented in organizations. Nevertheless, it also proves important to understand the perception of all employees and the actual impact of implementing CSR strategies (Aguinis & Glavas, 2019; Gotsch et al, 2023).…”

“…In turn, in a top‐down approach, CSR strategic objectives are defined at a high hierarchical level and extended to the rest of the organization. This type of design and implementation introduces the necessary structures at all organizational levels, defines the responsibilities of different actors in CSR and makes communication and information flow more systematic (Asif et al, 2013; Gotsch et al, 2023). However, when CSR is continuously imposed on employees, they may feel that their freedom is threatened, moreover, it may be seen as an extra‐role behavior, which may not lead to the intended positive outcomes.…”

“…Although the study of CSR is increasingly focusing on its results at the individual level (Donia & Sirsly, 2016), employees' perceptions and the real impact of the implementation of CSR strategies on them is still a path to explore (Aguinis & Glavas, 2019;Gotsch et al, 2023).…”

“…Although the study of CSR is increasingly focusing on its results at the individual level (Donia & Sirsly, 2016), employees' perceptions and the real impact of the implementation of CSR strategies on them is still a path to explore (Aguinis & Glavas, 2019; Gotsch et al, 2023). Thus, this research aims to analyze the effects of CSR policies and practices on meaningfulness through work, mitigating the existing gap in the literature at this level and extending previous studies (Cunha et al, 2022).…”