2Sustain

As I pointed out last week, many companies around the world are now developing strong, comprehensive corporate social responsibility programs.

But, have you ever wondered how these programs impact employee attitudes? What role, if any, do CSR initiatives play in, say, job retention and turnover?

Researchers at the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) explored questions like those during their 2008-2009 World Leadership Study. They sampled the opinions of 2,215 workers around the globe and found that, as you might expect, perceptions of CSR do, indeed, make a unique and positive contribution to overall employee commitment and that a strong CSR program can positively impact employees’ perceptions and how they represent the company to customers and other stakeholders.

Specifically, data in the study showed that:

• Corporate social responsibility programs are linked to how committed an employee is to an employer. This finding held true across all ages and job levels and was particularly strong among women workers. In general, the study’s authors maintain that the higher an employee rated an organization on its commitment to good corporate citizenship, the more committed the employee is likely to be to the organization.

• Employee perceptions about corporate social responsibility remained constant during the depth of the economic decline. Interestingly, despite budget reductions and layoffs becoming commonplace, the study found that employees were bullish about at least one thing: They believed their employers were committed to acting responsibly in the community.

• Corporate social responsibility programs are not a panacea for retention issues. According to the study, CSR is related to organizational commitment, but not to turnover, so companies can’t consider corporate social responsibility programs a cure-all for retention issues.

“If an employee isn’t happy, a strong corporate social responsibility program isn’t likely to tip the balance,” says Sarah Stawiski, Ph.D., a CCL post-doctoral research fellow and co-author of a report on the research. “Though a good social responsibility program won’t reduce turnover, it can impact how employees view your organization and the kind of ambassadors they will be when they come in contact with your customers, shareholders and community members. There are definitely positive benefits to be had.”

The full 12-page CCL report, titled Employee Perceptions of Corporate Social Responsibility, is available here.