Social Responsibility of Business: Types and Challenges

Social responsibility is an initiative that helps our society in growing along side businesses. By undertaking such initiatives, organization can ensure that they make profit but not at the cost of society and environment.

For any organization to grow and scale in size, it is important to understand the various social responsibility of business. Let us take a look at the key takeaways of business-related social responsibilities. 

Table of Contents

• What is social responsibility?
• Importance of social responsibility 
• Types of social responsibilities
• Socially responsible companies
• Challenges in the implementation of social responsibilities
• How to implement CSR?

What is Social Responsibility?

Social responsibility is a part of the business that helps to maximize shareholder value while leaving a positive impact on society. This action helps in benefiting society and protecting the environment. This helps in bringing change for coming younger generations. Companies adopt policies that promote well being of society and our environment in a way to lessen the negative impact.

Importance of Social Responsibility For Businesses

Reasons behind fulfiling social responsibility include the following:

• Improved reputation: Companies can have a more strong and more positive brand image. By contributing to the welfare of society, companies will help gain a positive and improved reputation.
• Loyal customer base: As the brand reputation improves, more customers stay with the company in the long term. This helps in building a strong, stable and loyal customer base that helps in keeping the company a going concern. 
• Legal safety: As the company start contributing to the company, it automatically starts contributing to society. This allows them to not face any penalties as they are compliant with regulations. 

Types of Social Responsibility of Business

The following are the different types of social responsibilities:

1. Economically profitable: One of the most important corporate social responsibilities includes economic responsibility. As it is rightly said that charity begins at home, it is businesses need to work on maximizing profit in order to survive in the market.
2. Legal responsibility: Another social responsibility of business is being legally compliant. A company must adapt to those business practices and working conditions that comply with the laws of the jurisdiction and the industry. This includes being compliant with safety standards, environmental regulations and labour laws.
3. Philanthropic responsibilities: This is an aspect of business where companies contribute to charities and other humanitarian causes. Their aim is to indulge in community development initiatives. 
4. Social Responsibility or CSR: Also known as Corporate Social Responsibility or CSR, the aim is to take responsibility for their actions. The bottom line is that they have to consider the interests of stakeholders within the company as well. 
5. Environmental Responsibility: Another ethical responsibility of business is environmental protection. Businesses must intake such manufacturing processes and business activities that do not harm the environment. They must adopt eco-friendly practices.

Socially Responsible Companies

A number of organizations in the world have understood the social responsibility of business and incorporated it into their work culture. Here are some  of the big names that have become socially responsible:

1. Microsoft: The organization has partnered with Disability Data Initiative at Fordham University and World Bank. Through this partnership, the company aims to gather data from people having atypical speech. This data will be used to improve voice recognition technology for people having diverse speech patterns and disabilities.
2. Slack: The organization is working to diminish barriers in the workplace culture. This helps employees engage with each other and get a sense of belongingness. The organisation also encourages its employees to serve local communities by volunteering with other organizations of their choice.
3. Coca-Cola: The company very actively pursues Corporate Social Responsibility. It has set several goals to serve society. This includes providing access to safe drinking water, empowering women and building inclusive workplaces. 
4. Salesforce: It is associated with different volunteering campaigns of United Way. Salesforce aims to support and provide educational resources to help employees bring a difference to communities.

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Challenges in Implementing Social Responsibilities

Following are the challenges that most companies face while implementing social responsibilities:

• Lack of a proper framework: This is one of the biggest challenges while implementing CSR in an organization. It is, therefore, important for businesses to have clear CSR strategies. Organizations should ensure that the social responsibility of the business is being fulfilled while still making profits.
• Transparency: Companies must be open about the efforts that they put into fulfilling social responsibilities. They should disclose information about soc and environmental impacts without letting adversaries impact them.

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How to implement CSR?

The following ways help in implementing CSR:

• The implementation of Corporate Social Responsibility should not hamper the expectations of stakeholders. Its principles and guidelines should be reviewed in a manner to ensure that it is consistently in line with company goals. 
• It is also important to establish a standardized reporting and disclosure mechanism for CSR activities. Through this practice, companies can provide consistent information about their CSR performance to facilitate benchmarking.

Conclusion

For most businesses, it is important to come together and develop guidelines for social responsibility initiatives. Through this approach, they can operate in a consistent and responsible manner. Overall, they will have an effective and consistent approach. Businesses should set a budget to implement cost-effective strategies to contribute to the society as well.