Community Responsibility

The question of whether corporate social responsibility is profitable and adds value to a company is important to the development community because the private sector has far greater resources than government aid programs. If the game-changing resources of the community's businesses are put toward the tasks of poverty, environmental, and social challenges, the results could be dramatic.

Corporate social responsibility over the years has developed from a simple form of check-writing by companies to a complex set of principles that encompass nearly every interaction a company has with society.

“Corporate social responsibility encompasses not only what companies do with their profits, but also how they make them,” according to a definition from the Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. “It goes beyond philanthropy and compliance and addresses how companies manage their economic, social, and environmental impacts, as well as their relationships in all key spheres of influence: the workplace, the marketplace, the supply chain, the community, and the public policy realm.”

Social responsibility does clearly have an impact on a company’s value and profitability. Companies that are socially responsible make their brands more attractive to consumers and are more appealing to high quality potential employees. The impact on the profits of companies that behave poorly is less clear.