Caroline Véran
Published on 26 June 2023
Behind the complex subject of CSR lies the challenge of the societal transition of the entire company. What’s the right way to go about it? How can companies turn CSR from a constraint into an opportunity?
CSR is on the verge of being recognized (at last!), given the government’s determination to give social and environmental issues a central role in its corporate reform. This will enable us to build CSR strategies that are both meaningful and valuable to all, and that are solid and sustainable. What does this mean? To get the full picture, we need to highlight the difficulties inherent in the subject, and demonstrate that CSR can be transformed from a constraint into an opportunity.
Difficult access to CSR
The first set of difficulties stems from the plethora of regulations associated with the subject of CSR, which makes access to it both daunting and complicated.
The accumulation of existing legislation
the so-called NRE law on New Economic Regulations (2001), the Grenelle II Accords law, Art. 225 (2012) on corporate social and environmental transparency obligations (and its Reporting Guide) or the Duty of Vigilance law (2017).
The proliferation of practical guides
proposed by organizations and rating agencies of all sizes to help build CSR policies: the ISO 26000 standard (36 principles of action for building a socially responsible business), the Afnor standard, the Vigeo Eiris label, the ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) criteria used by the financial community, the OECD’s Soft Law recommendations, etc.
The scope of engagement
Finally, let’s talk about the vast – so vast! – of social, societal and environmental commitments. A company that commits itself to a CSR approach can just as easily focus on the well-being of its employees, support civic initiatives to promote better nutrition around the world, drastically reduce its waste production and CO2 emissions, and so on. The list of actions to take is inexhaustible! Because, let’s face it, when it comes to corporate social responsibility, we’re talking about humanity as a whole.
Yet no one is asking the company to save humanity as a whole, and even less to supplant politics. Just as it would be completely unreasonable for politics to constrain the company in its societal conduct: the problems facing humanity are far too complex to assume that any particular program is the only solution.
This infinite range of possibilities for social commitment and the profusion of ways of doing things explains in part why many have fallen by the wayside, and why many have done just about anything!
Bad practices to avoid
The second pitfall is the preconceived ideas and bad practices that have undermined CSR. These include:
The art of drawing up charters of good conduct without giving oneself the means to put them into practice or check their consequences. #Bullshit.
The green strings of opportunistic marketing that displays the message “we love nature” on the packaging of products that are harmful to the environment and users’ health. #GreenWashing.
The choice not to communicate on societal and environmental actions that are nonetheless virtuous, for fear of saying the wrong thing or being accused of instrumentalizing an ethical practice. #GreenHushing.
Societal and environmental practices that are part of a “charitable” vision, carried out on the bangs of any corporate strategy that promotes innovation and economic sustainability. #Charity.
A less than virtuous use of compensatory measures: a company that pollutes prefers to compensate for damage that could have been avoided. #Cynicism.
This catalog of bad practices – irrelevant or opportunistic, unscrupulous, even downright deviant – goes some way to explaining why CSR has not always conveyed a totally virtuous image.
CSR at the heart of corporate transformation
So what do we need to understand and expect from a company’s commitment to society? And above all, what’s the right way to go about it?
First of all, an observation: the law and the sense of history are converging today to (re)connect the company – all companies – to humanist values.
(re)connect the company – all companies – to humanist values.
On the one hand, the legal obligations that are already binding on large companies will concern companies of all sizes in the future. On the other hand, the perceptions of citizens and consumers are resolutely focused on ethical considerations. Last but not least, the productivist business model must respond to a requirement for change: economic efficiency must increasingly go hand in hand with social efficiency and societal involvement. In other words, what’s good for business must be good for society as a whole.
So tomorrow – if they haven’t already – companies will have to develop their activities
while at the same time considering their impact on others and the environment. Nicole Notat and Jean-Dominique Senard’s report to the French government on rethinking the place of business in society supports this approach.
And while it’s up to each of them to choose the art and manner of doing so, two major trends stand out (alongside the catalog of bad practices).
Where some companies manage social and environmental performance indicators and “manage” the subject with a short-term vision, others seize the opportunity and build genuine innovation strategies. This latter approach is the only one with a real long-term vision!
To be meaningful and create lasting values, social commitment must be part of a genuine corporate strategy.
It must be supported by management and placed at the heart of the reactor. It must not be treated as an ethical issue alone, but as a lever for economic transformation of the entire company, leading to new business models and sources of motivation for employees and consumers alike. In short, a strategic approach in which we all stand to gain!
This corporate social responsibility strategy cannot be improvised; it must be built with common sense and discernment, based on the company’s field(s) of activity and its foundations. There are some areas where a company’s positioning makes it in its interest to be outstanding, and others where this is irrelevant.
CSR is a tremendous opportunity for organizations of all sizes to innovate and grow, while reconciling ethics and profit. It’s not just a fad that’s destined to fizzle out, but an issue of profound change for businesses and society alike, in the same way as the digital transformation we’ve seen over the past 30 decades. Some people have already understood this. Those who have not, those who are waiting, those who are doubtful or those who are reluctant, will have a hard time catching up…