All businesses known to me rely on society and people. Endorsing the existence of people and fulfilling their needs with good quality services and products are the first steps to achieving an organisation’s social responsibility. Mission/vision statements, and values are things that people want to skip in their first instances, but a company with a good social and cultural sense usually grabs attention easily and quickly.
So what is the big fuss about CSR? The answer is simple. Because it can retain customers and bring long term profits. In Bangladesh, CSR often works as a nice policy within many organisations. I find the importance of CSR to be exceptional not just for the people or the society but for the sustainability of the business itself. In fact, I feel that CSR can be a strong tool to retain customer loyalty for a very long time.
It is not very far that we will reach a point in time when advertising will not make sense to people. Adverts, teasers and flash mobs will not work anymore. People will look for ways to skip it. This is when organisation with great social response will be likely to retain loyalty of customers. In our country where consumer rights are far from reaching reality, advertisers and manufacturers take the liberty to produce low quality products and mass market it. With the limited knowledge of people in rural areas and even in cities, they find success.
Take the example of fresh juice for good quality. You may be satisfied with hardly one or two brands. But if you compare the quality with the ones in India, for example, you will probably not drink any of the local ones anymore.
Let us take the example of our telecom industry for social movement. I have always strongly felt the need for proper English language skills in our society. If a telecom company promised its customers to spend a certain percentage of their income in developing English language skills of street children and they came up with success stories, then for sure, I would want to use the services of that company provided other factors like quality, availability etc are not compromised.
Why would customers respond to a cause like that? It is simple. People want to be generous. Responsible citizens often look at the horrible things in society and feel the need to do something about it. Unfortunately, they cannot because of their lack of resources, time and many other things. But if they knew that through purchasing their regular needs will help achieve betterment in society, then that is an influencing factor to keep using that service.
So, why do companies not use it? They say the first movers usually get the advantage but also usually take the risk, and not all organisations can afford to take unknown risks. Social causes are so important, that if unsuccessful, can bring devastating effects like losing trust, for example.
Sometimes it happens that when you hear something too frequently, you lose the importance of it. Such, I think, is the term CSR. It is viewed as just another academic term that’s nice to know. We tend to ignore the power behind the three words. I think it is about time, CSR should be renamed as “Investment for profit” or “just doing our bit for the society.”
Good ethical practices in a business will change the course of their profitability and sustainability for the long run.