Corporate Social Responsibility Governance And Corporate Reputation

This unique volume expounds on the nature of white-collar crime and examines its relationship with corporate social responsibility, governance and corporate reputation. Based on empirical study and extensive literature review, this book presents different approaches for repairing damaged corporate reputations and also explains how internal governance and investigations can be conducted. Stages in corporate social responsibility are discussed and knowledge management is underscored as an imperative tool to combat white-collar crime and build corporate reputation. Contents:White-Collar CrimeCorporate ReputationReputation Damage and RepairInternal InvestigationsCorporate ComplianceCorporate GovernanceStages of Corporate ResponsibilityForensic AccountingKnowledge ManagementIntelligence Strategy Readership: Business course undergraduates, MBA students, students of governance, business ethics, corporate communications/public relations and corporate crime; management executives; auditing and corporate communications professionals. Keywords:Corporate Social Responsibility;Corporate Governance;Corporate Reputation;White-Collar Crime;Knowledge ManagementKey Features:Damage and repair of corporate reputation after white-collar scandalsStages of corporate social responsibilityKnowledge management for corporate social responsibilityReviews: “White-collar crime represents a serious threat to corporate reputation. Nevertheless, there are surprisingly many corporations that are involved in white-collar crime. A recent study found that 40 percent of the top-ranked corporations in the Swedish business world have been involved in white-collar crime in the last decade. These corporations had decisions against them, such as court decisions, administrative law, objection, or settlement. Petter Gottschalk's book covers important topics for crime prevention by linking white-collar crime to responsibility, governance and reputation in business enterprises.” Dr Stefan Holgersson Police Superintendent, Swedish Police Force & Assistant Professor, Linköping University, Sweden “White-collar crime can be difficult to detect, both by internal entities such as internal audit and control units, as well as by external entitites such as the stock exchange, the tax authorities and the police. Petter Gottschalk has written an important and interesting book that links white-collar crime prevention to corporate social responsibility, governance mechanisms, and corporate reputation damage and repair.” Dag Styrvold former Norwegian Police Superintendent and current instructor Norwegian Police University College for the education of officers to battle white-collar crime

The current economic situation has highlighted deficiencies in corporate governance while also showing the importance of stakeholder relations. It has also raised the profile of the debates regarding corporate social responsibility and shown the inter-relationship with governance. And the two together are essential for sustainable business. The social and environmental contexts of business are generally considered to be as significant as the economic and financial contexts and good governance will address all of these aspects. The combination of these aspects offers long term benefits for a firm, such as reducing risk and attracting new investors, shareholders and more equity as well as sustainable performance. Written by experts from all over the world, A Handbook of Corporate Governance and Social Responsibility is the most authoritative single-volume guide to the relationship between good governance and social responsibility and the reality of managing both. In addition to the theory and practice of governance and CSR, the book includes case studies from large and small organizations and NGOs to highlight examples of good and bad practice, and to show international and cultural similarities and differences while at the same time furthering the debate regarding the relationship between good governance and social responsibility.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an increasingly heated topic since the 1980s. This title proposes that the concept of Corporate Social Irresponsibility (CSI) offers a better theoretical platform to avoid the vagueness, ambiguity, arbitrariness and mysticism of CSR.

With the collapse of high-profile companies such as Enron and Tyco, worldwide anti-globalization protests, and recent revelations of questionable behavior by financial groups and auditors, corporate behavior has become the highest priority topic for businesspeople, investors, politicians and the public. Yet despite the critical importance of maintaining public and shareholder trust, most corporations make very little formal effort to actively manage the activities that can put their reputation, share price, and customer base at risk. Most corporations officially embrace the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility; but giving money away to local communities or worthy causes will not prevent an ethical disaster. The problem is not social irresponsibility; the problem is a lack of knowledge about what is taking place in the company or at its subcontractor sites. What companies need to be thinking about is not a theoretical construct around Corporate Social Responsibility, or how they can spin public opinion by charitable actions. They need to be thinking about how they can create a practical knowledge and risk management framework in their company that allows them to avoid costly and reputation-damaging behavior in the first place. Ultimately, this comes down to knowledge management. Whether violations of human rights, employment law, or environmental standards - or simply accounting shenanigans - invariably the reason that these activities are not anticipated and avoided is simply that executives and board members do not realize what is happening in the organization, and what the likely implications of actions will be. And the larger the organization, the more extensive that lack of knowledge. The good news is that developing a strategic approach to corporate integrity is neither exceptionally expensive nor particularly difficult. The problem is that companies that are already using sophisticated information technology and knowledge management tools for gathering internal and external information have focused those systems and practices almost exclusively on operational issues and increasing productivity. But these same knowledge management techniques - built around emerging ethical guidelines being developed by international standards groups - can be used by companies to create an effective global policy for building and maintaining corporate integrity. This means applying knowledge management techniques in three important areas: * First, they need to mobilize key employee knowledge and the vast amount of information available on potentially sensitive issues in a way that allows key decision-makers to "sense and respond" quickly and correctly to developing risks. * Second, it means creating objective, scenario-based guidelines for ethical behavior, communicating those guidelines using knowledge management techniques among key organizational leaders, and providing a workable system of incentives for managers to surface potentially dangerous issues. * Third, companies need to adopt emerging guidelines such as AA1000 that provide for ethical procedures and performance indicators that enable companies to audit and monitor their own behavior, and also to provide shareholders and the buying public with an objective report on the company's ethical performance. Much like ISO 9000, Six Sigma and other performance and productivity and practice standards of the 1990s, these new global ethics standards will inevitably become a baseline by which investors and customers judge a company's potential for future growth and stability. High marks on auditable ethical performance set against these guidelines will become an important way for companies to differentiate themselves from their competition in the future. Developing a workable program for corporate ethics will be one of the most important issues of this decade, and will be "the next big thing" for large organizations. A drive toward standardized reporting of corporate ethics practices was coming anyway; the recent public corporate disasters will only encourage corporate executive teams to scramble to demonstrate to customers and shareholders that their organization takes these issues seriously. This book, therefore, will be a primer for business people and business students worldwide who will shortly be tasked with devising or participating in those types of corporate integrity initiatives, and will explain how knowledge management is indispensable as a tool for helping corporations to manage their risk and integrity policies. Through a mixture of leading practice case studies and a clear framework, it will show how a corporation can begin to combine leading practices in risk and knowledge management with emerging international guidelines in order to develop and manage a program of corporate integrity.

With social and digital media reshaping the way business is conducted, and the number of companies embracing the new social medium, this book revisits CSR practices from a digital perspective. The volume explores the impact and influence of the new 'social' on responsibility and its feasibility, measurability and success in a boundary-less world.

This book brings together a representative collection of perspectives on the way how corporate governance is being aligned with the social responsibility of an organization and the accountability of its management both in large corporations and in medium sized businesses. Examples are given from various industries and branches as well as from different countries and regions across the globe. All examples are commented and explained in detail. Written by a group of selected academic teachers this book is suitable for adoption as a resource for a case driven approach to teaching "Corporate Governance" courses at an upper undergraduate or graduate level.