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  • Essay / Corporate Social Responsibility in Business - 1391

    Corporate social responsibility (CSR) can be defined as “the economic, legal, ethical and discretionary expectations that society has of organizations at a given time” (Buchholtz, 2014, p. 32) The basic principles of corporate social responsibility consist of organizations having a moral, ethical and philanthropic duty to not only generate profits for investors, but they must also comply with laws and standards established for businesses. Today's CSR requires that organizations assume a much broader spectrum of their responsibilities, which include not only shareholders, but also employees, suppliers, customers, the local community, state and federal governments, special interests and various environmental groups. (Sharma, 2014) Corporate social responsibility is, in many ways, linked to the values ​​and ethics that a company believes in. While CSR encompasses the economic, legal, ethical and discretionary responsibilities of organizations, business ethics generally focuses on the moral judgments and behavior of individuals and groups within organizations. In their text, BUSINESS AND SOCIETY: ETHICS, SUSTAINABILITY, AND STAKEHOLDER MANAGEMENT, Carroll and Buchholtz provide a four-part definition of CSR that incorporates the multifaceted nature of social responsibility. The expectation that businesses will produce the goods and services needed and desired by customers and sell those goods and services at a reasonable price is key to the economic responsibilities cited in their definition. Organizations must be efficient, profitable and creative to keep shareholder welfare in mind. In the Western business structure, fair market competition is not only the central part of paper's after-tax profits......to charitable causes, contributing more than $1.5 million in cash and kind donations to community organizations. In 2013, Outerwall also successfully mobilized 28 percent of employees to participate in company-sponsored volunteer events, continuing to build momentum toward its goal of engaging a third of the workforce in volunteering by 2015. “At Outerwall, we believe in cultivating inclusive work. environment where employees are empowered to take an active role in CSR initiatives,” said Nicole Trimble, Outerwall’s senior director of corporate responsibility. "We strive to provide employees with access to opportunities that will support their personal and professional development while enriching our communities and protecting the environment. In doing so, we are also able to advance our business goals." (The Wall Street Journal, 2014)