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any corporation that takes the issue lightly will lose the trust, loyalty, and advocacy of its stakeholders. These are important sine qua non which any corporation that aspires to prosper in modern markets cannot do without. It is the responsibility of the corporate secretary to steer the board to the path of formulating an effective CSR strategy on issues relating to CSR and to similarly steer executive directors’ attention to an effective path of executing the strategy. Formulating the strategy on paper or the corporate web site for people to see will not suffice. Actions must be taken to ensure that their key performance indicators on CSR are met in terms of measurable CSR initiatives across the business operations. One of the UK companies studied in the project noted above uses an annual business plan based on steering wheel drivers made up of community, customer, people, operations, and finance. At the beginning of the company’s year, it sets out specific projects which they hope to deliver over the following 12 months in terms of the five-wheel drivers in all its operations around the world. During the 12 months, it directs resources, energy, focus, and vigor to delivering their expectations in these areas. At the end of the 12 months, it measures its performance in the areas and asks a third party to take an independent examination of its performance in each of the five-wheel drivers and reports on the strengths and weaknesses in terms of their actions during the operating period. This is perhaps one of the future directions of CSR initiatives. CSR is a field that will remain with us for the foreseeable future as long as business and society continue to co-exist and it will continue to cut across different organizational functions including that of the corporate secretary. Over time, it is hoped that all professions will become more equipped and effective to dealing with its requirements in order to make our world a better place to live in by this generation and future generations.

Corporate Social and Environmental Responsibility

▶ Company Directors and CSR ▶ Corporate Governance ▶ Definitions of Social Responsibility

References and Readings Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. (2006). Companies Act 2006. London: HM Stationery Office. Idowu, S. O. (2009). Practicing corporate social responsibility in the United Kingdom and northern Ireland. In S. O. Idowu & W. Leal Filho (Eds.), Global practices of corporate social responsibility. Berlin/Hiedlberg: Springer. Idowu, S. O. (2010). Corporate social responsibility from the perspective of corporate secretaries. In S. O. Idowu & W. Leal Filho (Eds.), Professionals’ perspectives of corporate social responsibility. Berlin/Heidelberg: Springer. Idowu, S. O. (2011). An exploratory study of the historical landscape of corporate social responsibility in the UK, Corporate Governance, 11(2), 149–160. Lantos, G. P. (2001). The boundaries of strategic corporate social responsibility. Journal of Consumer Marketing, 18(7), 595–632.

Corporate Social and Environmental Responsibility ▶ Sustainable Production and Consumption

Corporate Social Development ▶ CSR and Poverty

Corporate Social Entrepreneurship Christine A. Hemingway Work and Organisational Psychology Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, Birmingham, UK

Cross-References Synonyms ▶ Agency and Corporate Governance ▶ Board of Directors

Policy entrepreneurship; Social intrapreneurship

Corporate Social Entrepreneurship

Definition The entrepreneurial process has been described as a blend between the individual’s personal attributes, such as psychological and demographic factors, which combine with environmental factors and the individual’s discovery of an opportunity and the successful exploitation of that opportunity (Shane 2003). Hence, the notion of corporate social entrepreneurship (CSE) relates to both personal characteristics and particular behaviors. The CSE is thus defined as an employee of a corporation who operates in a socially entrepreneurial manner, i.e., identifying opportunities for and/or championing socially responsible activity, in addition to their formal job role in working toward achieving the firm’s business targets. Interestingly, the CSE operates regardless of an organizational context that is predisposed toward corporate social responsibility (CSR). This is because the CSE is driven by dominant self-transcendent (other-orientated) as opposed to dominant self-enhancement personal values. Consequently, due to the CSE’s concern with the development of social capital as well as economic capital: the formal job role of the CSE may not necessarily be connected with CSR nor does the CSE have to be in an executive or management position in order to progress his or her socially responsible (SR) agenda. This may suggest similarities with the social entrepreneur (SE) in terms of personal values and the outcomes of entrepreneurship which may benefit society, but there is also a key distinction. This is connected to the differences between the remit, or mission, of the corporation and that of the social enterprise. Distinction from Social Entrepreneurship The social entrepreneurship literature has largely concentrated on the voluntary, not-for-profit or “third” sector. Moreover, the social entrepreneur in a for-profit context is traditionally perceived as a philanthropic agent or business owner. The exception to this might be the UK’s Co-operative Group, which describes its business as guided by social mission and is not responsible to shareholders for delivering profit. However, the corporate model, as defined by the company’s directors and shareholders in its articles of

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association, requires employees to deliver returns to shareholders, through their job roles. Consequently, unless a corporate employee has been given dispensation from the profit motive in order to specifically create social value, their employed work cannot be described as social entrepreneurship (although their activities outside of the workplace might be). This is an important distinction. Hence, even though the majority of corporations, nowadays, claim to be fully committed to CSR, it is pushing the boundaries to describe even the most hybrid of companies (such as those dedicated to the growth of fair trade or environmentally sustainable production), as social enterprises staffed by social entrepreneurs. This is because the remit of the organization as a corporation prevents this. As a consequence, the CSE is unlikely to have the time or other resources to commit full scale toward progressing a socially responsible agenda because the corporation imparts constraints. Thus, corporate social entrepreneurship is characterized by its informality, in terms of being added on to the job and performed in an ad hoc way and this results in its tremendous variability. And the entrepreneurial discretion which is required to perform it is controversial (Hemingway and Maclagan 2004). Even if the CSE is part of a CSR departmental function, CSR can produce both trade-offs and/or oncosts due to its connections with stakeholder management. So the concept of the CSE specifically reflects its nuanced nature within corporations, akin to the idea of the “different shades of green” of corporate environmental champions (Crane 2001). Moreover, tentative empirical research in this area has indicated that the penetration of corporate social entrepreneurship within the firm is dependent upon the levels of integration of CSR within the firm’s strategic corporate plan and also its organizational climate and culture. In the following section, the relevance of the CSE is put into its scholarly interdisciplinary context and some key themes are articulated. These concern some of the fundamentals of CSR, in terms of its connections with stakeholder theory; its discretionary nature and that, despite its widespread adoption in industry and as a subject taught in

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business schools and across other academic departments (e.g., schools of environment, law, politics), CSR remains contested both theoretically and empirically. Other premises of the CSE relate to its philosophical roots in business ethics, plus, connections with the psychological literature on personal values and prosocial behavior.

Introduction The notion of the CSE primarily relates to the field of corporate social responsibility (see separate entry). It is thus relevant to both practitioners and scholars of business and management and, more specifically, to business ethics, business strategy, organizational behavior, work psychology, and entrepreneurship. Such complexity reflects the interdisciplinary nature of the field of corporate social responsibility. CSR, corporate responsibility (CR), sustainability, social responsibility (SR), and all related concepts are most commonly understood to incorporate two key themes. First is stakeholder theory, whereby CSR is understood in terms of its effects on and how it is affected by all the different stakeholder groups: shareholders, employees, customers, end-consumers, suppliers, competitors, civil society (NGO’s, pressure and local community groups, unions), and governments, including regulation. This perspective is inherent within definitions of CSR as a balance between people; the planet and profit, sometimes referred to as the “triple bottom line” of the environment; and society and economics. The second key theme of CSR relates to its voluntary nature in terms of activities that exceed legal standards (Carroll 1999). It is this discretionary quality which connects it with the notion of personal values. As a consequence, the concept of CSR has been described as “essentially contested” (Moon 2003), due to the controversial and often political nature of the debate around the role of business in society, since the start of the industrial revolution. Thus, CSR is embedded within the field of business ethics, which considers ideas about morality in business and, in turn, the CSE is synonymous with (moral) agency. So, while


the social entrepreneur and corporate social entrepreneur are united in their quest to create social value, a business ethics perspective encourages us to ask the question “For what end?” Thus, business ethics can be helpful as it uses intellectual frameworks to encourage us to think deeply about means and ends. For example, the idea of the CSE creating social value which benefits both the corporation and society is known as enlightened self interest, whereas a deontological viewpoint frames acts of socially responsible behavior as driven by the individual’s sense of moral duty. Alternatively, virtue ethics is concerned with the desirable and habitual behavior that serves the common good, in the form of a moral character (Walton 1988). However, it is important to note that not all values may be regarded as virtuous and that value and virtue may be distinguished. In other words, while a virtue might be described as being a value, whether or not a value can be described as a virtue is subjective and in the eye of the beholder. The point is this: how a virtue is applied and to what ends can be variable and subject to what is valued. Further, the idea of a plurality of values in the world has been validated in the work of social psychologists (see below). Contentiously, then, this also implies subjectivity associated with the term “morality” (i.e., principles of right and wrong), and thus agency may encompass all types of behavior that may be regarded as “ethical” or “unethical.” Nevertheless, the possibility of dominant self-transcendent values, in some people, which are deployed out of a sense of duty to society, is implicit within the notion of corporate social entrepreneurship. Personal Values The behaviorist dimension associated with personal values was expressed thus: “values influence most if not all motivated behavior” (Schwartz 2006). Moreover, in the Schwartz Values Theory (SVT), our values are conceptualized as a hierarchical system of priorities and we act in accordance with our dominant, high-priority values. The SVT is depicted at Fig. 1, below. The SVT (Fig. 1) contains 10 motivationally distinct values which represent approximately 40

Corporate Social Entrepreneurship Corporate Social Entrepreneurship, Fig. 1 Schwartz (2010) theoretical model of relations among motivational types of values

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individual value items, such as ambition (in the achievement domain) or honesty (in the benevolence domain). Essentially, while we possess many thousands of attitudes, Rokeach (1973) identified just 36 values, Schwartz and Boehnke (2004) used 46 value items, and Confucius said that we have 50 values (Zhang 2002). Moreover, the SVT represents a motivational continuum: the closer any two domains in either direction around the circle, the more similar their underlying motivations. This means that the domains on opposing parts of the circle represent conflicting values. According to Schwartz: “. . .people can and do pursue competing values but not in a single act. They do so through different acts, at different times and in different settings” (Schwartz 2010: 225). And if we consider the essentially contested nature of CSR, referred to above, the SVT is also useful toward our understanding of the role of employees’ values in corporate social entrepreneurship. Of particular relevance are the four higher-order value types, most notably, the opposing dimensions of self-enhancement and self-transcendence. Self-enhancement encompasses the motivational domains of power and

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achievement, while the self-transcendence values are contained within the motivational domains of universalism and benevolence. Benevolence was defined in terms of values that “preserve and enhance the welfare of those with whom one is in frequent personal contact” and universalism as “understanding, appreciation, tolerance and protection for the welfare of all people and for nature” (Schwartz et al. 2001: 521). This selfother dimension to our values was also identified by scholars such as Rokeach (1973: 9), who described values as having either a “personal focus” or a “social focus” and also as “self-centered” or “society-centered.” Significantly, the SVT represents an almost universal structure of human values, which helps us to understand and predict different kinds of human behavior. See Table 1, below, which defines the 10 value domains and their value items in the SVT. Hence, the employee’s degree of involvement in CSR may be connected with their personal values, in addition to the formal requirements of their role. For example, if we examine the motives of a philanthropist, these might be viewed in terms of Rescher’s (1969) “benefit at issue” classification

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Corporate Social Entrepreneurship, Table 1 Definitions of the motivational types of values and items (Schwartz and Boehnke 2004: 239) Power: Social status and prestige, control or dominance over people and resources (authority, social power, wealth, preserving my public image) Achievement: Personal success through demonstrating competence according to social standards (ambitious, successful, capable, influential) Hedonism: Pleasure or sensuous gratification for oneself (pleasure, enjoying life, self-indulgent) Stimulation: Excitement, novelty, and challenge in life (daring, a varied life, an exciting life) Self-direction: Independent thought and action— choosing, creating, exploring (creativity, freedom, independent, choosing own goals, curious) Universalism: Understanding, appreciation, tolerance, and protection for the welfare of all people and for nature (equality, social justice, wisdom, broadminded, protecting the environment, unity with nature, a world of beauty) Benevolence: Preservation and enhancement of the welfare of people with whom one is in frequent personal contact (helpful, honest, forgiving, loyal, responsible) Tradition: Respect, commitment, and acceptance of the customs and ideas that traditional culture or religion provides (devout, respect for tradition, humble, moderate) Conformity: Restraint of actions, inclinations, and impulses likely to upset or harm others and violate social expectations or norms (self-discipline, politeness, honoring parents and elders, obedience) Security: Safety, harmony, and stability of society, of relationships, and of self (family security, national security, social order, clean, reciprocation of favors)

of values, which included religious and spiritual values, moral values, economic values, or sentimental values. And in behavioral terms, this might be regarded in terms of altruism. Figure 2, below, shows the relationship between altruism and helping behavior. Prosocial Behavior According to Bierhoff (2002), the terms altruism, helping behavior, or prosocial behavior may be used interchangeably. However, he also distinguished between these concepts and described helping behavior as the broadest term, including “all forms of interpersonal support.” Further, prosocial behavior is narrower, where “the action is intended to improve the situation of the helprecipient.” This is pertinent to the definition of

Helping Behavior

Prosocial Behavior

Altruism

Corporate Social Entrepreneurship, Fig. 2 The relationship between helping behavior, prosocial behavior, and altruism (Bierhoff 2002: 9)

the corporate social entrepreneur, in that “the actor is not motivated by the fulfilment of professional obligations,” i.e., the employee’s job description may not contain references to any of the forms of CSR, such as environmentalism. Furthermore, Bierhoff defined altruism as prosocial behavior that has an additional constraint, namely, “that the helper’s motivation is characterized by perspective-taking and empathy” (Bierhoff 2002: 9). Importantly, then, the contested essence of CSR (and the notion of corporate social entrepreneurship) is not restricted to its theoretical analysis and description. It was also indicated via a study of corporate employees (Drumwright 1994). Moreover, even though there is a dearth of empirical study into the relationship between prosocial behavior and CSR, some empirical insight was also derived from an exploratory investigation into the relationship between the personal values of corporate employees and CSR. Exploratory Empirical Support Between 2005 and 2008, an exploratory, qualitative investigation was conducted within an FTSE 100 listed UK corporation. It included personal, in-depth interviews with just 28 employees, and the findings revealed four modes of moral commitment to CSR, described as “extreme cases.” The study provided examples of employees who demonstrated all three types of the helping behaviors, described above, who were found at all levels in the organizational hierarchy and not just among some of


the senior executives. The results included 12 corporate social entrepreneurs (Hemingway 2010; Hemingway forthcoming). These corporate social entrepreneurs were described as principled moral leaders who demonstrated a moral conscience and integrity at work (Horowitz 2002) and also the independence and risk-taking commonly associated with entrepreneurship, which manifested as moral courage. Significantly, they demonstrated empathy (described, above, as a characteristic associated with altruism), humility, and an internal locus of control. The CSEs also espoused very strong opinions regarding personal responsibility and what they believed to be the social moral duty of individuals and corporations. This had driven them to enlarge and enrich their own jobs (see the human relations theorists Argyris and Herzberg in Pugh and Hickson 2007) across a range of CSR domains, such as championing fairness at work with regard to health and safety issues and discrimination in recruitment or performance appraisal. Some were passionate leaders of community fund-raising projects, or they helped disadvantaged members of the community. Some of the CSR domains, such as an environmental project, became formalized and incorporated within the company’s systems. Others were regular occurrences that were indicative of the CSE’s personal values, such as the engineer who angrily spoke out against the racist comments he heard at work. Importantly, these examples of helping behavior indicated tentative empirical support for the philosophical notion of moral character, all of which contrasts with the consensus in business and management regarding the homogeneity of management as an amoral group (Carroll 1987). The study also supported the notions of ethical and authentic leadership (Michie and Gooty 2005). Moreover, these CSEs expressed tremendous satisfaction with their lives. Furthermore, the non-senior employees who operated as CSEs is worthy of note, running counter to the prevailing view of the CEO and top executives setting the moral tone of the corporation. However, a subset of the CSEs felt constrained in their attempts to progress some CSR

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domains, which resulted in some activities being confined to outside of work and also produced espoused frustrations and some job dissatisfaction. Significantly, the majority of informants in this study could not be described as CSEs, even though they were involved in at least one of the CSR domains and some were also employed in a formal CSR role. These people placed greatest emphasis on their own capability, their ambition, and the importance of their families and home life. This is not to say that the CSEs within the firm were not ambitious or pragmatic individuals. Only that the non-CSE’s concerns were underpinned by their dominant self-enhancement as opposed to self-transcendent values, for example, the health and safety manager whose top priority was his next career move and who was considering studying for a master’s degree in CSR, as part of his drive toward directorship. Similarly, a number of young graduates lower management, administrators, and factory operatives who had volunteered as “brand ambassadors” within the firm, a role which incorporated local community projects. These people were characterized by the pragmatic emphasis they placed on CSR as good for their careers. Hence, some tentative, exploratory insight was derived regarding social responsibility as a subjective state, moral agency, and employee self-identity. Moreover, there were indications of integrity, whereby job satisfaction may be an outcome of the congruence between the employee’s self-transcendent values and their job role. Indeed, the espoused job satisfaction associated with corporate social entrepreneurship lends support to the claims regarding the economic benefits of CSR to the firm, including the potential for its sustainability. As a consequence, preliminary empirical study of corporate social entrepreneurship refocuses attention on the role of the individual in CSR, and it highlights a very interesting and alternative perspective to the traditional idea of rational management. More importantly, initial exploratory investigation provides us with a sense of hope and optimism, by indicating that amoral or even Machiavellian

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tendencies in management might be overcome, against the backdrop of the current global financial crisis, which was compounded by lapses in governance systems and personal integrity.

Key Issues Three key issues may be identified from the above discussion. Firstly, the notion of employee discretion may be regarded as problematic. Certainly, there is an argument for organizational control and governance measures in order to prevent unethical employees abusing their right to act autonomously in their appointed role: an argument which has been produced in favor of bureaucracy. Secondly, if employees do have the freedom to use such discretion with regard to the allocation of resources, or the time to champion CSR, tension and conflict may develop when an employee decides to support a different “cause” than has been directed by their manager. And not everyone will agree on what the “right” activities are (Buono and Nichols 1985: 68). Moreover, despite the widespread adoption of CSR by corporations (as evidenced in their corporate communications), the aforementioned study revealed some levels of ignorance and disengagement from CSR at the top of the organizational hierarchy, thereby continuing the contested theme of CSR. It also implies the necessity for greater access to educational programs in CSR for directors and senior managers, as well as those targeted at middle and junior management. Thirdly, methodological difficulties abound with regard to the investigation of social responsibility as a subjective state. However, despite the growing literature which connects values and behavior in systematic, predictable ways (Schwartz et al. 2001), these exploratory insights present scholars with both a highly complex and potentially fruitful research agenda.


much scope for replication and verification, perhaps using a comparison of industries and national contexts. Certainly, the quantification of the personal values of the different types of entrepreneur (business start-up, intrapreneur, public/social entrepreneur) is a starting point. Indeed, while the distinction has been made, above, between the social entrepreneur and CSE, preliminary insights into the personal characteristics of corporate social entrepreneurs and also what they do, i.e., corporate social entrepreneurship, is useful in our understanding of the motivations and activities of social entrepreneurs. Further studies might ask: What is the relationship between family background, personal values and CSR or between education and corporate social entrepreneurship? And considering the exploratory insights regarding younger employees who volunteered in CSR activities to help their career, is there a connection between life-stage and dominant self-enhancement or selftranscendent values? Can some predictive capability be developed on the basis of comparisons between the characteristics of the CSE and other employees? Also, the situation in the public sector remains unexplored. There is no reason why the C in CSR cannot be dropped for the purposes of such an investigation, particularly when the ethical conduct of public sector leaders and politicians can attract similar amounts of publicity for misdemeanor as their corporate counterparts, with regard to fraudulent expense claims or the negligent discharge of duties, for example. Therefore, the tentative empirically derived insights described above are just the beginning for management and business ethics scholars who need to dig much deeper in their quest toward the development of socially responsible organizations and a less flawed form of capitalism.

Cross-References Future Directions Following initial empirical investigation into the nature of corporate social entrepreneurship, a significant research agenda has emerged, with

▶ Agency Theory ▶ Business Ethics ▶ Corporate Social Responsibility ▶ Philanthropy ▶ Social Entrepreneurship

Corporate Social Innovation

References and Readings Bierhoff, H.-W. (2002). Prosocial behaviour. Hove: Psychology Press. Buono, A. F., & Nichols, L. (1985). Corporate policy, values and social responsibility. New York: Praeger. Carroll, A. B. (1987). In search of the moral manager. Business Horizons, 30(2), 7–15. Carroll, A. B. (1999). Corporate social responsibility. Business and Society, 38(3), 268–295. Crane, A. (2001). Corporate greening as amoralization. Organization Studies, 21(4), 673–696. Drumwright, M. E. (1994). Socially responsible organizational buying: Environmental concern as a noneconomic buying criterion. Journal of Marketing, 58, 1–19. Hemingway, C. A. (2010). The conditions and character traits of corporate social entrepreneurship: Insights from a UK-based multi-national corporation. Presented at the 23rd European Business Ethics Network (EBEN) Annual Conference, University of Trento, Italy, September 9–11. Hemingway, C. A. (Forthcoming) Corporate social entrepreneurship: Integrity within. In R. E. Freeman, J. Moon, & M. Morsingin (Eds.), Business, value creation, and society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hemingway, C. A., & Maclagan, P. W. (2004). Managers’ personal values as drivers of corporate social responsibility. Journal of Business Ethics, 50(1), 33–44. Horowitz, M. (2002). Defining character integrity. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 50(2), 551–572. Michie, S., & Gooty, J. (2005). Values, emotions, and authenticity: Will the real leader please stand up? The Leadership Quarterly, 16, 441–457. Moon, J. (2003). Corporate social responsibility: An overview. In C. Hartley (Ed.), The international directory of corporate philanthropy (pp. 1–13). London: Europa. Pugh, D. S., & Hickson, D. J. (2007). Writers on organizations (6th ed.). London: Penguin. Rescher, N. (1969). Introduction to value theory. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. Rokeach, M. (1973). The nature of human values. New York: Free Press. Schwartz, S. H. (2006). Les Valeurs de Base de la Personne: The´orie, Mesures et Applications [Basic human values: Theory, methods and applications]. Revue Francaise de Sociologie, 47(4), 929–968. Schwartz, S. H. (2010). Basic values: how they motivate and inhibit prosocial behavior. In M. Mikulincer, & P. Shaver (Eds.), Prosocial motives, emotions, and behavior: The better angels of our nature (pp. 221– 241). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Schwartz, S. H., & Boehnke, K. (2004). Evaluating the structure of human values with confirmatory factor analysis. Journal of Research in Personality, 38, 230–255.

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Schwartz, S. H., Melech, G., Lehmann, A., Burgess, S., Harris, M., & Owens, V. (2001). Extending the crosscultural validity of the theory of basic human values with a different method of measurement. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 32, 519–542. Shane, S. (2003). A general theory of entrepreneurship: The individual-opportunity nexus. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. Walton, C. C. (1988). The moral manager. New York: Harper Business. Zhang, Z. (2002). Confucius: The oriental sage and philosopher. Shandong, China: Shandong Friendship Press.

Corporate Social Innovation Ananda Das Gupta HRD, Indian Institute of Plantation Management, Bangalore, Karnataka, India

Synonyms Corporate citizenship; Corporate responsibility; Corporate social performance; Sustainability; Sustainable development

Definition Companies today are increasingly focused on corporate social and environmental responsibility as they face new constraints in decision-making processes, including the impact of activities on climate and local communities. This, together with unprecedented growth in the number of NGOs worldwide, has led companies and NGOs to forge new types of relationships. Corporate social innovation works because it is a listening, problem-solving process. Most importantly it shifts the point of knowledge away from individuals in companies, to embrace knowledge (of whatever kind) that everyday normal people hold, and can easily share. It is a carefully managed process, one which guarantees change and development for those willing to embrace it. Corporate social innovation is also called sustainable innovation. Corporate social innovation is about creating a good business by having

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