Industry Research Summary: The State of HR’s Role in Corporate Social Responsibility

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Today’s organizations are facing increasing pressure to respond to a wide range of social issues. This pressure is not just coming from activists and governments but also from investors.

In this report, we investigate the role that HR professionals are playing in the growing movement toward greater corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Key Findings

In areas of social responsibility, there’s a significant gap between where organizations are and where HR professionals would like them to be.

• While most respondents (74%) say their organization strives to be socially responsible to a high or very high extent, only 59% say that their organization actually achieves that aim. 

In the near future, global challenges will impact most organizations and HR professionals believe they can play a role in addressing some of them.

• Ninety-five percent of HR professionals predict that one or more global issues will negatively affect their corporations in the next three years. 
• The majority of HR professionals feel they can play a role in addressing the specific issues of discrimination and bias (67%) and mental health issues (63%).

 

HR professionals typically play a role in CSR in their organizations, but that role varies widely by company and by practice. 

• Fully 91% of respondents say HR plays some role in CSR in their organizations, and nearly a fifth (18%) say that HR actually oversees CSR in their organizations. 

Organizations are most likely to be engaged in four key CSR practices

• improving diversity, equity and inclusion (64%) 
• instituting fair labor/workforce priorities (63%) 
• charitable giving (60%)
• community improvements (57%) 

HR professionals believe that much of what they do has a strong impact on corporate social responsibility and business ethics, and these have a positive impact on the overall employee experience.

What Is Corporate Social Responsibility in Today’s Organizations?

CSR has been around for decades, but increased social and consumer awareness has driven a growing commitment to CSR practices in corporations. In 2019, 90% of companies on the S&P 500 index published a CSR report, up from just 20% in 2011.¹

In this report, we were keen to investigate the progress that businesses are making to deliver on their ethical and social commitments. In particular, we wanted to understand the role HR professionals are playing in today’s CSR initiatives and how HR can help to close the gap between intention and implementation.

The Adoption of CSR Principles and Practices Today

Most organizations strive to be socially responsible, but fewer actually succeed.
Only 5% of respondents say that their organization does not formally or informally follow any of the seven key subjects of CSR. The most common principles that are followed in today’s organizations are “ethical behavior” (86%), “accountability” (80%) and “respect for the rule of law” (76%).

As well as asking about the adoption of CSR principles, we also asked our respondents about specific initiatives aimed at improving CSR. More than three-fifths, for example, confirm that their organization is currently engaged in improving diversity, equity and inclusivity. Nearly as many are also instituting fair labor or workforce policies.

What Role Do HR Professionals Play in CSR?

Do HR professionals play a significant role in CSR? The answer is that they often do, but turns out to be a surprisingly complex question, and the answer may depend on who is being asked. Although organizational leaders are most typically overseeing CSR policies or initiatives, HR professionals are second on the list of responsible parties.
 

• Fifty-six percent of respondents say that the CEO or president is responsible for overseeing one or more of their CSR policies. For 36% of organizations, the Board of Directors is also responsible for overseeing one or more of the CSR initiatives. 
• For just 48%, their Chief Human Resources Officer also plays a leadership role in CSR.

Fully 91% of respondents indicate that HR is involved with CSR at some level. More than half of respondents answer that HR has partnered with others to work on CSR issues, and 35% say that HR is responsible for implementing CSR initiatives. However, HR oversees CSR in only 18% of organizations, and in 9% it is not involved at all.

Numerous HR functional areas are seen as having a positive impact on CSR issues, including employee experience (82%), diversity, equity and inclusion (72%), benefits (71%) and learning and development (68%).

There are three global challenges that the majority of HR professionals believe will have an impact on their organizations within the next three years.

For the majority (71%), economic difficulties such as a recession are most likely to negatively impact their company. This is closely followed by pandemics (64%) and mental health issues (55%).

The Future of HR’s Role in CSR

Close to two-fifths (38%) of the HR professionals we surveyed would be keen to increase their role in CSR in their organizations. Interestingly, a comparable number of respondents (33%) are unsure if they would like to be more involved.

Based on the findings in this report, we believe that HR professionals have the opportunity to make a real difference to the realm of CSR. Given the close and bidirectional relationship we found between HR functions and CSR objectives, HR teams are often ideally placed to own and/or implement social responsibility initiatives.
 
¹ Harvard Business School. (2021, June 15). 15 eye-opening corporate social responsibility statistics. Retrieved from
 

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