The Paradox of Communicating CSR in India: Minimalist and Strategic Approaches

This study explores the viewpoints of practitioners in socially responsible companies in India about the ethical dilemmas of corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication, especially in the paradoxical context of stakeholders’ high regard for socially responsible companies and low regard for companies’ deliberate, conspicuous communication about CSR. Findings, based on 19 interviews with key decision-makers in 16 companies from the Standard & Poor India ESG Index, revealed that practitioners in India foregrounded the importance of an implicit, minimalist approach to communication that privileged responsible corporate behavior over rhetoric. They also engaged in the strategic communication of their CSR efforts to involved stakeholders, largely avoiding publicity and aggressive media relations. Implications for public relations theory and practice are discussed.     

Corporate social responsibility engagement and communication by Chinese companies

Premised upon the centrality of relationship management in corporate social responsibility (CSR) and public relations functions, and the growing momentum toward CSR in China, this study reports survey results of corporate communication/public relations executives in Chinese companies on aspects of CSR accountability and transparency. Responses to four key topical areas – drivers for CSR engagement, areas of practice, importance of CSR communication, and preferred channels for communication – suggest a strong concern for corporate image and culture in pursuing CSR, an overwhelming emphasis on disaster relief despite the recognition of a much broader array of societal priorities, and the Chinese companies’ current reliance on in-house and Internet media for CSR communication.     

Company spokesperson vs. customer testimonial: Investigating quoted spokesperson credibility and impact in business-to-business communication

Through the framework of source credibility, this study examines the impact of quoting a company executive versus a customer testimonial in a business communication context. A 2 (spokesperson) × 7 (media channel) full factorial experiment (N = 514) showed partial support for enhanced perceived credibility of information conveyed by a customer testimonial compared to a company spokesperson in independent and controlled media channels online. When evaluated through a measure of media credibility, a customer spokesperson rates higher than a company spokesperson. In addition, a product is viewed more positively by an audience receiving information quoting a customer spokesperson rather than a company spokesperson. An audience with low business expertise considers both types of spokespersons as more trustworthy than a high-expertise audience; however, a customer is considered more trustworthy than a company spokesperson. The study provides public relations professionals with insight in determining the use of spokespersons when communicating to businesspeople.     

Economics or ethics? Exploring the role of CSR expectations in explaining consumers’ perceptions,motivations, and active communication behaviors about corporate misconduct

The purpose of this study was to explore the role of corporate social responsibility expectations in explaining consumers’ perceptions, motivations and communication behaviors about corporate misconduct, especially in the context of allegations of workplace gender discrimination. A survey was conducted in December 2016 among 473 Americans. The results show that while people with economic CSR expectations do not evaluate corporate misconduct negatively, those with ethical CSR expectations perceive it morally wrong. However, both types of CSR expectations were found to impact consumers’ motivations to engage in communication behaviors about the crisis. Theoretical and empirical implications are discussed.     

Employees’ voice behavior in response to corporate social irresponsibility (CSI): The role of organizational identification,issue perceptions,and power distance culture

While extensive literature has examined the role of employees in corporate social responsibility (CSR), little is known about employees’ role in corporate social irresponsibility (CSI). The current study aims to examine the voice behaviors of employees generated around the issue of CSI. Two online surveys were administered to full-time employees by using two different scenarios involving CSI situations: environmental and diversity issues. The results of the study identified employees’ pre-established organizational identification as a critical cross-situational factor that influenced their CSI perceptions. In addition, employees’ situational perceptions of CSI – how they perceive CSI as a serious problem, their sense of connection to the situation, and their perceived constraints in solving the situation – played critical roles in motivating them to engage in voice behavior. Furthermore, the level of power distance culture within an organization significantly moderated the relationship between employees’ CSI perceptions and voice behavior. By incorporating organizational identification literature and public relations theory in the context of CSI communication and management, this study provides theoretical and practical implications.     

Unpack the relational and behavioral outcomes of internal CSR: Highlighting dialogic communication and managerial facilitation

This study examines how corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication and management contributes to internal public relationship building and employees’ megaphoning behaviors. Specifically, it investigates how organization-public dialogic communication (OPDC) about CSR and organizational leaders’ facilitation behaviors for employees’ CSR engagement influence employees’ perceptions of two distinct types of organization-public relationships: communal and exchange relationships. Structural equation modeling results of 660 online survey responses suggest that OPDC has a positive association with communal relationships and negative association with exchange relationships. Facilitation behavior positively contributes to exchange relationships. Both communal and exchange relationships are positively associated with employees’ positive megaphoning. Yet, negative megaphoning is negatively linked with communal relationships and positively linked with exchange relationships. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on internal CSR communication and management. More importantly, it uncovers the nuanced effects of CSR on employee-organization communal and exchange relationship building.     

Effects of apologies and crisis responsibility on corporate and spokesperson reputation

This study is aimed at the effects of making apologies in a crisis situation and attributed crisis responsibility on corporate- and spokesperson reputation. In a 2 × 2 scenario experiment (spokesperson making apologies versus no apologies; and accidental versus preventable crisis), 84 respondents judged corporate and spokesperson reputation. We found that the crisis has more impact on corporate reputation than on the spokesperson's reputation. This indicates that the crisis is seen as a collective responsibility of the organization, rather than the personal responsibility of the spokesperson.     

Over-emoting and perceptions of sincerity: Effects of nuanced displays of emotions and chosen words on credibility perceptions during a crisis

This study focuses on understanding how words and discrete facial emotions influence credibility perceptions of both prepared statements and spontaneous question and answer sessions. We build on and extend existing theoretical work concerning crises communication and discrete emotions. Using a press conference simulation, spokesperson video recordings were analyzed using automated face-emotion recognition software (FaceReader™) to characterize discrete emotions. A crisis-message-strategy trained dictionary for Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) was used to characterize message content. Our results indicate that spokespeople can control their verbal messages better in prepared statements than in more spontaneous settings, but their facial emotions are quite similar in both settings. Only three discrete emotions are related to credibility perceptions: anger, sadness, and surprise, but sadness and surprise are not universally viewed positively or negatively. Expressing too much emotion, or over-emoting, is problematic. Expressing more anger in the Q&A, which we refer to as reactive anger, is perceived negatively, and when spokespeople emote a low amount of sadness and use a high amount of words expressing sincerity they are viewed as having the most credible messages.     

A two-path model of the impact of LGBTQ+ diversity CSR levels on public response

Since conflicting opinions and expectations of stakeholders about LGBTQ+ diversity coexist, companies contemplate how far to draw the line of CSR involvement in relation to LGBTQ+ diversity. This study examines how different levels of LGBTQ+ diversity CSR (i.e., proactive, passive, refusal) affect public responses. The proposed model investigates how public perceptions of corporate support for LGBTQ+ diversity (PCSL), influenced by CSR level, affects two dimensions of corporate associations differently (corporate ability and CSR association), and consequently CSR responses (supportive communication intent, purchase intent, and corporate evaluation in this study). The role of perceived value-driven motivation as a mediator was also examined. An online experiment was conducted with two Fortune 500 companies (Dell and Kellogg's). Overall, the results suggest that proactive CSR leads to higher PCS-L and better CSR outcomes among the general public than a passive or refusal approach. PCS-L, directly and indirectly, affects individuals’ CSR associations, which are mediated by value-driven motives. In turn, CSR associations positively influence publics’ supportive communication intent, purchase intent and corporate evaluations. As for CA associations, we found that they had a rather complicated relationship with PCS-L. Specifically, PCS-L had a direct negative effect on CA associations (Dell) or no effect (Kellogg), indicating possible backlash effects. However, higher PSC-L resulted in more favorable perceived motives of the CSR program, driven by the company's moral grounds and corporate values, consequently resulting in greater CA associations (positive indirect impact). Thus, perceived value-driven motives can offset potential backlash effects related to CA associations and corresponding CSR outcomes.     

How controversial businesses communicate CSR on Facebook: Insights from the Canadian cannabis industry

This study advances our current understanding of corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication in a controversial industry by analyzing CSR-related Facebook posts from seven Canadian public cannabis companies. Our findings indicated that these companies’ CSR communication on Facebook was mostly instrumentalist, lacked transparency, and used effective multimedia characteristics. In addition, associations between communication strategies and public engagement on social media (e.g., # of likes, comments, and shares) revealed both opportunities and ethical concerns regarding CSR communication in controversial businesses.     

The paradoxical effects of communicating CSR activities: Why CSR communication has both positive and negative effects on the perception of a company’s social responsibility

Supporting societal goals and sustainable developments can help a company to be seen as socially responsible. This corporate social responsibility (CSR) must be communicated effectively as too intensive communication could negatively affect the company’s perception. These negative effects may be caused by an imbalance between the amount of CSR communication and the actual extent of CSR activities. Two experiments show that increased CSR communication has a negative indirect effect on perceptions of a company’s social responsibility, mediated by persuasive intent and reactance. However, depending on the extent of a company’s actual CSR activities, there is also a countervailing direct effect: A high extent of CSR communication positively affects perceptions of a company’s social responsibility if the company engages in a great number of CSR activities. In contrast, if a company only engages in a few activities but communicates a lot about it, this positive effect may even become negative.     

Exploring nonprofit-business partnerships on Twitter from a network perspective

This exploratory study attempts to understand the role of nonprofits and their position in corporate social responsibility (CSR) partnership communication. Employing social network analysis, the study identifies and interprets the network strategies used by top U.S. nonprofits in communicating about their CSR partnerships on Twitter. The results show that although all the nonprofit issue sectors disclosed extensive business partnerships, they selectively mobilize communication with certain business partners. The present study extends the network approach in a CSR context. Theoretical and practical implications were discussed.     

Mapping networks in corporate social responsibility communication on social media: A new approach to exploring the influence of communication tactics on public responses

Grounded in the networked stakeholder management theory and two-way communication, this study provides a snapshot of networks between companies and publics on Twitter in the context of corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication. Results showed that CSR communication activities (i.e., informing, retweeting, and mentioning) empowered a corporation through centralizing its network position and gaining public support (i.e., emotional, influencer, and knowledge support). In addition, degree centrality mediated the relationship between corporate retweets and stakeholder support and between corporate response and stakeholder support.     

Language as an issue in international internal communication: English or local language? If English,what English?

The present paper discusses internal communication in the global context, with a focus on language as an issue for the organization. Although ‘language’, naturally, is a resource that enables any – internal or other – communication, it has not been examined in public relations research but has been taken for granted or as given. The current pace of globalization in all sectors has rapidly globalized internal communication and the language issue needs to be addressed. On the basis of two empirical studies we discuss language strategy and language use in international internal communication. Our findings show that although a common ‘corporate language’ – which mostly today refers to English – enables internal communication, it is not a straightforward solution but a number of issues need to be considered. For example, as international communication in a business context is today mostly conducted by non-native speakers of English, their language can be characterized as BELF (English as Business Lingua Franca), which differs from ‘standard English’ in many ways. Also, language issues need to be considered for organizational credibility and knowledge sharing and for constructing trust and rapport in international interaction.     

Baoren Baoguo: Zhongguo Xinwenshi De Lingyizhong Dufa [To Serve the Nation: Journalists as Prisms of Chinese Press History] edited by CHIN-CHUAN LEE

Social networking sites (SNS) have become an important vehicle for corporate communication. However, there has been little research on how East Asian firms use international SNSs to communicate with global stakeholders. This study compares the communication strategies of Chinese and Japanese companies on Facebook and Twitter and analyzes the public responses and complaints on these corporate SNSs. The results revealed that in addition to the traditional strategies of corporate ability (CA) and corporate social responsibility (CSR), Chinese and Japanese firms adopted the human interest (HI) strategy. The results showed that the Chinese companies in the study sample had a stronger preference for the CSR and interactive strategies, and they responded faster to online complaints compared with the Japanese firms, which were more likely to adopt the strategy of transferring in handling complaints. Moreover, “inviting participation into events” and “seeking specific feedback” were two types of interactive messages that received the highest numbers of responses from the public on Facebook, whereas “promoting sales” showed the highest engagement on Twitter. This study is the first to compare the effectiveness of different corporate response strategies for specific complaint topics on social media. Thus, it contributes to the literature on stakeholder–company interactions.     

The interplay between post-crisis response strategy and pre-crisis corporate associations in the context of CSR crises

How should a company respond to a crisis that is related to its social responsibility by capitalizing on consumers’ existing corporate associations? To answer this question, the present study focuses on two primary types of corporate associations, corporate ability (CA) associations and corporate social responsibility (CSR) associations, and proposes two different types of response strategies that are association-based: CA strategy and CSR strategy. Drawing on the framework of CA-CSR, Expectancy Violation Theory, and information processing literature, this study examines whether and how these crisis response strategies interact with consumers’ pre-crisis associations and collectively influence consumer reactions in times of CSR crises. Results of two experiments render support for the predicted interaction effect. Furthermore, the results show that crisis response diagnosticity and novelty, as perceived by consumers with varied pre-crisis associations, serve as the underlying process explanations that drive the observed interaction effect. Theoretical contributions and practical implications of these results to crisis communication are also discussed.     

Communicating about corporate social responsibility: A comparative study of CSR reporting in Australia and Slovenia

This paper examines how two countries on opposite sides of the world, Australia and Slovenia, are addressing corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting issues. The authors see reporting as an important communication tool or channel which can ensure greater corporate transparency and enable a better engagement with multiple stakeholders. The paper aims to provide a review and a comparison of the CSR guidelines and reporting standards in both countries by which this communication is guided. In both countries, reporting is largely voluntary and appears to be driven by market pressures. However, differences appear in national culture as a driver with product, management and financial considerations influencing Australian reporting whereas Slovenian reporting is shaped by employee, community and environmental concerns. From Australian and Slovenian perspectives it seems to be important to increase reporting incentives in both countries and to connect and compare them to global reporting requirements.     

Corporation as climate ambassador: Transcending business sector boundaries in a Swedish CSR campaign

At a time when corporations are addressing increasingly complex, global corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues, this study examines and evaluates the strategies used in Vattenfall's challenging and innovative CSR campaign which aimed at establishing the energy company as a credible climate ambassador. Based on an analysis of the campaign outcomes in terms of the distinct interests and competencies of business, government and civil sector actors, I suggest that the company's credibility was weakened by its portrayal of Vattenfall as being more intent on organizing a public, collective action to fight climate change than on securing company-related business interests. Two ways to ensure greater credibility in similar cases are proposed: communicating explicitly about company motives for conducting CSR campaigns, and carrying out CSR campaigns in collaboration with non-profit organizations.     

Spokespersons’ Nonverbal Behavior in Times of Crisis: The Relative Importance of Visual and Vocal Cues

When a chief executive officer or spokesperson responds to an organizational crisis, he or she communicates not only with verbal cues but also visual and vocal cues. While most research in the area of crisis communication has focused on verbal cues (e.g., apologies, denial), this paper explores the relative importance of visual and vocal cues by spokespersons of organizations in crisis. Two experimental studies have more specifically examined the impact of a spokesperson’s visual cues of deception (i.e., gaze aversion, posture shifts, adaptors), because sending a credible response is crucial in times of crisis. Each study focused on the interplay of these visual cues with two specific vocal cues that have also been linked to perceptions of deception (speech disturbances in study 1; voice pitch in study 2). Both studies show that visual cues of deception negatively affect both consumers’ attitudes towards the organization (study 1) and their purchase intentions (study 2) after a crisis. In addition, the findings indicate that in crisis communication, the impact of visual cues dominates the outcomes of vocal cues. In both studies, vocal cues only affected consumers’ perceptions when the spokesperson displayed visual cues of deception. More specifically, the findings show that crisis communication messages with speech disturbances (study 1) or a raised voice pitch (study 2) can negatively affect organizational post-crisis perceptions.