There is widespread support on the critical relevance of being virtuous and socially responsible for a firm. However, the enormous and still growing material on CSR does not remove lots of the ambiguities surrounding this concept. It is a complex and dynamic phenomenon applied to organizations that are themselves complex and changeable systems. If it’s well known that the results of a firm’s activity have to respect both a social and an environmental sustainability, apart from the traditional economic and financial profiles, not surprisingly there’s no consensus on what a company must do – not just to behave but – to be responsible and therefore respect that requirement of sustainability. This responsibility concerns a new qualification of the value created by the firm, value that is shared with the stakeholders who populate the environment and address their expectations upon the organization. But it is true and indispensable to preserve and protect the continuity of the organization itself. Is a virtuous and socially responsible firm more capable to face the uncertainty and the complexity of the environment where it lives? And how do the change towards more sustainable profiles and the integration of the CSR principles within the organization have influenced this capability? As a viable system, the primary aim of a firm is to survive in its own environment and keep its vitality over time. Several studies define the concept of resilience as the capability of an organization to absorb shocks and bouncing back after a disturbance or a critical event. The new business models adopted by the firms which have absorbed CSR principles have certainly had an impact over their organizational resilience that, assuming the systemic thinking perspective, embraces the organization as a whole. How do the introduction and the integration of CSR principles and practices of sustainability affect the organizational resilience of a firm? This work aims to study these issues, trying to connect the concept of organizational resilience to the effects of the integration of CSR principles within the preexistent business model of a firm as a viable system. CSR’s multidimensional nature imposes to conduct the research concentrating the study on a specific organizational area of the firm, which has to be sufficiently well defined in order to manage the complexity of the several variables to consider, but which also has that characteristic of transversality across the whole system to make it possible to interpret the results with a systemic and complete vision. Since every organizational process is characterized by a specific risk profile, and the concept of risk itself is at the heart of a firm, here is studied the impact of the integration of the principles of responsibility in the risk management system preexistent in a firm. In particular, a field research is conducted on a champion of firms operating in the energy market, following a mixed (quali-quantitative) methodological approach, in order to understand how the systemic profile concerning the organizational resilience is affected by the introduction and integration of CSR principles and practices in the risk management system of the firm. The results of this study want to represent a further step towards a better understanding of the application and the adoption of the CSR within the company, suggesting a systemic definition of organizational resilience of the sustainable firm.

CSR and Organizational Resilience. A study on the effects of the integration of sustainability principles in the risk management system of the firm / Fantasia, Roberta. - (2014). (Intervento presentato al convegno Business Systems Laboratory - 2nd International Symposium - SYSTEMS THINKING FOR A SUSTAINABLE ECONOMY. Advancements in Economic and Managerial Theory and Practice tenutosi a Roma nel 23 - 24 gennaio 2014).

CSR and Organizational Resilience. A study on the effects of the integration of sustainability principles in the risk management system of the firm

FANTASIA, ROBERTA
2014

Abstract

There is widespread support on the critical relevance of being virtuous and socially responsible for a firm. However, the enormous and still growing material on CSR does not remove lots of the ambiguities surrounding this concept. It is a complex and dynamic phenomenon applied to organizations that are themselves complex and changeable systems. If it’s well known that the results of a firm’s activity have to respect both a social and an environmental sustainability, apart from the traditional economic and financial profiles, not surprisingly there’s no consensus on what a company must do – not just to behave but – to be responsible and therefore respect that requirement of sustainability. This responsibility concerns a new qualification of the value created by the firm, value that is shared with the stakeholders who populate the environment and address their expectations upon the organization. But it is true and indispensable to preserve and protect the continuity of the organization itself. Is a virtuous and socially responsible firm more capable to face the uncertainty and the complexity of the environment where it lives? And how do the change towards more sustainable profiles and the integration of the CSR principles within the organization have influenced this capability? As a viable system, the primary aim of a firm is to survive in its own environment and keep its vitality over time. Several studies define the concept of resilience as the capability of an organization to absorb shocks and bouncing back after a disturbance or a critical event. The new business models adopted by the firms which have absorbed CSR principles have certainly had an impact over their organizational resilience that, assuming the systemic thinking perspective, embraces the organization as a whole. How do the introduction and the integration of CSR principles and practices of sustainability affect the organizational resilience of a firm? This work aims to study these issues, trying to connect the concept of organizational resilience to the effects of the integration of CSR principles within the preexistent business model of a firm as a viable system. CSR’s multidimensional nature imposes to conduct the research concentrating the study on a specific organizational area of the firm, which has to be sufficiently well defined in order to manage the complexity of the several variables to consider, but which also has that characteristic of transversality across the whole system to make it possible to interpret the results with a systemic and complete vision. Since every organizational process is characterized by a specific risk profile, and the concept of risk itself is at the heart of a firm, here is studied the impact of the integration of the principles of responsibility in the risk management system preexistent in a firm. In particular, a field research is conducted on a champion of firms operating in the energy market, following a mixed (quali-quantitative) methodological approach, in order to understand how the systemic profile concerning the organizational resilience is affected by the introduction and integration of CSR principles and practices in the risk management system of the firm. The results of this study want to represent a further step towards a better understanding of the application and the adoption of the CSR within the company, suggesting a systemic definition of organizational resilience of the sustainable firm.
2014
Business Systems Laboratory - 2nd International Symposium - SYSTEMS THINKING FOR A SUSTAINABLE ECONOMY. Advancements in Economic and Managerial Theory and Practice
04 Pubblicazione in atti di convegno::04d Abstract in atti di convegno
CSR and Organizational Resilience. A study on the effects of the integration of sustainability principles in the risk management system of the firm / Fantasia, Roberta. - (2014). (Intervento presentato al convegno Business Systems Laboratory - 2nd International Symposium - SYSTEMS THINKING FOR A SUSTAINABLE ECONOMY. Advancements in Economic and Managerial Theory and Practice tenutosi a Roma nel 23 - 24 gennaio 2014).
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11573/544104
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