Corporate social responsibility and firm financial performance: Comparison analyses across industries and CSR categories

IF 1.1 Q4 BUSINESS
Mingming Feng, X. Wang, Jerry G. Kreuze
{"title":"Corporate social responsibility and firm financial performance: Comparison analyses across industries and CSR categories","authors":"Mingming Feng, X. Wang, Jerry G. Kreuze","doi":"10.1108/AJB-05-2016-0015","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Purpose - Despite the intensive research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and firm financial performance, little is known about how the linkage between CSR and firm financial performance is heterogeneous across industries and how the performance implications are differentiated among specific categories of CSR activities. The purpose of this paper is to explore how the association between a firm’s engagement in CSR and firm financial performance is heterogeneous across industries and CSR categories. Design/methodology/approach - Using a sample of 17,083 firm-year observations representing 1,877 firms from the largest 3,000 US companies during years 1991 and 2011, the authors compare the association between CSR and firm financial performance across ten industry sectors defined by Global Industry Classification Standard and across the four CSR categories classified by Mandl and Dorr (2007). Findings - The authors find that the association between the overall CSR activities and firm performance is heterogeneous across industries. CSR has significant positive implications for firms from most, but not all, industries. Comparing the performance implication of CSR practices targeting different stakeholder groups, the empirical results indicate that different types of CSR have different influences on financial performance of firms from different industry sectors. Research limitations/implications - This study provides new angles for managers in maximizing firm performance through CSR activities and suggests an important and interesting direction for researchers who engage in CSR research. Due to its heterogeneous nature, the CSR-performance relationship needs to be examined more specifically – across industries and different CSR categories. Findings from studies incorporating both company industrial sector and CSR categories would provide more meaningful and practical implications for managers. Practical implications - This study provides important managerial implications. First, to maximize firm performance through CSR activities, managers must interpret the linkage between CSR and firm financial performance from the perspective of a specific industrial sector and acknowledge the importance of CSR practices across different CSR categories. Second, the findings suggest that CSR practices aiming at different stakeholder groups generate different financial returns in different industries. Firms engage in CSR to satisfy different stakeholder groups. When budgets are tight, managers may give higher priority to the CSR practices that have stronger effects on firm financial performance. Originality/value - This study advances our understanding of the CSR-financial performance relationship by exploring its heterogeneous nature across industry sectors and across specific categories. To obtain the biggest gain from CSR spending, managers must have a good understanding how a specific CSR category can contribute to the financial performance of their particular company in their particular industry.","PeriodicalId":44116,"journal":{"name":"American Journal of Business","volume":"3 1","pages":"106-133"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1000,"publicationDate":"2017-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"80","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"American Journal of Business","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1108/AJB-05-2016-0015","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"BUSINESS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 80

Abstract

Purpose - Despite the intensive research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and firm financial performance, little is known about how the linkage between CSR and firm financial performance is heterogeneous across industries and how the performance implications are differentiated among specific categories of CSR activities. The purpose of this paper is to explore how the association between a firm’s engagement in CSR and firm financial performance is heterogeneous across industries and CSR categories. Design/methodology/approach - Using a sample of 17,083 firm-year observations representing 1,877 firms from the largest 3,000 US companies during years 1991 and 2011, the authors compare the association between CSR and firm financial performance across ten industry sectors defined by Global Industry Classification Standard and across the four CSR categories classified by Mandl and Dorr (2007). Findings - The authors find that the association between the overall CSR activities and firm performance is heterogeneous across industries. CSR has significant positive implications for firms from most, but not all, industries. Comparing the performance implication of CSR practices targeting different stakeholder groups, the empirical results indicate that different types of CSR have different influences on financial performance of firms from different industry sectors. Research limitations/implications - This study provides new angles for managers in maximizing firm performance through CSR activities and suggests an important and interesting direction for researchers who engage in CSR research. Due to its heterogeneous nature, the CSR-performance relationship needs to be examined more specifically – across industries and different CSR categories. Findings from studies incorporating both company industrial sector and CSR categories would provide more meaningful and practical implications for managers. Practical implications - This study provides important managerial implications. First, to maximize firm performance through CSR activities, managers must interpret the linkage between CSR and firm financial performance from the perspective of a specific industrial sector and acknowledge the importance of CSR practices across different CSR categories. Second, the findings suggest that CSR practices aiming at different stakeholder groups generate different financial returns in different industries. Firms engage in CSR to satisfy different stakeholder groups. When budgets are tight, managers may give higher priority to the CSR practices that have stronger effects on firm financial performance. Originality/value - This study advances our understanding of the CSR-financial performance relationship by exploring its heterogeneous nature across industry sectors and across specific categories. To obtain the biggest gain from CSR spending, managers must have a good understanding how a specific CSR category can contribute to the financial performance of their particular company in their particular industry.
企业社会责任与企业财务绩效:跨行业、跨企业社会责任类别的比较分析
目的-尽管对企业社会责任(CSR)和企业财务绩效进行了深入的研究,但对于企业社会责任和企业财务绩效之间的联系在不同行业中是如何异质的,以及绩效影响如何在特定类别的企业社会责任活动中区分开来,人们知之甚少。本文的目的是探讨企业参与企业社会责任与企业财务绩效之间的关系在不同行业和企业社会责任类别之间是如何异质的。设计/方法/方法-使用1991年至2011年期间美国最大的3000家公司中代表1877家公司的17083个公司年度观察样本,作者比较了全球行业分类标准定义的十个行业和Mandl和Dorr(2007)划分的四个CSR类别中企业社会责任与企业财务绩效之间的关系。研究发现——作者发现,企业社会责任活动与企业绩效之间的关系在不同行业存在异质性。企业社会责任对大多数(但不是全部)行业的企业具有显著的积极影响。比较不同利益相关者群体的企业社会责任实践对企业绩效的影响,实证结果表明,不同类型的企业社会责任对不同行业企业财务绩效的影响不同。研究局限/启示——本研究为管理者通过企业社会责任活动最大化企业绩效提供了新的视角,并为从事企业社会责任研究的研究者提出了一个重要而有趣的方向。由于企业社会责任的异质性,企业社会责任与绩效的关系需要进行更具体的研究——跨行业和不同的企业社会责任类别。结合公司工业部门和企业社会责任类别的研究结果将为管理者提供更有意义和实际的启示。实际意义-这项研究提供了重要的管理意义。首先,为了通过企业社会责任活动最大化企业绩效,管理者必须从特定行业部门的角度解释企业社会责任与企业财务绩效之间的联系,并认识到跨不同企业社会责任类别的企业社会责任实践的重要性。其次,研究结果表明,针对不同利益相关者群体的企业社会责任实践在不同行业产生不同的财务回报。企业参与企业社会责任是为了满足不同的利益相关者群体。当预算紧张时,管理者可能会优先考虑对公司财务绩效有更强影响的企业社会责任实践。原创性/价值——本研究通过探索企业社会责任与财务绩效之间跨行业和跨特定类别的异质性,加深了我们对企业社会责任与财务绩效关系的理解。为了从企业社会责任支出中获得最大的收益,管理者必须很好地了解特定的企业社会责任类别如何有助于其特定行业中特定公司的财务绩效。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
求助全文
约1分钟内获得全文 求助全文
来源期刊
自引率
0.00%
发文量
3
×
引用
GB/T 7714-2015
复制
MLA
复制
APA
复制
导出至
BibTeX EndNote RefMan NoteFirst NoteExpress
×
提示
您的信息不完整,为了账户安全,请先补充。
现在去补充
×
提示
您因"违规操作"
具体请查看互助需知
我知道了
×
提示
确定
请完成安全验证×
copy
已复制链接
快去分享给好友吧!
我知道了
右上角分享
点击右上角分享
0
联系我们:info@booksci.cn Book学术提供免费学术资源搜索服务,方便国内外学者检索中英文文献。致力于提供最便捷和优质的服务体验。 Copyright © 2023 布克学术 All rights reserved.
京ICP备2023020795号-1
ghs 京公网安备 11010802042870号
Book学术文献互助
Book学术文献互助群
群 号:481959085
Book学术官方微信