A concern to mankind for many years has been social responsibility. But over the last two decades, it has gained immense importance in the business world. The growing interaction between the government, businesses and the society as a whole is the result. In the past, businesses were only concerned about making profits and minimizing their costs. Their sole motive was only linked with economic decisions. But today, businesses reflect on the legal, ethical, moral and social consequences of their decisions. The maintenance of high ethical standards in the business field and social corporate responsibility is not an option these days. It is rather an obligation for all businesses.
The amount of funds that a company donates to charity is no longer the definition of social corporate responsibility. The definition of the term today is, “its overall involvement in activities that improve the quality of people’s lives”. In the international business community, the term has come up as a significant subject matter. It is slowly progressing as a mainstream business activity. The workforce, clientele, the environment, investors, business associates, the society, competitors, the government, shareholders, customers and other groups related to a company are affected by the activities of the private sector. Taking into account the effect that organizations have on the entire globe while making business decisions, it is progressively clear that organizations can contribute to individual wealth and to the overall community.
On the other hand, ethics are related to the involvement of actions that are morally upright. The fact that most of the activities companies are engaged in do not meet the required ethical standards is common knowledge, such as taking shortcuts, lying to hide mistakes, bad mouthing colleagues, taking low value items, etc. This is mainly because majority of the businesses aim for profit maximization and do not cater to the needs of the society. Due to the sheer number of people involved, business ethics is an upcoming issue in the near future. An example of the same could be the firing of some employees just to keep the profit margin high, which is very unethical. Even though the company is suffering a loss, firing its employees means that those people and their families are going to suffer for a long time. Companies, young and old must always follow the legal demands of the country in which they operate in. Companies have a corporate responsibility of serving the society, their product or service must benefit the society. Profit making should not be the sole objective of the business. Looting people’s money for a
product or a service which is of no use is unethical. In fact, companies must work to make the
society a better place to live in.
Corporate responsibility is a vital element for all business organizations. There are many different areas where a company could choose to show its responsibility, such as, the environment, health, education, employment and nutrition. These elements not only portray the responsibility of the company towards the society, but also bring light to the ethical standards of the company. Thus, it can be concluded that corporate responsibility and high ethical standards is not an option, but an obligation for all types of businesses.