Effects of Internal CSR Activities on Social Performance: The Employee Perspective

Mavis Adu-Gyamfi, Zheng He, Gabriel Nyame, Seth Boahen and Michelle Frempomaa Frempong
Additional contact information
Mavis Adu-Gyamfi: School of Management and Economics (SME), Qingshuihe Campus, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
Zheng He: Centre for West African Studies, Qingshuihe Campus, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
Gabriel Nyame: School of Information and Software Engineering, Qingshuihe Campus, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
Seth Boahen: Department of Supply Chain and Decision Sciences, School of Business, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi 00233, Ghana
Michelle Frempomaa Frempong: School of Management and Economics (SME), Qingshuihe Campus, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 11, 1-28

Abstract: Corporate social responsibility (CSR) continues to receive greater attention in the current business world. Many studies on CSR focus on manufacturing or industrial companies by examining external CSR activities from external stakeholders’ perceptions. However, academic institutions such as higher education institutions (HEIs) remain highly unexplored in the context of internal corporate social responsibility (ICSR). Employees are the most valuable and vital assets for every business organization. Therefore, this study focuses on CSR’s internal dimensions to determine its impact on social performance in HEIs in Ghana. Recognizing the social exchange theory (SET), we specifically examined the effects of five internal CSR dimensions (i.e., health and safety, human rights, training and development, workplace diversity, and work-life balance) on social performance. We used a multi-case approach to assess internal CSR activities in private and public Ghanaian universities. We purposely selected three public universities and one private university because of their varying contexts and academic mandates. We used structured questionnaires to collect data from both teaching and non-teaching staff of the selected universities. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to assess the data. We found that health and safety, workplace diversity, and training and development positively and significantly impact social performance. At the same time, human rights and work-life balance have an insignificant effect on social performance. Thus, ICSR practices have a substantial influence on both employees’ and organization’s performance, and hence this study gives important implications for both researchers and practitioners

Keywords: internal CSR; social performance; employees; higher education institutions; universities; social exchange theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/11/6235/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/11/6235/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:11:p:6235-:d:566930

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().