Logistic - Food Supply Chain by Louise Manning - Article Example

? Logistic-Food Supply Chain Table of Contents Introduction 3 Summary 3 Review & Evaluate 3 Conclusion 7 References 8 Introduction Louise Manning discussed about the interaction between consumer social responsibilities strategies and corporate social responsibility strategies in logistic-food supply chain in the article titled “Corporate and consumers social responsibility in the food supply chain”; published by Emerald Group. The author’s thesis statement is “Organizations need to identify that their corporate social responsibility activities should remain harmonizing with the consumer social responsibility activities in order to improve or maintain customer loyalty and market share”. Summary The purpose of the author is to analyze the interaction between consumer social responsibility and corporate social responsibility strategies and contribute to the theory building approach by establishing an interaction model. The author included a detailed literature review in this research. In addition to this, he developed a CSR/CNSR interaction model for logistic-food chain. CSR is specifically an organo-centric response to a specific series of key supply chain drivers. It generally promotes effective use of resources and product or corporate differentiation in a competitive market place. In case of change in consumer engagement or lack of consumer engagement, the corporate social responsibility can be considered as of limited value to the organization. The author have summarized that several recent economic drivers have influenced the consumer social responsibility behaviour with the consumerism constituent rather than caring constituent of consumer social responsibility playing major role. According to the author, the organizations should determine that their CSR activities should remain similar with the CNSR activities as it will help the organization to maintain and improve customer loyalty and market share. This specific research is of academic value and specific value of policy practitioners and policy makers in the logistic-food supply chain. The article has summarized that the organizations should mull over the influence of CNSR associated with the services and products of the organization in the refinement and development of corporate social responsibility strategies. Review & Evaluate The author expertly portrayed the concept of corporate social responsibility and consumer social responsibility. Corporate social responsibility is the concept that defines how an organization integrate environmental and social concerns in its business operations and how the interact with its stakeholders depending on this integration on a voluntary basis. The author expertly asserted that significance interest in corporate social responsibility benchmarking for environmental and social performance led to the increase in codes and guidelines of practice in food supply chain management. Organizations used to implement CSR activities in order to bring sustainability in business through several sustainable business practices, such as employee engagement in decision making, customer loyalty, green business operation strategy, proper financial disclosure and maintain relation with the stakeholders according to the business or corporate culture. It is important for a food manufacturing and distributing organization to ensure the quality of food products. It will help the organization to maintain good relationship with the external stakeholders as effective interaction of profitability strategy, and sustainable manufacturing and distribution strategy can help an organization to maintain good reputation among the customers and other external stakeholders. He used various CSR models in this article to prove that effective corporate social responsibility activities can help an organization to improve its business performance and mitigate several internal or external challenges. The authors used appropriate methods to gather effective evidenced in order to prove his thesis statement. First of all the use of corporate social performance model by the author proved that the aspects and impacts of corporate social performance are measured in order to review and determine the actual performance of an organization. Figure 1: Corporate Social Performance Model Source: (Wood, 2010, p.21) It can be stated from the above figure that there are several principles of social responsibility, such as public responsibility and managerial direction. There are several process of social responsiveness, such as environmental scanning, stakeholder management and public affair management. Lastly, there are various impacts and outcomes of social performance, such as effect on institutions and social systems, effects on physical and natural environment, and effects on organization and its people (Fischer and Hartmann, 2010, p.33). This figure suggests that an organization should consider public responsibility. It is true that the organizations implement several types of unique business strategies in order to increase profitability. But, the business outcome should relate with the welfare of society. Significance care for society and potential customers can help an organization to attain effective customer loyalty that can help an organization to increase the profitability of that organization. The management of the organizations should develop strategies and undertake decisions depending on the business ethics. Green business strategy, effective relationship with stakeholders can help an organization to get positive and desired business outcome. The author argued that organizational reputation and product differentiation are key elements of branding. Branding is considered as an intangible asset for an organization. Branding is used in business as a differentiation device. It has been argued by the author that several organizations are using their specific corporate characters in a competitive market environment where the organizations find it difficult to differentiate their products. According to Louise Manning the brand value of an organization is becoming closer to the overall organizational behaviour. Figure 2: Brand value and Stakeholder Expectation Source: (Manning, 2007, p.13) Brand value along with the organizational behaviour and business performance is not only influencing the customers but also motivating the stakeholders to take interest in the organization. The author provided an example that retail firms in Europe are using several private label brands in order to indicate the quality of products and services, and provide effective service differentiation (Bunte, 2009, p.186). Corporate social responsibility has a significant contribution in the brand value of an organization. Several leading organizations are developing and implementing valuable CSR strategies to bring sustainability in business. In addition to this, CSR activities help an organization to increase profitability. Employee engagement, customer loyalty, quality of products and services, and effective stakeholder management can help an organization to improve its brand value which can attract the target customer towards the brand. The author implemented a used a CSR model in the article in order to prove that Organizations need to identify that their corporate social responsibility activities should remain harmonizing with the consumer social responsibility activities in order to improve or maintain customer loyalty and market share. Figure 3: Strategic CSR Activities Source: (Bhattachary, 2010, p.33) Generally organizations take corporate social responsibility initiatives in order to differentiate product offerings and influence the customers to purchase the products. Food manufacturing and distributing organizations are focusing on develop a potential customer base for their products and services through several social responsible strategies. It is important for the organizations to implement several CSR strategies as it will help the organization to increase its profitability and social reputation (Macdonald, 2013, p.92). The author provided an example in his article that in UK more than 80 percent respondents in a survey replied that organizations should focus on social initiatives to achieve benefits from business operations. According to the author CSR activities in each and every business functions can help organization to mitigate financial and legal risks. It is true that lack of sustainable business practices and focusing only on business profit rather than social contribution can force the customers to switch over the brand. In an addition, the organization can face difficulty in motivating the external and internal stakeholders to take interest in that particular organization (Ruben, 2007, p.87). The author effectively concluded after using several evidences in the study that corporate social responsibility strategies should be implemented by an organization along with consumer social responsibility strategies. The consumer social responsibility strategies are important to consider by a food supply organizations as the customers are considered as major business growth driver. Looking into these aspects, change in market demand and needs of customers several organizations are focusing on effective customer loyalty and engagement in their corporate culture. CRM is an effective adoption and implementation of business strategies that help a service or product providing organization to retain its potential existing customers (Ondersteijn, Hurine and Kooten, 2006, p.194). In addition to this, advanced CRM software can help the organizations to acquire new target customers. Recently the food producing and distributing organizations are ensuring food safety in order to enhance consumerism. Consumer social responsibility is a part of corporate social responsibility strategies. In this present era of competitive business environment, several leading organizations within the food manufacturing and distributing industry are mainly focusing on quality of food products and customer loyalty. The evidence gathered by the author effectively denotes that food supply chain organization should ensure CNSR activities along with CSR activities in order to gain all kind of social recognition. The author developed a logical argument on the thesis statement. Louis Manning supported the significance of consumer social responsibility along with the corporate social responsibility strategies in the business process. It is true that global business environment is becoming highly competitive as several leading organizations are operating within it (Habisch, Jonker and Wenger 2005, p.327). In food and beverage industry, each and every organization is trying to adopt sustainable business strategies as this industry is considered as one of the sensitive industries in which inadequate quality of products and services can create a negative brand image and bad reputation of an organization. Practice of corporate social responsibilities and focusing on customer’s needs and market demand can help an organization to increase the profitability. In addition to this, sustainable business practices can help the organization to mitigate the possibilities of entire external and internal challenges and problems associated with business operations. The evidences and examples that are provided in the article are valid. It is known to all that governments in several developed and developing countries are motivating and forcing the food supply chain organization to focus on environmental scan, workplace management and public responsibilities. In addition to this, the demand for differentiated high quality food products and services is significantly increasing among the global customers. Therefore, it is important for the organizations to take desired and appropriate action plans to ensure business profitability. Focused consumer social responsibility strategies can help an organization to enhance customer relationship management (DeKryger, 2008, p.186). Relationship with customers of an organization strongly depends upon the quality or products or services that provided by the organizations and customer service which offered by the organization. The customers can switch over another brand if they are unhappy with the quality of products and customer services offered by a specific organization. It is rightly stated by the author that an organization needs to incorporate corporate social responsibility with consumer social responsibility in business operation in a food supply chain industry. Lastly, it can be stated that the author was successful in making her point. He provided appropriate evidences and examples in his article to prove his thesis statement. In addition to this, his logical discussion behind the evidences and use of arguments of several authors in the literature review make the readers understand about the topic. Corporate social responsibility and consumer social responsibility in food supply chain industry is a vast area to discuss. His brief analysis and evaluation on gathered information and evidences make the article quite valuable for the readers. Conclusion It is clear from above criticism that Louise Manning effectively pointed out all the discussions and evidences. Each and every discussions and points are acceptable and justified. An organization within a food supply chain industry has to go through several business operations in order to provide the products to end customers. The organization has to make sure strong relationship with government, suppliers, distributors, employees and end customers. Lack of stakeholder management can hamper the brand reputation and business performance. Therefore, it is important for an organization to implement forward and backward integration process in supply chain quite effectively. It is true that several organizations are focusing on sustainable business practices and several CSR initiatives. The author agreed that these types of business operation strategies are required for these organizations to maximize business profit. In addition to this, he stated that the organization should incorporate customer special responsibility strategy in business process to enhance CRM. It is rightly to do so as lack of customer engagement and loyalty can result business losses. The article of Louise Manning helped to gather effective information to draw a concise conclusion. The evidences and analysis which is used in the article that clearly proves that “Organizations need to identify that their corporate social responsibility activities should remain harmonizing with the consumer social responsibility activities in order to improve or maintain customer loyalty and market share”. References Bhattacharya, S., 2010. “Exploring the concept of strategic corporate social responsibility for an integrated perspective”. European Business Review, 22(1), p.33. Bunte, F., 2009. The Food Economy. New York: McGraw-Hill. DeKryger, T., 2008. Food Safety Standards as Corporate Social Responsibility. London: Proquest. Fischer, C., and Hartmann, M., 2010. Agri-food Chain relationships. New York: CABI. Habisch, A., Jonker, J., and Wenger, M., 2005. Corporate Social Responsibility across Europe. New York: Springer. Macdonald, R., 2013. Global Corporate Social Responsibility of Tesco. Munich: GRIN Verlag. Manning, L., 2007. “Corporate and consumer social responsibility in the food supply chain”. British Food Journal, 115(1), p.13. Ondersteijn, C., Hurine, R., and Kooten, O., 2006. Quantifying the Agri-Food Supply Chain. New York: Springer. Ruben, R., 2007. Topical Food Chains. London: Routledge. Wood, D., 2010. “Measuring Corporate Social Performance Review”. International Journal of Management Reviews, 12(1), pp. 17-21. Read More