Adoption of Corporate Social Reporting - Singapore Airlines - Research Proposal Example

A Study to Examine the Adoption of Corporate Social Reporting (CSR) of Singapore Airlines Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Acknowledgements It is often said that hard work and discipline are the most ascertained attributes needed to achieve success. I have ensured to employ wide research and be disciplined in my coming up with the different sections of this project. I cannot go on without noting that the road has not been smooth all through as I have been met with a set of different challenges that tended to drag me from completing the thesis successfully. To make sure that I complete the project on time; I realised the importance of engaging different stakeholders. My family and especially my elder sister has been very paramount in ensuring that before my commencement to other sections of the paper; that she would read and edit the document thoroughly owing to her vast experience. I would also like to further my appreciation to my immediate supervisor of the thesis. The supervisor has been indeed instrumental and committed through providing much of his time and effort despite having a rather busy timetable on his side. The fact that he has always pushed me hard to attain my level best while at the same time providing imminent direction on ways I could successfully manoeuvre through my challenges has really benefited and developed me as an MBA student. Title of Proposed Dissertation "A Study to Examine the Adoption of Corporate Social Reporting (CSR) of Singapore Airlines” 1.0 Introduction Singapore Airlines remains to be one of the most well-known performing airline company’s around the world. Having been established in 1947, it is Singapore’s immediate national passenger carrier. The Airline operates from Changi airport with flights serving the Asian and trans-Pacific routes. Since its inception the airline has managed to extend its operations in more than 35 countries across the globe. To better provide its immediate services, the airline has distinguished its delivery into luxury suites; first and; business class cabins. It also operates a successful economy class suite that remains to be one of the top notches in comparison to its immediate rivals. It is important to note that Singapore Airlines is a group that ventured into extended operations through its subsidiaries like SIA Engineering Co that handles its repair and maintenance operations in more than 9 countries. The Subsidiary serves both the Boeing and Rolls Royce brand of its fleet. SilkAir is its subsidiary that focuses on regional flights to most of the major secondary cities as Scoot and Tigerair is channelled towards operating low-cost and affordable low-passenger carriers. One of its overall popular achievements rests with the launch of the Airbus A380- which remains to be the world’s largest passenger carrier. 1.1 Research Hypothesis and Research Objectives 1.1.1 Research Hypothesis: The immediate adoption of corporate social responsibility mechanisms helps to cement the airline’s immediate relationship with its major stakeholders; both internal and external. 1.1.2 Research Objectives: To successfully identify the different forms of corporate social responsibility (CSR) that the airline engages in to positively influence relations with its stakeholders. To find out the commitments made by Singapore Airline to further its efforts on improving corporate social responsibility. To formulate suggestions aimed at improving Singapore Airline’s current level of corporate social responsibility strategies. 1.2 Definition and Importance of Studying Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is defined as the immediate efforts made by a company to treat its stakeholders in a rather ethical or for that matter responsible manner (Dahlsrud, 2008). It is aimed at the creation of a higher standard of living for these stakeholders while at the same time ensuring to preserve the profitability function of the company for both the internal and external set of stakeholder groups. In essence, it is concerned with a fundamental behaviour of corporations to ascertain their level of impact to surrounding communities for where its operations are conducted (Matten & Moon, 2008). A socially responsible corporation is perceived to be one that is engaged in executing profitable businesses that focuses on evaluating both positive and negative environmental, social and economic effects of its overall operations on the immediate societies. Research indicates that management team are always faced with the challenge of meeting different set of demands from different stakeholder in order to channel resources to activities related to corporate social responsibility (Luo & Bhattacharya, 2006). This level of pressure emanates from such important stakeholders as employees; customers; government agencies; community groups as well as suppliers. For that case, corporate ensure to adopt CSR in order to further their efforts on ensuring social good that goes over and beyond the immediate interests of a company and that is required by aspects related to rules and regulations. Most of the managers have for a long period, ensured to respond to the demands of stakeholder’s interest in corporate social responsibility in a rather positive manner through committing substantial amount of resources to further the efforts of the activity. In essence, a fundamental ratio behind this positive response lies in the immediate appreciation and recognition of numerous set of stakeholders that affect the operations of a company towards a successful path or not. On the contrary, some of the managers show insignificant level of perception of this stakeholder requirement. All the same, McWilliams and Siegel (2001) note that the efforts made to satisfy the different set of demands for CSR-related activities are the definite reason for perceiving all groups of stakeholders; both internal and external as being a crucial element in business success. 1.3 Research Structure This research paper has been divided into six main sections that include; Section 1, which focuses on the overall introduction of the paper. The section presents the research scope; motivation; research objectives and questions as well as the research hypothesis. Section 2 covers the literature review relating to adoption of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Section 3 focuses on methodology adopted in coming up with the recommendations set out to improve Singapore Airline’s CSR efforts. Section 4 provides the ethical statement related to the thesis paper. Moving forward, section 5 provides information related to the proposed timetable and outlines of the research project while the very last section is the references used in the numerous aforementioned section of the paper. 2.0 Literature Review There are a good number of reasons for companies choosing to engage in a given set of corporate social responsibility operations. To successfully measure the manner for which for CSR positively influences different stakeholders, this literature review will focus on ascertaining the level of corporate performances achieved while engaging in this rather noble activity. In essence, it seeks to explain what it means when a company is said to fully engage in social corporate responsibility practices. The level of efforts made to present the definition of a corporate social responsible is indeed a rather challenging affair since it involves the inclusion of numerous levels of issues. In fact, it can be successfully put forward that the components of a socially responsible firm can really vary in accordance with the distinct perspectives of different people (Campbell, 2007). There is a probability that individual managers might opt to apply a more or less objective criterion of acceptable behaviours that could create a benchmark for evaluating whether successful adoption of CSR has been achieved or not (Bondy, Moon & Matten, 2012). For instance, managers might solely focus the definition of a social responsibility of firm as that which strongly ensures to look out for the immediate remuneration needs of employees as opposed to the underlying cost of living as established by numerous independent organisations like the United Nations. Consequently, CSR can be defined as an activity that entities engage in that do not distort or alter the underlying environment as well as risk the health of surrounding communities as can be fairly established within the internationally-recognised standards of the environment (Campbell, 2007). On another important note, the definition can adopt a rather subjective perspective and thereby employ the different perspectives of stakeholders for which the company is associated with within any given moment. Research indicates that there are good numbers of dimensions that can be adopted for the purpose of identifying crucial components of socially-responsible company behaviour (Cheng, Ioannou, & Serafeim, 2014). Some of the most popular dimensions put forward for the purpose of measuring a socially responsible organisation relates to how it focuses on treating its overall employees in matters related to remuneration packages; benefits; as well as the degree of workplace safety models, the manner for which it treats overall customer base and especially in regards to product quality; honesty in the course of advertising products and services to this group and matters pricing (Cheng, Ioannou, & Serafeim, 2014). Aguinis and Glavas (2012), note that there are measurement models that would focus on identifying how an organisation treats its suppliers in relation to their capacity and willingness to commit to the existing agreements and show immediate obligation to informal commitments; how it focuses on engaging with the existing government agencies in place especially in regards to whether it conducts operations in accordance with the set out laws and regulations while ensuring not to suppress it instead; the manner for which it treats the surrounding societies, which can be portrayed by the manner for which it seeks to make charitable contributions and making stringent efforts not to alter the existing environment conditions (Rupp, Shao, Thornton & Skarlicki, 2013). In essence, it is ascertained that the corporations are perceived to be committed to matters related to social responsibility whenever it take precautions not to engage knowingly that could directly or indirectly harm their immediate level of stakeholders like investors; employees; customers and the local surrounding community (Aguinis & Glavas, 2012). It could also be seen whenever the same organisations focus and commit to rectifying a possible harm made to these stakeholders. The ability to rectify could relate to a voluntarily response to motivate the affected; this can take the form of moral suasion, normative pressure as well as engage in regulatory practices as deemed to counter possible further of the effects. There is extensive literature that seeks to find out the rationale behind a corporation’s choosing or not to engage in socially responsible behaviours (Brammer, Jackson & Matten, 2012). It is noted that corporations would desist from engaging in these socially-responsible behaviour for economic reasons. The immediate proponents of contractarian perspective assume that the interests of maximising profits and shareholders’ value should take precedence over CSR-related activities. In fact, they argue that the purpose of profit and shareholder value maximisation might result to organisations acting in ways that cannot meet the minimum expectations set out for social responsible behaviour (Brammer, Jackson & Matten, 2012). Of particular interest to note, the immediate extent for which CSR can be conducted provides that corporations that have a slightly weaker financial performance would not likely engage in socially responsible behaviours. This is attributed to the fact that less profitable corporations would definitely have a lower degree of resources that should be spared for CSR-related activities as opposed to those that are deemed to be much more profitable in nature. It thus goes without saying that corporations whose financial performance is deemed to be weak that they are exposed to a possibility of being exposed to possible serious losses and thereby, altering shareholder value would not be focuses on meeting the predetermined minimum threshold set out for attaining corporate social responsible manner (Brammer, Jackson & Matten, 2012). It therefore means that the management is set to think that the willingness to act in a socially responsible manner will thereby improve on their overall financial condition and that they are likely to get away with this presumption. Notably, corporations can enjoy a great stride of competitive advantage over their immediate set of competition by adopting corporate social responsible behaviours. Corporations can also engage in CSR-related activities out of institutional conditions. In this era of globalisation, the immediate ability and willingness to shift investments and overall production from a single regulatory platform to the other has successfully improved (Baumann-Pauly, Wickert, Spence, & Scherer, 2013). It is a fact that whenever national governments does not need to lose possible local investment and production processess hence are compelled to ease business regulations that are aimed at triggering a socially-responsible corporate mechanism. For most cases however; this does not happen in a smooth manner especially since corporations would not willingly adopt the imposed regulations but might seek to have a control of these regulators and bend them towards their immediate level. Institutional factors have helped to define and thus, inform global markets especially in regards to the overall nature of the firm; organisation of underlying market processess and the overall integration and incorporation of control systems (Flammer, 2013). Research indicates that the nature of the firm is highly attributed to the institutional mechanisms put forth by fundamental structural features of a corporation model. It is directly influenced by such components as the level for which private entities can control underlying economic processess; the degree for which immediate shareholders permit management to conduct operations of the entity as well as overall organisational abilities to respond to possible alterations and differentiated set of demands (Flammer, 2013). As a result of this factor; corporations would enjoy a wider range of relationships with the existing societal stakeholders. Markedly, a decisive aspect that relates to the economic situations that exist between stakeholders that are deemed to be organised and coordinated as it relate to aspects of both markets and alliances. The aforementioned characteristic attributes of both market and alliances incorporate the level of long-term cooperation between corporations in a give sector; the immediate role of intermediaries in setting up distinct market transactions while making sure to uphold trust in the course of formulating these transactions (Flammer, 2013). It is important to note that the manner for which these relations are coordinated helps to address a substantial number of corporate social responsibility issues like consumer protection, product stewardship and, also the immediate liability of production and products. A Conceptual Understanding Notable Differences in Corporate Social Responsibility Primarily, there are two forms of CSR-explicit and implicit. For the case of an explicit CSR, it is ascertained that corporations engage in formulation of policies that fairly-well adopt and articulates the responsibility aspects for the purpose of societal interests (Crane, Matten & Spence, 2013). It certainly involves voluntary initiatives as well as strategies put forward by corporations that help integrate both social and business value while at the same time ensure that is socially-responsible to the needs of the surrounding communities upon where it operates (Crane, Matten & Spence, 2013). The underlying argument rest with the fact that explicit corporate social responsibility is highly reflected on corporate discretion as opposed to matters that reflect either governmental authority or even wider formal and informal entities. Subsequently, implicit CSR is directly involved with a corporation’s immediate role in aspects of both formal and informal institutions that reflect clearly on the society’s immediate interest and concerns (Kitzmueller & Shimshack, 2012). It should be noted that implicit CSR is composed on such crucial components as the values; rules and regulations that would help direct a corporations’ handling of different stakeholder’s issues and that seek to lay out proper commitment of corporate actors in overall collective as opposed to personal terms. In the modern literature reviews, it is established that the notion related to explicit as opposed to implicit corporate social responsibility has continued to gain intensive momentum amongst different corporations (Kitzmueller & Shimshack, 2012). This has been done effectively using different mechanisms that include; New Institutionalism Model/Theory This model provides a clear and concise conceptual perspective for easier comprehension of explicit processes. It is a model that has been fairly-developed using the distinct homogenisation of the institutional environment within and without the national boundaries and, it goes far beyond to showcase the regulation, normative and cognitive processess hence resulting to a standardised practice in different corporations (Kitzmueller & Shimshack, 2012). Under this model framework, corporation practices can be altered and transform to an institutionalised component since it is perceived as legitimate aspect altogether. Moving forward, it is crucial to note that the legitimacy of this model is upheld and triggered by three fundamental processes that include; I. Coercive Isomorphism This process ascertains that neo-institutionalism is indeed externally codified rules and regulations that help promote legitimacy to existing and new management practices. There is substantial level of research that indicates that in Europe and Asia, most corporations have ensured to quickly incorporate unique governmental strategies and programs thereby prompting its spread across different boundaries and corporations around the globe (Matten & Moon, 2008).. Notwithstanding, corporations can be seen to engage in self-regulatory and voluntary programs as well as codes of conduct that are formulated and well-laid for adoption by such important international bodies like UN, International Labour Organisations(ILO) and the Global Reporting Initiative, which are extensions of isomorphism. In addition to this, the capacity to comply with specific environmental standards like ISO 14000 that are mostly supply chain triggered calls for corporations to adopt workable corporate social responsibility policies (Asif, Searcy, Zutshi & Fisscher, 2013). The current shift to socially responsible investment indexes further incorporates newer drivers for organisations in order to formulate explicit CSR policies for purposes of accessing imminent sources of capital amongst different borrowers within the overall operational environment. II. Mimetic Processess The fact that the current operational environment is marred with a great number of uncertainty and sophisticated technologies; the management are left with no choice but to perceive practices as being legitimate in the event that they deemed to be best practices within their production sector like TQM (Saeidi & Sofian, 2015). Some of the most notable processess related to mimetic can be seen in the recent increase in the number of businesses forming coalitions like CSR Europe as well as adopting to extensive CSR training programs for purposes of further developing notable best CSR practices. 3.0 Methodology section 3.1 Research Design Quantitave Research The focus of this will incorporate quantitative research methodology. This mode of research will invoke the use of both surveys and employee-based questionnaires. It is crucial to indicate that quantitave research highly calls for participants to make their opinions in a more structured for the purpose of obtaining distinct and reliable end results (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). It makes sure to incorporate a substantial amount of participants that fairly-well represent the overall targeted population. Quantitave research incorporates a process that clearly obtains and verifies already set out hypothesis about different notions and quantity variations as long as measurable informational data is involved (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). Qualitative Research Qualitative research refers to a scientific research technique that focuses on the exploration of such important components as phenomenon, which is directly involved with preliminary investigations, and it is mostly adopted in the course of assessing research problems, opinions and notions that directly affects the underlying local parties (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). For most cases, qualitative research will tend to expound on relationships using open-ended questionnaires (Patton, 1990). It is important to note the notion of qualitative research sets to adopt approaches that focuses on unstructured or even semi-structured that are administered to a significantly smaller sample size to represent the thoughts of a larger population as a whole. Some of the most common qualitative research methods integrate observations; individual interviews and the use of focus groups. For the case of the SIA CSR adoption case, the research adopts a mixed method approach. This is attributed to the fact that the research study is focused on identifying the different CSR practices being engaged by SIA as envisaged by different stakeholders that are fairly represented by employees who are the most known primary stakeholder and focus groups that represent external stakeholders. The research seeks to formulate and administer research questionnaires to these participants in order to ascertain the level of CSR integration in SIA. The questionnaire is set to have at least 30 questions that will be administered to 50 respondents, which will be divided into 20 employees and 5 focus groups made of 6 members each. It is crucial to understand that the two aforementioned methodologies will serve as a platform for quantitative research while the literature review section will form the source of qualitative data needed for conducting data analysis for the paper (Chao, 1982). Notably, the research participants will be selected using a well-laid sampling framework. A sampling mechanism is put in place to ensure that a list of participants that can be selected is entirely a reflection of the overall scope and structure of the studies in place (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). In essence, in coming up with the sample size, the study adopted a random sample type that selected employees and, also focus groups that are ascertained to be directly related to the activities of Singapore Airlines. In the course of investigation of the study, the respondents were made to answer the questionnaires that were sent directly to their electronic mail platforms while the focus groups did so through a series of interviews (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). As far as the questionnaires are concerned, it is encouraged that they are structured in a simple and clear manner so that the respondents do not face a challenge in answering them. Another important element to discern while conducting this research study questionnaires rest with the fact that the researcher involved should seek to ascertain whether open or closed or even both forms of questions should be used. For this study, the questions that will be administered to both participants will encompass a mixture of the two forms. Closed-ended questions will only require that they respond on a simple Yes/No basis while for the open-ended questionnaires, the respondents will be required to provide personal opinions on how they perceive the corporation at hand: SIA, has either managed to failed to incorporate corporate policies that extends towards meeting the underlying societal needs (Taylor, Bogdan & DeVault, 2015). In fact, it will be important that the respondents are allowed the freedom to provide suggestions and recommendations on which areas that they feel Singapore Airlines should focus on; in order to improve on their handling of societal needs. This information would be a crucial to the research analysis especially in ascertaining the degree and pace for which certain suggestions should be considered and implemented in comparison to other assumed recommendations already formulated by the researcher at the onset of conducting the research analysis. 4.0 Ethical Statement In the course of conducting this research study, the researchers will ensure to secure the personal identity and other related information accordance with privacy policies. Certainly, integrity and transparency will be the core components that will be form the guideline while conducting both data collection and analysis; meaning that at single point will information will be manipulated to result to a certain pre-determined outcome. Respondents will not be coerced into favouring certain areas of the company hence resulting to poor and fixed outcomes. The questionnaires will be deemed to be a professional representation of the entire study analysis. Thank you for your commitment in ensuring the study is a success. Section5 - Proposed Timetable and Outlines of the Research Project Time(week Project 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Literature Review ★ ★ ★ ★ Survey Design ★ ★ Survey Pre-testing ★ ★ Data Collection ★ ★ Analysis Data ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Report Writing ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Submission ★ References Aguinis, H., & Glavas, A. (2012). What we know and don’t know about corporate social responsibility a review and research agenda. Journal of management, 38(4), 932-968. Asif, M., Searcy, C., Zutshi, A., & Fisscher, O. A. (2013). An integrated management systems approach to corporate social responsibility. Journal of Cleaner Production, 56, 7-17. Brammer, S., Jackson, G., & Matten, D. (2012). Corporate social responsibility and institutional theory: New perspectives on private governance. Socio-Economic Review, 10(1), 3-28. Baumann-Pauly, D., Wickert, C., Spence, L. J., & Scherer, A. G. (2013). Organizing corporate social responsibility in small and large firms: Size matters. Journal of Business Ethics, 115(4), 693-705. Bondy, K., Moon, J., & Matten, D. (2012). An institution of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in multi-national corporations (MNCs): Form and implications. Journal of Business Ethics, 111(2), 281-299. Campbell, J. L. (2007). Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? An institutional theory of corporate social responsibility. Academy of management Review, 32(3), 946-967. Chao, M. T. (1982). A general purpose unequal probability sampling plan. Biometrika, 69(3), 653-656. Crane, A., Matten, D., & Spence, L. J. (2013). Corporate social responsibility in a global context. Chapter in: Crane, A., Matten, D., and Spence, LJ,'Corporate Social Responsibility: Readings and Cases in a Global Context, 2, 3-26. Cheng, B., Ioannou, I., & Serafeim, G. (2014). Corporate social responsibility and access to finance. Strategic Management Journal, 35(1), 1-23. Dahlsrud, A. (2008). How corporate social responsibility is defined: an analysis of 37 definitions. Corporate social responsibility and environmental management, 15(1), 1-13. Flammer, C. (2013). Corporate social responsibility and shareholder reaction: The environmental awareness of investors. Academy of Management Journal, 56(3), 758-781. Kitzmueller, M., & Shimshack, J. (2012). Economic perspectives on corporate social responsibility. Journal of Economic Literature, 50(1), 51-84. Luo, X., & Bhattacharya, C. B. (2006). Corporate social responsibility, customer satisfaction, and market value. Journal of marketing, 70(4), 1-18. Matten, D., & Moon, J. (2008). “Implicit” and “explicit” CSR: a conceptual framework for a comparative understanding of corporate social responsibility. Academy of management Review, 33(2), 404-424. McWilliams, A., & Siegel, D. (2001). Corporate social responsibility: A theory of the firm perspective. Academy of management review, 26(1), 117-127. Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative evaluation and research methods. SAGE Publications, Inc. Rupp, D. E., Shao, R., Thornton, M. A., & Skarlicki, D. P. (2013). Applicants' and employees' reactions to corporate social responsibility: The moderating effects of first‐party justice perceptions and moral identity. Personnel Psychology, 66(4), 895-933. Saeidi, S. P., Sofian, S., Saeidi, P., Saeidi, S. P., & Saaeidi, S. A. (2015). How does corporate social responsibility contribute to firm financial performance? The mediating role of competitive advantage, reputation, and customer satisfaction. Journal of Business Research, 68(2), 341-350. Taylor, S. J., Bogdan, R., & DeVault, M. (2015). Introduction to qualitative research methods: A guidebook and resource. John Wiley & Sons. Read More