Abstract
This chapter presents elements of a student-faculty collaborative research that quantitatively examined the predictive relationships of retail employees' perceptions of corporate social responsibility (PCSR) and organizational identification (POI) on their perceptions of ethical organizational behavior (PEOB). One hundred and eighteen retail employees from 20 companies in the United States Virgin Islands (USVI) participated in an online survey. While no predictive relationship was found, the findings of this study identified significant relationships between retail employees PCSR, POI, and perceived ethical organizational behavior PEOB. The strongest association was discovered between PCSR and POI. Thus, this chapter spotlights a need for retail organizations to focus on the potential of employees' PSCR and POI in creating more authentic and responsible organizational environment.
TopBackground/Literature Review
There are global surges of research interests in corporate social responsibility (CSR), due to an increased demand for comprehensive knowledge by external organizational stakeholders (e.g., customers, society, government, managers, suppliers, creditors, shareholders). CSR knowledge is the awareness and understanding of an organization's CSR culture, initiatives, and engagement in positive contributions to society (Kim, 2019). CSR knowledge can also be defined as context-based information (internal and external) about organizational CSR acquired through experiences and observations (Kim, 2019). Lai, Yang and Wu (2015) affirmed that “increasing volume of research investigating CRS” is due to the “academic or practical values” of CRS knowledge (p. 554). As of 2018, there have been 2,386 publications in CSR from 100 countries (Low & Siegel, 2019, p. 8).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Organizational Ethics (OE): The values, standards, ideologies, and principles by which businesses operate.
Perceptions: the cognitive process of interpreting information, experiences, and events.
Stakeholders: Are persons or institutions that have an interest or concern in an organization (e.g., employees, customers, society, government, managers, suppliers, creditors, and shareholders).
Organizational Identification (OI): The sharing of goals and values between an organization and its shareholders.
Corporate Social Responsibility Knowledge: Context-based information about organizational CSR activities, experiences, and events.
Organizational Ethical Behavior (OEB): Application (activities) of ethics based on organizational standards, values, strategies, and protocols.
Perceived Corporate Social Responsibility (PCSR): The stakeholders’ perceptions of a business’ social responsibility perceptions.
Perceived Organizational Identification (POI): Stakeholders sharing goals and values with an organization, based on their perceptions.
Retail: The process of selling of goods to consumers.
Perceived Ethical Organizational Behavior (PEOB): Application (activities) of ethics based on stakeholders’ perceptions of organizational standards, values, strategies, and protocols.