Skip to main content

LUP Student Papers

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Involving While Evolving: A case study of Alfa Laval’s internal CSR communication

Power, Jenny LU (2019) SKOM12 20191
Department of Strategic Communication
Abstract (Swedish)
There is an increasing need for companies to showcase and communicate their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives to stakeholders, yet the majority of former research on CSR communication provides little insight into how CSR is communicated to internal stakeholders. This thesis aims to understand from an employee and managerial perspective how a Swedish CSR frontrunner communicates its CSR efforts to internal stakeholders and how the company uses internal CSR communication to involve its employees in CSR initiatives. The material was gathered through interviews with 15 employees and managers from Alfa Laval, a Swedish multinational manufacturing company. By using the Stakeholder Participation Typology and the Stakeholder CSR... (More)
There is an increasing need for companies to showcase and communicate their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives to stakeholders, yet the majority of former research on CSR communication provides little insight into how CSR is communicated to internal stakeholders. This thesis aims to understand from an employee and managerial perspective how a Swedish CSR frontrunner communicates its CSR efforts to internal stakeholders and how the company uses internal CSR communication to involve its employees in CSR initiatives. The material was gathered through interviews with 15 employees and managers from Alfa Laval, a Swedish multinational manufacturing company. By using the Stakeholder Participation Typology and the Stakeholder CSR strategies as a theoretical framework in the analysis, the findings reveal that the company’s CSR communication is quite weak, as employee awareness of CSR initiatives is limited to the environmental aspects of CSR, mostly in relation to the products. It is also shown that employee participation in CSR activities is for the most part on an informative level. Alfa Laval tends to use one-way communication rather than entering into dialogue with employees regarding CSR decisions and initiatives. The study concludes that the company needs to adopt a different CSR communication strategy internally to reap the benefits of one of its most important stakeholder groups, employees. It also provides valuable implications on how multinationals can use internal CSR communication effectively and benefit from increased employee participation in CSR initiatives. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Power, Jenny LU
supervisor
organization
course
SKOM12 20191
year
type
H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
subject
keywords
CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability, UN Sustainable Development Goals, SDGs, Employee Awareness, Employee Involvement, Internal Communication, CSR Communication, Internal CSR Communication, Alfa Laval
language
English
id
8993724
date added to LUP
2019-11-07 11:27:41
date last changed
2019-11-07 11:27:41
@misc{8993724,
  abstract     = {{There is an increasing need for companies to showcase and communicate their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives to stakeholders, yet the majority of former research on CSR communication provides little insight into how CSR is communicated to internal stakeholders. This thesis aims to understand from an employee and managerial perspective how a Swedish CSR frontrunner communicates its CSR efforts to internal stakeholders and how the company uses internal CSR communication to involve its employees in CSR initiatives. The material was gathered through interviews with 15 employees and managers from Alfa Laval, a Swedish multinational manufacturing company. By using the Stakeholder Participation Typology and the Stakeholder CSR strategies as a theoretical framework in the analysis, the findings reveal that the company’s CSR communication is quite weak, as employee awareness of CSR initiatives is limited to the environmental aspects of CSR, mostly in relation to the products. It is also shown that employee participation in CSR activities is for the most part on an informative level. Alfa Laval tends to use one-way communication rather than entering into dialogue with employees regarding CSR decisions and initiatives. The study concludes that the company needs to adopt a different CSR communication strategy internally to reap the benefits of one of its most important stakeholder groups, employees. It also provides valuable implications on how multinationals can use internal CSR communication effectively and benefit from increased employee participation in CSR initiatives.}},
  author       = {{Power, Jenny}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Involving While Evolving: A case study of Alfa Laval’s internal CSR communication}},
  year         = {{2019}},
}