Towards an internal change management perspective of CSR: evidence from project RESPONSE on the sources of cognitive alignment between managers and their stakeholders, and their implications for social performance

This paper aims to juxtapose two separate perspectives on CSR in terms of their ability to explain the cognitive alignment between managers and stakeholder on what constitutes the social responsibility of the focal firm, and to explain social performance. The first perspective is the stakeholder engagement one, which has historically characterized the debate on CSR. The second one focuses on the internal change processes required to integrate CSR in the firm’s operations. We leverage on data from 427 interviews, of which 209 with managers and 219 with stakeholders of 19 multinational firms in 8 sectors, to assess (a) the extent of cognitive alignment between managers and stakeholders on the conceptualization of CSR for the relevant firm, (b) which of the two theoretical perspectives is connected with the degree of cognitive alignment, and (c) which of the two is connected with the perception of corporate social performance (CSP). The data examined shows no evidence that the degree of sophistication in stakeholder engagement practices is connected with neither the magnitude of cognitive gaps, nor the level of CSP; whereas the degree of integration in internal operations is connected with both narrower cognitive gaps and higher CSP.