Will CSR be the cause of its own extinction?

New research into CSR shows that the more successful it becomes, the less likely it is to exist in its current form.

The report, A World in Trust: Leaders and Corporate Responsibility, was released this month by Echo Research and the International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF).

It found that 96% of the business leaders it survey believed that sustainability needed to be integrated into strategies and operations. Consequently, CSR departments are in 'steady decline'.

This is a far cry from research carried out by the Echo in 2000, in which only 11% of CEOs believed CSR was integral to commercial success.

The research report quotes The Economist, saying: "In a growing number of companies CSR comes close to being embedded in the business, influencing decisions on everything from sourcing to strategy. These may also be the places where talented people will most want to work. The more this happens, ironically, the more the days of CSR may start to seem numbered.

"In time it will simply be the way business is done in the 21st century. 'My job is to design myself out of a job,' says one company's head of corporate responsibility."

In this way, CSR has something in common with campaigning or charitable causes. The ultimate aim of both of these is to put themselves out of business. If this is what happens to corporate responsibility then it will have succeeded. The more that CSR activities are adopted as part of mainstream business practice the more effective they will be.

This report shows how business leaders have embraced CSR over the last decade, believing it to inspire trust and spark innovation.

Driven by the benefits of CSR, CEOs are now taking much more responsibility in tackling the difficult issues it throws up. One said:"We used to have a perhaps naïve approach that said, if you look at our environmental impact, we were not necessarily sure how much we could influence it or change it, because we are not a manufacturer. I think that that has changed significantly; I think that there is a much stronger consciousness of what is the role of our business as it relates to climate change and what kind of impact can we actually have on the issue."
In this recession-battered world, CSR provides a source of optimism, with business leaders believing that it will ultimately give rise to a more responsible economy. There is also, seemingly an understanding that improved financial results due to sustainability are a long-term aspiration.

A long as CEOs don't take their eye off the ball, and remember the long-term goal, the shape of CSR could end up changing for the better. In 20 years' time we may no longer need to talk of CSR strategies as they will be at the heart of every business.

Photo credit: [F]oxymoron