Читать книгу Corporate Innovation Strategies - Nacer Gasmi - Страница 11

Today, companies feel “almost” obliged to reconsider, indirectly, the way they relate to their internal and external stakeholders. They are increasingly exposed to risks in terms of image (as an institution), legislation (environmental and social risks) and competitiveness, if they do not behave in a way that is acceptable to these stakeholders. Some companies have developed CSR strategies based on creating shared value (CSV) without this being an entirely voluntary or a spontaneous act, but many other companies have only “woken up” after being surprised by the reactions of hard and soft power stakeholders, to issues they had not previously considered as part of their job responsibilities (Porter and Kramer 2010). The relationship between the company and its stakeholders should therefore not be analyzed as a relationship of agency, but as a relationship of dependence on the resources they hold (Quairel and Auberger 2005). This dependence subordinates the firm to the stakeholders and asserts that its sustainability depends on its ability to manage their demands and, above all, on those whose resources and support are decisive for its survival (Pfeffer and Salancik 1978). Managers do not have the same attention for all these institutional stakeholders, who depend on legitimacy, power and urgency (Mitchell et al. 1997) and on the interest they may have in the acceptable behavior of the firm. The company’s actions are deemed “acceptable” according to criteria adopted by these stakeholders, who hold resources that can make the company vulnerable through the various pressures exerted on it, in order to ensure that it reduces the negative caused by its activities. CSR is therefore a means of mitigating and avoiding these pressures. The strategic approach may lead the firm to think of its relationship with society as a form of implicit contract. This contract may sometimes be forcefully recalled by institutional arrangements embodied by the stakeholders of soft power and hard power.