Linking social responsibility activities to social responsibility strategies and determining their impacts to the firm

I identify six social responsibility strategies by linking a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities to social responsibility strategies using both CSR and strategic management theory. In addition, I investigate each strategy's impact to the firm. By looking at the wide range of different activities that a firm takes in the area of CSR and finding common theoretical links, I demonstrate that firms do form social responsibility strategies. Five specific strategies (giving, externality reducing, resource leveraging, product differentiation and stakeholder relationship) emerge and each has a different impact. While prior research has focused on overall performance (i.e., return on equity or assets, etc.), I suggest and find that each strategy has different primary impacts. I link each theoretical strategy to the firm impact that most closely aligns with the theory, including reputation, public policy risk, efficiency, sales and adverse stakeholder actions. I hypothesize primary impacts of each strategy; however, I also investigate alternative impacts. Finally, I investigate whether size drives firms from a specific to a combination social responsibility strategy.; The results of the empirical tests on firms in the 1993 Kinder, Lydenberg, Domini (KLD) dataset, using panel data analysis techniques for 308 firms between 1993 and 2000, show support that firms do exhibit both specific and combination social responsibility strategies and that each strategy has a different impact. In particular, I found that a resource leveraging strategy increases efficiencies, a giving strategy reduces efficiencies, an externality reducing and product differentiation strategy has no impact, and a stakeholder relationship strategy increases adverse stakeholder actions. I found that size drives firms to a combination strategy that leads to more efficiency. I also found that firms with only an externality reducing had mixed results, only resource leveraging increases sales while only product differentiation lowers sales and only a stakeholder relationship may increase efficiencies. I suggest further investigation into possible social responsibility strategies to understand their varied impacts on the firm. I also suggest that managers think carefully about the strategy they employ when helping society as the strategy chosen is likely to have different impacts to the firm. Implications for theory and future research are advanced as well.