Corporate social responsibility and employee engagement: The moderating role of CSR‐specific relative autonomy and individualism

Abstract

Summary Growing evidence suggests that employees' perceptions of their employer's corporate social responsibility (CSR) relate positively to employee work engagement. This is an important connection given the impact of work engagement on both employee health and organizational productivity, as well as the importance of CSR for society. In this paper, however, we argue that the CSR perceptions–work engagement relationship cannot be assumed to be universal and that both individual and contextual factors will place meaningful boundary conditions on this effect. Integrating motivation and cross‐cultural theories, we propose that the relationship between employees' CSR perceptions and their work engagement will be stronger among employees who perceive higher CSR‐specific relative autonomy (i.e., employees' contextualized motivation for complying with, advocating for, and/or participating in CSR activities) and that this amplification effect will be stronger among employees who are higher on individualism (studied at the individual‐level of analysis). These predictions were mostly supported among a sample of 673 working adults from five different regions (Canada, China [mainland], France, Hong Kong, and Singapore) and while controlling for first‐party justice perceptions, moral identity, employee demographics, and employer/nation characteristics. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Corporate social responsibility and competitive advantage: A developing country perspective

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The perception of corporate social responsibility and employee engagement: Examining the underlying mechanism

“…Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been a field of interest over the past couple of decades. The challenges encountered in the form of rapidly evolving technology, frequently changing market conditions along with a matured well‐informed customer resulted in increasing the attention paid by companies towards their respective stakeholders along with the social, economic, and the environmental issues (Garavan & McGuire, ; Rupp et al, ). Employees within the organization are constantly inquiring about the meaning of the work done by them, and organizations failing to respond to these will encounter difficulties in retaining and obtaining the services of the most efficacious workers (Bhattacharya, Sen, & Korschun, ).…”

The impact of perceived corporate social responsibility on employee engagement: The case of Qatar

“…They found that that offices with higher levels of corporate philanthropy would have higher average levels of employee attitudes. Rupp et al (2018) proposed that the relationship between CSR and EE is stronger among employees complying with, advocating for, and/or participating in CSR activities and that the amplification effect is stronger at the individual level of analysis. Their hypotheses were supported by data collected from a sample of 673 employees from Canada, China, France, Hong Kong, and Singapore.…”