Pursuing a strategy of ‘common benefit’ in business: The adoption of the benefit corporation model in Italy

Abstract

A benefit corporation (BC) is a for-profit company that pursues common benefits for stakeholders. Adopting institutional theory, we analyse the characteristics of the company in relation to the common benefits a BC pursue and how BC model fits with corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices defined in literature. BCs were introduced by a 2016 law in Italy, that was the first European country to approve legislation for BCs, under which a company must indicate its specific common benefit in its articles of association (AoAs). We run a multivariate regression on data from a content analysis on companies' AoA and then use questionnaire data to perform a cluster analysis and interviews to provide additional information. We show that larger and profitable firms focus on customers, while mature firm focus on the environment in the definition of common benefit in AoA. There is resistance to profit sharing. Industry and location specific are important drivers. Among first evidences, it is interesting to see that the most frequent perceived advantage of BC status is differentiation, BC and BCorp do not in practice overlap, and ownership is the main promoter of the change to become BC.

The transition towards benefit corporations: What are the roles for stakeholders?

“…This study contributes to highlighting the role of stakeholders in BCs (Blasi & Sedita, 2021) and provides an in-depth case study in the BC field in response to Del Baldo's (2019) call. Moreover, we show the efforts of an enterprise transforming into a BC to integrate its interests with those of stakeholders (Marchini et al, 2022). As stated by Brown and Forster (2013) and Sen and Cowley (2013) confirming that this theoretical framework is a useful lens in the field of CSR for untangling the interactions among interests, expectations, and influence of stakeholders in organisational change (Dmytriyev et al, 2021).…”

“…In particular, the authors argued how the BC label makes it possible to obtain an advantage in terms of recognition by stakeholders as an enterprise belonging to the BC community, which therefore shares the same values and principles. Recently, Marchini et al (2022) used a mixed-method approach to explore the relationship among BC transformation, strategy changes and impact areas pursued by BCs. The study showed that to have a positive impact on the community, the environment and workers, it is necessary to have constant dialogue with all stakeholders concerned.…”

Business Strategies and Competitive Advantage: The Role of Performance and Innovation

“…Dynamic capability is a company's ability to integrate, build, and reconfigure internal and external competencies to face a rapidly changing environment. Thus, dynamic capabilities reflect an organization's ability to achieve new and innovative forms of competitive advantage [43].…”

The Effect of Collective Decision-Making on Productivity: A Structural Equation Modeling

“…If a collective achieves the right common goals, it can also achieve common benefits (Ekwoaba et al, 2019). Profit corporations (BC) have reached the maturity that their goal is not only individual profit but also to create common benefit for all stakeholders so that they can maintain consensus and cohesion in the company (Marchini et al, 2023).…”