The Influence of Corporate Sustainability Officers on Performance

Peters, Gary F.; Romi, Andrea M.; Sánchez, Juan M.

doi:10.1007/s10551-018-3818-1

Cited by 89 publications

(80 citation statements)

References 66 publications

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“…Prior management research has focussed mainly on CEOs, who are responsible for overall strategies and market growth opportunities, as well as on CFOs' role regarding entities' financial risks and accounting matters. Nevertheless, both positions usually are not related to CSR issues (Peters et al 2019). Thus, to an increasing extent, firms hire CSOs to implement entities' CSR strategies or extend CEOs and CFOs' roles.…”

Section: Definition Of Csr Committees and Csosmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, CSOs and CSR committees also may function merely to take symbolic actions to meet stakeholders' expectations and enhance public image and financial outputs as greenwashing policy. Thus, substantial improvements in CSR may not be realised, and it remains unclear under which conditions CSOs and CSR committees reflect substantive CSR actions as intrinsic motivation among top management, or merely represent a symbolic function (Peters et al 2019). Generally, intrinsic or extrinsic motivations to implement CSOs and CSR committees are rather complex.…”

Section: Definition Of Csr Committees and Csosmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As the top management team's composition is of crucial importance in achieving solid organisational outcomes (Carpenter et al 2004), and classical board positions, such as CEOs or CFOs, might not be the appropriate to prepare CSR-oriented strategies (Waldman et al 2006), a research shift to other top management members is necessary (Peters et al 2019). As the CSO in particular fosters an entity's CSR-related activities as a member of top management, it can be assumed that the CSO in particular will engage in CSR reporting, illustrating the CSR strategy, which CSR targets the company has achieved and which CSR challenges remain.…”

Section: Upper-echelons Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although this topic is also of increased relevance for research, practice and regulatory initiatives, we still lack a systematic understanding of how the three main CSR outputs (CSR reporting, CSR assurance (CSRA) and CSR performance) are affected from an empirical-quantitative perspective. Prior research designs and results are rather heterogeneous, stressing the unclear consequences from implementation of CSR committees and CSOs, and their composition (Al-Shaer and Zaman 2019; Burke et al 2019;Dixon-Fowler et al 2017;Hussain et al 2018;Kanashiro and Rivera 2019;Peters et al 2019;Rodrigue et al 2013;Strand 2013Strand , 2014Wiengarten et al 2017). Institutionalised sustainability-related board expertise via CSOs or CSR committees may represent either symbol gestures for companies (related to the risk of greenwashing) or may contribute substantively to companies' CSR activities (management's intrinsic motivation).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Do chief sustainability officers and CSR committees influence CSR-related outcomes? A structured literature review based on empirical-quantitative research findings

Velte

Stawinoga

2020

J Manag Control

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Although an increasing amount of empirical research has been linked to the impact of management control and governance on corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues since the financial crisis of 2008/09, heterogeneous results have characterised this research field. Regarding the group level of corporate governance, the efficacy of board committees (e.g., audit, compensation or CSR committees) has been included in recent research designs. However, analyses of corporate governance at the individual level are related to the effects of top management members [e.g., chief executive officer (CEO), chief financial officer (CFO) or chief sustainability officer (CSO)] on CSR outcomes. This paper aims to convey a detailed understanding of sustainable management control’s impact as CSR-related board expertise. In more detail, we focus on the influence of both CSR committees and CSOs on three CSR measures mainly analysed in empirical-quantitative research: (1) CSR reporting; (2) CSR assurance (CSRA); and (3) CSR performance. We motivate our analysis with increased relevance from practical, regulatory and research perspectives, and we employ a systematic literature review of the symbolic vs. substantive effects of sustainability-related board composition. Based on our theoretical model (legitimacy theory, stakeholder theory and upper-echelons theory), we selected 48 quantitative peer-reviewed empirical studies on this research topic. Our analysis shows that CSR committees positively influence CSR reporting and performance. Thus, there are indications that the implementation of a CSR committee is not a symbolic act, but instead substantively contributes to CSR activities. However, in light of inconclusive empirical research results and a lack of studies that have analysed CSO-related effects, a notable research gap has been identified. Moreover, we note the main limitations of prior research in this review and develop an agenda with useful recommendations for future studies.

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Section: Definition Of Csr Committees and Csosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Definition Of Csr Committees and Csosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Upper-echelons Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Do chief sustainability officers and CSR committees influence CSR-related outcomes? A structured literature review based on empirical-quantitative research findings

Velte

Stawinoga

2020

J Manag Control

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“…5 This can engage people at all institutional levels, from non-clinical staff to health professionals. The creation of a chief sustainability officer position could help ensure that sustainability is prioritised across institutional decision making, 51 but senior leaders need to support and hold to account a pan-organisational approach to avoid isolating the actions to one department. People skilled at conflict analysis and resolution could help manage inevitable conflicts from impeding the rapid transformation required.…”

Section: Solutions Within and Outside Of Healthcare Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A pathway to net zero emissions for healthcare

Salas

Maibach

Pencheon

et al. 2020

BMJ

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Do independent, female and specialist directors promote eco‐innovation and eco‐design in agri‐food firms?

2020

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Eco‐innovation and eco‐design strategies are associated with firms' innovation capabilities. Moreover, they may impact on access to public subsidies and on financial performance. In this respect, the agri‐food industry is especially vulnerable, because in general, this sector has less experience of technological innovation, and managers are more likely to be averse to such projects. On the other hand, the board may promote a proactive environmental approach to defend the interests of investors and other stakeholders, taking the view that these strategies reduce the environmental impact of the firm's products and its production processes and are therefore beneficial. Our study aim is to identify the profile of directors who may be favourable to eco‐design and eco‐innovation strategies, focusing on the traits of independence, gender diversity and environmental specialisation. The results obtained, from a dependence model based on panel data supplied by 321 agri‐food companies for the period 2002–2017 (unbalanced panel data with 4878 observations), show that independent directors play a crucial role in implementing eco‐innovation and eco‐design projects. However, neither the diversity nor the specialisation of directors is a significant factor in this regard.

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The Influence of Corporate Sustainability Officers on Performance

Cited by 89 publications

References 66 publications

Do chief sustainability officers and CSR committees influence CSR-related outcomes? A structured literature review based on empirical-quantitative research findings

Do chief sustainability officers and CSR committees influence CSR-related outcomes? A structured literature review based on empirical-quantitative research findings

A pathway to net zero emissions for healthcare

Do independent, female and specialist directors promote eco‐innovation and eco‐design in agri‐food firms?

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