Harrison defines community as: ‘any group of people with a common interest as either stakeholders or publics’(2011). Further Harrison, quoting Peak, describes community relations as: ‘an institution’s planned, active, and continuing participation with and within a community to maintain and enhance its environment to the benefit of both the institution and the community’ (2011). Community relations differ from community engagement, which typically involved consultation for decision making.
Understanding community is an important part of carrying out effective Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The definition for CSR has remained somewhat of an enigma for todays PR professionals (Harrison 2011, 759), and I will not try and define it. However, I do tend to agree with Carroll’s summation that CSR is comprised of ‘economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic’ actions (1999).
The business that I am interning for provides professional services and, as a result, they value their corporate reputation. They are heavily involved in their local community and supporting fundraising efforts for charities. They have a number of events that they run each year. The most recent fundraising effort was ‘Loud Shirt Day’ which raised money for Telethon. Each team member wore their loudest shirt to work, and there were some hilarious garments to say the least.
However, what I noticed most about this day wasn’t the shirts, it was the internal impact that this community engagement activity had in the business. To link this experience back to our course, this week in Contemporary Practice we looked at Employee communications. It was interesting to see how a CSR initiative had the added outcome of improving team morale (everyone was in a great mood) and internal communication between staff.
From an external communications perspective, it was also great to that the team’s efforts received recognition in the local paper (see below picture).
References:
Carroll, A. 1999. ‘Corporate social responsibility: Evolution of a definitional construct’. Business and Society 38(3): 268-95.
Harrison, Kim. 2011. Strategic Public Relations: A Practical Guide to Success. Palgrave Macmillan: Sydney.
2 comments:
Nice entry Sarah!
i find it really interesting that you identified the positive impact community relations has on the internal environment of an organisation. I've also focused on how it benefits the community! It does make sense though when you think about it as employees would most likely be a part of that community.
Thanks for the insightful read!
Hi Sarah,
It's great to hear that the company you are interning for gets involved in community relations and supports their local community - it's surprising how many don't! I think it' a great thing to do for employees and encouraging their involvement. Happy employees certainly help with reputation!
All the best for the remainder of your internship.
Stephanie
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