Corporate Social Responsibilities In The Strategy Making Capability

Running head: CSR AND REFLECTION
CSR AND REFLECTION
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Part 1:
Introduction:
The aim of this paper is to discuss the importance of including the corporate social
responsibilities in the strategy making capability of the companies to face the competitive
market of the business world. Without developing the perfect approaches to cater all the need
s of the employees, customers and other stakeholders, it is not possible for the companies to
sustain for a long period of time. The international business is growing with the global supply
chain and growing retail base. Therefore, it is mandatory that the companies have perfect
understanding of the business needs in the market and take good care of the stakeholders
associated in any part of the company.
Explanation of a sustainable approach to business strategy and management:
The sustainable approach of the companies in this competitive world of business has
incurred the necessity to bring changes in the strategies of management and the operation.
The importance of sustainability has gone beyond the environmental aspects but included the
competencies of the companies to behave responsibly towards the stakeholders. In this
regard, the wellbeing of the employees, managing end product responsibilities, meeting the
material and psychological needs of the customers, maintaining good relationship with the
suppliers and properly answering the employee unions and other interest groups like
environmental NGOs are detailed (Primark.com 2019). This sustainable strategies in one
hand allow the companies to focus on the innovative approaches and on the other hand
demonstrates compliance which ultimately leads them to attain all the ingredients of long
time growth as well as profitability.
In order to understand the approaches that one of the most importance and challenged
retailing company has taken in the present years after the devastating accident took place. In

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the accident of Rana Plaza in Bangladesh, the name of Primark has affected the reputation
and sustainability approaches of the company. Primark is a major retail group that was
established in 1969 in Ireland. The company directly appoints 68000 employees from the
countries like the United Kingdom, Spain, Republic of Ireland, Germany, Portugal, Belgium,
Austria, France and the US. In addition to this, the company has manufacturing unit in some
of the Asian countries where it employees cheap labours in the manufacturing of garments
that are sold in the Primark retail shops in other parts of the world.
The company through wanted to attain sustainability, did not follow the basic rules of
providing support to the stakeholders. The negative aspect of the strategies of this company
was related to the dependability of the corrupt agents who exploited the cheap labour force in
the name of production. Previously, the company did not include these cheap labours into the
direct workforce but the accident of Rana plaza, Bangladesh where almost five hundred
textile workers were killed due to poor infrastructure.
The positive approaches followed by this company is mainly related to the welfare
of the employees and suppliers from those markets other than the home country. The
company takes care of these employees by ensuring their rights and wellbeing so that they
can grow both personally as well as professionally. The company as operates in the retailing
business does not own the factories for manufacturing but takes help of the agents for
employing cheap workers in the Asian countries. After the incident of Rana Plaza, the
company has launched HER project in the country. The company has started to take
responsibility of those labours who are employed for manufacturing the goods for Primark.
Through this HER project, the company has initiated to employ women workers to empower
them. Over 50% of women are employed through this project in the manufacturing section of
Primark in Bangladesh (Primark.com 2019).

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Before this scenario till today the company has been following some of the
sustainability approaches that has guided Primark to work ethically and leading to
sustainability. There are five sections based on which the company aims to attain
sustainability. These are people and production, planet, product quality, code of conduct,
partners and the collection of resources. There is a sustainability reason why the company has
embraced the approach of corporate social responsibility and acting accordingly. Primark
believes that every business has a responsibility to act ethically. This is the reason why the
company had offered 7 million jobs in the three continents where it operates directly or
indirectly. These employee groups include the suppliers and workers in the manufacturing
process of Primark. The company commit to treat the employees decent and pay their fair
wage. The company though does not own any of the factories for the manufacturing purpose,
it makes sure that it knows it agents properly and they have internationally recognised
standards to maintain the code of conduct for the company. In order to maintain ethical
actions, the company takes care of the HR processes. Primark uses Ethical Trade and
Environmental Sustainability Team to work collaboratively with the suppliers, local and
factory partners and suppliers so that the delivery of the trainings and programmes which
help the factories address locally relevant issues as well as needs (Primark.com 2019).
Secondly, the company also takes ethical decision in the regard of the managing
environmental impact of the business. The environmental sustainability team covers the
sources of the raw materials like cotton, the impact of the manufacturing operation of the
manufacturing process and the recycling of the waste products (Klimkiewicz and Oltra 2017).
The company has partnership with the NGO named Newlife working for children around the
world. The company donates the unsold items from its stores of the European braches and the
samples to these children preventing wastage. The company has big sustainability challenges
so it partners with Zero Discharge of Hazardous chemical Program that reviews the chemical