Social Innovation and Community Engagement for Sunstate Cement Ltd

Community Engagement 1
Community Engagement
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Community Engagement 2
Executive summary
In the recent days, innovation has been termed as one of the fundamental tools which
every business seeks to utilize to ensure it not only realizes good performance but also relates
well with its stakeholders. Although there are many types of innovations, research has indicated
that social innovation is one of the most crucial types of inventions especially during this type
when companies are faced with different things such as competition. Over the years, researchers
and scholars have been trying to come up with different theories, frameworks, and models which
seek to explain the concept of social innovation. Although some of them differ in various aspects
concerning this type of innovation, most of them agree on the fact that it helps businesses to
attain some of their strategic goals. As time goes on, many organizations are trying to include
social innovation in their operations to ensure they deliver common good between the company
and its stakeholders. However, their attempts to come up with these inventions are affected by
both internal and external factors. This paper will discuss the social innovation and community
engagement theory, suggest a social for Sunstate cement ltd, discuss how it contributes to
common good, and also conduct SWOT and PESTLE analysis to identify some of the factors
that influence social innovation in this company. The paper will also discuss the implementation
challenges and provide a conclusion concerning the major findings.

Community Engagement 3
Social innovation and community engagement theory
Over the past years, the concept of social innovation has attained significant attention
from various stakeholders including specialists, policymakers, scholars and the general public
(Kathleen 2018, 122). Currently, many organizations consider this type of innovation as a crucial
tool for recognizing and responding to various issues associated with social challenges when the
market and the public sector fail to address these factors.
According to Paul & Neil (2017, p. 68), social innovation can be defined as the
designing, developing, adopting and integrating new and renewed concepts and practices that
value the society. It can also be referred to as coming up with new tactics, ideas, and institutions
that aim address social needs that result from various aspects such as nature of work, learning,
and health. According to Smyth & Buchanan (2013, p. 78), these ideas are generated with the
primary goal of enhancing and strengthening the civil society and every organization that wants
to enhance its relationship with the public should implement them in their operations.
Over the years, the concept of social innovation has gained fame because of its ability to
not only assist an organization to attain some of its goals but also other stakeholders to live well.
Muysinaliyev (2014, p. 79) asserts that social innovation has been a fundamental tool in enabling
organizations to relate well with the community because it makes them to engage in activities
which the community expect. For example, engaging in social innovation can make an
organization to minimize environmental pollution, promote public health, or consider the
venerable communities in some of the activities that they are discriminated from.
Manfred (2015, p. 25) asserts that understanding issues that affect the community and
coming up with ways of addressing them is crucial for organizations that want to succeed in their

Community Engagement 4
operations. Although many businesses focus on attaining success through maximization of sales
revenue, achieving these goals may be hard without promoting the social well-being of the
community. John & Annette (2017, p. 57) affirms that the reputation of a company is enhanced
through coming up with approaches that enhance the relationship between the organization and
the society. If the management considers innovating and playing a role in promoting the social
well-being of the people around, then the public develop a positive perception towards the
organization and hence promote its reputation.
Focusing on social innovation and community engagement leads to the introduction of
new ideas that simultaneously meet social needs of different stakeholders, and also create new
social relationships or collaborations. According to Diane (2015, p. 68), good social innovation
should not only be good for the society but should also enhance the society’s capacity to act.
This means that when making decisions on enhancing the relationships between a company and
the society, managers should consider some of the new things that can be introduced to not only
satisfy the customer needs but also benefit the community as a whole.
According to David & Michael (2010, p. 58) engaging in social innovation can make
organizations to not only enhance their relationships with the community but also to avoid
various issues which may affect their performance. For example, it can assist them to avoid
engaging in legal action because of doing things which are against the law. For instance, if an
organization does not come up with means of preserving environment to promote the public
health, it can be subjected to legal action for violating environmental conservation policies.