Study Skills: Literature Review and Corporate Social Responsibility

This report provides an in-depth analysis of study skills, focusing on the application of these skills to enhance learning and academic achievement. It explores the concept of literature reviews, detailing their types, requirements, and the stages involved in their development, along with their importance in research and academic writing. The report also delves into corporate social responsibility (CSR), defining it as a crucial aspect of business operations that emphasizes a company's accountability towards society and stakeholders. It examines the benefits of CSR, including gaining a competitive advantage, enhancing brand image, and fostering positive relationships with stakeholders. The report concludes by emphasizing the vital role of CSR in the long-term survival and success of companies in a competitive global environment, highlighting the significance of fulfilling social obligations to maintain and expand market share.

Study skills

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
ASSESSMENT 2.............................................................................................................................1
1. Literature review and its achievement....................................................................................1
2. Literature review of corporate social responsibility................................................................2
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
Study skills may be defined as those skills which are applied to learnings and helps in
achieving the new heights of success. These study skills act as a guide for students and they not
only provide tips, lessons and strategies to the students but also aims at improving their study
habits, writing skills, reading skills, etc. these skills are very easy to follow and provides an array
to tackle with the new information, retaining the information and then finally dealing with the
assessments in this regard. This report will include literature review in detail as well as its
achievement. Furthermore, the report will also include the literature review of corporate social
responsibility.
ASSESSMENT 2
1. Literature review and its achievement
Literature review may be defined as a descriptive and analytical summary of the current
knowledge related to a particular topic or specific area of study in the books or journals( Hart,
2018). While on the other hand, literature review process is concerned with carrying out
systematic examination of prior scholarly works. Literature review may consist of thesis,
dissertation or self contained review on a particular topic or a specific area. Literature reviews
are of two types. The first kind of review is concerned with the assignments which the students
are asked to write at their university. While the next kind of review is concerned with the thesis
or research report.
There are various requirements of literature review such as it should be organized
efficiently as well as they should be directly related to the development of thesis or question
paper. Apart from that, literature review must be able to synthesize the results as well as identify
the areas of literature in which controversy might have arisen. Furthermore, it must be able to
formulate the questions which are required for the purpose of carrying out future research.
There are 4 stages for the purpose of development of literature review. The first step is to
formulate the problem which is essential in order to identify the topic to be examined as well as
its component issues. The next step is to search literature which is essential for finding the
material which has relevance towards the subject which is being explored. After, literature
search, the next step is to evaluate data for the purpose of determining all the significant
contributions which played a major role in understanding the topic such as determining the
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similarities and dissimilarities of each work(Machi and McEvoy, 2016). Finally the last stage,
analysis and interpretation. This stage is concerned with analysis the various aspects of literature
and then drawing conclusions from them.
It is very important to review the literature as it helps in understanding the research topic
thoroughly as well as in establishing the importance of a topic. The most important purpose of
literature review is to provide easy access to readers as well as to provide excellent starting point
for researches to begin their research. It helps in identifying inconsistency and contradictions in
the research work. Apart from that, it helps in development of ideas and demonstration of
knowledge which is very important to carry out review efficiently. Moreover, other purposes of
literature review includes placement of all the elements of review systematically in such a way
that would foster efficient understanding of the topic(Booth, Sutton and Papaioannou, 2016). It
even plays a vital role in describing the relationship and identification of new ways which would
foster interpretation of previous research. Literature review helps in resolving conflicts of
contradictory work as well as it helps in prevention of duplicate work.
Literature review helps in gaining and demonstrating skills for the purpose of seeking
information. It can seek information effectively as it has the ability to it has the ability to scan the
literature through various kinds of methods such as manual or computerized in order to identify
the articles and books for the purpose of extracting useful set of information. Moreover, it helps
in critical appraisal as it has the ability to identify unbiased and valid studies for the purpose of
application of principles as well as analysis.
2. Literature review of corporate social responsibility
According to Crowther and Seifi, (2018) corporate social responsibility may be defined
as one of the major responsibility of companies that lays emphasis on company to be socially
accountable towards the society as well as towards all the stakeholders of the company, who are
directly or indirectly interested in the company. Corporate social responsibility plays a vital role
in integrating all those programs and practices that are focussed towards benefiting the society
into the business model and culture of the corporates. Thus, this not only help the companies in
achieving sustainability but also helps the company in running the business smoothly towards the
attainment of their objectives.
While on the other hand McWilliams, (2015) says that corporate social responsibility is
not a compulsory responsibility rather than it is a voluntary initiative adopted by the company so
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as to foster relationship between business practices and the society. It is a concept by which
organizations can choose whether they want to merge the profit-driven activities with regulations
or not in order to ensure social investment. CSR activities are even increasing because of the
high pressure from the various stakeholders of the company which in turn has created a need for
business firms to adopt them in order to grow and maintain their operations as the company
would be viewed as sustainable and responsible. Thus, in order to survive in the long run, it is
very essential for the companies to adopt corporate social responsibility by re-investing a part of
their profits in fulfilment of social obligations. On the other hand, if the company fails to fulfil its
social obligations then it would not be able to retain or grow its market share in this globalised
environment.
But in the views of the Cramer, (2017) corporate social responsibility is a broad concept
and includes various other concepts as well such as social responsiveness, corporate citizenship
and stakeholders management. These responsibilities vary from company to company and from
country to country. Each company adopts different practice towards the sustainability depending
upon its size, nature and objective. Involvement of some companies may be high, while on the
other hand, it would be low for other companies. Now-a-days companies are encouraged to
remain aware about the impact of corporate social responsibility towards the productivity of the
companies in order to survive and grow in this globalized world. Hence, it is very important for
all the business firms to undertake strong CRS initiatives in order to achieve the business
objectives effectively and efficiently.
According to Kim, Kim and Qian, (2018) corporate social responsibility provides wide
number of advantages to the corporates. This not only helps the company in gaining competitive
advantage over the rivalry firms but also helps the company to run its business smoothly in the
long run which in turn helps the company in increasing the profits in long run. Apart from that,
corporate social responsibility plays a major role in developing a positive perception in the mind
of society which in turn helps in increasing the customer base for the corporates. It helps in
developing the positive perception in the mind of society because the company is viewed as
being concerned about the well-being of the society and is laying immense emphasis on uplifting
or development of society.
According to Moon and Knudsen, (2018) corporate social responsibility plays a vital role
in reducing or eliminating complexities in the working by avoiding unnecessary government
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restrictions. This is possible because the company would be viewed as socially responsible firm
and would promote its operations rather than imposing strict rules and regulations. Furthermore,
it helps in the expansion of capital and markets by enhancing customer loyalty which in turn
would also contribute in increasing the sales as well as profits. This is so because if the company
is able to enhance customer loyalty then it would be able to retain the existing customers as well
as would be able to attract new customers which in turn would play a huge role in increasing the
sales and profits. Hence, this will help the company in achieving their objectives smoothly in the
long run.
But in the views of Chaudhary, (2017) there are various activities that are adopted by
businesses in order to fulfil their corporate social responsibility. The most important
responsibility is to manage the environment efficiently by adopting environmental-friendly
practices in its processes and programmes. By adopting environmental-friendly practices
businesses are not only able to work towards the benefit of the society but would also improve
their image which is essential for them in order to survive in this globalized world. Apart from
this, businesses should try to make good relations with employees by fostering employee
employer relationship by taking care about the well- being of the employees; this in turn would
help in boosting up the morale of the employees as they will feel more connected towards the
business organizations and would retain in the business for a longer duration of time; leading to
decrease in the employee turnover rate as well as cost of hiring new employees. This would also
contribute in improving the productivity of the employees which is very essential for the
company to enhance its performance towards attainment of their objectives. Thus, it is beneficial
for both the employees as well as the company and this in turn brings the necessity for the
company to adopt corporate social responsibility.s
But, according to Lowea, Stanleyb and Stanleyc, (2016) businesses also have corporate
social responsibility towards the community and they should ensure that all their social
obligations should be fulfilled. Since, success of the business firms depends up-to a wide extent
on the acceptance by the community, it is very important for business firms to keep the
community happy and satisfied in order to run the business smoothly in long run. Moreover, if
the community fosters the business of the organisation, it is their responsibility to pay their
obligations by showing the concern towards them. Furthermore, they should make efforts to
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improve the working conditions, responsible sourcing and adoption of anti - corruption
measures; which in turn would help in building up the image of the company.
According to Shaukat, Qiu and Trojanowski, (2016) corporate social responsibility plays
a huge role in bridging the gap between the operations of a company and the reputation of the
company in the mind of various stakeholders of the company. Higher the involvement of the
company in CSR activities, higher would be the reputation and vice versa. Similarly, higher the
reputation of the company, higher would be the ability of the company to gain competitive
advantage over its rivalry firms. Thus, there are large number of opportunities that the company
can grab by fulfilling various social obligations. By grabbing these opportunities company would
be able to achieve new heights of success by attainment of their objectives effectively and
efficiently.
CONCLUSION
From the above report, it can be summarised that the corporate social responsibility play
a vital role towards the long term survival of the company. If any company fails to fulfil its
social obligations then it would not be able to survive for a long duration of time in this
competitive world. Through the discussion in the above report, it was found that by adopting
corporate social responsibility company would be able to gain competitive advantage over its
rivalries and thus would be able to retain and grow its market share. Apart from that, it was also
found that, it will not only help the company in improving its brand image but would also help in
smooth running of the business by avoiding encouragement of government restrictions. Every
business organization has responsibility towards community, employees, customers and various
other stakeholders which are directly or indirectly nterested in the company.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Booth, A., Sutton, A. and Papaioannou, D., 2016. Systematic approaches to a successful
literature review. Sage.
Chaudhary, R., 2017. Corporate social responsibility and employee engagement: can
CSR help in redressing the engagement gap?. Social Responsibility Journal. 13(2). pp.323-338.
Cramer, J., 2017. Corporate Social Responsibility and Globalisation: an action plan for
business. Routledge.
Crowther, D. and Seifi, S. eds., 2018. Redefining Corporate Social Responsibility.
Emerald Group Publishing.
Hart, C., 2018. Doing a literature review: Releasing the research imagination. Sage.
Kim, K.H., Kim, M. and Qian, C., 2018. Effects of corporate social responsibility on
corporate financial performance: A competitive-action perspective. Journal of
Management. 44(3). pp.1097-1118.
Lowea, C., Stanleyb, J. and Stanleyc, J., 2016. Sense of community responsibility as a
determinant of corporate responsibility. Sociology. 6(10). pp.653-662.
Machi, L.A. and McEvoy, B.T., 2016. The literature review: Six steps to success.
Corwin Press.
McWilliams, A., 2015. Corporate social responsibility. Wiley encyclopedia of
management, pp.1-4.
Moon, J. and Knudsen, J.S., 2018, July. Corporate social responsibility and government.
In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2018, No. 1, p. 12777). Briarcliff Manor, NY
10510: Academy of Management.
Shaukat, A., Qiu, Y. and Trojanowski, G., 2016. Board attributes, corporate social
responsibility strategy, and corporate environmental and social performance. Journal of Business
Ethics. 135(3). pp.569-585.
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