Analysis of Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility at Woolworths

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Woolworths Group Limited's Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives. It begins with an executive summary and introduction outlining the company's commitment to sustainable practices and stakeholder interests. The report delves into various aspects of Woolworths' CSR, including its approach to stakeholders, environmental impact, and human rights policies. It explores the company's governance structure, philanthropic activities, and adherence to Carroll's four-part definition of CSR, encompassing economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities. The analysis covers Woolworths' economic performance, legal compliance, ethical conduct, and contributions to the community. The report highlights Woolworths' efforts in environmental sustainability, human rights programs, and governance practices. It concludes with recommendations for further CSR improvements. The report also mentions Woolworths' engagement with various stakeholders, including employees, suppliers, customers, and government bodies, emphasizing its commitment to ethical sourcing, safe workplaces, and community welfare.

Running head: ETHICS AND CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Executive summary
This report entails about the corporate giant Woolworths Group Limited operating in Australia.
The company aims at providing the customers with sustainably certified products and services to
ensure that their needs are fulfilled. The company further ensures to perform all its corporate
social responsibilities to achieve its objectives of a sustainable development, maximization of
profits and best interest of its stakeholders. Woolworths is associated with variety of human
rights programs and NGOs to ensure society welfare and profit maximization of the company.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Woolworths: Corporate Social Responsibility................................................................................3
Stakeholders.....................................................................................................................................7
Environment....................................................................................................................................8
Human Rights..................................................................................................................................9
Governance....................................................................................................................................10
Company Philanthropy..................................................................................................................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................10
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................11
References......................................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
The report is based on the company Woolworths Limited is a major Australian company
that deals with supermarket or grocery store accounting for about 80 percent of the Australian
market. The company particularly deals with fruit, vegetables, meat, magazines, DVD, beauty
and health products, household products, stationery as well as baby and pet supplies. The
corporate giant operates 1000 stores, 968 supermarkets and 19 additional convenience stores in
Australia.
The company aims at delivering best in value, convenience and quality for its customers.
The company giant ensures that their sustainability approach has a significant impact on then
community, environment and economy of the nation with a view to create a better future.
Woolworths: Corporate Social Responsibility
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) refers to the persisting commitment of an
organization to exhibit ethical behavior and make significant contribution to the economic
development along with an improvement in the quality of the life of the employees and their
families (King and Thobela 2014). The corporate social responsibility of an organization requires
it to focus on not only the economic development and welfare of its workforce but also to ensure
welfare and development of the society and local community significantly.
Corporate social responsibility at the Woolworths Group has always been about doing
what is right. The company believes that profits and growth are not the only means to measure
the success of the company. It significantly depends on the ways in which the operations of the
organizations can have a reduced impact on the environment. The corporate giant strives ensure

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that integration of the financial performance of the company with non-financial criteria enhances
the value for all the stakeholders and the Members.
The company asserts the following corporate social responsibilities that it strives to achieve:
 To create a safe and comprehensive working environment for the employees and creating
opportunities for them to outshine; To recognize the environmental impact on the value chain of the company and ensure to
work with the service providers, suppliers thus, making innovations to make a healthy
planet; To shift to a globular economy and source environmentally sustainable commodities thus
responding to climate change;
 The brand products of the company are free from genetically modified ingredients;
Carroll’s four-part definition of CSR defines CSR of an organization as a responsibility that
encompasses the legal, economic, ethical and philanthropic expectations of the society from a
business at any point of time (Comyns 2015). These four responsibilities laid down the
foundation or an infrastructure that describes the nature of the responsibilities of any business
towards the society of which such business is an essential part.
In order to assess the Woolworths CSR based on the Carroll’s four-part definition, the
responsibilities carried out by the company are discussed below:
Economic responsibilities
According to the definition, it is essential for a company to have an economic
responsibility towards the society that has enabled the company to sustain and develop. Although

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an economic expectation cannot be perceived as a social responsibility at the first place but a
society requires a business organization to sustain themselves which is only possible by being
profitable. Profits are essential for rewarding the owners or the investors and for business growth
by reinvesting the profits back into the business (Comyns 2015).
The strong financial indicators of Woolworths Limited signify that the company
comprehends the importance of their economic obligations. According to the Woolworths
Holding Limited (WHL) Integrated report of 2014, WHL posted a profit of Rs 3.86 billion
before tax up 20.1% year on year for the financial year while its earnings per share (EPS) were
as high as 356c/share. These numbers are not mere numbers on a report but are numbers that
have been actually translated into return capital to the shareholders in the form of share value or
dividends and to the employees in the form of salaries and stock options. The remaining profit
was served to safeguard its stakeholders that were financially dependent.
Legal responsibilities
Legal responsibilities refer to the responsibilities of a business to fulfill its legal
obligations and society’s codification of wrong and right. Laws are rules that are implemented
and created on a national, international or local level, which regulates the conduct of the
company in relation to employment, corruption, environmental protection, product safety and
human rights (Wu et al. 2015). It is the fundamental duty of an organization to comply with
national, local international laws to avert legal consequences and safeguard the future business
operations. Legal obligations of a company are implemented to safeguard stakeholder of
businesses including the consumers, suppliers, shareholders, public, suppliers, and employees as
well as safeguard the business from financial instability and unethical business practices.

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Woolworths Group being a public company aims at maintaining clean legal profile and
carries out all its legal obligations. The WHL Integrated Report is evidence that establishes that
the company fulfills its legal obligations and is consistent with the national, local and
international laws applicable to the business operations. In the annual report of the company,
WHL strongly supports its commitment to fulfill legal requirements and the legal framework that
has been stipulated under the Integrated Reporting Council.
Ethical Responsibilities
Most of the societies expect that though fulfilling the legal requirements is essential but it
is not sufficient. It is equally important for a company to conduct their business operations in an
ethical manner. Part of the ethical expectation is that businesses will be receptive to the spirit of
law instead of just the letter of law. Another significant aspect of ethical expectation from
businesses is that the business operations are conducted in an objective and in a fairly manner
even under circumstances when laws do not provide any course of action for the organization
(Corkery, Mikalsen and Allan 2017).
Woolworths Group maintains a value-based approach towards the company and its wide
ethical behavior. The company is a global leader in retail brands that draws attraction of people
who are concerned about the innovation, quality, sustainability and value. The company
envisions that the understanding of the society is leading towards a rapid and constantly
progressive future and in order to meet the desire of the people who are concerned about the
ethical practice and sustainability, a company must be ethical in its operational conduct. The fact
that the company is ethical in its practice is evident from the several International Awards that
the company has received for its CSR initiatives.

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Philanthropic Responsibilities
Corporate philanthropy includes the discretionary or voluntary activities where
discretionary activities refer to the desirable yet voluntary acts of the company that significantly
contributes to the welfare of the community (Wu et al. 2015). These activities take the form of
charity and aim to provide resources associated with the business to the society for improving
quality of life. These philanthropic contributions go beyond the legal or ethical requirement or
something that is beyond the societal expectations. The contributions aim at giving back to
stakeholders either in the form of money, time or other resources. These discretionary activities
not only uplift the community but also compliment the brand from the perspective of the
stakeholders and the customers thus fulfilling employee satisfaction.
Woolworths has a significant impact on the societal wellbeing as the company considers
trust and valuing customers as fundamental to customer satisfaction. The company strives to
move towards a circular economy due to which the company aims at improving their
recyclability of their brand packaging and contribute to circular economy. To play their part, the
company has reduced use of plastic bags. The company is partner with the Redcycle where soft
plastics are collected and recycled into furniture.
Stakeholders
The company includes Board of Directors and Leadership team as its internal
stakeholders and the employees, suppliers, customers, logistic companies as its external
stakeholders. The Australian government is the primary stakeholder of the company. In addition,
the other stakeholders include media, franchisees, unions organized business, community interest
groups and NGOs.

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Environment
The core values of the Woolworths Limited are embedded within the culture of the
organization. From its contribution in recycled plastic bags to its ethical sourcing initiatives, the
company has been proved a company that not only permitted its progressive company values
from different situations but also implements the core values to fortify the culture, business
philanthropy and strategy of the organization (Corkery, Mikalsen and Allan 2017).
The company is a proud member of the Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) and is a
signatory to the CGF Deforestation Resolution of 2010 to achieve net zero deforestation by
2020. Further, since the customers require more sustainable products and independently certified
products, in FY17, the brand products of the company were sold containing 28,883 tons of
coffee, sugar and chocolate that were certifiably sustainable. Furthermore, the company has
produced almost 880 million paper catalogues that were made using sustainable resources. The
health and beauty products under the company’s own brand are produced significantly
considering the welfare of the animals by not testing the products on animals.
The company has been supporting Children’s Hospital Foundation to safeguard lives of
children, especially, the sick children and has successfully raised $50million. Further, it has been
associated with White Ribbon’s work through Dan Murphy and BWS in FY17 to prevent
violence against women in New South Wales.
The Chief Legal Officer and Company Secretary and the Audit, Risk management and
Compliance Committee of Woolworths limited is accountable for monitoring and reporting the
performance and effectiveness of the business operations. The Board of the company confers
these responsibilities upon the Committee.

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In regards to the auditing of the company, the company has an independent internal audit
function (Group Internal Audit) that is managed by the Risk and Assurance team. The external
audit is conducted by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu which is subjected to review and monitoring
thrice every year.
Human Rights
Woolworths Group has been in association of programs and foundations that aims at
safeguarding human rights. The company raised around $25000 donation through Red Cross
Kaikorua Earthquake immediately after the occurrence of the earthquake. The company strived
to promote gender equity and it aims to fill the position of senior manager and executive with
women by 2020 to achieve gender equity.
The company employs almost 202,000 people from all communities and cultural
diversities as a contribution to alleviate international poverty. The company is committed to
enhance indigenous employment opportunities in the organizational business. The company is
member of Pride in Diversity which is NGO supporting the LGBTI community.
The company has committed to work in cooperation with the National Union of Workers
(NUW) and other interested stakeholders for addressing and identifying human rights in fresh
food supply chains in Australia. The corporate giant deals with interests groups and emphasizes
on maintaining a healthy relationship with the stakeholders (Bolton 2015). Woolworths assure
ethics and values its suppliers by making efforts to improve the social and environmental
practices with them. The company has a good ethical record of providing safe workplace and
ensures job security and a motivating environment.

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Governance
The Board serves and represents the interests of the shareholders and the Board approved
strategy is delegated to management through the CEO who implements such strategy. The
Chairman is independent and non-executive who assesses the development plans of non-
executive directors and monitors the contribution of individual directors, thus, providing
feedback on the effectiveness and performance. The performance of the Chairman is subjected to
review every year. The Board reviews the desired and current experience or skills of independent
directors as well as that of the Board.
Company Philanthropy
The company aims at publishing report on social impact of the company on the
community in which it operates to measure the positive changes that it is undertaking by
emphasizing on the economic, health development and emergency belief. The company strives to
fulfill the needs of the customers because of the policies adopted by the company and put in
efforts to resolve the issues and complaints of the stakeholders regularly. The remaining profit of
the company is served to safeguard the stakeholders that are financially dependent on the
company.
Conclusion
The company has been carrying out its corporate social responsibility and it claims to
make further significant contribution in achieving sustainable development and ensure
conducting its business operations ethically. As per Carroll’s definition of corporate social
responsibility, the corporate giant seems to be fulfilling all the four essential elements of

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corporate social responsibility accordingly, ensuring its sustainability approach has significant
impact on the community as well as the environment.
Recommendations
In the contemporary era, the corporate sector is more focused on maximizing profit and
becoming the leading organization than they are concerned about the social welfare. Though the
companies claim to carry out their corporate social responsibilities, the growing competiveness
in this sector often cause the corporations go off their course to maximize their profit and retain
the top positions in the global markets which results in environmental degradation, affecting the
community altogether. Therefore, it is recommended, that corporate giants like Woolworths
Limited must persist to carry out their corporate social responsibilities and set an example that it
is possible to strike a balance between maximizing profits and ensuring social welfare for any
organization, to create a better tomorrow.

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References
Bolton, S., 2015. Woolworths workers back at work. Green Left Weekly, (1065), p.3.
Comyns, B., 2015. Our spoons came from Woolworths. New York Review of Books.
Corkery, J., Mikalsen, M. and Allan, K., 2017. Corporate social responsibility: The good
corporation. Centre for Commercial Law.
King, L. and Thobela, S., 2014. Woolworths farming for the future. International Food and
Agribusiness Management Review, 17(B).
Woolworths.com.au (2018). Woolworths.com.au. Retrieved 05, 2018 from
https:///www.woolworths.com.au.
Wu, J.H., Neal, B., Trevena, H., Crino, M., Stuart-Smith, W., Faulkner-Hogg, K., Louie, J.C.Y.
and Dunford, E., 2015. Are gluten-free foods healthier than non-gluten-free foods? An
evaluation of supermarket products in Australia. British Journal of Nutrition, 114(3), pp.448-
454.

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