15. Sustainability and Lean Management

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is also known by a number of other names. These include corporate responsibility, corporate accountability, corporate ethics, corporate citizenship or stewardship, business ethics, responsible entrepreneurship, and triple bottom line, to name just a few. As CSR issues become increasingly integrated into modern business practices, there is a trend towards referring to it as “responsible competitiveness” or “corporate sustainability”. CSR is understood to be the way firms integrate social, environmental, and economic concerns into their values, culture, decision-making, strategy, and operations in a transparent and accountable manner and thereby establish better practices within the firm, create wealth, and improve society. A key point to note is that CSR is an evolving concept that currently does not have a universally accepted definition. Generally, CSR is understood to be the way firms integrate social, environmental, and economic concerns into their values, culture, decision-making, strategy, and operations in a transparent and accountable manner and thereby establish better practices within the firm, create wealth, and improve society. As issues of sustainable development become more important, the question of how the business sector addresses them is also becoming an element of CSR. The World Business Council for Sustainable Development has described CSR as the business contribution to sustainable economic development. Building on a base of compliance with legislation and regulations, CSR typically includes “beyond law” commitments and activities pertaining to: