Company Q Corporate Social Responsibility

While maximizing profits is considered an important responsibility for a company to accomplish, it is not more important than fulfilling the responsibility of being socially responsible to the society in which it operates. Social responsibility can be defined as the duty of businesses to behave ethically and with sensitivity towards economic, cultural, and social issues. In other words, businesses are socially responsible when they maximize the economic, cultural, and social benefits of all their close associates such as employees, investors, and customers. When companies put all of their focus on profits, this usually brings companies repercussions such as bad reputation leading to a decrease in profits. Companies need to be both conscious of increasing their profits as well as meeting the demands of their stakeholders. Company Q is a clear example of what companies should not be doing. In an effort to stop losing money, this company closed two stores in higher-crime rate areas, provides a very limited amount of health-conscious and organic products to their customers, and declined to donate day-old products to the area’s food bank. The main mistake this company is committing is putting their interests before the interests of customers and employees. Although company’s Q is right in trying to maximize their profits, their actions are not socially responsible because their employees and customers are losing their jobs and access to grocery shopping; they are limiting their customers from more health conscious and organic products; and their philanthropic responsibilities are not being met. Firstly, closing two stores in higher-crime-rate areas of the city because they were consistently losing money is not socially responsible because the company’s direct stakeholders, in particular employees and customers are losing their jobs and access to grocery shopping. For many employees, working at these stores could be their only sources of income, so by closing these stores, the company left these employees without a job. This is socially irresponsible because their employees lose their ability to pay for their bills and most likely the sustenance of their families. For many customers, these stores could be the only stores in their neighborhoods, so by closing these stores, the company has denied customers their only access to buy their daily physical food. This creates an inconvenience for customers because they might have to travel longer distances and spend more sums of money to buy the same products. The first action I recommend company Q to take is to keep their two stores open and provide for more security at these stores. It is true that one of the main reasons these stores lose money is because of shoplifting. This can be avoided by providing more security equipment and personnel. With the increase of security protocols, more customers will visit the store and it will greatly reduce the risk of shoplifting, causing company Q to stop losing money and keep providing services and products in higher-crime rate areas of the city. Secondly, even though all of their stores have started offering a very limited amount of health-conscious and organic products, company Q is not being socially responsible because they are limiting the customers from more health conscious and organic products. Limiting customers from more health-conscious and organic products is socially irresponsible because customers have the right to a wider choice of products. Besides the disappointment of customers because they had long-awaited for these products, they find themselves sadly limited to products they have been wanting for years. The second action I recommend company Q to take is to provide unlimited number of health-conscious and organic products in all their stores. With …show more content…
This is something that company Q was not keeping in mind because their actions were negatively affecting many of their direct stakeholders which included employees and customers. Company Q was putting their own interests before the interests of employees and customers, which caused employees to lose their jobs and customers their access to daily sustenance. While being more worried about maximizing their own profits, company Q lost sight of maximizing the benefits of their customers and employees. Although it is important for companies to prioritize profitability, it is equally important to be socially responsible because it develops long-lasting relationships between their employees and customers. These relationships guarantee companies increasing profits and long-term