And Shareholder Structure

Submitted by Juliane Gasser

Submitted at Institut für betriebliche Finanzwirtschaft Abteilung für Corporate CORPORATE SOCIAL Finance

RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) Supervisor Univ.Prof.in Dr.in Eva Wagner

AND SHAREHOLDER May, 2018 STRUCTURE THE INFLUENCE OF SHAREHOLDERS ON CSR AND THE INFLUENCE OF CSR ON SHAREHOLDER STRUCTURE

Master Thesis

To obtain the academic degree of Master of Science Global Business

In the Master Program Global Business Russia/Italy – Joint Master Program

JOHANNES KEPLER UNIVERSITÄT LINZ Altenberger Straße 69 4040 Linz, Österreich www.jku.at DVR 0093696

STATUTORY DECLARATION

I hereby declare that the thesis submitted is my own unaided work, that I have not used other than the sources indicated, and that all direct and indirect sources are acknowledged as references.

This printed thesis is identical with the electronic version submitted.

Linz, 25.05.2018 ______Location, Date Signature of the student

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank Univ.Prof.in Dr.in Eva Wagner for her expertise as well as her continuous help and support in the writing of this thesis. I am grateful to all the participants of the survey, as they provided valuable insights and helped me to get results of better quality. I would also like to thank Barbara and Richard for their tireless support, as well as Oliver and Markus for preparing me. Finally, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Michael for everything.

TABLE OF CONTENT

I. Table of Tables ...... V

II. Table of Figures ...... VI

II. List of Abbreviations ...... VII

III. Abstract ...... VIII

1. Introduction ...... 1

1.1 Problem Definition ...... 1

1.2 Research Objective ...... 2

1.3 Methodology ...... 3

2. Theoretical Framework ...... 5

2.1 Definition and differentiation of CSR ...... 5

2.2 Two schools of thought on CSR ...... 7

2.3 A Changing Framework of CSR ...... 9

2.4 Drivers and Barriers of CSR ...... 10

2.5 Further development in the area of CSR ...... 13

3. Shareholders’ influence on CSR ...... 16

3.1 Development of status quo ...... 16

3.2 Social Shareholder Activism (SSA) ...... 18

3.2.1 Social shareholder activism (SSA) as a a tool for change ...... 19

3.2.2 Activist tactics ...... 22

3.2.3 The shareholder activist ...... 26

3.3 Socially responsible investments (SRI) – entry and exit instead of negotiations ...... 28

3.3.1 Definitions ...... 28

3.3.2 A change in the understanding of a ‘good investment’ ...... 29

3.3.3 Screening Methods ...... 30

3.3.4 SRI influencing business practices ...... 31

3.3.5 Limitations of SRI ...... 32

4. Empirical Research ...... 34

4.1 Research Design ...... 34

4.2 Research Methodology ...... 37

4.2.1 Participants: sample description ...... 38

4.2.2 Development of the interview guidelines ...... 39

4.2.3 Interview setting and situation description ...... 41

4.2.4 Material description ...... 41

4.2.5 Qualitative Content Analysis (QCA) ...... 42

5. Research Results in Detail...... 45

5.1 Motivators for CSR ...... 46

5.1.1 Internal Motivators ...... 47

5.1.2 External Motivators ...... 50

5.1.3 Drivers and Barriers of CSR ...... 52

5.2 Shareholders influencing CSR ...... 53

5.2.1 Topics of Interest ...... 53

5.2.2 Reasons for influencing ...... 54

5.2.3 Interaction and Communication with the firm ...... 54 II

5.2.4 Reactions to CSR implementation ...... 56

5.3 Shareholder Structure ...... 57

5.3.1 Change in Shareholder Structure ...... 57

5.3.2 Background of New Shareholders ...... 58

5.3.3 Interests of New Shareholders ...... 60

5.3.4 Interaction and Communication with New Shareholders ...... 62

5.3.5 Screening Methods ...... 65

6. Discussion of the Findings ...... 69

6.1 Motivators for CSR ...... 69

6.2 Shareholders influencing CSR ...... 71

6.3 Shareholder Structure ...... 72

7. Limitations of the Study ...... 75

8. Further possible Research and recommended course of action ...... 76

9. Conclusion ...... 79

IV. List of References ...... 82

V. Appendix ...... 95

Appendix I - Interview Guidelines ...... 95

Interview Outline - Business Side...... 95

Interview Outline - ethical/social fund manager ...... 97

Appendix II - Category Systems ...... 98

Category system - Business side ...... 98

Category System - SRI ...... 120 III

Appendix III - Interview Transcripts ...... 129

Transcript Interview 1 ...... 129

Transcript Interview 2 ...... 137

Transcript Interview 3 ...... 143

Transcript Interview 4 ...... 151

Transcript Interview 5 ...... 155

Transcript Interview 6 ...... 167

Transcript Interview 7 ...... 172

I. TABLE OF TABLES

Table 1 - Drivers and barriers of CSR ...... 12

Table 2 - Groups of social shareholder activists ...... 27

Table 3 - Overview and information about the interview sample ...... 38

Table 4 - Description of examined companies ...... 39

II. TABLE OF FIGURES

Figure 1 - Shareholder Activism: Antecedents, Processes, and Outcomes ...... 21

Figure 2 - Shareholder proposal process ...... 24

Figure 3 - Category System - CSR ...... 43

Figure 4 - Category System - SRI ...... 44

II. LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Abbreviation Explanation CSR Corporate Social Responsibility CS Corporate Sustainability GRI Global Reporting Initiative ICCR Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility IRRC Investor Responsibility Research Centre IR Investor Relations MNC Multinational Corporation MNE Multinational Enterprise SA Shareholder Activism / Shareholder Activist SEA Securities Exchange Act SIF Social Investment Forum SME Small and Medium Enterprise SRI Socially Responsible Investors SSA Social Shareholder Activism / Social Shareholder Activist UNCTAD United Nation Conference on Trade and Development

VII

III. ABSTRACT

As the title indicates, the present master thesis deals with corporate social responsibility (CSR) and shareholder structure. Particularly it focuses on the influence the shareholders have on CSR efforts of a company, as well if and how CSR strategies, efforts and activities of companies influence and alter a corporation’s shareholder structure. The following empirical study shows the interdependencies of shareholders and CSR with a focus on the countries of Austria and Italy. Results show that in the examined countries shareholder structure has changed in recent years due to CSR and sustainability strategies of the respective firms. In addition to the finding of existing influence of CSR on a firm’s shareholder structure. A further finding suggests the importance of the communication between firms and shareholders.

VIII

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 Problem Definition

This work addresses the role of shareholders in regard to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities of a company, as well as to what extent CSR efforts and activities of a company may influence its shareholder structure in a comparison between countries. Literature and data suggest, that CSR efforts of a company are influenced by different factors, those are internal as well as external factors. Due to their increasing connection to wider society through firm’s operations.1 During the last decades, a growing number of companies have integrated social and environmental issues, i.e. CSR issues, into their strategies.2 According to a survey with CEOs, 93% of them regard sustainability as important to the future success of their companies and 96% of the questioned CEOs believe social, and environmental issue should be integrated into the businesses strategy.3

Due to the increasing importance of CSR for firms, customers, employees, regulators, policymakers, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as well as the financial community, the investor of today does not only look for the most profitable investment but also on how the companies perform in non-financial areas.4 The classical image of the shareholder being a narrow-minded economist, who is only interested in profit-maximization and almost demanding to ignore social responsibility of a company, is therefore obsolete.5 In reality shareholders have become one of the most important allies of the CSR movement.6 This consciousness beyond mere profits does not remain unprofitable for companies and investors as increasing stock prices and financial performance are reported in firms active in CSR.7

Literature on CSR focuses mostly on the link between CSR activities and financial aspects and concentrates research mostly on angloamerican countries.8 Therefore this work will provide additional exploration and insights in the topic of CSR in two ways, namely CSR and shareholder structure as well as CSR and shareholder structure in European countries.

1 see. Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 220. 2 see. Eccles/Ioannou/Serafeim, 2014, 2852. 3 see. Lacy/Cooper/Hayward/Neuberger, 2010, 7. 4 see. Gómez-Bezares/Przychodzen/Przychodzen, 2016, 277. 5 see. Friedman, 1970, 122; Glac, 2014, 55; Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 335. 6 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 229; Glac, 2014, 42. 7 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3263. 8 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3230. 1

Not only are there differences between angloamerican countries and Continental Europe, but also between European countries themselves. There are major differences in laws and culture, even if spatial proximity is given.9 Therfore it is of interest to investigate circumstances for CSR and shareholder influence in more than just one country.

As this thesis analyzes two sides, namely shareholders influencing CSR and CSR influencing shareholders: also the central question the addresses aim at these two directions:

How do shareholder influence CSR and does CSR influence shareholder structure?

 How do Shareholders influence CSR activities in different countries?  Do CSR efforts of companies attract more and new shareholders?  Are the effects of CSR efforts on shareholder structure differing among countries?

In the course of the thesis these questions will be answered. First from a theoretical point of view through theory research and analysis and as a second step through empirical research.

1.2 Research Objective

Out of the described problem definition the author intends to reach the following research objectives:

 To explore CSR in general, its development and influence internationally  To gain understanding of shareholder’s role in CSR activities, the processes and collaborations with firms  To explore differences in countries of firm’s and investor’s perception of said collaboration  To provide an outlook of the development to come

The main objective of this work is to answer to the research question mentioned above and to gain a better understanding of CSR as a tool for shareholders as well as a tool for change. A second objective for this work is to contribute to a better understanding of the effects of CSR on a firm’s shareholder structure as well as provide new insights on the matter. This work aims at enhancing current knowledge of the topic, especially in the two countries studied.

9 see. Cziraki/Renneboog/Szilagyi, 2010, 769. 2

Furthermore, having explored managers impressions and perceptions, this work should give additional impulse to and provide recommendations for organizations, international companies and investment funds. Studying CSR and shareholders can provide indications for future actions, trends and requirements.

By increasing the awareness of CSR, its influence on business and business performance, as well as its influence on the shareholder structure but also the shareholder’s influence on the matter, this research provides valuable knowledge on how to better meet, present and also meet future needs of investors. This change in investors and their needs is of importance to businesses as well as investment banks. The results of this study might be interesting also for international companies, as this thesis addresses an international comparison of CSR and shareholders.

1.3 Methodology

This work deals with the perceptions of different managers in different countries of the status quo of CSR in general, shareholders influencing CSR efforts of a company, as well as the perception of change in shareholder structure. In order to understand the complexity of the topic, a vast literature research and analysis offers the basis for this thesis. By starting with the topic CSR and its development this work offers a broad insight in corporate social responsibility internationally and depicts the different views, motivators, drivers and barriers on the topic and its influences on business. Next the role of shareholders and their influence on CSR will be analyzed through theory. The different shareholder groups will be depicted and analyzed.

As a follow up step, the empirical research is conducted through a qualitative research, which consists of a semi-structured interview. This is because this thesis intends to obtain in- depth knowledge about managers’ perception on the matter as well as their subjective experiences with shareholders, shareholder activism, and socially responsible (SRI) funds. The foucus is clearly on exploring individual’s belief, understanding and perception. To gain these insights, a qualitative study is best suited, as it allows getting a rich and deep understanding of perceptions, individual experiences and attitudes.

The qualitative analysis is conducted following Mayring’s qualitative content analysis (QCA).10 This method is used to analyze six interviews of CSR or Investor Relations (IR)

10 see. Mayring, 2014, 10. 3

managers and one interview with an SRI fund manager. In one of the interviews two managers – one CSR and one IR manager – were interviewed in one sitting. Out of the 8 interviewees, five come from Austria, while the other two come from Italy. The interviewed managers are chosen according to the CSR activities of their respective firms. All of the firms have a CSR strategy in place and are internationally active. The analysis of the transliterated interviews was conducted with MAXQDA.

2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

2.1 Definition and differentiation of CSR

The term of CSR is one of the most ubiquos terms nowadays. The CSR field presents not only a landscape of theories but also a breeding of approaches, which are controversial, complex and unclear.11 Besides that it can be found in studies and business context, it is also present in popular culture such as movies. The term Corporate Social Responsibility is one of the most searched terms in the web.12 As CSR is such a widespread topic, it must be clarified what the term encompasses: as for now no universal definition is generally accepted, as this single term is used to describe multiple facets of business behavior in different business areas, from (corporate) philanthropy, corporate citizenship to corporate social performance.13 As Votaw already mentioned nearly 50 years ago, CSR means something but not always the same thing to everybody.14

As CSR is not a topic to stand on its own, it first has to be understood in which context to place CSR, what bigger topic it is part of: Corporate social responsibility is part of sustainability, sometimes the two words are being used as synonyms, but a sustainable company can be seen as a business unit that considers its long term health as a combination of the right behavior and the right management of all single activities, may they be of financial, social or environmental nature.15 When speaking about corporate sustainability (CS), one speaks about longterm goals for a firm, to create long-term shareholder wealth and the preservation of the business, by adopting sustainability goals into the businesses strategy and operations. In CS the ultimate goal is the balance between social, environmental, and financial goals: The triple bottom line.16 Whereas CSR is according to theory, more short term oriented and does not take shareholder wealth into account as a critical factor and sees the triple bottom line only as an intermediate stage. Therefore CSR can be defined as a sub area of CS.17

Coming back to Votaws insight that CSR can mean different things to different parties, Carroll follows with an in-depth explanation. To some it encompasses a business’ legal

11 see. Garriga/Melé, 2004, 54. 12 see. Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 328. 13 see. Nwoke, 2017, 130. 14 see. Votaw, 1972, 25. 15 see. Przychodzen/Przychodzen, 2013, 241. 16 see. Kaptein/Wempe, 2000, 12; Norman/MacDonald, 2004, 251. 17 see. Kaptein/Wempe, 2000, 15; Weber, 2008, 249. 5

responsibility or liability, to others, it has an ethical meaning, where a business behaves socially responsible in an ethical context, again others simply understand CSR as charitable actions. Still others see it as a way of identification and a reason to exist in society and therefore to legitimize a business. Very few see it as a duty to behave exemplary as business and businessmen, with standards being higher than for normal citizens.18

These multiple options of what CSR can mean to an organization or a private person can be summed up with one of the most defining characteristics of CSR: it is voluntaristic. CSR is not only promoting legal regulation of corporations, but also self-regulations of said corporations. As a result CSR is most effective in companies that chose freely to be active in CSR, i.e. when it is not forced upon anyone. CSR has to come voluntarily from within the corporation. Imposed CSR from outside the corporation is mostly counterproductive.19

In practice we can see that CSR encompasses up to now at least three traditions: the first being environmental, the second tradition is the rights movement and the third is the philanthropic approach.20

This chapter began with listing multiple defining characteristics and interpretations of CSR. Following now are three definitions of CSR, that are in the opinion of the author the clearest ones and encompassing the most characteristics of CSR.

The United Nation Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) simply states that CSR encompasses all actions of a business that relate to and impact upon a society’s needs and goals. It specifies that especially for multinational companies (MNEs) and publicly listed companies the requirements and challenges are increasing, as to the increased role they play in the globalized world.21

Campbell complements these actions with a behavioral standard, consisting of two basic and simple criteria: First, companies must not knowingly do anything that could harm their stakeholders. Second, if they do cause harm in contempt of respecting the first criteria, they must make amends once it is discovered.22

The European Commission (EC) defined CSR as ‘the responsibility of enterprises for their impacts on society. They further complemented the definition with the notion that CSR

18 see. Carroll, 1999, 268. 19 see. Ireland/Pillay, 2010, 80; Wagner, 2016, 10. 20 see. Mostovicz/Kakabadse/Kakabadse, 2009, 453. 21 see. UNCTAD, 1999. 22 see. Campbell, 2007, 949. 6

stimulates corporations to ‘have in place, a process to integrate social, environmental, ethical, human rights and consumer concerns into their business operations and core strategy in collaboration with stakeholders’.23 Here it can be already seen that actions are demanded and whom and what these actions include, but it is not specified how these actions should look like.

Besides being complicated to define and differentiate, CSR is mostly limited to less financially constrained firms.24 A firm being able to be active in CSR is able to build goodwill and trust and therefore it may influence a firm’s value.25 The correlation between CSR efforts of a company and sustainability of a company in general was analyzed by many authors, but no conclusive answer could have been given.

Another reason for CSR definitions to be so broad is to counteract on CSR’s adversaries. They state that if definitions would be narrower and rules would be stricter the free market would be restricted in a way for it to not work in a liberal way.26

CSR is a broad topic with many different definitions but with commonalities to all of them. This research will therefore focus on CSR as efforts to give back to the community.

2.2 Two schools of thought on CSR

As already seen in the definitions, CSR is a multifarious topic with many subfields and divisions. CSR itself is still a young topic in the business world and is continuously developing as a whole and each subunit and division develops on their own within the CSR framework. Nowadays CSR, and with it the question if a firm should ‘go beyond its profits’ is an important topic and cannot be erased from the business world. Nonetheless there were multiple opponents to CSR becoming a part of business and there still are a lot of academics and practitioners, who doubt the sense and usefulness of CSR. The first way of thinking can be defined as the narrow view: the scope of business is to make profits and doing it within the legal parameters and restrictions. The second view encompasses those academics and practitioners that thinkt there is a broader scope to making business, i.e. the inclusion of social and environmental topics.27

23 see. European Commission, 2011, 7. 24 see. Hong/Kubik/Scheinkman, 2012. 25 see. Flammer, 2013, 762. 26 see. Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 336 27 see. Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 327. 7

The most known advocate of the first school of thought is Milton Friedman, with one of his much cited statements: ‘the only social responsibility of a firm is to maximize its profits’.28 Standing alone, this sentence sounds very drastic and is the complete opposite of the general understanding of CSR. But one of Friedman’s best known sayings is – in most cases – taken out of context. Friedman stated the above mentioned sentence in connection with the phrase that the company must achieve this goal of profit maximization within ‘the rules of the game’. These rules are on the one hand the laws of the state it operates in, on the other hand the ethical customs.29 If everyone would play by the rules, Friedmans approach would be sufficient, but not all firms act ethically, as well as the term ethical itself leaves room for interpretation. In addition to that, laws differ in countries which again might cause unethical behavior in international firms.30 For academics of this school of thought another reason not to invest in CSR is the argument, that adopting environmental and social policies can even destroy shareholder wealth. They see CSR, when broken down to its simplest core, as an agency cost limiting shareholders’ profits. Academics argue, that CSR takes corporations outside their proper role and represents a waste of shareholder’s money. A socially conciuos but a bankrupt corporation is no good to anyone.31 Additionally theory states, that firms investing in CSR might experience a higher costs, that companies not acting under the restraints and additional rules of CSR are more competitive, and as a result more successful.32 Jensen goes even further and states that companies, trying to act within these additional environmental and social pressures, will be either eliminated by competitors or by themselves, as they will consume their economic rents.33

The second school of thought presumes corporations have not only the obligation to generate value for the shareholders and ‘give them their money back’34. They have also obligations for all those with interests in the company and affected by corporate activities, better known as stakeholders and summarized as stakeholder view.35 A second name for this corporate governance type, is the ‘good governance view’.36 Academics see these obligations a company has towards their stakeholders as a result of the decrease in power of nations and states and the increase of financial, political and social power of corporations: in the beginning of the emergence of corporations, they were thought of providing social

28 see. Friedman, 1970, 122. 29 see. Friedman, 1970, 122; Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 331. 30 see. Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 337. 31 see. Friedman 1970, 123; Navarro 1988, 70; Galaskiewicz 1997, 467; Maloni/Brown, 2006, 41; Schwartz/Saiia, 2011, 340; Ferrell/Liang/Renneboog, 2016, 589. 32 see. Eccles/Ioannaou/Serafeim, 2014, 2842. 33 see. Jensen, 2010, 37. 34 Shleifer/Vishny, 1997, 738. 35 see. Donaldson/Preston, 1995, 73; Ireland, 1999, 53; Ackoff, 2002, 18. 36 see. Ferrell/Liang/Renneboog, 2016, 602. 8

services, which small businesses could not easily provide. Therefore, corporations are expected to be the administrators of responsible behavior and the provider of solutions to social and economic challenges.37 When corporations are engaging in environmentally friendly activities, they are merely fulfilling their obligations to society.38

The second school of thought is convinced, that companies can do well by doing good.39 A direct connection between CSR and higher profits has not been prooven sufficiently, yet secondary benefits, such as increasing goodwill and profiting from positive media coverage, are proven. CSR has therefore value to a firm and effects on its profits.40 One being that meeting the needs of stakeholders other than shareholders will create value for the firm and therefore for the shareholders for instance investments in employee training creates better qualified employees and results in less mistakes and less production time.41 The second assumption is that if a company does not meet their stakeholders needs the destruction of shareholder value is the direct result to that, as through consumer boycotts42, or the inability to hire the most talented people, because of their bad reputation.43 Furthermore academics challenged Friedman’s view on CSR as a simple agency cost. Taking the example of pollution reduction, they argue, that pollution is a waste of resources therefore efforts to reduce pollution, such as improving products and processes, might not only reduce a companies environmental footprint but also strengthen its competitiveness. It might also improve the company’s position on the market and result in higher profits for the company. Literature even suggests, that properly designed social and environmental efforts can stimulate innovativeness of businesses.44 This is known as the ‘Porter hypothesis’ and has led to enhanced discussion on environmental topics in management literature.45

2.3 A Changing Framework of CSR

Besides the schools of though on CSR, which cover mostly influences CSR has on the business, CSR is also influenced by multiple factors. They can be divided into external and internal moderators, which are furthering its development. An external moderator is e.g. the status of environmentally friendly behavior in society, which grew greatly over the last

37 see. Berle/Gardiner, 1968, 204; Ackoff, 2002, 20; Ireland, 2010, 847. 38 see. Ackoff, 2002, 20. 39 see. Godfrey, 2005, 795; Porter et al., 2011, 17. 40 see. Frame, 2005, 430. 41 see. Freeman, 2010; Porter et al., 2011, 23. 42 see. Sen/Bhattacharya, 2001, 235. 43 see. Greening/Turban 2000, 255. 44 see. Porter, 1991, 96; Porter/van der Linde, 1995, 109; Wagner, 2016, 32. 45 see. Flammer, 2013, 763. 9

decades. Not only the general importance of eco friendly behavior has increased, also the consequences for corporations have changed: whereas positive reactions to eco-friendly behavior have lessened, negative stock market reactions to eco-harmful behavior have increased.46 Additionally corporations receive pressure from NGOs since the beginning of the 1990s. Other factors at this time were investment losses due to declines in stock valuations as the public reacted to corporations’ unethical behavior and fraudulent behavior.47 To stay legitimized and forestall external regulations, firms started to pursue institutional change and incorporate CSR practices.48 In some of the cases, PR departments were tasked with greenwashing the corporations image.49

There are varying degrees of corporations’ commitment to CSR, ranging from stated policies and public statements, to the alignement of business functions with social and environmental objectives. Studies also show, that internally motivated companies build a more effective CSR culture and embed it better in business practices than those that are motivated externally.50

An example of the increasing importance of CSR, with respect to financial arguments is the case of two massive oil spills and stock market’s reaction to it: the Exxon oil spill occurred in March of 1989, the stock price on that day was $44.5 per share and dropped only to $41.75 in April. It even recovered to pre-incident levels after only four months. Whereas the second oil spill (British Petrolium – BP) had totally different outcomes: it occurred in April of 2010 with a stock price of $59.5 on the day of the incident, which dropped to $28.95 in June of the same year, showing a more drastical and higher impact on the firms share value and therefore the firm value. Even though this is just one simplified comparison, it gives a hint of the changed importance of CSR over the past decades.51

2.4 Drivers and Barriers of CSR

According to theory there are multiple drivers and barriers for CSR. The table below demonstrates an onverview of them. However, only those which the author condisders as relevant to this thesis, are explained in more detail.

46 see. Flammer, 2013, 766. 47 see. Brickey, 2008, 27. 48 see. Hoffman, 1999, 360; Chapple/Moon, 2005, 429; Newell/Frynas, 2007, 672; Gjølberg, 2011, 14. 49 see. Newell/Frynas, 2007, 679. 50 see. Graafland/van de Ven, 2006, 113; Ireland/Pillay, 2010, 99. 51 see. Flammer, 2013, 771. 10

As already stated in the definitions part of this work, CSR can improve shareholder value; so, one might ask why firms might not voluntarily pursue a CSR strategy:52 Generally speaking successful CSR with positive consequences, such as an increase in firm value, demands a favourable management attitude. This favourable attitude towards a CSR strategy can be considered as a mediating variable between drivers and barriers of CSR.53

When speaking about drivers and barriers of CSR a distinction between MNEs and SMEs must be made, as some drivers and barriers are only relevant for one of the two categories.

Nr. Name Group Affects Short explanation 1 Shareholder view Barrier SME and MNE This barrier was already explained to – neoliberalism a great extent in the previous chapters.54 2 Performance Barrier SME and MNE Performance related pay is introduced related pay by shareholders to solve the principal agent theory and pressures managers to adopt high risk attitudes.55 3 Size – cost Barrier SME MNEs have greater possibilities just benefit ratio for their size: e.g. with just 1% of revenue an MNE might be able to recruit a CSR specialist, with the same percentage a SME is not able to make any durable changes.56 4 External control Barrier SME SMEs generally lack knowledge in the field of CSR and thus recognize less CSR issues than MNEs.57 5 Political influence Barrier MNE Corporations, due to their financial prowess, have influence on government decisions, which can act as a barrier to effective CSR.58 6 Internal control Driver SME CSR issues and foremost decisions in and SMEs often lie directly with the owner. Barrier It is therefore easier for SMEs to implement CSR activities, but only if the owner is interested in CSR.59

52 see. Dimson/Karakaş/Li, 2015, 3248. 53 see. Laudal, 2011, 240. 54 see. chapter 2.2 for more information on shareholder view. 55 see. Nwoke, 2017, 139. 56 see. Jenkins/Obara, 2006, 68; Laudal, 2011, 245. 57 see. Lepoutre/Heene, 2006, 261. 58 see. Nwoke, 2017, 135. 59 see. Spence, 2007, 542; Jenkins/Hines 2003; Laudal, 2011, 249. 11

7 Sensitivity to local Driver SME As SMEs are mostly completely or to stakeholders a great deal family held, they are rooted in the local communities and are therefore more aware of local issues and risks.60 8 Conformity Driver MNE As MNEs are active in an international setting, the legitimacy setting is rising. Therefore, companies follow lead companies also in CSR topics.61 9 Reputation Driver MNE MNEs are more vulnerable for harming activities, as to their size and popularity and the thereby involved media coverage.62 10 Autonomy Driver SME and MNE CSR can be used to safeguard a company from restrictive governments’ influences.63 11 Geographical Driver MNE and SME Firms active in multiple countries are spread wanting to influenced by a set of different expand governmental rules. This can be a internationally driver for the incorporation of a CSR strategy.64 Table 1 - Drivers and barriers of CSR

Internal control is one of the drivers and barriers of greater importance to SMEs. It describes the fact that CSR efforts must come from within the company to be successful, as already mentioned before. Therefore this can be defined a driver for owner-mangaed or family-run SMEs as long as the business owners are interested in.65 It is much harder for MNEs to implement a serious CSR strategy sheer to their size.66

Complementary to the driver of internal control, the sensitivity for local stakeholders is worthy of mentioning. This is also a driver for SMEs rather than MNEs, as they mostly exhibit a strong connection and attachment to local communities, people, and cultures. They are also

60 see. Studer/Welford/Hills, 2006, 425; Amato/Amato, 2012, 324. 61 see. Bansal/Roth, 2000, 730; Husted, 2003, 489. 62 see. Amato/Amato, 2012, 319; Flammer, 2013, 779; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3259. 63 see. Florini, 2003, 238; Rondinelli/London, 2003, 71. 64 see. Forstater, 2006, 63; Laudal, 2011, 253. 65 see. Jenkins/Obara, 2006, 20. 66 see. Bielak/Bonini/Oppenheim, 2007, 9. 12

more aware of local issues and risks than MNEs.67 Furthermore SMEs are less mobile and therefore must take a more long-term view of their interaction with local communities.68

The most cited driver for MNEs, on the other hand, is reputation and the reason for that is once again their size and popularity.69 Its reputation has a great influence on the firm as it summarizes the opinions of customers, business partners, investors, employees, and, of their potential employees.70 Therefore managers often use CSR strategies as a mean to establish or secure a good reputation for the firm and to prevent negative media coverage. 71

Connected to negative media and a good reputation is the next driver for MNEs, autonomy. CSR strategies is also used by MNEs to guard against threats to their self-rule.72 Management might use self-restricting measures, as a code of conduct or a emission maximum, to avoid external influences such as government restrictions.73 However studies show that SMEs favor this external regulations threaded so much by MNEs, this is due to their lack in competence in the CSR field.74

As it can be seen, most drivers and barriers are interdependent or at least connected with each other. There is not only one single barrier or driver influencing a firm’s attitude towards CSR, but multiple factors influencing them.

2.5 Further development in the area of CSR

Seeing that CSR is a very current topic and has increased greatly in importance, the way of future development is of interest to many academics, but also practitioners. CSR and sustainability have already developed to the point as being an opposing position to the ‘maximizing shareholder value’ model of corporate governance, that is to be taken seriously.75 The development of firms is also very interesting and important, as corporations possess a considerable amount of influence and power in international finance.76

The power of corporations is best pictured by the sheer fact that 51 out of the 100 largest economies in the world are corporate entities. To illustrate this even more comprehensible

67 see. Laudal, 2011, 257. 68 see. Forstater/Raynard/MacDonald, 2002, 12. 69 see. Amato/Amato, 2012, 320; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3228. 70 see. Sen/ Bhattacharya, 2004, 237; Brekke/Nyborg, 2008, 513; Laudal, 2011, 239. 71 see. Borghesi/Houston/Naranjo, 2014, 170. 72 see. Gjølberg, 2011, 26. 73 see. Chapple/Moon, 2005, 426. 74 see. Studer/Welford/Hills, 2006, 419; Williamson/Lynch-Wood/Ramsay, 2006, 319. 75 see. Newell/Frynas, 2007, 671; Ireland/Pillay, 2010, 90; Gjolberg, 2011, 30. 76 see. Wheeler/Sillanpää, 1997, 38. 13

literature often compares the strongest corporate entities to countries: the economy of Toyota is bigger than that of Norway, the assets of General Motors surpass those of Denmark and the combined assets of the wealthiest corporations are more than double that of the aggregate GDP of the world’s 100 poorest nations.77 When looking at this enormous wealth, it is evident that corporations’ power in international finance is coupled with corporations’ economic and political influence. They become one of the biggest influencers, not only for national economic progress but also for environmental and social topics. Their influence on environmental and social struggles cannot be seen anymore as that of mere individuals or group of individuals.78

Even though CSR has increased in importance in recent years, academics’ opinions do still drift apart when it comes to the expected development. On the one hand, literature sees the shareholder value model too dominant for CSR to be an effective mechanism. They state that current company cultures do not encourage a development of CSR activities or a CSR strategy. As well as external forces do not pressure the corporations enough for a more socially responsible behavior.79 On the other hand, shareholder resolutions regarding social and environmental responsibility are increasingly frequent.80 In a report by the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) only submitted shareholder resolutions are counted, therefore it can be expected that resolutions that were worked out outside the annual shareholder meetings through private meetings is even higher.81

Besides the two directions of CSR increasing in importance and CSR not being able to develop appropriately, other theories about the development of CSR exist. Coming back to the three traditions of CSR mentioned in chapter 2.1, academics think that philanthropy will be the future of CSR. Meaning that the environmental and rights movement tradition of CSR will fade out. The trend here seems to lead even further away from government and a broader span, having philanthropists think about communities’ issues. With them building hospitals and schools for the public, philanthropists become the government in a way. CSR in this way is changing from the current corporate public issue to a more political issue. Taking large corporation’s original purpose of providing social services and reason for the emergence of CSR to today, academics observe that governments giving their responsibilities to the private sector. They absolve their responsibilities toward citizens to private entities. This leads to the monetarization of services and to a variance of practices.

77 see. Utting, 2000, 11. 78 see. Nwoke, 2017, 132. 79 see. Chapple/Moon, 2005, 450; Newell/Frynas, 2007, 674; Ireland/Pillay, 2009, 94; Gjølberg, 2011, 28. 80 see. ICCR, 2013 81 see chapter 3.2ff for further information on shareholder resolutions and CSR. 14

These again depend on the country corporations operate in, often also on the companies. Research states that governments must take initiative towards these developments as to prevent increasing social inequalities not only in underdeveloped countries, such as third world countries, but also in highly developed countries.82

82 see. Kakabadse/Morsing 2006, 12; Mostovicz/Kakabadse/Kakabadse, 2009, 453. 15

3. SHAREHOLDERS’ INFLUENCE ON CSR

Most equities in the market are owned by so called ‘universal owners’, as they hold long- term, diversified and significant shares.83 Universal owners have more than just one role, they serve for example as shareholders and creditors and have responsibilities towards their customers, beneficiaries as well as the wider community. Therefore, they are not only focused on issues related to shareholders, but to a wide range of stakeholders.84 As these investors own a substantial part of the markets equities, their investment portfolios are exposed to risks. As a result it is in the investors’ interest to minimize these risks, minimize potential costs and maximize the potential benefits by influencing the firm’s behavior they invested in. Most of these universal owners were focused traditionally on economic profits, but they can also influence a firm’s behavior when it comes to CSR as profits can emerge from that and costs can be minimized or erased. Studies have shown, that shareholders react positively to the announcement of eco-friendly initiatives and behavior, whereas they react negatively to eco-harmful behavior or incidents.85 The traditional shareholder versus stakeholder approach is for most firms not prevailing anymore, as also shareholders are interested in further CSR efforts.86 As the conventional shareholder changes, also socially responsible investing (SRI) is on the rise. These investors have a clear mission: they seek to deliver social as well as financial benefits, as they are confident that these goals are not exclusive.87

3.1 Development of status quo

In the early days of shareholder activism, starting with 1940, shareholders mostly wanted to enable themselves, but as well empower women and enhance civil rights.88 Already in the beginning companies reacted hostile against these engaged individuals and they were often not taken seriously. Companies did not know how to respond and interact with its shareholders. Many large and influential companies have resisted the idea at first, that shareholder could influence important aspects of business and even went to great lengths to prevent it.89 Eventhough these early active shareholders were few in numbers and had only limited effect on corporations activities, their activities were groundbreaking for todays

83 see. Monks/Minow, 1995, 26; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3261. 84 see. Hawley/Williams, 2000, 73; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3263. 85 see. Flammer, 2013, 773. 86 see. Ackoff, 2002, 17; Nwoke, 2017, 141. 87 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3265. 88 see. Marens, 2002, 381. 89 see. Vogel, 1983, 74. 16

shareholder activism: one of the earliest results of shareholder activism was the introduction of Rule 14a-8 of the Securities Exchange Act (SEA). This rule lays out the process and standards related to shareholder proposal (see figure 2 for more information), laying the grounds for regulated active ownership. Another important achievement of the early shareholder activist was the initiation of shareholder networks, which later on became instrumental for further development, such as the Federation of Women Shareholders. These shareholder networks were also determinative in the establishment of additional groups such as the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR).90

Already in the 1940s and 1950s the question about CSR emerged in the beginning of shareholder activism. It can be observed, that the division in views about corporations’ role in social and environmental topics in general and to what extent and in which way firms should pursue social and environmental goals according to shareholders differed greatly.91 Active owners interested in the improvement of social rights and environmental issues had to be more inventive than shareholders today when it came to proposals for change: as an example a female shareholder sought female representation on corporate boards and argued that having women on the board would result in an increased and better R&D. A second example is the case of the Medical Committee on Human Rights and Dow Chemical. They argued Dow Chemical would have an increased number of and better applicants if they stopped the sale of napalm. They addressed the company’s recruiting problems and gave their concern on human right a different context.92 Up to this day many active owners have to work around the system and find – for the companies – plausible reasons for their shareholder proposals when they included CSR. This duality in views of CSR continues to this day. One side views CSR activities merely as good management and as a means to achieve better economic results, as for afore mentioned example the cessation of napalm production diminished their recruiting problem. The other side sees more obligations for the companies, as they are an immense economical and also political power. This entails special obligations towards society, such as to be a source for social change and doing good, despite the fact that some actions might have a negative effect on the economic bottom line.93

Likewise, the reasons for enacting with the corporation differed from the beginning. Some of the activists saw their engagement and efforts as an addendum to their responsibility as

90 see. Marens, 2002, 384; Logsdon/Rehbein/Van Buren III, 2007, 2. 91 see. Thompson/Davis, 1997, 154; Logsdon/Rehbein/Van Buren III, 2007, 4. 92 see. Marens, 2002, 381. 93 see. Davis/Thompson, 1994, 168; Marens, 2002, 383. 17

owners of the corporations. Others even acquired shares only to influence a corporation and advance their causes. In the latter case corporations were seen as instruments to achieve broader social and environmental goals.94

After the introduction of the groundbreaking rule 14a-8 in 1942, only a few dozen shareholder proposals were submitted each year. Not even a decade later in 1951 the number of submitted proposals rose to 72 on average per year.95 Most of these early proposals were not focused on CSR issues, it can be seen that the beginning of social issues shareholder activism started after 1970, after the SEC relaxed the interpretation of proposal rules. The Campaign GM, eventhough unsuccessful, is seen by many as the starting point of social shareholder activism.96

3.2 Social Shareholder Activism (SSA)

Shareholder activism generally is defined as the active influence an owner exerts to shape company policy proactively.97 This interest and influence does not always limit itself to traditional financial aspects of the company, but can also involve social and environmental issues. In the latter, shareholders can pursue social and environmental dimension for principle-based reasons, whereas others might purse it still for financial reasons, using the positive aspects of CSR as a part of risk management or corporate brand enhancement.98 Environmental and social activists are often using the increasing interest of shareholders in CSR, but also shareholders themselves become active lobbyists for environmental and social issues.99 When social activists and corporate investors are the same person, the question of how the corporate executive has to handle economic and environmental pressures, arises. Especially when CSR activist investors only see the corporation as a tool for achieving social change even at a loss of financial gains.100 Nonetheless have active owners more often than not had a crucial part in the creation of sustained value and success of these companies.101

Social shareholder activism can be defined as a social movement, as it is driven by interested groups, such as pension funds (e.g. the Pension Fund of the Chrisitan Church)

94 see. Vogel, 1978, 43; Marens, 2002, 367. 95 see. Marens, 2002, 370. 96 see. Vogel, 1983, 74; Profitt/Spicer 2006, 183. 97 see. Sjöstrom, 2008, 150. 98 see. Proffitt/Spicer, 2006, 183; Sjöstrom, 2008, 154; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3260. 99 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 232. 100 see. Hoffman, 1999, 364; O’Rourke, 2003, 235. 101 see. Carlsson, 2003, 10. 18

and special interest groups (e.g. the Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investment). These groups are working together and are organized to a certain degree. Essentially SSA breaks the norms of business, namely the maximization of profits, by advocating for the well- being of nonshareholding stakeholders. Other characteristics of SSA are that it has a suprainstitutional orientation and its orientation toward change in corporate behavior in line with their own values and beliefs. 102

Shareholder activism has its roots in the 1940s and the extent of engagement between shareholders and corporations is said to be at an all-time high nowadays.103 For CSR topics the development became positive with the change in the SEC interpretations. It has increased the legitimacy of social proposals and management is nowadays much more inclined to discussing social issues with shareholders before a proposal is officially put on the proxy card. Yet (social) shareholder activism has been taking place for decades: Literature claims that U.S. shareholders have been actively pressuring corporations’ managements to address and improve social issues since the 1940’s.104 Brancato says, that these early shareholder activists were crucial in the change of annual shareholder meetings from ‘perfunctory legal rituals’ to symposiums for discussion between shareholders and management.105

Due to historical and economical differences the shareholder activist movement was led by U.S.’ active shareholders, however it is now a worldwide phenomenon.106

3.2.1 Social shareholder activism (SSA) as a a tool for change

Shareholder activism – just as CSR itself – has gained more attention in the eye of the public in the past five to ten years. The reason for this was thousands of social and environmentally oriented issues, which have been proposed to companies by shareholders.107

Eventhough some academics see the beginning of social shareholder activism already in the 1940’s, majority agrees that the actual beginning of social issues shareholder mobilization was in the 1970’s when the legal ruling allowed social policy topics to be submitted.108 In the years after its legal inception, social shareholder activism occurred predominantly through

102 see. Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 216. 103 see. Goldstein, 2013, 165. 104 see. Brancato, 1997, 78; O’Rourke, 2003, 235. 105 see. Brancato, 1997, 89. 106 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 237. 107 see. Brancato, 1997, 90. 108 see. Proffitt/Spicer, 2006, 180. 19

the Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) using mostly the method of filing shareholder proposals to further social justice and peace (e.g. on South African Apartheid and against militarism). These examples only demonstrate that in the beginning SSA was rather reactive, as shareholder’s calls for CSR were stimulated by particular incidents or events, such as accidents or mal-practice.109 This example clarifies that social shareholder activism was always globally oriented increasing the range of topics and fields they were fighting against year after year.

In the late 1990s, the SSA approach became more holistic, as the leading groups demanded a better management system and more reporting procedures integrating social and environmental concerns into the whole company and not anymore on just one event, issue or product. Companies were and still are compelled to adopt environmental and social reporting principles or to implement international standards, such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI).110 In the course of the years SSA learned how to use rhetoric to ease and accelerate the process of discussion and negotiation with corporations’ management. They claimed a direct effect of environmental and social issues on shareholder value. In this way they moved their social actions into the realm of profitability and shareholder value as did already Ms Soss and the Medical Committee on Human rights.111 The Investor Responsibility Research Centre (IRRC) and U.S. Social Investment Forum (SIF) state, that investor initiatives apprise management on reputational and sector risk. They ask management about the realities of changing political circumstances and how these will affect future decisions for growth, new products and acquisitions.112

109 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 239. 110 see. SIF, 2003, 3; O’Rourke, 2003, 241. 111 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 243; for further inormation see chapter 3.1. 112 see. SIF, 2003, 3. 20

Figure 1 - Shareholder Activism: Antecedents, Processes, and Outcomes113

Non-shareholding social activists have been able to pressurize corporations on changing their impact, as can be seen in the figure above. Activists, be they external stakeholders or also acitivist shareholders, can trigger processes within the organization. On the one hand from shareholders and on the other hand from management. During these processes both parties interact and try to find the best outcome possible.114 In this globalized and digitalized world it has become easier for activists to communicate globally, virtually and with little to no time diference. Technology has also massively reduced the costs of mobilizing support for social and environmental action. NGOs have increased in size, number, and impact.115

It is evident, that pressure for a more socially and environmentally responsible behavior has substantially increased in the past decades. Not only from the conventional activist side, but also from the side of firms’ owners. In addition to that, potential investors make CSR involvement a premise to invest in the company.116 They argue that the incorporation of social and environmental responsibilities may enhance firm value in the long term.117 Some corporations even draw on their shareholders’ expertise and use them when they develop new social policies.118

With an increasing number of shareholder activists pointing on social and environmental topics, firms that take CSR measures have marked up significantly.119 Eventhough there are a number of examples where SSA is an effective tool for change, the majority of academics lean towards a skeptical stance, as they say SSA is not powerful enough to be a tool for

113 see. Goranova/Ryan, 2014, 1246. 114 see. Chapter 3.2.2 for more information. 115 see. Doh/Teegen, 2002, 572; Guay/Doh/Sinclair, 2004, 135. 116 see. chapter 3.3ff for more information on SRI. 117 see. Barber, 2007, 505; Mallin/Michelon/Raggi, 2013, 32. 118 see. Logsdon/Rehbein/Van Buren III, 2007, 5. 119 see. Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 48. 21

‘significant corporate change’.120 Only when acting in large groups and shareholder conglomerates corporate change towards CSR can be achieved.121 Other than the shareholders size also experience plays a role in engaging with corporations: prior engagement experience with a corporation increases the likelihood of success for following interactions regarding CSR.122

3.2.2 Activist tactics

As already mentioned in the chapters above, shareholder activists have multiple ways to interact with a firm and execute their power as owners. Social shareholder activists use their voice in several kinds. The most prominently used is the filing of a formal shareholder resolution at the annual general shareholder meetings,123 a further method is confrontation and verbal or written communication with managers.124 Another method is dialogue with the board, as well as asking questions at the annual shareholder meeting.125 One more possibility for shareholders to exert their power is to put pressure on a corporation by bringing issues at hand to the attention of the media.126 Often shareholders use these methods in combination to enhance the probability of change in the corporation, but the most widely used method remains the shareholder resolution. This mean of influence has increased by four times in the time from 1997 to 2009.127 This is also the most studied method of the above mentioned, as there is clear evidence in numbers.128 Corporations respond to shareholders’ demands and making changes to their business practices as to hold their legitimacy in society. Therefore they must handle new shareholder demands well, but this is not always the case, as already mentioned above.129

This section will explain the used and most known activist tactics as well as the firms’ reactions and responses.

120 Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 59. 121 see. Graves/Waddock/Rehbein, 2001, 300; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3229. 122 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3231. 123 see. Song/Szewczyk, 2003, 326; Westphal/Bednar, 2008, 34; Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 213. 124 see. David/Hitt/Gimeno, 2001, 152; David/Bloom/Hillmann, 2007, 93. 125 see. Sjöstrom, 2008, 147. 126 see. den Hond/de Bakker, 2007, 911. 127 see. Flammer, 2013, 767. 128 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 229; Sjöstrom, 2008, 147; Flammer, 2013, 766; Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 217. 129 see. Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 219. 22

Shareholder Proposals

Besides the exchange of information and the presentation of the financial report, annual general shareholder meetings are used to vote on shareholder proposals, which can be submitted by shareholders owning shares in the value of $2000 or 1% of the firm in the U.S. if they are dissatisfied with corporation’s action throughout the year.130 Through these resolutions, SSA can express their concerns about social issues and draw public attention to them.131 Not all proposals have to be presented, as managers can appeal to exclude them, which is often the case, especially if the proposed actions would be breaking the law.132

The number and type of shareholder resolutions often depend on shareholders’ perception of the corporation’s current CSR performance. If said performance is perceived as satisfactory, shareholders are more inclined not to submit any proposals. Whereas if CSR performance leaves something to be desired or even weak, they may be much more supportive of proposals and even submit proposals for change on their own.133 Often groups of shareholders submit joined resolutions, as it is more likely for them to take actions if their interests overlap with others.134 Commonly investors only file one proposal for each targeted company per year. However, the filing of multiple resolutions by one shareholder or one group of shareholders is used when large and well known firms have negative media coverage over an issue.135

When a proposal has been successfully submitted, corporate officials then must choose between the following courses of action: they can publish and distribute the proposal, along with the submittees explanation and management’s opposing statement and soliciting a vote as well as publish the results of said vote. A second option would be to enter negotiations with the submitting party and try to get them to withdraw the proposal, or to directly omit the proposal on technical grounds as illustrated below.136

130 Gillan/Starks, 2000, 276 131 see. Tkac, 2006, 1; SEC, 2011; Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 217. 132 see. SEC, 2011. 133 see. Cullinan/Mahoney/Roush, 2016, 699. 134 see. Rowley/Moldoveanu, 2003, 210. 135 see. Graves/Waddocck/Rehbein, 2001, 303; Clarke, 2005, 604; Tkac, 2006, 1. 136 see. Proffitt/Spicer, 2006, 168. 23

Figure 2 - Shareholder proposal process137

The process of a shareholder proposal starts with an identified issue, which can differ regarding the focus set by the SSA. The shareholder then continues with the submission of the proposal and this is mostly the point where the company notices a shareholder’s action and is forced to act and enter into dialogue with the shareholder. Depending on how the dialogue proceeds, three outcomes are possible: If a corporation is willing to enter in further dialogue about the issue at hand and to work on the issue, shareholders can even withdraw their proposal. Mostly a written agreement between firms and shareholder is issued as a safeguard for the shareholder, as to guarantee the commitment of the firm.138 The second possibility for shareholder proposals is that they will be omitted; omission is mostly based on legal grounds. The third possibility is, that the dialogue was unsuccessfull and the proposal is officially added to the agenda of the annual general shareholder meeting. Before the meeting, the corporation must send out all shareholder proposals to each shareholder including a statement of the submittee and a counter statement by the corporation. At the meeting itself, the proposal is voted on. Again two possibilities emerge: the vote can be negative and the proposal dismissed, which can entail it will be forgotten or it will be submitted again in one of the following meetings.139 If the vote is positive there is no legal requirement for the company to actually change the matter at hand. They have a nonbinding nature in the U.S.,140 whereas they are legally binding in the UK and in most of Continental Europe with the exceptions of the Netherlands.141 Nonetheless, shareholder proposals are regarded a powerful tool of change also in the U.S..142

137 Adapted from O’Rourke, 2003 138 see. Guay et al., 2004, 129; Logsdon/Van Buren, 2008, 5. 139 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 236. 140 see. Gillan/Starks, 2000, 29. 141 see. Cziraki/Renneboog/Szilagyi, 2010, 742. 142 see. Bebchuk, 2005, 1784; Cziraki/Renneboog/Szilagyi, 2010, 745. 24

The case of shareholder activism and therefore shareholder proposals in Europe is very little examined by academics in comparison to the U.S.. Apart from the differences of nonbinding and binding proposals after a positive vote, there are two other differences between the U.S. and Europe playing a role in the discussion of shareholder proposals: In Europe regulations on shareholder access to the proxy vary across countries and therefore affect the costs and incentives borne by submitting shareholders.143 The German Stock Corporation Act set the threshold of submitting proposals, as well as calling extraordinary meetings at an ownership rate of 5%. The Austrian Stock Corporation Act states that general meetings can be called by shareholders with an ownership of 5% in shares, but those with 1% of capital in shares, or €70,000 can submit proposals.144 Additionally the different corporate governance models – market orientation in Anglo-American countries and stakeholder orientation in Continental Europe – influence shareholders behavior.145

Negotiations

In addition to shareholder proposals, SSA are also entering into active dialogue with corporations. Often being a result of withdrawn shareholder resolutions, dialogue between activists and corporations can develop into deeper relationships as to achieve long-term social goals.146 In dialogue with corporations, activists must be persistent, as mutual understanding and trust is needed of both parties. The interaction is mostly fruitful after a long period of interaction and 79% of withdrawn proposals were followed by a concrete outcome.147

When working with so called ‘quiet diplomacy’148 it often leads to better results than with shareholder proposals, as managers prefer to discuss matters behind closed doors, with exclusion of the media.149 If this approach does not lead to satisfactory results, the media and therefore the public is often involved.150 This is one of the bargaining leverages available to shareholders in negotiations with corporations, the other is power, to be exact the number of shares.151

143 see. Cziraki/Renneboog/Szilagyi, 2010, 748. 144 see. Cziraki/Renneboog/Szilagyi, 2010, 745. 145 see. La Porta et al., 1998, 1140. 146 see. Logsdon/Rehbein/Van Buren III, 2007, 2. 147 see. Tkac, 2006, 1; Logsdon/Van Buren III, 2008, 529. 148 see. Roberts et al., 2006, 291. 149 see. David/Bloom/Hillman, 2007, 94. 150 see. Brav et al., 2008, 1769. 151 see. Hoffman, 1999, 366; Useem, 1996, 38. 25

Letters

A method often used by European shareholder activists is written letters. In a study the response rate of corporations to letters about labor conditions was tested and most of the 18 contacted corporations responded. This is proof, that corporations are willing to communicate. Looking at the content of their responses, the authors of the study could see denial of the allegations, stating that the shareholders had misinterpreted the case. It is therefore of great importance to communicate with corporations in the right tone to guarantee a successful result.152

3.2.3 The shareholder activist

Shareholder activists, which submit CSR resolutions cover a wide spectrum. Religious organizations and churches, pension funds, labour unions, social organizations and nongovernmental organizations (NGO), individual investors and socially responsible investment (SRI) funds.153 The latter will be explained in more depth in chapter 3.3, this unit will provide an overview of the six most prominent SSA as well as a short summary in table two.

When scrolling through the placed shareholder resolutions a small, yet growing group can be found each year: the individual investors. They actively place resolutions and vote on them. They are also known to work together with other groups to have a bigger impact. The number of individual SSAs, that divest because a firm does not comply with their personal social or ethical believes is not known, but studies suggest, it is higher than the small number of resolutions placed, in comparison to the other SSA groups.154

A much bigger force of the SSA are social and non-government organizations (NGOs). They are known to pursue specific changes and frequently buy shares just in order to vote and submit resolutions, to support their cause. NGOs such as Greenpeace are using their active involvement with corporations to the betterment of the situation for publicity. Besides buying shares and using media to influence corporations, NGOs are also known to be actively lobbying other shareholders on particular arguments or concerns. SSA in general is often led by NGOs to change a corporation’s behavior.155

152 see. Vandekerckhove/Leys/Van Braeckel, 2007, 407. 153 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 231. 154 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 233. 155 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 231. 26

Religious organizations are known to be the most consistent active filers of shareholder resolutions in the US and are even said to be the first SRI funds.156 Religious organizations such as the Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility in the U.S., pursue changes according their religious values. Since the 1960’s they tackle issues such as Apartheid in South Africa, peace issues and antimilitarism.157

These three groups of SSA are focused more on the moral aspects, but SSA can also have a strong target on financial aspects. These groups use their furthering of social and environmental topics in a firm more as a risk management tool for their financial incomes. These groups are pension funds and labor unions. While their interest in social and environmental improvements is not disputed, they are more interested in financial numbers as are mainstream investors. They have picked up on some of the SSAs demands regarding CSR, which suggests a large shift in mainstream investors’ behavior.158

In addition to these different SSA groups, new groups and coalitions are formed continuously to pursue the debate on environmental and social performance issues at annual general meetings.159 The following table summarizes the different SSA groups in short:

SSA Group Focus Reasons for being SSA Individual investors Diverse spectrum of activities Personal preferences Moral reasons Pension funds and Financially well performing Seeking greater financial returns Endowments Firms and consideration of Risk-management CSR Unions Financially well performing Seeking economic benefits firms and consideration of Risk-management CSR Religious Topics in accordance with Religious values organizations religious believes Social organizations Mostly on one topic (e.g. Moral reasons and NGOs either environmental or social causes) Socially responsible Pursuing both social and In accordance with criteria of their funds economical goals investors

Table 2 - Groups of social shareholder activists160

156 see. chapter 3.3. for more information on SRI funds. 157 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 232; Sjöstrom, 2008, 147 158 see. Repetto/Austin, 2000, 20; O’Rourke, 2003, 233. 159 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 233. 27

3.3 Socially responsible investments (SRI) – entry and exit instead of negotiations

Another possibility in taking influence on a business’ behavior is socially responsible investments (SRI). When it comes to SA, investors do not communicate with the corporations in negotiations or through shareholder proposals but instead, buy shares and enter or exit the corporations. For SRI funds to enter a corporation, said corporations must live up to the investors standards. In addition to financial criteria, corporations have to fulfill also social criteria. If a corporation decreases in CSR activities or displays immoral behavior, the fund exits the company again.161

Due to its rapid growth, SRI became an important subject to academic research. The reason for this rapid growth is that the trend of socially responsible investing has grown so much in recent years, but at the same time pressure for short-term financial returns remains.162 These two objectives can be merged in SRI: due to the funds’ best in class screening also financial demands can be met.163 Reports demonstrate that an estimated 11% of the U.S. investment marketplace in 2013 was managed by SRI funds, this is an 18% increase from just a decade ago.164

The definitions, which can be found, are as vast as the topic of SRI itself, but a structure can be found. Three definitions were chosen to give a better understanding of SRI in contrast to Friedman’s classical shareholder view.

3.3.1 Definitions

SRI is an investment process that integrates social, environmental and ethical considerations into investment decisions. Unlike conventional types of investments, SRI applies a set of investment screens to select or exclude assets. They are based on ecological, social, ethical criteria or on corporate governance. It often engages in the local communities and in shareholder activism to further corporate strategies towards the above aims opposed to the ‘traditional’ monetary aim of investments.165

160 Adapted from O’Rourke, 2003. 161 see. Sparkes/Cowton., 2004, 47. 162 see. Uysal/Tsetsura, 2015, 215. 163 see. O’Rourke, 2003, 236. 164 see. SIF, 2003, 8. 165 see. Renneboog/Horst/Zhang, 2008, 1723. 28

Haigh and Hazelton include the financial aspect in their definition and define SRI as the practice of directing investment funds in such ways as to combine financial objectives of investors with their commitment to social concerns. The social investor goes beyond Friedman’s approach of the shareholder view, as he considers not only the economic development of his shares, but also the associated social justice, peace, healthy environment, and community.166 Therefore, it is a way to systematically integrate the environment, social and economic factors into financial analysis and valuation of assets.167

A third view of SRI is given by Scholtens: Friedman saw the investors as purely focused on the economic side of business, using their influence and power to maximize their profits.168 Scholtens sees the investor of today, especially the SRI investor differently. SRI is closely connected with shareholder activism, community investing and social venture capital funding. There are several reasons behind this interest in more responsible investment strategies. The first driver is the need to manage risk, as research implicates that SRI is less risky in the long run. A second driver of more responsible investments is regulations and legislation. Furthermore, peer pressure in the investment community plays a significant role.169 To these influencing factors the matter of media coverage and how it influences SRI efforts is added. It is hypothesized that SRI efforts increase if media coverage increases.170

3.3.2 A change in the understanding of a ‘good investment’

In the beginning SRI was mainly used by investors to extend their personal values into their investment activities. Most of these values were of religious nature, which underlines the rooting of SRI in religion. Rather than focusing on monetary issues, investors focused on aligning firms’ behavior with their personal believes, focusing on how and where they produced their goods. After 1960 SRI became a more mainstream topic, as environmental concerns, fair trade and globalizations became topics of general interest. With an increasing diversity of topics treated by SRI, the interconnection between SRI and CSR increased as well: SRI funds became less focused on achieving a very specific social goal with their

166 see. Friedman, 1970, 122; Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 63; Scholtens, 2014, 383. 167 see. Ferrell/Liang/Renneboog, 2016, 599. 168 see. Friedman, 1970, 122. 169 see. Benson/Humphrey, 2008, 1853; Scholtens, 2014, 382. 170 see. Borghesi/Houston/Naranjo, 2014, 179. 29

investments,171 but rather concentrate on a bigger picture and how corporate conduct can be altered to improve its contribution to society.172

The establishment of ethical indices in 1988, which track performances of selected companies that have to meet a set of social criteria, facilitates engagement in SRI for both companies and investors:173 not only can companies use these ethical indices as a guideline and to forecast expectations of the marketplace in regards to CSR, but they can also use them as benchmark for their own social performance.174 Investors can use these indices as means of search to find the right company that meets certain CSR standards and can invest in it. Another facilitator for SRI to become more popular was the drive toward a standardized corporate social reporting, e.g. the standardization by the GRI.175

Some may view SRI as a loss of assets and therefore being inconsistent with shareholders’ interests, but in many cases, investors receive benefits from SRI. As a more socially, environmentally and ethically wholesome behavior is encouraged in companies, they might be able to recruit more qualified employees, or foster a better relationship with customers and the governement. This leads to better performance and lower costs, which enhances a firm’s intrinsic value. In turn, it is reflected in share values and dividends.176

3.3.3 Screening Methods

To identify suitable companies for SRI, multiple methods can be used. The most common are negative and positive screening.177

Negative screening of companies encompasses the leaving out of controversial firms, such as those active in the tobacco, weaponry and gambling industries, i.e. investors apply social criteria to evade specific corporations.178 Positive screening on the other hand focuses on companies, which are favorable and in certain industries, that already have a good reputation. Examples for a positive screening might be ‘select all companies that offer child care facilities.’.179 Other methods, which are used by SRI funds to choose firms are the best- in-class screening, which focuses on the top 30% of a field, with a focus on social or

171 see. Brill/Brill/Feigenbaum, 1999, 35. 172 see. Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 46. 173 see. Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 50. 174 see. Borghesi/Houston/Naranjo, 2014, 180. 175 see. Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 50. 176 see. Borghesi/Houston/Naranjo, 2014, 181; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3244. 177 see. Kinder/Lydenberg/Domini, 1994, 56. 178 see. Cox/Schneider, 2010, 278. 179 see. Kinder/Lydenberg/Domini, 1994, 61. 30

environmental performance criteria.180 Another widely used method is activism and engagement screening, where investors screen companies regarding the level of influence on and cooperation with boards and directors. Of course, also combinations of the above- mentioned methods exist.181

3.3.4 SRI influencing business practices

As already stated, SRI assets have increased about 18% in the years from 2005 to 2012 and they have increased about 500% since 1995, from $639 billion to $3.7 trillion in 2012. This is the main reason for the increasing influence through SRI on business practices.182

Studies show, that shareholder resolutions at annual general meetings of SRI funds are smaller, than those of conventional funds, as the relationships between funds and management teams and boards is more developed in SRI funds.183 Therefore, more private negotiations take place, which reduces the number of resolutions. With this example it can be seen, that SRI do not only have the power to change business practices and make them more sustainable, but also the way of interaction between investors and companies are changing and become bilateral.184

Examples of investment funds, which actively want and already influence business practices, are Continental Venture Capital, Australian Ethical Investment and AMP Henderson Global Investors. The most prominent goal among these examples is corporate change. This consists of encouragement of companies to adopt higher social and environmental standards, as well as influencing other corporations to change their behavior. The latter are companies in which SRI funds do not yet invest in. The influence is therefore dual, once on the invested firm and on peer firms. The second most prominent goal of these institutional investors is outperformance of others. AMP Henderson Global Investors are convinced, that social and environmental issues can influence long term profitability and share price development.185

Studies proof that SRI is used to alter business practices and to make them more sustainable. SRI funds are therefore doing ‘right’ by investing ‘right’. Active ownership

180 see. Dam/Heijdra, 2011, 1429. 181 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3257; Lesser/Rößle/Walkshäusl, 2016, 174. 182 see. Oh/Park/Ghauri, 2013, 709. 183 see. Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 63; Oh/Park/Ghauri, 2013, 709. 184 see. Oh/Park/Ghauri, 2013, 711. 185 see. Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 68. 31

mitigates managerial myopia and therefore helps to secure long term profts and diminishes negative externalities186- changing the business world to make business more sustainable.187

3.3.5 Limitations of SRI

Eventhough a powerful mean to influence corporations’ behavior and nonetheless the considerable number of advocates of the positive influence of SRI on business practices,188 it is far from faultless.189 Critics add the remark, that shareholder activism can influence a company’s behavior only to a certain point. They provide several examples of Multinational Companies (MNC) that practice a value relativism, by using different values and possibly acting immoral in other countries than their home countries. Even though stockholders and stakeholders influence MNC’s, they do not act socially responsible anyway. This is an example of the boundaries of the influence of SRI and other business methods.190

When SRI funds simply sell unethical stock or buy ethical stock there will be no effect for the company. Firstly, the company may not notice it at all, if the SRI fund does not hold a large and essential part of shares.191 Secondly solely by selling unethical or buying ethical stock the stock prices do not change, as long as there are other shareholders, willing to buy them. In both cases there will be no signal towards the managers and thus no incentive to change a firm’s behavior.192 Even if managers notices an SRI fund select or avoid their stock, they mostly do not know the reason for it and which of the many characteristics of a firm the investors wish to support or punish.193 For these reasons, SRI is considered to be much more indirect and possibly even less effective than other SSA groups as a tool for corporate change.194

Another problem of SRI is one of its core mechanisms: the screening methods. They often focus too much on the outcomes of production rather than the impact on the production

186 see. Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3251. 187 see. Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 67; Oh/Park/Ghauri, 2013; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3259. 188 see. Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 67; Scholtens, 2006, 23; Oh/Park/Ghauri, 2013, 712; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3250. 189 see. Grein/Gould, 2007, 290. 190 Grein/Gould, 2007, 291. 191 see. Heinkel/Kraus/Zechner, 2001, 434. 192 see. Statman, 2005, 19. 193 see. Angel/Rivoli, 1997, 58; Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 51; Lewis, 2001, 333. 194 see. Lewis, 2001, 332. 32

process itself. By ignoring the important topic of the supply chain they are making it hard to effectively separate ethical from unethical.195

SRIs influence is also limited to a certain degree, as the amount of funding for firms via the stock market is finite in most countries. Therefore, SRI cannot completely control the non- financial aspects and performance of a firm.196

For SRI to become more auxiliary for the CSR movement, several prerequisites have to be met. It must firstly grow, i.e. more assets need to be invested in SRI funds. The current level of 11% must at least rise to a quarter of all managed assets according to academics. Secondly, for SRI to become an investment force to reckon with, the image of CSR that it pursues must be unified among the funds. This prerequisite seems to be easily achievable as SRI indices are growing and facilitate a convergence of investors’ view on a generally accepted minimal value of CSR standards. It could also provide a commonly used set of screening methods and compliance levels of companies with these standards. Thirdly, SRI strategies should take the multi-dimensionality of CSR into account when screening for potential investments. As mentioned above, screenings often do not take all parts of production or supply into account. Furthermore other organizations, to be exact, other shareholder groups must be considered and worked with.197

195 see. Entine, 2003, 355; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3234. 196 see. Scholtens, 2006, 27. 197 see. Heinkel/Kraus/Zechner, 2001, 436; Mill, 2006, 131; Scholtens, 2006, 383; Grein/Gould, 2007; Dimson/Karakas/Li, 2015, 3231. 33

4. EMPIRICAL RESEARCH

After having depicted an overview of CSR in general, shareholder activism and socially responsible investements in the theoretical part of this thesis, , this following part is devoted to the empirical part of this master thesis. Besides an introduction of the research process, it presents the results and finally the interpretation of the findings of the qualitative study. It will try to provide insight in the investigated countries – Austria and Italy – as to shareholders influence on CSR efforts, as well as depict eventual changes in shareholder structure due to CSR efforts of the companies.

4.1 Research Design

Research deals with the plans and procedures that encompass data collection, analysis, and their interpretation. A research includes the methods as well as the research design. Basically, three research approaches are common, namely qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods. However, studies are mostly not entirely either qualitative or quantitative. Mixed methods include elements of both, qualitative and quantitative approaches (Creswell, 2013).

Qualitative research compared to quantitative research is a much more subjective and inductive approach. It is characterized by the focus on the individual, to explore and understand them, their feelings, and their problems. Qualitative research is used to enable the individual to express themselves in their own words, which allows research to capture informants’ own experiences and interpretations.198 Said experiences and interpretations is the data qualitative research analyzes and builds a theory upon it. Qualitative research is well fitted to render complex situations.199

Hence, the qualitative approach should be used if thinking outside the box and examining topics on a multi-dimensional basic is needed, in genereal if a concept must be explored and understood.200 Methods used for qualitative research include a variety of approaches, e.g. interviews, focus groups, and observation. All these approaches differ in the inclusion of the

198 see. Graebner/Martin/Roundy, 2012, 278. 199 see. Atteslander, 2010, 29; Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 56. 200 see. Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 52; Edwards/Holland, 2013, 17. 34

researcher. Where he is mostly involved in interviews, it lessens with each approach, being minor to non-existent in observations.201

Yet, the qualitative approach exhibts also limitations and disadvantages, foremost in generalizability, representativeness, comparability, or protection of bias. In addition to that, the analysis of qualitative data is very complicated and complex, which makes it difficult to codify the insights and developing theoretical contributions.202 Qualitative interviews, as used in this thesis, allow on the one hand a very detailed and deep insights of motives, attitudes, and values of the individual. On the other hand the transfer to the broader population is often inhibited.203

Drawing once again the comparison to quantitative methods, it is clear to see, that they aim at explaining and testing objective theories by examining a relationship among variables. These variables are measurable and analyzable through statistical procedusres. In this way quantitative methods provide a high level of objectivity, validity, and reliability. As a result, quanititative research findings are – given the premiss of a large enough sample – generalizable and replicable.204

One more research method is the mixed method. It incorporates both quantitative and qualitative data and can integrate different forms of information. The main reason for the mixed method to exist, is that theory argues the combination of both approaches allows a more complete understanding of a research problem than one of the approaches could provide alone. With the mixed method an attempt is undertaken to diminish the disadvantages of the qualitative and quantitative method alone.205

In empirical research the choice of research design and research method is based upon the research intention, research problem, and the research question. Therefore the research method will not be decisive for the work, but the researcher has to choose the right method for his research intention.206

In relation to this work, both quantitative and qualitative research dealing with the topic of CSR, as well as the topic of shareholders and CSR can be found in literature. Most of the quantitative studies on CSR limit themselves on the topics of CSR’s influence on a firm’s

201 see. Wisker, 2009, 68; Atteslander, 2010; Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 56. 202 see. Glaser/Strauss, 1967, 301; Carlsen/Dutton, 2011, 18. 203 see. Ebster/Stalzer, 2008, 87. 204 see. Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 18. 205 see. Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 13; Edwards/Holland, 2013, 98. 206 see. Creswell/Creswell, 2017, 29. 35

profits or the number of shareholder proposals submitted with a focus on CSR topics. The number of qualitative studies in regards to CSR and shareholders is limited, an in-depth and rich knowledge on shareholders’ and CSR’ influence is lacking. In this work a clear focus lies on qualitative interviews, as only they allow to gather in-depth and rich information about participants expertise and their firms behavior. It is important to gain deeper knowledge through subjective views on CSR and shareholder structure in these countries. The reason for this can already be seen in the multiple definitions listed in the theoretical part: CSR encompasses a wide spectrum of topics and activities. Therefore a clarification for the empirical part is needed as well. The qualitative method is better suited to capture this complexity in the empirical part. The aim is to get a deeper understanding of the influence shareholders have in regard to CSR efforts and activities, complementary to the existing literature on the topic. This thesis aims especially to gain insight in the effects CSR can have on the shareholder structure of a company. This includes finding out when, why, and how the change in shareholder structure occurred and if these new shareholders behave differently than conventional shareholders. In order to find answers to these questions the qualitative study is best suited, as it puts the individual at the center and allows the interviewee to respond very flexible and in more detail.207 In accordance with this, the author decided to use a qualitative approach, as it allows gaining rich information on participants’ perception of the matter at hand. Also one can obtain a more complete understanding about their perceptions, attitudes, and behavior.208

Qualitative interviews can be highly structured, semi structured, and unstructured. For the first typ a predetermined set and order of questions and answer possibilities is characteristic. This results in a high limitation and high control. Whereas the unstructured interview offers much freedom of action and flexibility, because it does not require any specification of questions or answers.209 As a mix of both afore mentioned methods, the semi-structured interview has predetermined questions but the order is not fixed. As well as the order, the phrasing of the questions is also not predetermined. The focus in this interview style lies with the single person and their answers. Therefore the adaptation of questions in regard to the individual survey, situation, and environment is possible.210

207 see. Creswell, 2013, 18. 208 see. Creswell, 2013, 12; Edwards/Hollands, 2013, 25. 209 see. Atteslander, 2010, 94. 210 see. Ebster/Stalzer, 2008, 57. 36

4.2 Research Methodology

The following empirical research aims at exploring the role of CSR and shareholder structure across different countries, namely Austria and Italy. This is conducted by a deductive qualitative procedure which means that the research design is based on the vast literature review within the theoretical part of this work. Several above explained frameworks are used for the empirical measurement.

To bestow represantativity upon the qualitative research at the beginning of the qualitative interview, quantitative questions are asked. The author chooses not to qualify them as quantitative research per se, as they just give a statistical ground for a better qualitative analysis. The main part of the empirical research is composed of a semi-structured interview with ten planned questions. According to theory on qualitative research, namely interviews, the knowledge the interviewer has is as important as the knowledge he or she wants to achieve. What one wants to know will determine which questions will be asked and what one already knows, will determine how the questions will be asked.211

By using semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions – as the middle way of qualitative interviews – details, depth, and an insider’s perspective can be provided, rich information about motives, attitudes and causes can be obtained, while still be able to test hypothesis and do a quantitative analysis of the interviewees responses. In this way, the interviews guarantee flexibility but also certain comparability between them as very important topics always have to be considered. Regardless, some questions of the manual might be adapted, omitted, or asked in different order during the interview as not to disturb the flow of speech of the interviewee. The interviewer tries to let the interviewee speak as much as possible and tries to intervenes only if the interviewee gets off topic, or is stuck. Such a setting offers much more space for interviewees because they can answer in their own terms. At the same time it provides some structure for comparison across interviewees.212 During the interviews, the author followed Leech’s213 example of seeming professional and generally knowledgeable, but not as knowledgeable as the interviewee on the particular topic on hand.

211 Leech, 2002, 665. 212 see. Leech, 2002, 667; Atteslander, 2010, 97; Ebster/Stalzer, 2008, 42; Edwards/Hollands, 2013, 13. 213 Leech, 2002, 667. 37

4.2.1 Participants: sample description

In total, eight managers participated in the study on a voluntary basis in seven interviews (two managers from the same firm were interviewed in one sitting). The sample size in empirical qualitative studies is not as relevant and crucial as in quantitative studies. In qualitative studies the range of meanings is decisive regarding the number of interviewees rather than the number itself.214

All the chosen firms are stock corporations from a small to medium to large size and are internationally active. Either they export to countries other than their home country and/or have production sites in other countries than their home country. In addition to that, the participating firms had to fulfill the requirement of existing CSR activities or have a CSR strategy in place. This requirement was fulfilled by all interviewed corporations.

Out of the seven interviews five were conducted with Austrian managers, two with Italian managers. The managers can again be divided into CSR and IR managers (on the business’ side) and fund manager (the investor’s side). Five CSR and IR managers from Austrian companies, one manager of an Austrian fund, and 2 CSR and IR managers from Italy were interviewed. The reason to display both sides – business and investor side – developed in the course of the first interviews with CSR and IR managers, as they mentioned quite often that they do not know the reasons of funds to invest or divest and their behavior in genereal. Because of this the author decided to investigate this issue further and interviewed one fund manager to gain deeper knowledge of this condition.

The participants exhibit similar educational and professional backgrounds and fields of work. The following table offers an overview of the participants:

Participant Interviewee Company Position Countr Nr. y P1 Claudia Korntner Voestalpine AG CSR manager Austria P2 Peter Fleischer Voestalpine AG Head of IR Austria P3 Stefan Grafenhorst Greiner AG CSR manager Austria P4 Hannes Roither Palfinger AG Head of IR Austria P5 Stephanie Kniep Lenzing AG Head of IR Austria P6 Florian Hauer Kepler Ethik Fonds Fund manager Austria P7 Melanie Gschwenter Loacker AG/S.p.A. HR and CSR manager Italy P8 Agostino Pieressa Buzzi Unicem S.p.A. IR manager Italy Table 3 - Overview and information about the interview sample

214 see. Edwards/Holland, 2013, 50; Klenke, 2016, 21. 38

Most of the companies are active in sectors were it is much more difficult, but also more important to be active in CSR. The following table provides an overview of the companies interviewed for a better understanding of the size and industry they are active in:

Interview Company Short Description Nr. 1 Voestalpine AG Voestalpine AG is a steel producer with its headquarters in Upper Austria and can be divided into four divisions. It is represented by 500 group companies and has locations in more than 50 countries. 2 Greiner AG Greiner AG is a plastic based producer with its headquarters in Upper Austria and is active in the packaging, furniture and automotive industries, as well as in the medical technology and life science sectors and in profile extrusion. The company is active in 33 countries and has over 10,000 employees. 3 Palfinger AG Palfinger AG is a manufacturer of hydraulic lifting, loading and handling systems, with its headquarters in the region of Salzburg. The company has locations in over 21 countries. 4 Lenzing AG Lenzing AG is a producer of sustainable fibers with its headquarters in Upper Austria. It has over 15 locations and more than 6.400 employees worldwide. 5 Kepler Ethik The Kepler Ethik Fonds KAG is part of the Kepler Fonds Fonds KAG KAG, managing 136 funds with a volume of €15.77 billions. Kepler Ethik Fonds KAG manages approximately 7% of the total volume. It is located in Upper Austria and has 90 employees. 6 Loacker AG/S.p.A. Loacker AG/S.p.A. is a producer of sweets – mainly wafers - and has its headquarters in Southtyrol. It has over 660 employees and three production locations. 7 Buzzi Unicem Buzzi Unicem S.p.A. is a producer of cement, ready mix, S.p.A. and aggregates, with its headquarters in the region of Piemonte. It operates in 12 countries with 9,700 employees worldwide. Table 4 - Description of examined companies

4.2.2 Development of the interview guidelines

Two interview guidelines were developed for this thesis: one for the business side (CSR and IR managers) and one for the investor side (fund managers). The interview guidelines are based on vast literature research and build upon the discussed literature in the theoretical part of this thesis.

The interview guideline for the business side includes the following general topics and categories:

- Personal experiences and professional history of the interviewees - CSR activities of their respective companies - Reasons and motivators for CSR in and outside of the companies - Involvement of shareholders in CSR development and activities - Outlook for CSR in their company and in general

At the beginning of each interview the participants were asked to tell about their personal history with CSR and what their firm’as current CSR activities are. This first question served as an introductory question and to help the interviewees get into the topic at hand. Then questions about the shareholders’ influence on the companies followed as the first direction of study. The second part was CSR’s influence on the shareholder structure of the company and how these new shareholders behaved. As a closing question, the participant’s personal opinion on how CSR will develop according to them concluded the guideline of the interview. Sometimes the interviewees added other points after this last planned question.

The interview guideline for the investor side was based on the one for IR and CSR managers and is seen as complementary to it. It encompasses the following general topics and categories:

- Personal background (academic and professional career); connection to CSR - Screening methods - Communication with firms - Outlook for SRI for their company (fund) and CSR in general

The first question of this interview guideline was almost the same as for the business side. Again it was an introductory question about the participants’ personal experience and professional background. Then the guideline moved to screening and communication methods of SRI, concluding the guideline once again with a general outlook question.

Both interview guidelines can be found in the appendix of this thesis.

4.2.3 Interview setting and situation description

The interviews have been conducted starting from July 2017 and ending with April 2018. The interviews were led personally with three of the participants and via phone with the remaining five. Each participant of the study was told in advance that participation is voluntary, without any form of compensation, that all data from the interview would be treated confidentially, and only for research purpose within this thesis. Additionally the participants’ permission was asked to use their name and their company’s name; all participants agreed. The participants were also asked in which language they wanted to conduct the interview in; options were English, Italian and German. Only three interviews were conducted in German, the remaining were conducted in English. All interviews have been recorded with a laptop or a mobile phone. The interviewer also took notes during the interviews to recall important details afterwards. On average the interviews took about 25 minutes, not counting greeting, small talk and information at the beginning and farewell at the end.

After informing the interviewees about the thesis and the aim of the study, all interviews started with above-mentioned introductory question as an icebreaker to get the interviewees into the topic and make them feel at ease. Afterwards the rest of the interview questions followed. As the questions were only a guideline the interview questions were often not asked in the indicated order. It was of great importance to gain knowledge of the interviewees in their own words and in their own time and not to quiz them. Also more often than not, some questions could be left out, as many interviewees answered them in the course of another question.

4.2.4 Material description

For the analysis of the gathered data in the next chapter the whole obtained data is used. No questions or text passages or parts are excluded. This means that all eight interviews were analyzed in full and relevant passages and segments are allocated to respective categories and cited as such.

To analyze the interviews, all recordings were transcribed using the computer software ‘xpress scribe’. All interviews were transliterated in the language they were held in. The author then translated the used passages if the interview language was not English. The interviews were transliterated according to a clean read or smooth verbatim transcript style to simplify the transcription process: the transliteration is done word for word except for

utterances, that happen often in spoken language, which were left out.215 The interviewer is always indicated by ‘I:’, the interview partner or partners are indicated by their initials (e.g. ‘SG:’). Emotional states of the interviewees are not regarded in the transcription, as they are not crucial for the analysis.

4.2.5 Qualitative Content Analysis (QCA)

The results of the empirical research are analyzed with the qualitative content analysis (QCA), a very common method for analyzing interviews. This method is part of the conventional content analysis, where researchers immerse themselves in data and allow inductive categories to arise. QCA is mostly used to reduce data and analyze statements about the object of interest.216

QCA not only offers a systematic, qualitatively oriented text analysis but also a quantitative content analysis. The central idea of QCA is to start from Quantitative Content Analysis, but to assign categories to passages of text as a qualitative interpretation. Therefore the QCA is a mixed method, as it assigns categories to text passages in multiple texts as the qualitative step and analyses the frequencies of said categories as the quantitative step.217

The text analysis procedure is adapted to the particular object but bound on rules, which makes the method rather flexible. It provides no single standard usage but needs to be adjusted to suit the individual study.218 To analyze the results QCA offers three main interpretation methods: summary, explication, and structuring. The latter is applied for this thesis: it filters out particular aspects of the material and allocates it to pre-determined criteria based on theory, the so called categories. As a result a certain structure can be extracted from the accumulated material.219

Mayring advises to adhere to the following steps. At first the framework has to be established, which is the procedural model. This determines, which material is used, how it will be approached, which parts are to be analyzed, and which content-analytical units will be used. Within this thesis, all conducted and transcribed interviews represent the core. The whole transcriptions are used to identify statements, which are of interest. The following step encompasses the central part of anlysis and is the category system. This ensures the

215 see. Mayring, 2014, 15. 216 see. Hsieh/Shannon, 2005, 1279; Mayring, 2014, 12. 217 Mayring, 2014, 10 218 see. Mayring, 2014, 15; Schreier, 2014, 179. 219 see. Mayring, 2014, 10. 42

comparability of the different texts, namely the transcribed interviews. In this thesis, the structuring bases on a deductive category formation. The structuring process is based on the research problem of this work and on the theoretical analysis presented. The different categories are defined and divided into sub-codes, according to a coding guideline. The defined coding rules help to differentiate between categories and to correctly allocate text passages. Basing the categories and sub-codes on the literature review guarantees a coherent and corresponding work, as also the interview guidelines were developed according to literature.220 As this thesis analyzes two sides, firstly the business’ side and secondly the inverstor’s side, there were created two category frameworks for the according sides.

The following figures show an abstract oft he used category systems as well as the coding guideline. The development of the guideline was done according to Mayring and Schreier.221 The detailed category systems can be found in the appendix.

Figure 3 - Category System - CSR

220 see. Mayring, 2014, 16. 221 see. Mayring, 2014, 11; Schreier, 2014, 173. 43

Figure 4 - Category System - SRI

During the main part of the analysis, all relevant texts, namely all transcribed interviews are analyzed, filtered, and allocated to the pertinent category or sub-code. For the coding the software program MAXQDA was used, as computer programs facilitate an easier evaluation, guarantee a very systematic, and controlled analyzing process.222

222 see. Mayring, 2014, 13. 44

5. RESEARCH RESULTS IN DETAIL

The following chapter covers the research results and presents the findings in more detail. The aim of this chapter is to gain insight in the statements, opinions, and attitudes of the interviewees related to CSR and shareholder structure. Furthermore it aims to summarize the most important findings.

The chapter is divided into subsections according to the category systems. The author decided to do the country comparison within the categories, if a country comparison is possible. Therefore most sub-chapters are divided into three parts. The first two parts will illustrate statements from the two examined countries and the third part will be the country comparison, where the findings will be compared. The additional information gained from the interview with a fund manager will be added according to affiliated topics and not be treated separately. This procedure was chosen, as the analysis of the investors’ side is based on the business-side questionnaire and thus a complementary source of knowledge. In addition to this, the categories used for the analysis of the investors-side, can be allocated to matching categories in the business-sides’ analysis.

Based on this detailed illustration of findings, the discussion part (chapter 6) will interpret the data and provide a comparison of all results included in this chapter.

The research results which are used for the analysis are the results of a generalization and reduction process, as described in the previous chapter. They compile the main issues of each category and serve as basis for the presentation of the findings in this section. In each sub-chapter examples of the interviewees statements are presented and connected. The mentioned statements do not encompass all examples that led the author to a certain conclusion. In addition to that some statements might be used in more than one category or sub-code, as they refer to different aspects and thus can be relevant to more than just one topic. To highlight the statements gathered through empirical research, the examples are indicated in Italic style. To allocate the single statements, the document source and the line where the statement can be found in the transliterated document are indicated in the footnotes. All Interviews refer to one participant, except for Interview number one, where two participants were interviewed. In this case the single participant is indicated as well in the footnotes.

5.1 Motivators for CSR

The first code of the category system approaches the topic of motivation for CSR in general and which motivators were essential for the single firms to implement CSR strategies in their firms.

The results in this category show, how different the approaches in the single firms were, within the countries as well as between the two examined countries. This first section offers insight on general statements of the importance of CSR, following specific statements on internal and external motivators.

The following quote illustrates one of the perspectives, i.e. reasons for being active in CSR for the interviewed companies.

Resources are an important topic, that we use, also the legal requirements, as they are now, compared to those from 10 years ago, are completely different. Austrian companies are required to issue an integrated report. The topic of CSR is given already by legal framework, this cannot be denied and I think, that this topic will grow and grow in importance.223

Whereas another firm mentioned in regard to shareholders:

Starting from 2017 the value of the non-financial information is equal to the financial information […]224

Here different influences on firms can already be seen, which are not exclusive to a single country. In addition all firms were aware of external and internal influences on their behavior, especially on their CSR behavior.

Whether you call it sustainability or CSR, that is an academical question. For both we have internal as well as external reasons.225

These internal and external motivators of CSR will be presented in the following sub- chapters.

223 I3, L199-204. 224 I7, L104-105. 225 I2, L22-24. 46

5.1.1 Internal Motivators

In this chapter of internal motivators for CSR we can see a number of reasons, which are internal to the firm mentioned by the participants in the interviews.

Austria

In interviews with Austrian firms the topic of employees as an internal motivator was mentioned multiple times. The importance of the well-trained employee for Austrian firms certainly plays an important role in this case.

[…] for employees of course it is a big issue of course and how the company is treating its employees226

We try to be an employer that looks after his employees, that takes care of the environment. There are many initiatives internally for different stakeholders, of course also the employees, but also for other stakeholders where we simply try to be a responsible employer.227

[…] particular when you are a technical company like we are and we sort of need engineers all the time and is of interest to us to have a good culture in treating our employees and it is publicly known, so we get the people we need. I think this is also why we are strategically invested in CSR.228

In the last statement we can already see the interconnections of reasons and categories. It is important to this company to act responsible and have a good company culture, but in return they gain better qualified employees and manage to keep them. This is only the first of many examples of how reciprocal the categories are.

The next statement could be also classified as external motivation, but seen that the wish to engage with society comes from within the firm it is also categorized as an internal motivator.

And also like you know how are you engaged with society and how do you tackle problems that result from your business and that obviously brings us to CSR and how we deal with these issues.229

226 I1, L73-74, P2. 227 I3, L21-25. 228 I1, L80-83, P2. 229 I2, L33-35. 47

Another internal reason is the improvement of production processes, including less pollution or less energy consumption.

[…] we have a large share of production of our products, so we try to make the production as eco-efficient as possible230

In addition to the wish of being a good employer, the will to engage with society and a better production, another topic was mentioned in the interviews. One of the interviewees stated that his department was crucial in developing the CSR strategy of the firm and that it was driven strongly from within the company:

We drove the issue ourselves, the department, and have, that again is an advantage for us, that I report directly to the chairman of the board, and I was able to win him over. I know a lot of colleagues in other companies, that struggle with that. If the topic is not directly located with the board, ideally with the chairman, then you cannot really work on the issue and implement it.231

We can see from this, that it is not only important to have internal motivation and motivators, but the topic of CSR must be internally well established and have the support of high level officials. This leads to the assumption that CSR must be carried out internally bottom-up but also bottom-down. Only one of the direction would not lead to a successful CSR strategy.

Some of the companies are driven so strongly by their internal motivators that they start to influence their surroundings, i.e. they influence other businesses:

[…] we don’t only look on our own products but on the whole value chain […] and it is important to us to influence the value chain, as to make the whole textile industry more sustainable.232

This is a very good example of a trailblazer company in the field of CSR. Not only does the company try and better its own production and impact on society and environment but the company tries to make a whole industry more aware and sustainable.

230 I3, L31-32. 231 I3, L58-62. 232 I4, L23-28. 48

Italy

In the interviews with the Italian companies similar motivators could be examined. The topic of employees was once again the most often mentioned topic.

[…] we as an employer are taking the responsibility very serious and are continuing to work hard […]233

In addition the factor of company culture and good treatment of employees, a general sense for responsibility and ethics was mentioned multiple times:

[…] every company decision, it always has to be based on this general sense of responsibility towards the company in an economical sense, but also a very strong social sense and from an ecological point of view.234

The main motivator is generally speaking the ethics of the company235

In connection with this the point of credibility was also mentioned by an interviewee. Again, this credibility issue can also be seen as part motivation from the outside, as the firm of the interviewee sees it as their selling proposition:

[…] also a marketing issue: we say that we are a quality food from the alps […] so behaving like this and guaranteeing this quality has shown us that we enter markets very well […]236

Also the will to connect and engage with society was noticed in the interviews with the Italian firms:

So we want to stay here for a long, long, long time, in a certain area, we want to have a good relationship, with the environment, with the people, with the local people, with the community, so this is the main reason.237

Country comparison

The interviews show that the main internal motivators for firms of both countries are very similar. On both sides we have the factor of employees as a big influence. For some with the

233 I6, L133. 234 I6, L74-77. 235 I7, L46. 236 I6, L59-63 237 I7, L48-50. 49

background of having and keeping the best employees, for others it is simply part of their company culture. All companies exhibit a strong internal will to live their own values and even influence their surroundings. For some it is the life cycle of their products, for others the production process where they see their responsibility to come to pass.

Small differences can be observed in this sub-code, but a general similarity between the countries can be observed.

5.1.2 External Motivators

External motivators come from outside the company itself, here the shareholder is understood as an outside force to the company. They were the main point of interest in this category, but also other stakeholders, were mentioned during the interviews.

Austria

As mentioned above the main focus for this category is to find out what influence shareholders have and why they would influence the firms. In the course of the interviews it was mentioned, that for conventional shareholders, money is still the prevalent interest, even if their interest in CSR efforts of the companies has increased in the last years.

[…] with the ETS system the CSR topics are becoming part of your financial success, and I think the more important it gets in your daily business, the more important for the conventional shareholders.238

The public, including the public perception and the governments play also an important role as motivators for CSR. Here we have two examples for legal requirements towards firms:

[…] there are certain imprints on the business from CR topics if we just think about emission creating system, emission creating system in Europe.239

[…] we have our production at the Attersee and if we wouldn’t have invested in environmentalism or wouldn’t have the production we have today, we couldn’t even

238 I1, L203-205, P2. 239 I1, L53-58, P2. 50

produce here anymore […]. This is why it was important to implement sustainable processes.240

These two statements highlight the increase of government regulations in recent years, which again displays the general increase in public interest toward social and environmental topics.

In addition to the shareholders, the government and legal framework, another important stakeholder functions as external motivator in different ways. This stakeholder is the clients of a firm. For the interviewed Austrian firms, the perceived influence of their clients in regard to CSR efforts differed: It was mentioned that they had questions, but the opinions if the clients were strong enough to influence it, varied.

And our clients obviously also have questions and demands also because if the consumer asks questions, how is the product produced, under what circumstances, what is the impact of the product, what does the supply chain look like.241

Whereas others thought, their clients could ask questions, but not really have any demands regarding CSR activities.

[…] and our customers do not force us to be responsible, they ask us how responsible are you?242

This is once again a confirmation for the increase in importance of CSR in the eye of the public. Nonetheless it is handled differently in the single companies.

Italy

Also in Italy the shareholders were mentioned as a major influence, also due to the fact, that one firm’s shares are held completely in the hand of one family, and the other company’s majority (58%) is also held by one family. In this way the main shareholders of both firms do not only have – as other conventional shareholders – monetary interests, but are also interested in the future existence of the company. Nevertheless, do they see CSR as an important part of this future.

240 I4, L31-34. 241 I2, L31-33. 242 I1, L95.96, P1. 51

[…] the issue of social responsibility is deep in their own believes. They have always chosen the business ways, which are aligned to their ethical believes.243

[…] Between the managers and the family there is a common interest, that we, the company stays in business for a long time, and we think that sustainability and CSR is the way to achieve that.244

Nevertheless the strong interest in the going concern of the firm, financial topics are also an issue for these shareholders. So it can be said with reservations that shareholders in the interviewed firms in Italy are very much interested in and furthering CSR in the respective corporations.

Country Comparison

When comparing the two countries in this category it is evident, that for Austrian firms, legal requirements, as well as clients are a major influence. Whereas in Italy the major influence are the companies’ owners. The owners in Austria, namely the conventional shareholders are also of influence. They are interested in CSR and its development in the single firms, but the focus still lies on the monetary side of business.

5.1.3 Drivers and Barriers of CSR

All of the above mentioned statements can be considered as drivers. In addition to the aforementioned influences and motivators, another driver of CSR is worth mentioning in this category:

[…] we then thought of how can we […] win over these new funds, how can we be of interest to them, for them to buy our shares?[…]245

With ‘these new funds’ the interviewee intends ecological and environmental funds, i.e. SRI funds. This statement is therefore also considered a driver for CSR. The corporation wants to gain new shareholders, to be attractive for these new funds.

243 I6, L44-46. 244 I7, L61-64. 245 I3, L8-19. 52

5.2 Shareholders influencing CSR

When speaking of conventional shareholders, the influence they exert in the observed countries is very little noticeable:

Actually I think that they usually don’t actively, they don’t incentivize, I would rather say they think rather to invest or not.246

5.2.1 Topics of Interest

Austria

Even though the investors do not seem to influence a firm’s behavior, they still are very much interested in CSR topics.

So it is a big, I would say, a very big topic for us internally, strategically and of course it is the same for investors.”247 “[…] environment topics, ecological topics, emissions, water, water treatment systems, energy consumption […]248

Italy

In Italy there is a rather similar situation:

The fact that the company is acting in the best way with the environment, with the population, this is a plus, absolutely a plus. And also the investors and shareholders will be more interested in non-financial information.249

Country comparison

In Austria we have a rather big focus on environmental topics such as the energy consumption, whereas in Italy the topic of society plays also a big role.

For Italian companies their interaction with society and with communities is of great importance, as well as for their shareholders. They direct their efforts to the engagement with society as it is of importance to their shareholders.

246 I1, L91-92, P2. 247 I1, L63-64, P2. 248 I1, L116-117, P2. 249 I7, L107-109. 53

While in Austria the focus lies more on environmental issues, once again because of shareholder’s and stakeholder’s interests.

5.2.2 Reasons for influencing

A major reason for investors to influence a firm’s behavior regarding CSR issues is monetary issues. Most conventional shareholders see CSR as an additional risk management tool as to ensure a safe investment..

In this category we can see also the dependencies between firm and shareholder: on the one hand shareholders influence firms because of their interest, on the other hand a firm influences shareholders with their behavior and their interests:

[…] the more important it gets in your daily business, the more important for the conventional shareholders.250

It can therefore be assumed that the influence is in fact bilateral: shareholders do influence CSR efforts of a firm but also CSR influences shareholders.

5.2.3 Interaction and Communication with the firm

Once more the focus in this category lies on the conventional shareholders and the interaction of firms, including various communication forms, between firm and shareholder.

Austria

For the interviewed Austrian companies the communication between them and their shareholders is twofold: they provide their shareholders with information on a voluntary basis in the form of their integrated or CSR reports and answer inquiries from their shareholders.

[…] if GRI changes then you see that the inquiries change […] then we have to take a look on reporting those topics a little bit more than in the past.251

In addition to reporting as an information tool, one firm mentioned a stakeholder survey with which they want to include all interested and affected parties to influence their behavior.

250 I1, L203-205, P2. 251 I1, L94-98, P1. 54

[…] every two years we do a stakeholder survey, […] where we ask analysts, shareholders, suppliers, employees […] where we ask about what is important to them what we do.252

In addition to answering and making inquiries the Austrian Firms often do Roadshows, where they speak with (potential) investors and answer their questions directly. Up to now very little questions about CSR come from conventional shareholders during these meetings, but they are confident, that it will change:

[…] companies are pushed in this direction. I think that in the future there will be more questions […].253

Italy

The picture painted by the statements of the interviewed firms in Italy is quite similar, eventhough the interest in CSR topics of their shareholders seems to be higher.

[…] during the communication with investors I mainly focus on financial information. That is 95%, but you know I have seen that for investors and shareholders, the fact that we are a sustainable company is considered a plus. So they already know that we are sustainable and do good for the environment and the people, so they don’t have to worry about that […]254

[…] sometimes they are asking information about corporate social responsibility and sustainability information.255

Country comparison

Whereas the Austrian statements seem rather pessimistic about the interest of shareholders in CSR, when meeting with them, the Italian firms are rather optimistic: they are convinced that, as they are informing their shareholders and it is known that they are a responsible company, shareholders feel at ease when only focusing on monetary issues during the meetings. Austrian firms on the other hands see the simple facts, which are conventional shareholders interested in the financial results of the business year.

252 I3, L69-77. 253 I3, L87-90. 254 I7, L73-79. 255 I7, L90-92. 55

Between the countries similarities in the described situations are observable, but a difference in perception of the situations at hand is noticeable.

What became evident in this category is, that both countries see their annual reports as a communication tool for their CSR efforts. Therefore they also take pride in the quality and information of their CSR and sustainability reports.

5.2.4 Reactions to CSR implementation

In this category shareholders’ reactions to the implementation of CSR efforts was analyzed. The goal of this analysis was to learn about positive or negative reactions to the implementation of CSR by existing shareholders.

Austria

Within Austria the reactions differed from company to company. In one of the examined companies shareholders welcomed these new initiatives, but they showed no reaction in another.

In general they of course welcomed the initiative to be more active in the area of sustainability and be more active in CSR activities.256

No, at the beginning none at all. I have to say up to this day. We do have a lot of investor meetings in Europe and Northern America, and we still seldomly speak about CSR aspects.257

Italy

In Italy the beginning of CSR and sustainability was welcomed with open arms in both firms. Respectively it was even initiated by the shareholders. This can once again be attributed to the fact that the majoritiy of shareholders belong to the founding family.

Country Comparison

We can see a clear difference in this category, not between the countries but the shareholder structures of the examined firms. The majority of both Italian firms is in the hands of one family, therefore their long term interest play a role for the implementation of CSR. In addition

256 I2, L52-53. 257 I3, L80-82. 56

to that the Austrian company mentioned above is family held. Thus it can be concluded that for the category of ‘shareholder reactions’, not the country, but the shareholder structure makes the difference.

5.3 Shareholder Structure

This category studies the shareholder structure of the interviewed firms with the main focus of a possible influence of CSR activities on a firm’s shareholder structure. As well as the behavior, interaction and communication of the new shareholders.

In addition to the insights gathered from the firms, statements from the interview with the fund manager will be added, they are complementary information to the comments from CSR and IR managers. This provides not only insight in businesses, but also into funds.

5.3.1 Change in Shareholder Structure

This sub-code analyzes the changes the interviewed firms have undergone in past years in their shareholder structure.

Austria

All three interviewed Austiran companies that are traded on the stock exchange stated that a change in shareholder structure was noticeable.

I would say we meet more and more responsible funds, sustainable investment funds.258

One of the interviewees was quite surprised that his company performed better than expected in portfolios of sustainable shareholders:

In my view it is not that I have the feeling, that many eco-funds have Palfinger in their portfolios, but I read quite often in external reviews that we are actually overrepresented […]259

[…] in the last two, three years substantially more sustainable funds invested in us […]260

258 I1, L148-149, P2. 259 I3, L211-214. 57

In this increase of SRI funds the companies see the increase in importance of CSR and its development throughout the last year:

[…] so there are various trends I would say, directly affecting us. 261

[…] these funds increased substantially in the last years in volumina, more than conventional funds, so I believe that the importance of CSR is also depicted here.262

It is a growing industry in the funds universe I would say.263

Italy

Also in Italy a drive towards sustainability and sustainable funds is noticeable:

There are not many but I rememeber some particularly from Finland, they do not only ask about financial information but mostly are asking for sustainable indicators […]264

Country Comparison

In both countries a change in shareholder structure is noticeable in firms traded on the the stock exchange. Eventhough a difference in volumina can be assumed from the statements, both countries exhibit the drive to sustainable funds.

In Austria as well as in Italy nordic investors were mentioned during the interviews as one of the firsts as well as the most important sustainable investors for the firms.

5.3.2 Background of New Shareholders

This sub-codes analyzes the statements of the interviews in regard to perceived backgrounds and goals for the investors and how the investors are assessed by the firms.

Austria

In general the Austrian firms knew that the the new investors had different goals and interests than the conventional shareholders:

260 I4, L68-70. 261 I1, L66-69, P2. 262 I3, L211-214. 263 I1, L47-52, P2. 264 I7, L81-84. 58

I would say they have a different approach, whereas conventional investors are very much focused on figures. With sustainability funds you have a much broader area of discussion.265

During the interviews it was also mentioned that sustainable funds avoid certain companies:

NORGES […] has completely withdrawn from certain activities, completely withdrawn from coal activities whether it be coal mines or power plants or power suppliers being generated from coal, they completely stepped out of it. So there are various trends I would say, directly affecting us.266

Italy

In the interview with the Italian IR manager only little information about the background of SRI investors could be gathered. The interviewee mentioned that their most important SRI shareholder was from Finnland. In addition to that their interest in sustainability issues was emphasized.

[…] they do not only ask about financial information but mostly are asking for sustainable indicators. […]267

Country Comparison and Addition by SRI Fund Manager

The interviewed firms had in general only little information regarding the goals of the SRI funds. This lack in information was also a reason for the additional interview with the fund manager.

During his interview he provided additional insight into the matter of background and goals of SRI funds:

Essentially there are two directions for SRI, the first being the one where you want to avoid certain things, because it does not fit your values or your conscience […]268

In the end the investor wants to invest in firms, where he can say, ‘yes I can live with that.”269

265 I1, L163-165, P2. 266 I1, L66-69, P2. 267 I7, L90-92. 268 I5, L65-66. 269 I5, L204-206. 59

This emphasizes what the Italian IR manager has said about their emphasis on sustainability factors. In addition to that the SRI fund manager mentioned that the roots of SRI lie within churches and religious groups.

Not only institutional investors point on sustainable investments according to the interviewee:

[…] we especially see great interest in Upper Austria, even from private investors […]270

[…] many institutional investors have to, on the one side because of regulations, but also because the investor himself says that he does not want to invest in controversial firms […] therefore you can see the pressure from private investors. I have the impression that it will develop further in this direction and that no one can afford to not offer something like this, no insurance, no banks etc. and the volumina grew a lot in the last years.271

In this statement the goal of investors can be identified to make investments compatible with ethical and moral values.

For many not only because they want to improve the world, but also because they‘ve seen that it is a puzzle piece, so to say, in the analysis of companies, which was missing and if it is considered it improves the risk management.272

Here he mentions the moral compatability and financial success. Which again accords with the statement of the Italian IR manager. It can therefore be stated that SRI have the goal of earning returns with sustainable and ethical firms.

5.3.3 Interests of New Shareholders

This sub-code filtered all relevant statements regarding the interests of the new shareholders. The following chapter will highlight some statements of the interviewees from both countries and again be complemented by the insights gathered in the interview with the fund manager.

270 I5, L326-334. 271 I5, L335-342. 272 I5, 352-355. 60

Austria

During the interviews with the Austrian CSR and IR managers a multitude of perceived interests were mentioned from very broad interests, to more specific, to very detailed.

Of course everyone has different interests and emphasis […]273

And then we have these particular funds where they ask particular questions about our behavior.274

[…] it is about environment protection, about social criteria, how you can imagine, the women’s quota and so on […]275

Italy

In Italy the information on perceived interests was very general:

[…] there are some investors that are mainly focused on sustainability.[…] mostly asking for sustainable indicators.[…]276

In addition to that the interviewee also mentioned that new investors do not only have a focus on sustainability, but are also interested in financial ratios and numbers.

[…] the information they want to know are financial information.277

As this statement clarifies, SRI funds are not only interested in sustainability issues, but also have a focus on the financial side of the firm.

Country Comparison and Addtion of Fund Manager

The firms of both countries were informed on the interests of their new shareholder, as they are also communicated by them.

In addition to the insights gained from the business’ side, the fund manager added that risk management is of great value to the investors.

273 I3, L127-129. 274 I1, L135-136, P2. 275 I4, L51-57. 276 I7, L81-84. 277 I7, L90-92. 61

I believe that on the long term you can save yourself a lot. You won’t have any disadvantage regarding risk or even performance.[…]278

Here the aforementioned statement of the Italian IR manager is confirmed.

Another very important point for the SRI funds is that they do not have any problematic companies in their funds, be they environmental scandals or social issues, which confirms the statement from the Austrian IR manager depicted above.

We also do no thave any firms in our funds that could have a massive problem in the future […]279

SRI funds do generally think on the long term, sometimes their financial goals suffer from this restricitve behavior, but as mentioned above in the long term also their financial interests are secured.

5.3.4 Interaction and Communication with New Shareholders

This sub-code analyzes the communication between firms and new shareholders, namely SRI funds. As this was the point, where many firms were unsure, it was decided to add the complementary interview with the SRI fund manager.

Austria

One interviewee stated that he is convinced, that the active communication towards shareholders is helping in getting new shareholders to invest in ones company:

Yes, I would say so.280

Another interviewee mentioned the direct communication with the investors as a crucial point:

[…] if you are invited as a sustainable company to certain conferences […], you will get asked about your CSR and sustainability activities281

278 I5, L149-152. 279 I5, L153-156. 280 I1, L157-159. 281 I3, L90-93. 62

Not all of the interviewed firms spoke of sustainability conferences, but did mention additional inquiries from the investors:

Well, they have other interests and they do communicate them, what they want to know […]282

[…] they have their own criteria and in personal conversations you can see ‘have we fulfilled this criteria?’ and maybe you get to know additional wishes and requirements […]283

Not only the direct communication with investors was mentioned, but one interviewee mentioned also the collaboration with NGOs and rating agencies to gain additional information on the process and the criteria.

[…] with the NGOs doing the analyses on our sustainability […]284

In addition to direct communication with the shareholder or communication with the rating partners of the corporations the communication through the annual report was a major issue in the interviews. The report is not only seen as a pure information and marketing tool, but also as a tool for communication with the shareholders. Many of the interviewed firms mentioned, that through the report they are better prepared for the questionnaires coming from SRI funds, but also get less questions as the information is already provided in the reports.

[…] if you don’t have a sustainability report, or like us an integrated report, then it becomes relatively complicated to gather all the information that is asked.285

But all Austrian firms mentioned the facilitation since the implementation of the GRI standard:

It got easier since there is the GRI standard, we also report according to that and you notice that there come little additional inquiries from investors what they want to know in addition to that […] many topics are covered with the report.”286

282 I3, L179-180. 283 I4, L51-57. 284 I4, L90-93. 285 I3, L110-112. 286 I3, L119-123. 63

Italy

In the interviewed Italian firm the communication between firm and shareholders is mostly handled through the report and direct communication.

[…] this year we will publish at the same time the financial report and the sustainability report […] you can find a lot of interesting information in the report.287

The interviewee of the Italian Firm is convinced, that through their sustainability report, they are communicating well enough with conventional shareholders as well as new shareholders and that they know through the communicated information that the firm is responsible and good for investing.

Country Comparison and Addition of Fund Manager

In the interviewed firms it can be seen, that may focus on the preparation of the annual report. The interviewed firms either have an integrated report or add a separate CSR report to the annual financial report. Many of the firms are convinced, that the preparation of said report helps to inform the investors. Nonetheless the information in the CSR reports is abundant. Firms of both countries often get additional inquiries, questions, and questionnaires from SRI funds.

Differences between the countries can be seen, as the focus in the Italian firm lies mostly with the preparation of the report and to answer eventual additional information. Whereas two of the Austrian firms are convinced, that active communication with the new shareholders is key.

It was also mentioned that the reasoning of SRI is sometimes unclear. Firms often did not know, why their stocks were sold by SRI funds. The interview with the SRI fund manager brought additional insight for this topic as he stated:

[…] of course I have a minor share in a compnay and buy it from someone anonymousl at the stock exchange or sell it and the firm does not know of it288

This is the choice principle, which firms to choose, but there is also the voice principle where you directly contact the firms.289

287 I7, L104-109. 288 I5, L230-232. 289 I5, L249-250. 64

We handle it like this, we contact firms, which are either slightly below our threshold. We give them the information from Ökom Research to clearify that we would like to invest but cannot, as this and that point in the sustainability rating is below the alowed threshold.290

We even contact firms we already have in our funds […] when they reach a critical point in the rating and maybe even become uninvestible291

The fund manager underlined the importance of the direct contact with the firms, to make them aware of the importance of the sustainability ratings.

[…] it is important for us investors that the firms are investible ]…]292

But he also mentioned that the firms already improved in their communication with the new shareholders:

[…] they answer more and more, as they’ve seen how important it is […] that also sustainable investors are important […]293

Not only, that firms take SRI funds more into account as potential investors, through the increased communication between SRI funds and corporations, the interviewee is convinced that sustainability in firms become a topic of greater importance:

[…] the sustainability responsible in the firms gain importance and are backed in this way.294

The interviewee assumes that the additional communication increases the focus on better reporting of CSR activities as well as the increase of CSR in general, as its significance is underlined.

5.3.5 Screening Methods

The sub-code of screening methods was used to analyze the single interviews in regard to criteria which are decisive for the new investors to invest or divest in a corporation. Once

290 I5, L255-258. 291 I5, L259-264. 292 I5, 266-270. 293 I5, L271-275. 294 I5, L271-275. 65

again statements from the different countries are listed below, followed by a comparison between countries as well as the statements of the fund manager.

Austria

Austrian companies are in general well aware of the the existence of screening methods. Nonetheless specific knowledge on the process was lacking in some companies.

I get the impression that we sort of get a score and then depending on how good or bad we are, maybe we have to cross a certain limit to be investible, for it to be safe for them […]295

Whereas other companies were more informed on the specific process and criteria.

There are also external organizations, which develop criteria catalogues, the Ökom for example, we also inquired how we are rated there and how we could improve.296

So it is very important to work also with these NGOs, like Ökom or sustainalytics that you look closely on the existing criteria to improve […]297

Not only did some of the Austrian firms get in contact with these analysts, but also in personal conversations with the investors gained knowledge on their screening methods.

It already happened to me that investors told me they could not invest in Lenzing shares as we did not fulfill the external sustainability criteria at the time.298

Italy

The knowledge in the Italian firm on screening methods was again quite general and the emphasis lay once again more on the report and the small number of meetings with sustainable investors

Starting from 2017 the value of the non-financial information is equal to the financial information […]299

295 I1, L167-175, P2. 296 I4, L47-50. 297 I4, L86-90. 298 I4, L130-132. 299 I7, L104-109. 66

Country Comparison and Addition of Fund Manager

The knowledge on screening methods and procedures was greater in Austrian firms, they were also more active with engaging with the investors or with the analysts to improve their rating and their behavior.

The fund manager once again provided additional information on the matter at hand.

There are many analyses done prior, first the sustainability analysis, then the financial analysis. You could also integrate the analyses as others do […] but we have decided to handle it in this way at the moment and it works very well, as long as the rating of Ökom research is good and no negative criteria exist, the corporation is good to go and the financial analysis can begin.300

So during a screening two analysis are done: a sustainability screening and a financial screening. The sustainability screening can once more be divided into two parts: negative screening and positive screening.

A whole list of negative criteria and you can always adapt them as a client of Ökom research.301

After the negative screening the interviewed SRI fund applies a best-in-class approach

[…] where in one sector the most sustainable firms are chosen.302

When a firm is considered sustainable, the financial analysis by the SRI fund begins to be certain that it is also investible.

The screening methods are a very important tool for SRI funds and with the following example it can be once again seen that screening according to sustainability factors can also be used as additional risk management.

BP, which was rated very badly for years in sustainability analyses, because they were quite stingy with environmental topics and didn’t spend a lot of money and the pipeline security was always seen as critical, which you wouldn’t notice from financial analysis alone.303

300 I5, L149-156. 301 I5, L178-179. 302 I5, L182-183. 303 I5, L217-223. 67

This chapter was concerned with presenting the findings of the qualitative interviews and put them in order according to the category system. This is done as to provide emprical evidence and to already commence the answering of the research question. The next chapter will put theory and empricism together and discuss conformity as well as incoherence between them. This will help to structure gathered insights.

6. DISCUSSION OF THE FINDINGS

After having presented the theoretical background and frameworks as well as the research results, the following chapter aims at connecting the insights from literature with the empirical findings. This chapter aims at revising existing theory as well as gaining new knowledge and insight on the research topic.

As in the previous chapter, the discussion chapter is divided into three sub-chapters according to the category system. For a better understanding and connecting theoretical with empirical insights, the three categories are not divided into sub-codes. Another reason for this is the strong interdependence of the sub-codes of each category.

6.1 Motivators for CSR

As mentioned, as a first step it was important to clarify what were the motivating factors for the single companies in implementing CSR. It is interesting to explore if the firms’ motivating factors and motivators, i.e. people influencing the firm’s behavior, are consistent with the reasons mentioned in theory. For this exemplification the category of ‘motivators for CSR’ and theory from chapter 2 will be compared.

Theory stated there are multiple motivators for CSR, as depicted in chapter 5.1, and additionally the interviewees mentioned multiple factors which increase the will to implement CSR activities. One of the most often mentioned factors was their responsibility as an employer and the responsibility towards the well-being of their employees.304 This factor was mentioned by all of the interviewed firms in one form or another, be it the responsibility and will to be a good employer or to do their best to get and retain the best employees.305

Another important motivator for CSR that was mentioned by the interviewees is their engagement with society.306 These points are summarized in theory as the stakeholder view. Namely all obligations a firm has towards all those with interests in the company and affected by its activities. Therefore, a company has not only the obligation to give back to their shareholders in monetary form, but also to other interest groups such as employees, society, and suppliers.307

304 see. I1, L73-74, P2; I3, L21-25; I6, L133. 305 see. I1, L73-74; I7, L50-51. 306 see. I2, L33-35. 307 see. Donaldson/Preston, 1995, 73; Ireland, 1999, 53; Ackoff, 2002,18. 69

In addition to the human-factors of employees and society, the wish for ecofriendly behavior was a topic emphasized in the interviews.308 This supports a theoretical statement that the status of environmentally friendly behavior in society grew in past years.309 This was again confirmed by statements of interviewees mentioning the importance of country- and European-wide laws and also the unacceptance for harming behavior towards the environment. One of the interviewees stated that they had to implement changes to their production, as their headquarters are in a top touristic location.310

This leads to the next theoretical statement, which says that firms act ethical and ecofriendly to stay legitimized, i.e. to avoid government influence in their business. So they started to pursue institutional change and incorporate CSR practices as a precaution.311 This can be summarized as the driver of autonomy, valid for SMEs as well as MNEs.312 This driver was confirmed in the interviews emphasizing the longterm relationship with local people as well as the environment as important points for a company to stay in business and be successful.313 It can be therefore confirmed that one reason for firms to be active in CSR is to avoid external influences, so they choose to change their institutional behavior. This statement from an interviewee also confirmed yet another driver for CSR. The driver of ‘sensitivity to local stakeholders’ often influences SMEs as they are more connected with local cultures and more aware of local issues and risks. The interviewed firms were active internationally, but nonetheless they knew how important a good relationship with local communities is for them.314

Where there could be observed an equal number of drivers and barriers in theory,315 the drivers outweighed the barriers in the empirical interviews. Not because there are no barriers in practice, but because during the interviews it was specifically asked for motivators for CSR activities and not what the demotivating factors were. Nonetheless a compliance between theory and empirical evidence can be observed.

308 see. I6, L74-77. 309 see. Flammer, 2013, 766. 310 see. I1, L53-58, P2; I4, L31-34. 311 see. Hoffman, 1999, 360; Chapple/Moon, 2005, 429; Newell/Frynas, 2007, 672; Gjølberg, 2011, 14. 312 see. Florini, 2003, 238; Rondinelli/London, 2003, 71. 313 see. I6, L74-77. 314 see. Studer/Welford/Hills, 2006, 425; Amato/Amato, 2012, 324. 315 see. table 1 for reference. 70

6.2 Shareholders influencing CSR

For the second part empirical findings from the category ‘shareholders influencing CSR’ will be connected with theory from the chapters 3.1 through 3.2. Once again it is emphasized that this chapter will only analyze the influence on corporate social behavior from conventional shareholders. Socially responsible investment funds will be the topic of the next chapter.

Theory states that SSA has gained more attention from society in the past ten years.316 With increasing importance also the methods used to reach their goals developed. In the last decades several tactics and initiatives commenced, beginning with the general acceptance of social policy topics for shareholder proposals.317

The importance of social shareholder activism in the theoretical part of this work was underlined with numbers. At its beginning the number of social policy proposals was quite low, but increased exponentially after only a couple of years.318 Whereas from the empirical part the insight emerged that – at least for the interviewed firms – this was not the case. A general interest from conventional shareholders in CSR efforts exists and has increased in past years.319 Nonetheless no active involvement or incentive from conventional shareholders was noted in the interviewed firms, but rather the classical entry and exit strategy.320

Another interviewee stated, that the interest of the conventional shareholders was still very much focused on financial information and financial ratios of the company.321 However the increase in interest in CSR by conventional shareholders was also noted by this interviewee. He assigns this increased interest to the general development towards a stronger focus on non-financial information.322

In this comparison of theory and empiricism a discrepancy can be noted – theory and empirical evidence do not match in this case. Whereas theory mentions numerous cases of SSA, the interviewed firms state otherwise. Nonetheless a development in the conventional shareholders is already noticeable as to their increasing interest in CSR activities of the

316 see. Brancato, 1997, 90. 317 see. Proffitt/Spicer, 2006, 180. 318 see. Marens, 2002, 370. 319 see. I1, L63-64, P2. 320 see. I1, L91-92, P2. 321 see. I7, L90-92. 322 see. I7, L107-109. 71

invested firms. Therefore it can be assumed that the practice of social shareholders in Austria and Italy lags behind.

6.3 Shareholder Structure

For the final part of the discussion, the category ‘shareholder structure’ is compared to the theory in chapter 3.3. With the category ‘shareholder structure’ any changes in the firms’ shareholder structure was examined. The ‘new’ shareholders in the firms were socially responsible investors (SRI).

Theory defines SRI as a process that integrates social, environmental, and ethical considerations in addition to monetary aims of an investment.323 There are several drivers for SRI according to theory, namely risk management, regulations, legislations, and peer pressure in the investment community.324 It is therefore a way to systematically integrate the environmental, social, and economical factors into the financial analysis and evaluation of assets.325

From the interviews the general knowledge was gained that in all companies traded on the stock exchange more and more responsible funds were interested and invested in the firms.326 In the opinion of one of the interviewees the growing importance of CSR is depicted in this increase of socially responsible funds.327

At the beginning responsible investors wanted to extend their personal values into their investment activities.328 This is still the case according to empirical evidence gained from the interviews.329 Eventhough personal values are an important factor to invest in SRI funds, other factors play a role as well. Therefore SRI can be used as additional risk management.330 This additional risk management is done through the screening by SRI funds. Most funds use two methods. Either they use a sustainability analysis or a financial analysis. The sustainability analysis can be again divided into negative screening, where unfit firms are filtered out and a positive screening, where mostly the best-in-class approach

323 see. Haigh/Hazelton, 2004, 63; Renneboog/Horst/Zhang, 2008, 1723; Scholtens, 2014, 383. 324 see. Benson/Humphrey, 2008, 1853; Scholtens, 2014, 382. 325 see. Ferrell/Liang/Renneboog, 2016, 599. 326 see. I1, L148-149,P2; I4, L68-70. 327 see. I3, L211-214. 328 see. Sparkes/Cowton, 2004, 53. 329 see. I5, L205. 330 see. Borghesi/Houston/Naranjo, 2014, 181; I5, L352-355. 72

is used.331 The interviewee mentioned the example of the share price collapse of British Petrol (BP) after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.332 This was also one of the examples used in the theoretical part.333 With this example it becomes evident, how a financially stable firm and seemingly secure firm can have problems that would have been detected when using a sustainability analysis.334 Again empirical evidence and theory coincide.

In addition to the insights from the interview with the fund manager, most of the interviewed firms were well informed on screening and screening methods. Some of them are directly getting in contact with the funds’ external partners or with the investors themselves to gather additional information on their rating and how to improve.335 In more than one interview the assumption was confirmed, that the communication between firms and funds are very much different than between firms and conventional shareholders. Whereas roadshows are used as a popular mean to inform shareholders and communicate directly with them, social responsibility funds are not as represented at roadshows as one of the interviewees stated. During his 30 days of roadshow, maybe 1 day is with SRI funds.336 Another interviewee stated that in the communication with SRI funds, conferences on sustainability are of higher importance when it comes to investments. Furthermore, firms have to get invited to these conferences.337 It can therefore be assumed that SRI funds do a preselection before the conferences as to decide with which firms they want to communicate.

Apart from direct communication with the firm, empirical evidence shows that firms rely very much on their sustainability report to do the communication for them. 338 Firms choose to proactively send their reports to investors and if there are any additional questions, they are easy to answer, one of the interviewees stated.339

Not only the firms are communicating towards the investors, but also the investors are getting in contact with the firms’ empirical evidence showed. Here the fund firstly has to decide to not only use the choice principle, i.e. whether to invest or not, but rather to use their voice.340 The fund manager, who was interviewed, mentioned that his fund would contact firms, which do not fulfill all criteria, but would be otherwise investible, as well as firms

331 see. Kinder/Lydenberg/Domini, 1994, 61; I5, L149-156. 332 see. I5, L217-223. 333 see. Flammer, 2013, 771. 334 see. I5, L217-223. 335 see. I4, L47-50. 336 see. I3, L180-188. 337 see. I4, L75-76; I4, L78-81. 338 see. I7, L104-109. 339 see. I3, L126-127. 340 see. I5, L249-250. 73

represented in the fund’s portfolio, which are dangerously close to loose their status and become uninvestible.341 It can be seen that the interaction and communication with the firms is an important point for the funds, as the interviewee stated that it is important to the funds that companies remain investible and see direct communication as a way to convey the importance of sustainability information and sustainability screening.342 The interviewee mentioned that the availability of firms for direct communication as well as the quality of communication itself has increased in recent years. He also stated, that through their inquiries the sustainability responsible in firms gains tailwind, as well as the importance of CSR is once more put on spot in firms. He highlighted therefore the importance of the voice aspect for sustainable investors.343 It can be therefore assumed that for a successful collaboration between firms and investors the communication must come from both sides. Not only the investors have to contact firms, but also the firms must inform themselves via direct communication with funds or their external partners, as stated from the investor’s side as well as from the business’ side.344 This was barely mentioned in any of the the examined literature.

In summary this chapter sustained most of the theoretical statements listed in the first part of the thesis, but also added new insights to theoretical knowledge. These new insights are mostly regarding the active communication from the fund toward the firms to achieve change. Change not only in firms a fund is already invested in, but also in possible investments. In this part empirical evidence contradicts theory, which states, that SRI funds mostly act through ‘choice’, i.e. they enter or exit a firm as shareholders.

341 see. I5, L259-264; I5, L266-270. 342 see. I5, L255-264. 343 see. I5, L283-288. 344 see. I4, L42-47; I5, L283-288. 74

7. LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

This master thesis tries to enlighten the situation of current CSR in Europe, namely in the two countries Austria and Italy. The research goal was to compare theoretical literature to empirical evidence and to gather new insights into the topic of CSR’s influence on shareholder structure. As does existing theory also this thesis has several limitations.

The applied research method is a restriction. This study enables the exploration of insights and personal experiences. As these are personal experiences they are very complex and it is very hard to compare them. Because of this the qualitative approach was chosen for this work. However, due to innate limitations to qualitative studies, such as limitation of validity, reliability, and objectivity, the same quality of quantitative studies cannot be guaranteed.345 However this study follows the guidelines of a qualitative study and guarantees within the parameters correct data collection and analysis.

Another limitiation for this study is its sample size. The thesis focuses on seven participants from the business’ side and one participant from the investors’ side. Due to its limited sample size the study does not fully conform to quality criteria of research. Another limitation related to the sample size is the uneven distribution between the countries. There were more Austrian firms willing to participate in the study but only two Italian firms.

In addition to the research method and the sample size, the language is regarded as another limitation of this thesis. Most interviews in this study were conducted in English, which is not the native tongue of the participants. Therefore, the interviewees might not have been able to fully express their insights to a full extent due to a language barrier. The remaining three interviewees were conducted in german and used passages were translated by the author. As the author is no native speaker as well the translation of the passages might also be considered a limitation.

A final limitation has to be mentioned in regards to the interview and the connected data analysis. The transcribing process as well as the developing of the coding guideline followed strict rules. However, errors can never be excluded entirely. In addition to possible errors in the transcripts and category system, the analysis might also contain biased behavior. The author tried to exclude any biases, also by using software programms like ‘xpress scribe’ a subjective assessment or biased evaluations of the results might be possible as well.

345 see. Cresewell, 2013. 75

8. FURTHER POSSIBLE RESEARCH AND RECOMMENDED COURSE OF

ACTION

The importance of the topic of CSR as well as of SRI and other shareholders’ influence has increased in recent years. Therefore, this study identified several issues that require a more in-depth exploration as well as practical actions and applications.

As for the scientific recommendation the author regards the following two points as important for possible further research.

The first field, i.e. shareholders influencing CSR efforts, is an already studied field. Nevertheless, further research in this field is needed, as with so many fields of study, the part of academical work focuses on angloamerican countries and businesses. Additional knowledge on the power, goals and interests of shareholders in European countries is needed. Here the focus should not only lie on shareholder activism in general but especially on social shareholder activism. As this study is limited to only two countries a study including more countries or even a European-wide analysis would be of great value. Not only to the scientific community but also for firms and investors.

The second field concerns the change in shareholder structure. In this field further research is recommended as shareholder activism and especially SRI has increased in importance in society as well as in business. Regarding this thesis further research of SRI in both countries would be informative and lead to a more subjective study. A possible focus could be SRIs goals as well as the screening methods. Within this thesis, participants were mostly informed on screening methods, but lacked knowledge on the general goals of SRI. It is also recommended to direct one’s attention to the interaction and communication between SRI and firms, as this is were a real collaboration and change is achieved. In addition to a general overview on SSA and SRI in Europe, as well as the focus on the firm-shareholder interaction, an additional focus could lie on how to approach the changes of shareholders as well as how to attract these new shareholders. In this thesis it was observed, that most of the examined and interviewed corporations were focused on attracting new shareholders with their CSR or integrated annual reports. Other means of communication and interaction were left unconsidered by some of the corporations.

In both of the above-mentioned cases the views on the topics from both the business’ side as well as the investors’ side would be of great interest and value. Therefore, it is recommended to include both sides in future studies, as it provides a wholesome depiction.

As an additional topic a further exploration of the topic of CSR and business performance could be a supportive addition for the above-mentioned fields. This is because as seen in this thesis especially conventional shareholders still focus very much on the financial performance of a firm. Through a broader exploration of CSR’s influence on business performance a greater interest in CSR, as well as in new forms of shareholding could emerge.

Regarding practical recommendations, the study identifies several factors which might be very valuable for businesses and investors.

In general, it can be said that this study underlines the importance of CSR. CSR has increased in importance in the last decades and empirical evidence also confirmed the increasing trend and future importance of CSR. Companies not active in CSR should implement socially and ecologically responsible actions in their business, otherwise it could have rough consequences for the firm, as stated by interviewees.

If a company is already active in CSR they can expand their change from their respective corporation to the whole industry, as one of the interviewees mentioned. With this positive peer pressure more firms would implement more sustainable ways of business and profit from positive effects of CSR.

As CSR has increased in significance, SRI has increased in importance as well. This is due to a change in society and society’s perception of good investing and good business. As SRI have already increased in investment volumina in the last years and the trend is predicted to continue, corporations will have to take these new shareholders into account. Not only to gain them as investors, but also because the requirements and demands of these funds reflect society’s wishes and demands.

The most important factor identified in this study is the factor of communication between firms and shareholders. Here once again a differenciation has to be made between conventional shareholders and social shareholder activists. The latter group of shareholders communicates very differently than conventional shareholders. Whereas conventional 77

shareholders use the possibility of personal meetings and roadshow meetings, most SSA do not. Instead they prefer to filter out corporations through screenings and if they choose to interact and communicate with a firm, it is on special sustainability conferences or through direct communications. As for this corporations have to actively contact SSA to improve and be investible for this expanding group of shareholders and investment funds.

The factor of communication is also important for the funds. As right now, funds have a very limited investment universe they can choose from. It would be in their interest to use the method of ‘voice’ more often than the simple entry and exit strategy. It is not only important for them to grow their investment universe, but also to change corporations’ behavior as the investors also want to improve the overall situation. This is why funds need to actively improve their possible investment pools and get more firms to be investible.

Summarized it can be said, that this thesis provides additional insights into the topic of CSR and shareholder structure, but further research as well as more practical implications are possible.

9. CONCLUSION

In the initial part of this work the topic of CSR was examined through literature research and analyisis. Multiple views, factors and motivators, as well as drivers and barriers were depicted in the first part of this thesis. Theory is still divided over the value of CSR: studies show there is a positive correlation between CSR and business success. Some studies even link the CSR of a firm to higher profits, but no generally accepted proof is given. Nonetheless positive relations between CSR and corporations – in various forms – exist, critcs are still not convinced and see CSR only as a cost to the firm and finally its shareholders and not part of its responsibility. It can be said that theory provides an equal amount of advocates and opponents. What can be observed is the general increase of academic work on this topic.

The next part of this thesis is on the role of the shareholders, when it comes to CSR. As in the third chapter a general overview on shareholder activism was provided, followed by deeper insights to the topic of social shareholder activism. Different studies and articles explore the interactions between shareholders and firms in regard to CSR. In general it can be observed that shareholder activism for social as well as environmental issues is on the rise. Eventhough historically a quite young topic, SSA has increased immensly in importance in the last decades not only for investment funds, but also for businesses. When speaking of shareholders and their influence on businesses different trends are observable. Therefore this work focuses on the influence shareholders have on CSR efforts of a company. In this matter lies another focus on‘new’ shareholders, i.e. SRI funds. This includes finding out how SRI developed as part of shareholder activsm its present dimensions, the goals it pursues, and the means these shareholders use. Beside a vast literature review dealing with this topic, this study intends to revise the current knowledge as well to gain further insight in shareholders’ and business’ behavior regarding CSR and their relations among them. This is done by conducting an empirical study that analyzes seven interviews with investor relations, corporate social responsibility, and fund managers in Austria and Italy.

First of all it turned out that no single statement or solution is valid in order to answer to the research question. This applies to all different aspects observed within this study. Empiricism is in this case very consistent with theory, starting from the definitions for CSR. There is a different understanding and there lies a different focus within each of the examined firms for CSR. Some are more focused on social topics, others more on environmental topics, but generally all firms’ CSR efforts encompass all ranges of CSR.

Next participants express their strive towards an improvement of CSR in general, as it became such an important point in business. On the one hand the influence of governments and NGOs is growing, on the other hand businesses observe a positive influence from CSR. Such positive influences can be better qualified employees and cost reduction in production due to emission reduction. These are two important drivers quoted in theory as well as mentioned multiple times in the interviews. It can therefore be concluded that firms are influenced from the outside, namely governments and NGOs as well as from the inside.

The participants underlined multiple times the importance of the communication of their CSR activities, not only for their stakeholders, but increasingly also for their shareholders. This leads to the conclusion that the conventional shareholder is in a process of change. Empiricism laid evidence to the assumption, that conventional shareholders are changing towards a more socially and environmentally interested and active owner of the firm. This was also illustrated by theory. Seen that the examined theory is mostly concerned with angloamerican countries it can be assumed that the development of conventional shareholders or the rise of SSA is only at its beginning but more exertion of influence in regard to social and environmental issues is to be expected.

In addition to the conventional shareholders ‘new’ shareholders, namely SRI funds, become more important for all the interviewed corporations traded on the stock exchange. When it comes to the communication with these new shareholders, most of the companies interviewed display a low interaction. Eventhough they try to be proactive with the preperation of good integrated annual reports or CSR reports, only two of the interviewed firms look for direct contact and direct communication with the new shareholders. In the future an increased customized communication will be necessary for firms to gain new shareholders and also keep them interested in their respective firms. This results in the outcome of increased importance for CSR and the communication of CSR in all firms.

Not only the communication toward the shareholders is important, also the communication from SSA and SRI towards firms is important. Especially in these first years, where corporations underestimate the possible magnitude and investment volume of these new shareholders, is it important for funds to incentivize communication and interaction. Also due to the low interaction between funds and corporations, funds exhibit only a limited assortment of investible firms. The examined SRI fund does already use active communication to increase its investment universe and states that due to their communication sustainability and CSR gets a higher status in firms, as it is clearly communicated that possible investors

are behind sustainability screenings and would be of clear importance to firms. This leads to the conclusion that active communication of SRI and SSA will lead to increased CSR in firms.

Generally it can be summarized that CSR efforts can influence the shareholder structure, as has been examined in theory as well as in the selected firms. Nonetheless it must be stated, that these CSR efforts and activities must be clearly communicated to attract new shareholders. From the analysis of the interviews it can be seen that the importance of integrated financial reports or CSR reports has increased. Either to attract new shareholders, such as SRI funds, or to preemptively answer questions that might arise, as well as a preparation for the question catalogues of SRI. Eventhough these reports are a usefool tool, additional information and communication is needed.

IV. LIST OF REFERENCES

Ackoff, R. L., The corporation as a community, not as a corpus, in: Reflections: The SoL Journal, Vol. 4, No. 1, 2002, 14-21.

Amato, L. H./Amato, C. H., Environmental policy, rankings and stock values, in: Business Strategy and the Environment, Vol. 21, No. 5, 2012, 317-325.

Angel, J. J./Rivoli, P., Does ethical investing impose a cost upon the firm? A theoretical perspective, in: The Journal of Investing, Vol. 6, No. 4, 1997, 57-61.

Atteslander, P., Methoden der empirischen Sozialforschung (13th ed.), Berlin, 2010.

Bansal, P./Roth, K., Why companies go green: A model of ecological responsiveness, in: Academy of management journal, Vol. 43, No. 4, 2000, 717-736.

Barber, J., Mapping the movement to achieve sustainable production and consumption in North America, in: Journal of Cleaner Production, Vol. 15, No. 6, 2007, 499-512.

Bebchuk, L. A., Letting shareholders set the rules, in: Harv. L. Rev., Vol. 119, 2005, 1784.

Benson, K. L./Humphrey, J. E., Socially responsible investment funds: Investor reaction to current and past returns, in: Journal of Banking & Finance, Vol. 32, No. 9, 2008, 1850-1859.

Berle, A. A./Gardiner, C., The modern corporation and private property, in: Means. 1932, 1968, 204-5.

Bielak, D./Bonini, S. M./Oppenheim, J. M., CEOs on strategy and social issues, in: McKinsey Quarterly, Vol. 4, 2007, 8-12.

Borghesi, R./Houston, J. F./Naranjo, A., Corporate socially responsible investments: CEO altruism, reputation, and shareholder interests, in: Journal of Corporate Finance, Vol. 26, 2014, 164-181.

Brancato, C. K., Institutional investors and corporate governance: best practices for increasing corporate value, Burr Ridge, 1997.

Brav, A./Jiang, W./Partnoy, F./Thomas, R., Hedge fund activism, corporate governance, and firm performance, in: The Journal of Finance, Vol. 63, No. 4, 2008, 1729-1775.

Brekke, K. A./Nyborg, K., Attracting responsible employees: Green production as labor market screening, in: Resource and Energy Economics, Vol. 30, No. 4, 2008, 509- 526.

Brickey, K. F., Environmental crime: Law, policy, prosecution, Aspen, 2008.

Brill, H./Brill, J. A./Feigenbaum, C., Investing with your values: Making money and making a difference, Chapel Hill, 1999.

Campbell, J. L., Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? An institutional theory of corporate social responsibility, in: Academy of management Review, Vol. 32, No. 3, 2007, 946-967.

Carlsson, R. H., The benefits of Active Ownership, in: Corportate Governance, Vol. 3, No. 2, 2003, 6-31.

Carlsen, A./Dutton, J. E. (Eds.), Research alive: Exploring generative moments in doing qualitative research (27th ed.), Copenhagen, 2011.

Carroll, A. B., Corporate social responsibility: Evolution of a definitional construct, in: Business & society, Vol. 38, No. 3, 1999, 268-295.

Chapple, W./Moon, J., Corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Asia: A seven-country study of CSR web site reporting, in: Business & society, Vol. 44, No. 4, 2005, 415-441.

Clarke, T., Accounting for Enron: shareholder value and stakeholder interest, in: Corporate Governance: An international Review, Vol. 13, No. 5, 2005, 598-612.

Cox, P./Schneider, M., Is corporate social performance a criterion in the overseas investment strategy of US pension plans? An empirical examination, in: Business & Society, Vol. 49, No. 2, 2010, 252-289.

Creswell, J. W./Creswell, J. D., Research design: qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (4th ed.), Thousand Oaks, 2017.

Cullinan, C. P./Mahoney, L. S./Roush, P., Corporate social responsibility and shareholder support for corporate governance changes, in: Social Responsibility Journal, Vol. 12, No. 4, 2016, 687-705.

Cziraki, P./Renneboog, L./Szilagyi, P. G., Shareholder Activism through Proxy Proposals: the European Perspective, in: European Financial Management, Vol. 16, No. 5, 2010, 738-777.

Dam, L./Heijdra, B. J., The environmental and macroeconomic effects of socially responsible investment, in: Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Vol. 35, No. 9, 2011, 1424-1434.

David, P./Hitt, M. A./Gimeno, J., The influence of activism by institutional investors on R&D, in: Academy of management Journal, Vol. 44, No. 1, 2001, 144-157.

David, P./Bloom, M./Hillman, A. J., Investor activism, managerial responsiveness, and corporate social performance, in: Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 28, No. 1, 2007, 91-100.

Davis, G. F./Thompson, T. A., A social movement perspective on corporate control, in: Administratvie science quarterly, Vol. 1, 1994, 141-173.

Den Hond, F./De Bakker, F. G., Ideologically motivated activism: How activist groups influence corporate social change activities, in: Academy of Management Review, Vol. 32, No. 3, 2007, 901-924.

Dimson, E./Karakaş, O./Li, X., Active Ownership, in: Review of Financial Studies, Vol. 28, No. 12, 2015, 3225-3268.

Doh, J. P./Teegen, H., Nongovernmental organizations as institutional actors in international business: Theory and implications, in: International Business Review, Vol. 11, No.6, 2002, 665-684.

Donaldson, T./Preston, L. E., The stakeholder theory of the corporation: Concepts, evidence, and implications, in: Academy of management Review, Vol. 20, No. 1, 1995, 65-91.

Ebster, C./Stalzer, L., Wissenschaftliches Arbeiten für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftler (3rd ed.), Wien, 2008.

Eccles, R. G./Ionnou, I./Serafeim, G., The impact of corporate sustainability on organizational processes and performance, in: Management Science, Vol. 60, No. 11, 2014, 2835- 2857.

Edwards, R./Holland, J., What is Qualitative Interviewing? London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2013.

Entine, J., The myth of social investing: A critique of its practice and consequences for corporate social performance research, in: Organization & Environment, Vol. 16, No. 3, 2003, 352-368.

European Commission, Mitteilung der Europäischen Kommission an das Europäische Parlament, den Rat, den Europäischen Wirtschafts- und Sozialausschuss und den Ausschuss der Regionen. Eine neue EU-Strategie (2011-2014) für die soziale Verantwortung der Unternehmen (CSR), Brüssel, 2011.

Ferrell, A./Liang, H./Renneboog, L., Socially responsible firms, in: Journal of Financial Economics, Vol. 122, 2016, 585-606.

Flammer, C., Corporate Social Responsibility and Shareholder Reaction: The Environmental Awareness of Investors, in: Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 56, No. 3, 2013, 758-781.

Florini, A., Business and global governance, in: Current Readings in Management (Special Indian Edition), 2003, 238.

Forstater, M./Raynard, P./MacDonald, J., Business and poverty: Bridging the gap, Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum, 2002.

Forstater, M., Green jobs: Public service employment and environmental sustainability, in: Challenge, Vol. 49, No. 4, 2006, 58-72.

Frame, B., Corporate social responsibility: A challenge for the donor community, in: Development in Practice, Vol. 15, No. 3, 2005, 422-432.

Friedman, M., The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits, in: NY: Academic Press, 1970, 122-124.

Freeman, R. E., Strategic management: A stakeholder approach. Cambridge, 2010.

Galaskiewicz, J., An urban grants economy revisited: Corporate charitable contributions in the Twin Cities, 1979-81, 1987-89, in: Administrative Science Quarterly, 1997, 445- 471.

Garriga, E./Melè, D., Corporate Social Responsibility Theories: Mapping the Territory, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 53, 2004, 51-71.

Gillan, S. L./Starks, L. T., Corporate governance proposals and shareholder activism: The role of institutional investors, in: Journal of financial Economics, Vol. 57, No. 2, 2000, 275-305.

Gjølberg, M., Explaining regulatory preferences: CSR, soft law, or hard law? Insights from a survey of Nordic pioneers in CSR, in: Business and Politics, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2011, 1- 31.

Glac, K., The influence of shareholders on corporate social responsibility, in: Economics, Management and Financial Markets, Vol. 9, No. 3, 2014, 34-72.

Glaser, B./Strauss, A., The discovery of grounded theory, in: London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, Vol. 24, No. 25, 1967, 288-304.

Godfrey, P. C., The relationship between corporate philanthropy and shareholder wealth: A risk management perspective, in: Academy of management review, Vol. 30, No. 4, 2005, 777-798.

Goldstein, A., The Political Economy of Global Business: the Case of the BRICs, in: Global Policy, Vol. 4, No. 2, 2013, 162-172.

Gómez-Bezares, F./Przychodzen, W./Przychodzen, J., Corporate Sustainability and Shareholder Wealth—Evidence from British Companies and Lessons from the Crisis, in: Sustainability, Vol. 8, 2016, 276-298.

Goranova, M./Ryan, L. V., Shareholder Activism: A Multidisciplinary Review, in: Journal of Management, Vol. 40, No. 5, 2014, 1230-1268

Graafland, J./van de Ven, B., Strategic and moral motivation for corporate social responsibility, in: Journal of Corporate Citizenship, Vol. 22, 2006, 111-123.

Graebner, M. E./Martin, J. A./Roundy, P. T., Qualitative data: Cooking without a recipe, in: Strategic Organization, Vol. 10, No. 3, 2012, 276-284.

Graves, S. B./Waddock, S./Rehbein, K., Fad and fashion in shareholder activism: The landscape of shareholder resolutions, 1988–1998, in: Business and Society Review, Vol. 106, No. 4, 2001, 293-314.

Greening, D. W./Turban, D. B., Corporate social performance as a competitive advantage in attracting a quality workforce, in: Business & Society, Vol. 39, No. 3, 2000, 254-280.

Grein, A. F./Gould, S. J., Voluntary codes of ethical conduct: Group membership salience and globally integrated marketing communications perspectives, in: Journal of Macromarketing, Vol. 27, No. 3, 2007, 289-302.

Guay, T./Doh, J. P./Sinclair, G., Non-governmental Organizations, Shareholder Activism, and Socially Responsible Investments: Ethical, Strategic, and Governance Implications, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 52, 2004, 125-139.

Haigh, M./Hazelton, J., Financial markets: a tool for social responsibility?, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 52, No. 1, 2004, 59-71.

Hawley, J. P./Williams, A. T., The rise of fiduciary capitalism: How institutional investors can make corporate America more democratic. Philadelphia, 2000.

Heinkel, R./Kraus, A./Zechner, J., The effect of green investment on corporate behavior, in: Journal of financial and quantitative analysis, Vol. 36, No. 4, 2001, 431-449.

Hoffman, A. J., Institutional evolution and change: Environmentalism and the US chemical industry, in: Academy of management journal, Vol. 42, No. 4, 1999, 351-371.

Hong, H./Kubik, J. D./Scheinkman, J. A., Financial constraints on corporate goodness (No. w18476), National Bureau of Economic Research, 2012.

Hsieh, H./Shannon, S. E., Three Approaches to Qualitative Content Analysis, in: Qualitative Health Research, Vol. 15, No. 9, 2005, 1277-1288.

Husted, B. W., Governance choices for corporate social responsibility: to contribute, collaborate or internalize?, in: Long range planning, Vol. 36, No. 5, 2003, 481-498.

ICCR (Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility), Guidelines for investing right, 2013, available at: https://www.iccr.org/investing-rights-way-guide-investors-business-and- human-rights

Ireland, P., Company law and the myth of shareholder ownership, in: The Modern Law Review, Vol. 62, No. 1, 1999, 32-57.

Ireland, P., Limited liability, shareholder rights and the problem of corporate irresponsibility, in: Cambridge Journal of Economics, Vol. 34, No. 5, 2010, 837-856.

Ireland, P./Pillay, R. G., (2010). Corporate social responsibility in a neoliberal age, in: Corporate social responsibility and regulatory governance, 2010, 77-104.

Investors Responsibility Research Center/Shareholder Action Network of Social Investment Forum Foundation, Toward a Shared Agenda: Emerging corporate and social trends from the 2002 proxy season and 2001 Issues review, 2002.

Jenkins, H./Hines, F., Shouldering the burden of corporate social responsibility: what makes business get committed?, Centre for Business Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society, 2003.

Jenkins, H./Obara, L., Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in the mining industry–the risk of community dependency, Belfast, 2006.

Jensen, M. C., Value maximization, stakeholder theory, and the corporate objective function, in: Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, Vol. 22, No. 1, 2010, 32-42.

Kakabadse, A./Morsing, M. (Eds.), Corporate Social Responsibility: reconciling aspiration with application, New York, 2006.

Kaptein, M./Wempe, J. F. D. B., The Balanced Company: A Theory of Corporate Integrity, Oxford University Press, USA, 2000.

Kinder P./Lydenberg S. D./Domini A. L., Investing for good, Making Money While Being Socially Responsible, New York, 1994.

Klenke, K., Qualitative research in the study of leadership, West Yorkshire, 2016.

La Porta, R./Lopez-de-Silanes, F./Shleifer, A./Vishny, R. W., Legal determinants of external finance, in: Journal of finance, 1997, 1131-1150. 88

Lacy, P./Cooper, T./Hayward, R./Neuberger, L., A new era of sustainability: UN Global Compact-Accenture CEO Study, Geneva, 2010.

Laudal, T., Drivers and barriers of CSR and the size and internationalization of firms, in: Social Responsibility Journal, Vol. 7, No. 2, 2011, 234-256.

Leech, B. L., Asking questions: Techniques for semistructured interviews, in: PS: Political Science & Politics, Vol. 35, No. 4, 2002, 665-668.

Lepoutre, J./Heene, A., Investigating the impact of firm size on small business social responsibility: A critical review, in: Journal of business ethics, Vol. 67, No. 3, 2006, 257-273.

Lesser, K./Rößle, F./Walkshäusl, C., Socially responsible, green, and faith-based investment strategies: Screening activity matters!, in: Finance Research Letters, Vol. 16, 2016, 171-178.

Lewis, A., A focus group study of the motivation to invest: ‘ethical/green’and ‘ordinary’ investors compared, in: The Journal of Socio-Economics, Vol. 30, No. 4, 2001, 331- 341.

Logsdon, J. M./Rehbein, K./Van Buren III, H. J., Seeking Social Change Through Shareholder Activism: When Do Corporations Respond Positively to Shareholder Resolutions?, in: Academy of Management Proceedings, Vol. 2007, No. 1, 2007, 1-6.

Logsdon, J. M./Van Buren III, H. J., Justice and large corporations: What do activist shareholders want?, in: Business & Society, Vol. 47, No. 4, 2008, 523-548.

Marens, R., Inventing corporate governance: The mid-century emergence of shareholder activism, in: Journal of Business and Management, Vol. 8, No. 4, 2002, 365-389.

Mallin, C./Michelon, G./Raggi, D., Monitoring intensity and stakeholders’ orientation: how does governance affect social and environmental disclosure?, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 114, No. 1, 2013, 29-43.

Maloni, M. J./Brown, M. E., Corporate social responsibility in the supply chain: an application in the food industry, in: Journal of business ethics, Vol. 68, No. 1, 2006, 35-52.

Mayring, P., Qualitative content analysis: theoretical foundation, basic procedures and software solution, Klagenfurt, 2014, available at: http://nbn- resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-395173.

Mill, G. A., The financial performance of a socially responsible investment over time and a possible link with corporate social responsibility, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 63, No. 2, 2006, 131.

Monks, R./Minow, N., Corporate Governance, Cambridge,1995.

Mostovicz, I./Kakabadse, N./Kakabadse, A., CSR: the role of leadership in driving ethical outcomes, in: Corporate Governance: The international journal of business in society, Vol. 9, No. 4, 2009, 448-460.

Navarro, P., Why do corporations give to charity?, in: Journal of business, 1988, 65-93.

Newell, P./Frynas, J. G., Beyond CSR? Business, poverty and social justice: an introduction, in: Third world quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 4, 2007, 669-681.

Norman, W./MacDonald, C., Getting to the bottom of “triple bottom line”, in: Business Ethics Quarterly, Vol. 14, No. 2, 2004, 243-262.

Nwoke, U., Corporations and development – The barriers to effective corporate social responsibility (CSR) in a neoliberal age, in: International Journal of Law and Management, Vol. 59, No. 1, 2017, 122-146.

Oh, C. H./Park, J. H./Ghauri, P. N., Doing right, investing right: Socially responsible investing and shareholder activism in the financial sector, in: Business Horizons, Vol. 56 , No. 6, 2013, 703-714.

O'Rourke, A., A new politics of engagement: shareholder activism for corporate social responsibility, in: Bus. Strat. Env., Vol. 12, 2003, 227–239.

Porter, M. E., America's green strategy, in: Scientific American, 1991, 96.

Porter, M. E./Van der Linde, C., Toward a new conception of the environment- competitiveness relationship, in: Journal of economic perspectives, Vol. 9, No. 4, 1995, 97-118.

Porter, M. E./Hills, G./Pfitzer, M./Patscheke, S./Hawkins, E., Measuring shared value: How to unlock value by linking social and business results, 2011, 1-24, available at: https://www.hbs.edu

Proffitt, W. T. Jr./Spicer, A., Shaping the shareholder activism agenda: institutional investors and global social issues, in: Strategic Organization, Vol. 4, No. 2, 2006, 165-190.

Przychodzen, J./Przychodzen, W., Corporate Sustainability and Shareholder Wealth, in: Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Vol. 56, No. 4, 2013, 474-493.

Rehbein, K./Waddock, S./Graves, S. B., Understanding Shareholder Activism: Which Corporations Are Targeted?, in: Business & Society, Vol. 43, No. 3, 2004, 239-267.

Renneboog, L./Ter Horst, J./Zhang, C., Socially responsible investments: Institutional aspects, performance, and investor behavior, in: Journal of Banking & Finance, Vol. 32, No. 9, 2008, 1723-1742.

Repetto, R./Austin, D., Coming Clean: Corporate Disclosure of Financially Significant Environmental Risks, World Resources Institute, Washington DC, 2000.

Roberts, J./Sanderson, P./Barker, R./Hendry, J., In the mirror of the market: The disciplinary effects of company/fund manager meetings, in: Accounting, Organizations and Society, Vol. 31, No. 3, 2006, 277-294.

Rondinelli, D. A./London, T., How corporations and environmental groups cooperate: Assessing cross-sector alliances and collaborations, in: The Academy of Management Executive, Vol. 17, No. 1, 2003, 61-76.

Rowley, T. I./Moldoveanu, M., When will stakeholder groups act? An interest-and identity- based model of stakeholder group mobilization, in: Academy of management review, Vol. 28, No. 2, 2003, 204-219.

Schreier, M., Qualitative Content Analysis, in Flick, U. (Ed.), The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Analysis, 170-183, London, 2014.

Scholtens, B., Finance as a driver of corporate social responsibility, in: Journal of business ethics, Vol. 68, No. 1, 2006, 19-33.

Scholtens, B., Indicators of responsible investing, in: Ecological Indicators, Vol. 36, 2014, 382-385.

Schwartz, M. S./Saiia, D., Should Firms Go ‘Beyond Profits’? Milton Friedman Versus Broad CSR, in: Proceedings of the International Association for Business and Society, Vol. 22, 2011, 327-338.

SEC (US Securities and Exchange Commission), 2011 Performance and Accountability Report, 2011, available at: https://www.sec.gov/reportspubs/annual- reports/aboutsecpar2011shtml.html

Sen, S./Bhattacharya, C. B., Does doing good always lead to doing better? Consumer reactions to corporate social responsibility, in: Journal of marketing Research, Vol. 38, No. 2, 2001, 225-243.

Shleifer, A./Vishny, R. W., A survey of corporate governance, in: The journal of finance, Vol. 52, No. 2, 1997, 737-783.

Social Investment Forum, Report on Socially Responsible Investing Trends in the United States, 2003, available at:

SIF (Social Investment Forum), Report on Socially Responsible Investing Trends in the US, 2003, available at: http://www.ussif.org/trends.

Sjöstrom, E., Shareholder Activism for Corporate Social Responsibility: What Do We Know?, in: Sustainable Development, Vol. 16, 2008, 142-154.

Song, W./Szewczyk, S., Does Coordinated Institutional Investor Activism Reverse the Fortunes of Underperforming Firms?, in: The Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Vol. 38, No. 2, 2003, 317-336.

Sparkes, R./Cowton, C. J., The maturing of socially responsible investment: A review of the developing link with corporate social responsibility, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 52, No. 1, 2004, 45-57.

Spence, L. J., CSR and small business in a European policy context: the five “C” s of CSR and small business research agenda 2007, in: Business and society review, Vol. 112, No. 4, 2007 533-552.

Statman, M., Socially responsible indexes: Composition and performance, 2005, 1-38, available at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Data_Integrity_Notice.cfm?abid=705344.

Studer, S./Welford, R./Hills, P., Engaging Hong Kong businesses in environmental change: drivers and barriers, in: Business Strategy and the Environment, Vol. 15, No. 6, 2006, 416-431.

Tkac, P., One proxy at a time: Pursuing social change through shareholder proposals, in: Economic Review-Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, Vol. 91, No. 3, 2006, 1.

Thompson, T. A./Davis, G. F., The politics of corporate control and the future of shareholder activism in the United States, in: Corporate Governance: an international review, Vol. 5, No. 3, 1997, 152-159.

Secretariat of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Trade and Development Report, New York and Geneva, 1999.

Useem, M., Investor capitalism, Hoboken, 1996.

Utting, P., Business responsibility for sustainable development (No. 2), Geneva, 2000.

Uysal, N./Tsetsura, K., Corporate governance on stakeholder issues: shareholder activism as a guiding force, in: Journal of Public Affairs, Vol. 15, No. 2, 2015, 210-219.

Vandekerckhove, W./Leys, J./Van Braeckel, D., That's not what happened and it's not my fault anyway! An exploration of management attitudes towards SRI‐shareholder engagement, in: Business Ethics: A European Review, Vol. 16, No. 4, 2007, 403-418.

Vogel, D., Lobbying the corporation: Citizen challenges to business authority, New York, 1978.

Vogel, D., Trends in shareholder activism: 1970–1982, in: California Management Review, Vol. 25, No. 3, 1983, 68-87.

Votaw, D., Genius becomes rare: A comment on the doctrine of social responsibility Pt. I, in: California management review, Vol. 15, No. 2, 1972, 25-31

Wagner, E., Corporate Social Responsibility und finanzielle Performance – Internationale Evidenz, Linz, 2016

Weber, M., The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: A Company-Level Measurement Apporach for CSR, in: European Management Journal, Vol. 26, 2008, 247-261.

Westphal, J. D./Bednar, M. K. The pacification of institutional investors, in: Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 1, 2008, 29-72.

Wheeler, D./Sillanpää, M., The Stakeholder Corporation: The Bodyshop: Blueprint for Maximizingstakeholder Value, London, 1997.

Williamson, D./Lynch-Wood, G./Ramsay, J., Drivers of environmental behaviour in manufacturing SMEs and the implications for CSR, in: Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 67, No. 3, 2006, 317-330.

Wisker, G., The undergraduate research handbook, Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

V. APPENDIX

Appendix I - Interview Guidelines

Interview Outline - Business Side

General questions to the participant Name Position Company Years active in company Introductory questions

General experience with CSR efforts and activities: Could you tell me a little about your personal experience with CSR so far? In which fields of CSR is your company active? What were the main achievements of your company in CSR thus far?

What are current CSR activities of your company?

Questions for the main part

First direction: Shareholder’s influence on a firm’s CSR

Why is your firm active in CSR? What were the main motivators for being active in CSR?

Who are the main influencers on CSR efforts in your company? Have these influencers changed in recent years and how?

What were the reactions of your shareholders when you started CSR activities? Did they show interest, when and how?

Which of the current CSR activities did shareholders incentivize? Are any more activities planned for the near future, which were started by shareholders?

When shareholders influence your CSR efforts, how is the interaction handled? Which methods do shareholders use?

How would you describe the extent of power your shareholders have, when it comes to CSR? Do your shareholders build groups to have more influence?

How is the communication between shareholders and firm handled once the project/activity starts? Are shareholders checking up on progresses?

Second direction: Influence of CSR on Shareholder structure

Did you notice an increase in shareholder interest for CSR efforts in the last years? What is in your opinion the reason for that?

Since you started CSR efforts are changes in your shareholder structure noticeable and why do you think these changes in structure occurred?

Who are these new shareholders?

Which methods do the new shareholders use to communicate with the board of directors?

Concluding question

How do you think the future of CSR will look like? Would you predict a de- or increase in importance? Which role will shareholders play in this future?

Interview Outline - ethical/social fund manager

Name Position

Company Years active in company

Could you tell me a little bit about yourself, about your professional career so far and what your personal interest and experience in ethical funds management is?

Could you sum up your companies main fields of action?

There are many reasons for investing ethically, what would you say are the most important or prevalent reasons for your customers?

What would you say are the main advantages of ethical investments? What are disadvantages of investing ethically (also compared to conventional investments)?

For ethical funds screening for the right investment is an important part of the process: which screening methods do you use to select companies to invest in and why do you use these methods?

Would you say your screening methods are encompassing all parts of production?

Some critics see a problem in SRI as there is little communication and negotiation between the investor and the firm. Therefore they say that SRI’s entry or exit strategy according to a firm’s ethical or unethical behavior is rather inefficient when it comes to influencing said behavior; what is your opinion on that?

How would you predict the development of SRI compared to conventional investments in the future?

Is there anything else of importance in your opinion you would like to add?

Appendix II - Category Systems

Category system - Business side

Category Sub-Code Definition Anchor sample Coding Rule

1 Motivators Description of the Wether you call it sustainability or CSR, that is an academical question. For This category includes only for CSR motivating factors and both we have internal as well as external reasons. (I2, L22-24) motivating factors for people for implementing CSR strategies Es ist ein wichtiges Thema, Resourcen sind ein wichtiges Thema, die wir corporations to in the firm. verbrauche, auch die gesetzlichen Anforderungen, die es jetzt gibt, implement a CSR verglichen mit denen vor 10 Jahren, die sind ganz anders. Österreichische strategy. Unternehmen werden dazu gezwungen so einen Bericht zu machen. Das Thema wird allein schon vom gesetzlichen Rahmen vorgeschrieben, das kann man auch nicht mehr wegdiskutieren und ich glaube auch, dass es ein Thema ist, dass stärker und stärker wird. (I3, L199-204)

Starting from 2017 the value of the non-financial information is equal to the financial information (I7, L104.105)

1.1 Internal This includes only So it is a big, I would say, a very very big topic for us internally, strategically internal motivators, (I1, L63-64, P2) may they be people for employees of course it is a big issue of course and how the company is or other factors. treating its employees of course (I1, L73-74, P2)

particular when you are a technical company like we are and we sort of need

engineers all the time and it is of interest to us to have a good culture in treating our employees and it is publicly known, so we get the people we need. I think this is also why we are strategically invested in CSR (I1, L80-83, P2)

And also like you know how are you engaged with society and how do you tackle problems that result from your business and that obviously brings us to CSR and how we deal with these issues (I2, L33-35)

Wir versuchen ein Arbeitgeber zu sein, der auf seine Mitarbeiter schaut, der auf die Umwelt schaut, es gibt wirklich viele Initiativen im Haus für verschiedenste Stakeholder, natürlich auch für die Mitarbeiter aber auch für andere Stakeholder wo wir versuchen einfach ein verantwortungsbewusster Arbeitgeber zu sein (I3, L21-25)

Wir haben uns mehrere Bereiche ausgedacht, wo wir uns fokussieren wollen und eines davon ist ein ökoeffiziente Produktion, wir sind ja ein Unternehmen – damit wir uns verstehen – das eine sehr hohe Wertschöpfungstiefe hat, das heißt, dass 75-80% von allen Teilen, die wir für unsere Produkte brauchen wenn wir sie bauen, warden in-house gefertigt und nur ungefähr 20% ist outgesourced, kaufen wir zu, das heißt wir haben einen sher großen Anteil am Produkt und wir versuchen natürlich unsere Produktionen ökoeffizient zu gestalten (I3, L26-32) wir sind kein Riesenunternehmen, aber wir sind ein mittelgroßes Unternehmen und wir wollen verantwortungsvoll mit unseren Mitarbeitern, aber auch mit der Umwelt, unseren Kunden umgehen (I3, L45-47)

Der Treiber war immer meine Abteilung von Anfang an aber wir haben auch, und das ist einer der Vorteile (I3, L53-54)

Aber getrieben haben wir es selbst, die Abteilung, und haben, das ist auch wieder ein Vorteil, ich in meiner Person reporte direkt dem Vorstandsvorsitzenden und den konnte ich auch dafür gewinnen. Ich kenne auch viele Kollegen in anderen Unternehmen, wenn das nicht wirklich ganz oben angesiedelt ist, beim Vorstand und idealerweise beim Vorstandsvorsitzenden dann wird man das auch nicht wirklich durchsetzen können (I3, L58-62)

Intern beschäftigen wir uns natürlich mit welcher dieser SDG’s wollen wir, können wir umsetzen, aber die haben auch sozusagen abgefragt, manche kommen ja gar nicht in Frage für unser Unternehmen, aber es war beidseitig. Interne Beschäftigung damit und wiederum ganz oben, also auch mit dem Vorstand, was können wir, was kommt für uns in Frage, und auch extern abgefragt (I3, L162-166)

Da wir ja Holz aus nachhaltigen Quellen verwenden, ist für uns Nachhaltigkeit sehr sehr wichtig. Wir haben auch gerade wieder einen neuen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht, wo wir alle Aspekte, oder versuchen alle Aspekte abzudecken, deswegen hat das einen sehr hohen Stellenwert für uns (I4, L8- 11) wir nicht nur auf unsere eigene Produktion sondern auf die gesamte Wertschöpfungskette schauen und deswegen haben wir schon relativ frühzeitig die gesamte Branche im Blick gehabt und für uns ist es nicht nur wichtig mit unseren eigentlichen Kunden, das sind die Spinnereien

100

zusammenzuarbeiten, sondern auch zu schauen, wo können wir in der weiteren, insbesondere Textilwertschöpfungskette einen Beitrag leisten, um diese gesamte Textilindustrie auch nachhaltiger zu gestalten (I4, L23-28)

So what the company has is the governance about it, that they really, the whole management, really tries to live it this way of working in our everyday experience. Every new governance you make, every company decision it always has to be based on this general sense of responsibility towards the company in an economical sense, but also a very strong social sense and from an ecological point of view (I6, L15-20) very unique culture of the board is very familiar even if other members do not belong to the family but they are in the company for so long, so they feel about the same way. They have different opinions on everything, that is true, but their position towards society and towards ecology is very similar (I6, L74-77) going to have an increase in importance. Not only from a marketing point of view, its not a service but it’s really something you have to do. Because we have to honest, the children of the children of tomorrow are our future consumers so we have to promise them something too, not just the customers from today to look at. It’s a long-term promise, which is going to have an increase in importance (I6, L128-132) we as an employer are taking the responsibility very serious and are continuing to work hard on the way we behave among each other, the way of communication, we want to treat everyone equally, regardless of their gender, their background or religion and this is something we really, really

101

want to do and we are doing it already but it is having an increase in importance obviously because of the immigrant situation in the working markets and we are really keeping up the thought that you have to work with the resources responsibly, to use as little as you can and if you have any discard products to use them somehow (I6, L133-139)

The main motivator is, generally speaking the ethics of the company, and then also I want to tell you that our industry, is not a short period activity, a cement plant normally stays in an area for 50, 60, 70 years. So we want to stay here for a long, long, long time, in a certain area, we want to have a good relationship, with the environment, with the people, with the local people, with the community, so this is the main reason (I7, L46-50)

We want to have the best relation we could have with the people and the environment in an area (I7, L64-65)

1.2 External This includes external We are dealing very much with the topic at the moment, mainly from the motivators. May they automotive industries at the moment, and therefore we try to, maybe yes, be persons or other enrich the project a little bit and go through the supply chain down to the factors. Shareholders mines and setting up, there is lets say project, its called responsible steel and are regarded as its in the beginning now we try to work with this.(I1, L29-33, P1) external motivators. responsible steel should be a platform not a consisting of the industries, you could say of the steel industry and its suppliers and its costumers. So you could say an industry wide project. (I1, L34-36, P2)

very general interest I would say because everything which is touched in this topic, CSR, is more or less of strategic interest, you can say, I mean there is, there are various areas that are closely linked and others where the links are

102

a bit more softer, but finally you can say there are certain imprints on the business from CR topics if we just think about emission creating system, emission creating system in Europe. (I1, L53-58, P2)

For the banks, I think its hard for us to speak for the banks. I think you would really need to speak to them, it is really hard for us to speak about our co- investors to be fair. But I think, when you look at their history of their holding, it seems as if they see their holding as a sort of strategic holding, strategic shareholding. So I think they are strategic investors who are long term interested and they focus on CSR topics somewhere, its ecological or the environmental issues, whether its issues on the human rights issues or how you treat your employees (I1, L74-80, P2) and our customers do not force us to be responsible, they ask us how responsible are you? (I1, L95-96, P1) with the ETS system the CSR topics are becoming part of your financial success, and I think the more important it gets in your daily business the more important for the conventional shareholders.(I1, L203-205, P2)

I believe that there is obviously one huge issue, plastic has a pretty bad reputation (I2, L72)

Wir haben gestartet Anfang 2000, konkret 2003, zum ersten mal überlegt, es

103

war die Zeit wo die ersten Öko Fonds, Umweltfonds groß geworden sind; Palfinger ist ja eine börsennotierte Gesellschaft und wir haben uns dann überlegt, wie könnten wir, oder konkret ich selbst, es war sozusagen mein Projekt auch, ich war damals für Investor Relations zuständig, also für die Aktie, für Corporate Communications, die interne Kommunikation, wie könnten wir diese neuen Fonds für uns gewinnen, wie könnten wir interessant für sie sein, damit sie bei uns einsteigen? Und haben dann auch 2003/2004 den ersten Nachhaltigkeitsbereicht gemacht, allerdings nicht vergleichbar mit den integrierten Berichte wie wir sie heute machen oder auch den Nachhaltigkeitsbereichten danach 2005, 2006, 2007 usw. Es war eigentlich nur der Versuch interessant zu sein es war auch nur auf Österreich beschränkt und wenn ich ganz ehrlich bin, es waren eigentlich nur, ja, schöne Phrasen, die wir damals aber nicht gelebt haben. (I3, L8-19) hier am Attersee sind und wenn man da nicht in den Umweltschutz investiert hätte oder nicht so eine Produktion hätte wie wir sie heute haben, dürfte man da gar nicht mehr produzieren, davon bin ich überzeugt. Deshalb war es wichtig, dass wir überall geschaut haben, dass wir nachhaltige Prozesse aufsetzen (I4, L31-34) the shareholders are the family members and the issue of social responsibility is deep in their own believes. They have always chosen the business ways, which are aligned to their ethical believes (I6, L44-46) also a marketing issue: we say that we are a quality food from the alps and that is something that works, we can guarantee a high quality that based on the higher price – the segment is a bit higher, but it’s high quality food – so behaving like this and guaranteeing this quality has shown us that we enter

104

markets very well, so this is our selling proposition (I6, L59-63)

the main shareholder is the family. You know that the Buzzi family owns 58% of the company (I7, L57-58)

the family decided they want to stay in business for a long time and so even in the beginning. Between the managers and the family there is a common interest, that we, the company stays in business for a long time, and we think that sustainability and CSR is the way to achieve that (I7, 61-64)

1.3 Drivers /Barriers Which of the Aber getrieben haben wir es selbst, die Abteilung, und haben, das ist auch motivators can be wieder ein Vorteil, ich in meiner Person reporte direkt dem categorized as drivers Vorstandsvorsitzenden und den konnte ich auch dafür gewinnen. Ich kenne and which factors or auch viele Kollegen in anderen Unternehmen, wenn das nicht wirklich ganz people are to be oben angesiedelt ist, beim Vorstand und idealerweise beim named barriers for Vorstandsvorsitzenden dann wird man das auch nicht wirklich durchsetzen the single firms. können (I3, L58-62)

Richtig. Man braucht ja irgendwo einen Rückhalt und wenn der Rückhalt vom Vorstand da ist, dann kann man auch Dinge umsetzen (I3, L66-67)

2. Shareholders Actually I think that they usually don’t actively, they don’t incentivize, I would All aspects relating to the influencing rather say they think rather to invest or not (I1, L91-92, P2) interaction and influence of CSR shareholders on a firm in regard to CSR strategies and they are quite passive, I mean we (the management) choose the partners we efforts. work with. I mean we inform them on what we do, but it is not that they suggest us something and have a stake in the discussions with the partners on where we engage and with whom, the partners we work with. That is not

105

something we discuss with them (I2, L56-59)

wir haben ein Unternehmen das von einer Familie sozusagen mehrheitlich im Besitz ist, der Familie Palfinger, und das hat große Vorteile, da bei den Aktionären nicht unzählige Fonds sind und Hedgefonds Manager sondern wirklich eine Familie dahintersteht, weil die natürlich auch sehr langfristig denkt und wir haben immer Unterstützung in der Familie Palfinger gefunden.(I3, L54-58)

2.1 Topics of This category refers So it is a big, I would say, a very very big topic for us internally, strategically Interest to all kind of topics of and of course it is the same for investors. (I1, L63-64, P2) CSR which are of Not the retail investors, but also from the retail side there is a big awareness interest to the on energy consumption, in every GSM we get the same question about shareholders. energy consumption, what we do to reduce energy consumption and to become more efficient, which is of course an everyday topic anyway because energy is money. It is a CSR topic but it is not driven by CSR efforts but rather by cost efficiency efforts (I1, L107-111, P2).

environment topics, ecological topics, emissions, water, water treatment systems, energy consumption (I1, L116-117, P2)

In our particular case it is more ecological and environmental issues. Nevertheless of course we have a code of conduct about human rights treatment and so on and so on. (I1, L121-123, P2)

The fact that the company is acting in the best way with the environment with the population, this is a plus, absolutely a plus. And also the investors and shareholders will be more interested in non-financial information (I7, L107-

106

109)

2.2 Reasons for This category refers with the ETS system the CSR topics are becoming part of your financial Influencing to reasons for success, and I think the more important it gets in your daily business the shareholders to more important for the conventional shareholders.(I1, L203-205, P2) influence a firms 2.3 Interaction and questionnaires and inquiries for and from our customers, from our main behavior. Communication customers (I1, L28-29, P1) This category includes all types of , if GRI changes than you see that the inquiries change. So, I think that the interaction and communication change in human rights changed the inquiries on the platforms as well, and between the our customers do not force us to be responsible, they ask us how responsible shareholders and the firms. are you? And we are a responsible company of course, but then we have to take a look on reporting those topics a little bit more than in the past. (I1, L94- 98, P1)

, now we released it that we are against human trafficking. This is because our customers ask us, this is because of the UK modern slavery act and keeping the supply chain clean. (I1, L127-129, P1)

in general we use the GRI, which are the Global Reporting Initiative Standards, which is a thing like, the most important, the most dominant standards. (I2, L132-134)

When it comes to supply chain, we just developed the code of conduct for Greiner suppliers, that is basically a longer document outlining on what we demand when it comes to supplies. That is what we do right now in supply chain and of course we discuss whether we specially monitor, our supply chain in RISC countries (I2, L134-138)

107

Und haben dann auch 2003/2004 den ersten Nachhaltigkeitsbereicht gemacht, allerdings nicht vergleichbar mit den integrierten Berichte wie wir sie heute machen oder auch den Nachhaltigkeitsbereichten danach 2005, 2006, 2007 usw. Es war eigentlich nur der Versuch interessant zu sein es war auch nur auf Österreich beschränkt und wenn ich ganz ehrlich bin, es waren eigentlich nur, ja, schöne Phrasen, die wir damals aber nicht gelebt haben.(I3, L14-19) wir machen alle zwei Jahre eine Stakeholderbefragung, die letzte jetzt im Jahr 2017, wo die Rücklaufquote bei 33% lag, wir haben 600 Stakeholder befragt und haben Antworten von 200 bekommen, da waren Analysten dabei, da waren Investoren dabei, Lieferanten, Mitarbeiter, von der Familie, vom Aufsichtsrat, vom Top Management wo wir eben abgefragt haben, was sind denn die Themen für die nächsten Jahre, was sollte Palfinger wichtig sein, was ist den Stakeholdern wichtig zum umsetzen. Aus dieser Umfrage, die sehr umfangreich ist, die wir alle zwei Jahre durchführen, kristallisieren sich einfach die Themen für die nächsten Jahre heraus: was wollen die Stakeholder, in welche Richtung sollen wir gehen? Das ist ein sehr hilfreiches Instrument sozusagen, um was auf Schiene zu bringen.(I3, L69- 77)

Wir machen ja viele Investoren Meetings in Europa in Nordamerika, nach wie vor wird sehr selten über CSR Aspekte gesprochen. Wenn dann sind das richtige Nachhaltigkeitskonferenzen, da wo auch speziell Fondmanager aus Umweltfonds, Nachhaltigkeitsfonds dort sind, aber wirklich von 10 Meetings, die ich in London habe, ist ein Meeting dabei, der tendenziell diese Thematik abfragt. Aber auch nicht so tief rein, sondern nur wie wir das sehen, ob es

108

hier Aktivitäten gibt. (I3, L80-84)

Es wird sich vielleicht auch ändern, es gibt ja viele Dinge, die Unternehmen werden ja auch in diese Richtung gedrängt. Ich nehme an, dass vielleicht zukünftig es da mehr Fragen daraus gibt. Aber bis dato, und ich mache den Job jetzt doch bereits seit fast 20 Jahren, ist es nie ein großes Thema gewesen, außer man ist wirklich auf bestimmten Konferenzen (I3, L87-90)

da kommen schon Schwerpunkte, die sich die Investoren und die Analysten wünschen, dass wir sie umsetzen, immer wieder (I3, L137-139) in regard to stakeholder questionnaire

Personally I have to say, that my relationship with investors, that during the communication with investors I mainly focus on the financial information. That is 95%, but you know I have seen that for investors and shareholders, the fact that we are a sustainable company is considered a plus. So they already know that we are sustainable and do good for the environment and the people, so they don’t have to worry about that. They are probably not asking so much information on non-financial indicators, but they feel fine investing with us, because we also communicate our sustainability (I7, L73-79)

80-90% of the information they want to know are financial information. But, sometimes they are asking information about corporate responsibility and sustainability information. (I7, L90-92)

2.4 Reactions to Perceived reactions In genereal they of course welcomed the initiative to be more active in the CSR of shareholders to the area of sustainability and be more active in CSR activities. (I2, L52.53) implementatioin of Nein, am Anfang überhaupt nicht. Ich muss auch sagen, heute noch. Wir CSR efforts are

109

summarized with this machen ja viele Investoren Meetings in Europa in Nordamerika, nach wie vor category. wird sehr selten über CSR Aspekte gesprochen.(I3, 80-82)

Es wird eigentlich immer noch nach wie vor von konventionellen Investoren eher ignoriert das Thema. (I3, L85-86)

3. Shareholder All aspects regarding the Structure shareholder structure of a corporation are summarized 3.1 Change in Includes all NORGES, which is one of the biggest investors in the world, which has in this category. Shareholder mentioning of a completely withdrawn form certain activities, completely withdrawn from coal Structure change in activities whether it be coal mines or power plants or power suppliers being shareholder structure generated from coal, they completely stepped out of it. So there are various of the firm. trends I would say, directly affecting us (I1, L66-69, P2)

I: So you say the active communication towards your shareholders is helping in getting new shareholders?

PF: Yes, I would say so. (I1, L157-159, P2)

I would say we meet more and more responsible funds, sustainable investment funds (I1, L148-149, P2)

Und für die Investoren: in den letzten Jahren sind speziell diese Nachhaltigkeitsfonds, oder das Geld das in diese Fonds geflossen ist von den Kunden, diese Fonds sind wesentlich stärker gestiegen in den letzten Jahren vom Volumen her, als traditionelle Fonds, also glaube ich auch, dass die Wichtigkeit von CSR auch hier abgebildet wird (I3, L211-214)

Gefühlsmäßig ist es nicht so, dass ich das Gefühl habe, dass viele

110

Umweltfonds Palfinger in den Fonds drin hat, ich lese aber immer von externen Umfragen und Untersuchungen, dass wir eigentlich immer überrepräsentiert sind in diesen Fonds, also stärker drin gewichtet sind als es unsere Unternehmensgröße eigentlich zulassen würde. Gefühlsmäßig aber auch, weil ich viel weniger Meetings habe in diesem Bereich, würde ich eher sagen umgekehrt, aber von externer Seite hören wir eigentlich immer dass wir sehr stark vertreten sind in diesen Fonds. (I3, L170-175)

überall gibt es mehr nachhaltige Anlagen und Fonds, was wir sehen ist, dass es zum Einen noch immer den klassischen Investor gibt, der vor allem auf die Zahlen guckt, das tun auch die nachhaltigen Investoren, aber dieses Nachhaltigkeitskonzept, das wir haben bzw. dass wir ein nachhaltig arbeitendes Unternehmen sind, hat uns auch viele Türen geöffnet für neue Zielgruppen und wir stehen auch viel in Kontakt mit Investoren, die auch Nachhaltigkeitskriterien haben (I4, L42-47)

Nein, in den letzten zwei, drei Jahren sind wesentlich mehr nachhaltig orientierte Fonds dazugekommen und die haben, wir haben auch gerade bei den grösten Investoren gibt es da auch welche, die darauf Wert legen (I4, L68-70)

There are not many but I remember some particularly from Finnland, they do not only ask about financial information but mostly are asking for sustainable indicators. They are very much interested in our sustainability indicators. (I7, L81-84)

3.2 Background of Perceived goals and The one is really when you have sort of sustainabiltiy funds or responsibility New judgements of new funds, investors dedicated to investing in companies who fulfill certain

111

Shareholders shareholders. requirements from a certain responsibilities so to speak, that originally started with funds being managed by, like churches for instance, where from the very beginning you get some requirements, where you are not aloud to invest in the weapon industry, the defense industry, stuff like that, but it is a growing industry in the funds universe I would say. (I1, L47-52, P2)

I would say they have a different approach, whereas conventional investors are very much focused on figures. With sustainability funds you have a much broader area of discussion. (I1, L163-165, P2)

3.3 Interests of New Perceived interests of NORGES, which is one of the biggest investors in the world, which has Shareholders the new shareholders completely withdrawn form certain activities, completely withdrawn from coal and how they might activities whether it be coal mines or power plants or power suppliers being differ from generated from coal, they completely stepped out of it. So there are various conventional trends I would say, directly affecting us (I1, L66-69, P2) shareholders. And then we have these particular funds where they ask particular questions about our behavior (I1, L135-136, P2)

they have a sort of system, sort of requirement catalogue so to speak on how they rank companies, on whether they are investable for them or not, this is a very broad discussion I would say. Really covering basic, all CSR topics, its GRI the generally accepted guideline and you get the impression that most investors, most CSR funds are sort of aligning with GRI principles. (I1, L141-

112

145, P2)

I get the impressions that we sort of get a score and then depending on how good or bad we are, maybe we have to cross a certain limit to be investible, for it to be safe for them, this is the main question. And then we have from time to time, we have really funds who are quite deep in details with certain topics and then we also are using in this discussions the head of the environmental system, of the environmental function of voestalpine in this case. What we can see quite clearly is that our approach, or lets say our experts here are technician and they have a very technical approach whereas the investors are financial guys and at a certain point the discussion is getting quite difficult. Also Miss Korntners work is a sort of translating.(I1, L167-175, P2)

Klar hat jeder Investor verschiedene Interessen und auch Schwerpunkte, der eine fragt das nach, der andere das, aber ein Großteil erschlagen wir mit diesem Bericht. (I3, L127-129) natürlich gibt es Investoren, die ihre eigenen Kriterien haben und da geht es natürlich auch im direkten Gespräch mit diesen Investoren darum ‚haben wir alles erfüllt?’ dann gibt es auch vielleicht den Hinweis, was man sich noch mehr wünscht, da geht es nicht nur um Umweltschutz, da geht es auch um soziale Kriterien, wie Sie sich vorstellen können, die Frauenquote usw. Das geht auch teilweise in die Gespräche mit rein, aber wie gesagt der überwiegende Teil der Investoren pocht schon noch darauf, dass beides zusammenpasst, dass die Zahlen stimmen und wenn es dann noch nachhaltig ist, ist es gut (I4, L51-57)

113

there are some investors that are mainly focused on sustainability. There are not many but I remember some particularly from Finnland, they do not only ask about financial information but mostly are asking for sustainable indicators. They are very much interested in our sustainability indicators (I7, L81-84)

Starting from 2017 the value of the non-financial information is equal to the financial information. This year we will publish at the same time the financial report and the sustainability report. So non-financial information will start to be more important and this is the way, this is the direction in our opinion. The fact that the company is acting in the best way with the environment with the population, this is a plus, absolutely a plus. And also the investors and shareholders will be more interested in non-financial information. (I7, L104- 109)

3.4 Interaction and Description of how And then we have these particular funds where they ask particular questions Communication the interaction and about our behavior (I1, L135-136, P2) of New communiationc with I: So you say the active communication towards your shareholders is helping Shareholders the new shareholders in getting new shareholders? are handled and if any differences are PF: Yes, I would say so. (I1, L157-159, P2) noticeable. they have a sort of system, sort of requirement catalogue so to speak on how they rank companies, on whether they are investable for them or not, this is a very broad discussion I would say. Really covering basic, all CSR topics, its GRI the generally accepted guideline and you get the impression that most investors, most CSR funds are sort of aligning with GRI principles. (I1, L141-

114

145, P2) außer man ist wirklich auf bestimmten Konferenzen, da wird man da auch als Unternehmen, als nachhaltiges Unternehmen eingeladen, da sind auch spezielle Investoren dort, da gibt es Konferenzen in Frankfurt, es gibt ein paar weiter große, und da wird dann auch nachgefragt, ist vollkommen klar (I3, L90-93)

Wir werden ja auch gerated, wir lassen uns auch raten, es gibt ja verschiedene Rating Agenturen, es gibt in Österreich ja auch einen Nachhaltigkeitsindex, Phönix, seit vielen Jahren, wo wir auch seit Anfang an drinnen waren. Da lauft die Kommunikation schon, wir wollen auch drin sein, wir wollen jedes Jahr bestätigt werden, es zeigt auch, dass die Unternehmen, die in dem Index sind auf alle Fälle Schwerpunkte haben, was Nachhaltigkeit angeht. (I3, L103-107) keinen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht hat, oder wie wir einen integrierten Bericht, da tut man sich schon relativ schwer die ganzen Daten, die abgefragt werden zusammen zu bringen (I3, L110-112)

Das ganze ist jetzt leichter geworden seit es den GRI-Standard gibt und wir reporten ja auch danach, da merkt man schon, wenn man diesen Standard einhält, kommt dann relativ wenig noch von Investoren, was sie zusätzlich wissen möchten. Wer den Bericht gelesen hat, sehr viele Themen werden damit abgedeckt (I3, L119-123) proaktiv unsere Berichte zuschicken und was dann noch fehlt, ist leicht zu beantworten (I3, L126-127)

115

Gefühlsmäßig aber auch, weil ich viel weniger Meetings habe in diesem Bereich, würde ich eher sagen umgekehrt, aber von externer Seite hören wir eigentlich immer dass wir sehr stark vertreten sind in diesen Fonds. (I3, L173-175)

Naja sie haben andere Schwerpunkte und die kommunizieren sie auch uns gegenüber, was sie auch wissen wollen und ansonsten (I3, L179-180) ich mache so ca. 30-40 Roadshow Tage im Jahr, Roadshow Tage nennt man wenn man auf der Straße ist um Investoren zu treffen und hier sind ungefähr 29 konventionelle und 1 Tag CSR. Also hier ist schon mal das Verhältnis wirklich ganz eindeutig zu konventionellen Investoren, ist aber gar nicht so beabsichtigt, sondern die wollen uns stärker sehen, vielleicht ist es auch so, das – wir werden ja jedes Jahr ausgezeichnet für unseren Bericht, ich glaube wir haben jetzt bereits zum 7. Mal in Folge den besten Bericht in Österreich gemacht - vielleicht decken wir ja mit unserer Berichterstattung viele Fragen ab dieser Umweltinvestoren und deswegen sind sie auch weniger präsent um uns zu treffen (I3, L180-188) natürlich gibt es Investoren, die ihre eigenen Kriterien haben und da geht es natürlich auch im direkten Gespräch mit diesen Investoren darum ‚haben wir alles erfüllt?’ dann gibt es auch vielleicht den Hinweis, was man sich noch mehr wünscht, da geht es nicht nur um Umweltschutz, da geht es auch um soziale Kriterien, wie Sie sich vorstellen können, die Frauenquote usw. Das geht auch teilweise in die Gespräche mit rein, aber wie gesagt der überwiegende Teil der Investoren pocht schon noch darauf, dass beides zusammenpasst, dass die Zahlen stimmen und wenn es dann noch

116

nachhaltig ist, ist es gut (I4, L51-57)

Es gibt auch Konferenzen, die auf Nachhaltigkeit ausgerichtet sind, da sprechen wir natürlich auch überwiegend über die Nachhaltigkeit (I4, L75-76)

Und wir haben auch häufig Anfragen zu verschiedenen Themen, die dann auch oft vom Direktor der Nachhaltigkeitsabteilung übernommen werden und das sehen wir schon, dass das sehr, sehr stark zugenommen haben in den letzten zwei drei Jahren, exponentiell, das kann man auf jeden Fall sagen (I4, L78-81)

direkt mit den Investoren sprechen und auch, das ist ganz wichtig, mit den Nicht-Regierungs-Organisationen, die Analysen über die Nachhaltigkeit in unserem Unternehmen machen. Da sind wir auch in engem Kontakt um insgesamt natürlich auch noch Lücken, die sie haben weiter zu schließen, um noch nachhaltiger zu werden (I4, L90-93)

the information they want to know are financial information. But, sometimes they are asking information about corporate responsibility and sustainability information. (I7, L90-92)

3.5 Screening Includes all Da gibt es ja zum einen die externen Organisationen, die Kriterienkataloge Methods mentioning of aufstellen, die Ökom zum Beispiel, da haben wir natürlich auch geschaut, wie screening methods in wir da abschneiden, wo können wir selber etwas verbessern, (I4, L47-50) the data sample.

natürlich gibt es Investoren, die ihre eigenen Kriterien haben und da geht es natürlich auch im direkten Gespräch mit diesen Investoren darum ‚haben wir alles erfüllt?’ dann gibt es auch vielleicht den Hinweis, was man sich noch

117

mehr wünscht, da geht es nicht nur um Umweltschutz, da geht es auch um soziale Kriterien, wie Sie sich vorstellen können, die Frauenquote usw. Das geht auch teilweise in die Gespräche mit rein, aber wie gesagt der überwiegende Teil der Investoren pocht schon noch darauf, dass beides zusammenpasst, dass die Zahlen stimmen und wenn es dann noch nachhaltig ist, ist es gut (I4, L51-57)

Es ist so, dass mir Investoren schon gesagt haben, dass sie nicht in Lenzing Aktien investieren können, weil wir diese externen Nachhaltigkeitskriterien seiner Zeit nicht erfüllt haben.(I4, L84-86)

Also es ist auch ganz wichtig, dass man auch mit diesen Nicht-Regierungs- Organisationen zusammenarbeitet, wie Ökom oder sustainalytics, dass man sich das genau anschaut, welche Kriterien sind da, um sich zu verbessern, denn wenn wir da die Anforderungen nicht erfüllen, gibt es Investoren, die sagen ‚wir können da nicht investieren’ (I4, L86-90) direkt mit den Investoren sprechen und auch, das ist ganz wichtig, mit den Nicht-Regierungs-Organisationen, die Analysen über die Nachhaltigkeit in unserem Unternehmen machen. Da sind wir auch in engem Kontakt um insgesamt natürlich auch noch Lücken, die sie haben weiter zu schließen, um noch nachhaltiger zu werden (I4, L90-93)

118

population, this is a plus, absolutely a plus. And also the investors and shareholders will be more interested in non-financial information. (I7, L104- 109)

119

Category System - SRI

Category Sub-Code Definition Anchor Sample Coding Rule

1. SRI This category includes general statements on SRI. 1.1 Reasons for SRI This category Ja im Wesentlichen gibt es zwei Stoßrichtungen, die eine ist die, dass man includes perceived sagt, man will gewisse Sachen vermeiden, weil man es mit dem eigenen reasons for investors Gewissen, dem eigenen Unternehmen, der eigenen Organisation nicht to contribute money vereinbaren kann. Das ist typischerweise, und hier haben wir einige Anleger to SRI funds. in dem Bereich, die vielleicht aus dem kirchlichen Bereich kommen (I5, L89- 93)

Und wenn es dann um die Veranlagungen der Pensionsgelder der Priester geht, ist genau die Frage, ob man in solchen Veranlagungen Waffen, Atomenergie, oder sonst irgendwas drinnen haben will und das ist für viele eben aus dem Bereich – großer institutioneller Investoren – ein Thema und natürlich für viele Private auch (I5, L94-98)

Der Anleger will ja schlussendlich Firmen haben, wo er sagt, hier kann er gut damit leben, aber er will natürlich auch langfristig einen Ertrag haben für seine Pensionsversicherung (I5, L204-206)

Von den Investoren selber kann man schon sagen, wir sehen vor allem in Oberösterreich reges Interesse von der privaten Seite, hier geht es aber um kleinere Volumina, das richtig große Volumen kommt von den großen institutionellen Investoren, die sind teilweise auch durch regulatorischen Druck gezwungen mehr und mehr in diesem Bereich zu investieren, da gibt

120

es auch verschiedenste Initiativen die laufen, auch auf EU Ebene, wo man merkt es geht einfach stark in die Richtung wo man sich bewusst ist, dass viele Investitionen nötig sind um Dinge wie das Klimaziel zu erreichen, dass es sinnvoll ist auch von der EU her in die Richtung Sustainable Finance geht und die Gelder, die grundsätzlich da sind in die richtige Richtung zu lenken (I5, L326-334)

die Richtung geht ganz klar dahin, dass auch viele institutionelle Investoren gezwungen sind weil eben einerseits Regulatorik, Gesetzgeber Sachen fordern, aber auch weil der Anleger sagt, dass sie nicht in kontroverse Firmen investieren, in den Pensionsinvestments drinnen haben und somit sieht man schon wieder die privaten Investoren, die den Druck machen. Ich habe schon den Eindruck, dass die Entwicklung auch weiterhin in diese Richtung gehen wird, dass das mehr und mehr kommt und dass es sich keiner mehr leisten kann, dass er sowas nicht anbietet, keiner der Versicherungen, der Banken etc. und das Volumen ist in den letzten Jahren stark gestiegen (I5, L335-342)

Von vielen auch nicht nur weil sie die Welt verbessern wollen, sondern weil sie erkannt haben, dass es einfach ein Puzzlestein in der Analyse von Unternehmen, der gefehlt hat und wenn man das mitberücksichtigt ist es auch aus Risikoertrags-Gesichtspunkten Vorteile bringt (I5, 352-355)

1.2 Advantages of SRI Includes all indirekt ein Risikomanagement durch die Nachhaltigkeitsanalysen habe, das mentioned ich beim klassischen breiten Index nicht habe, weil ich einfach alles drin hab, advantages of SR sprich gewisse Risiken, die man statistisch quantitativ nicht sieht mit Investments. Korrelationen und Volatilitäten, die aber irgendwo drinnen stecken (I5, L139- 142)

121

Langfristig glaube ich wirklich, dass man sich auch vieles erspart und dass man dadurch risikoseitig als auch performance seitig auf jeden Fall keinen Nachteil hat. Idealerweise werden wir sogar besser abschneiden (I5, L149- 152)

wir haben auch viele Firmen nicht drinnen, die auf einmal ein massives Problem haben, wie es z.B. bei der Tabakindustrie sein könnte, weil sich die Regulatorik etc. verschärfen wird (I5, L153-156)

1.3 Disadvantages of Includes all in Summe habe ich eine Spur geringeres Diversifikationspotential (I5, L137) SRI mentioned disadvantages of SR investments.

auch wenn ich nicht so viele Titel im Fonds habe, rein statistisch keine perfekte Diversifikation und vielleicht auch nicht die perfekten Möglichkeiten, die ertragreichsten Firmen alle auszuwählen, ich werde nicht die Firmen kaufen können, die auch langfristig ertragreich sind, z.B. Firmen aus der Tabakindustrie, die wir ausgeschlossen haben, die langfristig möglicherweise historisch zumindest sehr gutes Geld verdient haben, oder aus der Gücksspielbranche, aber wir haben auch viele Firmen nicht drinnen, die auf einmal ein massives Problem haben, wie es z.B. bei der Tabakindustrie sein könnte, weil sich die Regulatorik etc. verschärfen wird (I5, L149-156)

1.4 Importance of SRI Includes all Entscheidend wird sein in den nächsten Jahren wird es mehr Investoren und mentioned statement mehr Fonds geben, die ähnliche Strategien durchführen, weil dann wird es on the present and irgendwann so sein wenn man den entsprechenden Marktanteil hat, wir bei future importance of Kepler haben um die 7%, das ist auch in Östereich ungefähr der Schnitt,

122

SRI. wenn der bei 20%, 25% oder 30% liegt an nachhaltigen Investoren, die dann alle ähnliche Firmen gut oder schlecht finden, dann wird es natürlich für Firmen, wenn sie an den Kaptialmarkt herantreten, einerseits weil sie das Geld auf der Fremdkapitalseite brauchen, aber auch andererseits auf der Eigenkapitalseite und da ist es für Unternehmen entscheidend, dass ich Investoren habe, die bereit sind meine Aktien zu kaufen, also neue Aktien die ausgegeben werden zu kaufen. Wenn der Marktanteil dementsprechend groß sein wird, werden die Firmen noch viel mehr als jetzt darauf schauen müssen, dass sie ein gutes Nachhaltigkeitsrating haben, weil sonst fällt ein Viertel der Investorenschaft weg und dann führt es genau dazu, dass die Kapitalkosten ansteigen (I5, L232-243)

der Trend ist ganz klar da und wird sicher noch anhalten oder sich verstärken, dass mehr und mehr Gelder in nachhaltige Geldanlagen fließen und da glaube ich schon, dass das bei den Unternehmen ankommt und wir nehmen das auch jetzt schon wahr, dass es den Firmen immer wichtiger wird, dass es ihnen bewusst wird, dass viele Investoren dran hängen und dass einige Unternehmen sich hier auch weiterentwickelt haben (I5, L244- 249)

in jeder größeren Firma einen Nachhaltigkeitsverantwortlichen, die stehen natürlich total hinter diesen ganzen Ideen, die auch Ökom Research hat und wenn dann die von Investoren Briefe bekommen und die dann zu den Vorständen gehen können mit etwas handfestem, dann stärkt man deren Position und das haben wir schon immer wieder rückgemeldet bekommen, dass dadurch die Firmen immer wieder auf Sachen aufmerksam gemacht werden (I5, L275-280)

123

grundsätzlich ist es für nachhaltige Anleger wichtig nicht nur diese Choice Komponente, sondern auch die Voice Komponente irgendwie auszuüben und eben genau dieses Problem, dass Sie angesprochen haben zu verringern zumindestens, dass es den Firmen mehr und mehr bewusst wird und je mehr Investoren das sind und je mehr Briefe sie bekommen und je mehr Millionen und Milliarden da dahinter stecken, desto mehr Druck kann man auch machen (I5, L283-288)

Dementsprechend ist es wichtig, dass es Privatanleger, institutionelle Anleger gibt, die dann auch Geld in solche Fonds investieren. (I5, L289-290)

2. Screening BP, die von Nachhaltigkeitsanalysen damals schon jahrelang, von unserem All aspects on screening Methods Partner Ökom Research, schon jahrelang sehr schlecht beurteilt worden methods are gathered in sind, aufgrund dessen dass sie beispielweise im Umweltbereich immer sehr this category, especially on knauserig waren und sehr viel eingespart haben und die Pipeline-Sicherheit screening on sustainabilty immer schon als sehr kritisch gesehen worden ist und wo man dann gesehen factors. hat, dass man es im Kurzverlauf nicht gesehen hätte (I5, L143-147)

124

Das sind die vorgelagerten Analysen, zuerst die Nachhaltigkeit, dann die Finanz. Man könnte das auch integrieren, das machen andere, dass man neben den Kennzahlen das Ökom Rating anschaut oder Teile daraus miteinzubeziehen, wir haben uns dazu entschieden, momentan das so zu machen und es funktioniert auch sehr gut und sofern das Rating von Ökom Research passt und keine Ausschlusskriterien irgendwo vorhanden sind, passt das Unternehmen und die finanzeille Analyse kann beginnen (I5, 217- 223)

wenn Ökom Research das nächste mal anfragt, werden sie sich vielleicht mehr bemühen den Fragenbogen gewissenhaft auszufüllen mit dem Bewusstsein, dass hier Investoren dahinter sind (I5, L268-270)

2.1 Negative Includes all screening Ausschlusskriterien, wo wir einfach sagen, welche Ausschlusskriterien wir Screening methods that use gerne haben würden und da ist es so, dass wir die auch offenlegen auf exclusion criteria to unserer Homepage und ein Beispiel wäre die Atomenergie (I5, L169-172) filter firms and investments.

eine ganze Liste von Ausschlusskriterien und die kann man als Kunde von Ökom Research auch individuell immer wieder anpassen (I5, L178-179)

2.2 Positive Screening Includes all best-in-class Ansatz, wo innerhalb der Branchen die nachhaltigsten mentionings of ausgewählt werden (I5, L182-183) screening methods Hier ist jede Branche etwas anders, aber im Wesentlichen schaut sich Ökom related to favorable Research die zwei großen Kategorien Umwelt und Soziales an und im criteria used to filter Umweltbereich kommt es auf die Branche drauf an, bei einer Bank werden firms and andere Sachen angeschaut als wie bei einem Industriekonzern, (I5, L183- 125

investments. 186)

aber im Wesentlichen geht um die Produkte und Dienstleistungen, die angeboten werden und ob es hier ein Environmental Management gibt, wie die Firma selbst sich mit Strom versorgt, wie energieeffizient sie sind etc. all jene Sachen die Teil des Umweltthemas sind (I5, L186-189)

im Sozialbereich geht es sehr stark darum, wie wird mit den Stakeholdern umgegangen, mit Mitarbeitern, werden faire Löhne gezahlt etc (I5, L189-190)

eine genaueste Analyse, wo am Schluss ein numerischer Wert herauskommt, der in ein Rating übersetzt wird und wo es dann in jeder Branche eine Mindestschwelle gibt. Also die Branchen, die eher kontroverser sind, ist die Schwelle, die Anforderungen höher (I5, L192-195)

2.3 Financial Includes all mit diesem Universum machen wir noch zusätzlich ein Screening wo wir die Screening statements on ökonomische Komponente berücksichtigen (I5, L203-204) screenings based on financial ratios.

Hier haben wir einen Ansatz wo wir verschiedenste finanzielle Kennzahlen anschauen, wieviel das Unternehmen kostet an der Börse oder auch enterprise value, sozusagen wieveil das Unternehmen kostet wenn man börsennotiertes Eigen- und Fremdkapital dazuzählt abzüglich Cash und das in Relation setzt zu verschiedenen Kennzahlen, wie beispielsweise dem EBITDA oder dem EBIT, dem Cash Flow oder was auch immer. Solche Sachen schauen wir uns an, oder auch in Richtung Stabilität und Wachstum, ob die Firmen mit starken Schwankungen gewachsen sind, hier schauen wir uns auch statistische Kennzahlen an und das dann in Kombination mit den

126

anderen Kennzahlen und der Nachhaltigkeitskomponente, kommen dann in einer klassischen Portfolio (I5, 207-216)

3. Interaction habe ich natürlich einen Minianteil an einem Unternehmen und kaufe es This category includes all with Firms jemandem anonym an der Börse ab oder verkaufe und die Firma kriegt statements on the davon nichts mit (I5, 230-232) interaction and communications of investors / fund managers with the firm.

Das ist jetzt nur mal dieser Choice Ansatz, welche Firmen wir auswählen, es gibt dann auch den Voice Ansatz, nämlich direkt in Kontakt zu treten (I5, L249-250)

Wir machen das so, dass wir Firmen, die entweder knapp unter der Schwelle sind, dass wir investieren könnten, dass wir die anschreiben und mit Info von Ökom Research ihnen bewusst machen, dass wir gerne investieren möchten, aber nicht können, da diese und jene Punkte im Nachhaltigkeitsrating noch problematisch sind (I5, 255-258)

Firmen, die wir im Fonds drinnen haben, die sich verschlechtern, wo auf einmal irgendein Ausschlusskriterium aktiviert wird von Ökom Research weil es irgendeinen Skandal gegeben hat oder weil sich das Rating verschlechtert hat. Dann schreiben wir die Firmen auch an und informieren sie, dass wir jetzt leider verkaufen, aber sie können uns auch gerne ein Feedback geben und wir leiten das auch an Ökom Research weiter(I5, L259-264)

ein wichtiger Ansatz, dass wir Firmen anschreiben, das wir denen bewusst machen, wir als Investoren ist es wichtig, dass sie investierbar sind und wenn

127

Ökom Research das nächste mal anfragt, werden sie sich vielleicht mehr bemühen den Fragenbogen gewissenhaft auszufüllen mit dem Bewusstsein, dass hier Investoren dahinter sind.(I5, L266-270) die Firmen doch interessiert, sie schreiben jetzt auch mehr und mehr zurück und sind draufgekommen, dass es wichtig ist und zu einer Investor Relations Abteilung sehr stark dazugehört, dass man auch die nachhaltigen Investoren wichtig sind und dass dadurch die die im Haus bei den Firmen für Nachhaltigkeit stehen (I5, L271-275) grundsätzlich ist es für nachhaltige Anleger wichtig nicht nur diese Choice Komponente, sondern auch die Voice Komponente irgendwie auszuüben und eben genau dieses Problem, dass Sie angesprochen haben zu verringern zumindestens, dass es den Firmen mehr und mehr bewusst wird und je mehr Investoren das sind und je mehr Briefe sie bekommen und je mehr Millionen und Milliarden da dahinter stecken, desto mehr Druck kann man auch machen (I5, L283-288)

128

Appendix III - Interview Transcripts

Transcript Interview 1

Participants 1 and 2

Name Claudia Korntner Position CSR manager

Company voestalpine AG Years active in company 7

Name Peter Fleischer Position IR manager

Company voestalpine AG Years active in company

I: Thank you very much for your time, and I’d like to start right up. Could you tell me something about your general experience with CSR efforts and activities? And could you tell me a little about your personal experience with CSR, in which field of CSR is your company active and what were the main achievements?

CK: Do you know our report? Do you know our CSR report?

I: Yes, I do.

CK: Okay, do you want to start or should I? (To other interviewee)

PF: I think you should start.

CK: So, I am in charge of Corporate Sustainability since 2011 and I am a certified CSR manager and this is my personal experience: I, in 2011 I finished my CSR course from Plenum, maybe you know that, in Vienna?

I: No.

129

CK: At that time it was maybe the only one that offered such courses. Then I started here in Voestalpine in the Investor Relations Department, CSR is located in the Investor Relations Department because it is a public listed company and it is much, I think, from my opinion, if CSR department is located near public relations because it is a little bit tricky then. Yes, general experience, this is my experience, I am working with CSR everyday I know a lot of trends and activities and global trends for example and one of the main trends in our industry, maybe in all industries, is supply chain management. Sustainable supply chain management and this is one of the main parts of my work today, lets say. So we have a project called sustainable supply chain management and we are in the middle of this project, lets say. And maybe taking a look at our CSR report, they are the corners of our project. Other fields which are very important but maybe a little bit connected with this topic are questionnaires and inquiries for and from our customers, from our main customers. We are dealing very much with the topic at the moment, mainly from the automotive industries at the moment, and therefore we try to, maybe yes, enrich the project a little bit and go through the supply chain down to the mines and setting up, there is lets say project, its called responsible steel and its in the beginning now we try to work with this.

PF: Right, responsible steel should be a platform not a consisting of the industries, you could say of the steel industry and its suppliers and its costumers. So you could say an industry wide project.

CK: And do you know the aluminum and steel industry council or initiative, the ASI, it is so that you have mining companies and consumers and end costumers and NGOs for example talking together at this platform, keeping the metal supply chain more or less transparent and sustainable.

I: So it is a joint effort from all?

CK: Yes, and it started one year ago, again, because it was an initiative from Australia and now it started again with European companies.

I: And why is your firm active in CSR, you already mentioned that your customers are very involved. What about your shareholders? Can you say that they are very interested in your CSR efforts?

PF: I would say yes, from two perspectives maybe. The one is really when you have sort of sustainabiltiy funds or responsibility funds, investors dedicated to investing in companies who fulfill certain requirements from a certain responsibilities so to speak, that originally started 130

with funds being managed by, like churches for instance, where from the very beginning you get some requirements, where you are not aloud to invest in the weapon industry, the defense industry, stuff like that, but it is a growing industry in the funds universe I would say. So this is the area which is of particular interest I would say and the other one a very general interest I would say because everything which is touched in this topic, CSR, is more or less of strategic interest, you can say, I mean there is, there are various areas that are closely linked and others where the links are a bit more softer, but finally you can say there are certain imprints on the business from CR topics if we just think about emission creating system, emission creating system in Europe. I mean we have to pay for emissions and every type of heavy industry, every type of industry, which is in its processes, heating processes, cement industry, concrete, glass, paper, steel, aluminum, whatever, is automatically impressed by this emission rating system and then the question is of course for investors how much do you, how big are your emissions, how much do you have to pay for your emissions, and on the other hand where does the system go to, does it finally maybe harm your business at all? So it is a big, I would say, a very very big topic for us internally, strategically and of course it is the same for investors. So, just to mention an example but you also have others, I would say other trends maybe, you can see NORGES, which is one of the biggest investors in the world, which has completely withdrawn form certain activities, completely withdrawn from coal activities whether it be coal mines or power plants or power suppliers being generated from coal, they completely stepped out of it. So there are various trends I would say, directly affecting us.

G: And for example for Voestalpine, one of the biggest investors for Voestalpine are its employees and also Banks, how important is CSR for especially for these types of shareholders?

PF: I mean for employees of course it is a big issue of course and how the company is treating its employees of course. For the banks, I think its hard for us to speak for the banks. I think you would really need to speak to them, it is really hard for us to speak about our co- investors to be fair. But I think, when you look at their history of their holding, it seems as if they see their holding as a sort of strategic holding, strategic shareholding. So I think they are strategic investors who are long term interested and they focus on CSR topics somewhere, its ecological or the environmental issues, whether its issues on the human rights issues or how you treat your employees particular when you are a technical company like we are and we sort of need engineers all the time and it is of interest to us to have a good culture in treating our employees and it is publicly known, so we get the people we

131

need. I think this is also why we are strategically invested in CSR and CSR is a big issue, but I would say not everyone necessarily would subsumize it under the topic of CSR, but I would say that many of them are looking on it from a sort of risk perspective.

I: And once again coming backing to your customers and, you said that they incentivized, or they incentivize you to be more responsible or to have more CSR activities. What other CSR activities or projects you’re currently having are incentivized by your shareholders or also by your stakeholders?

CK: Shareholders I think that they…

PF: Actually I think that they usually don’t actively, they don’t incentivize, I would rather say they think rather to invest or not.

CK: Yes and I think it is really closely connected to the GRI guidelines. Lot of the topics, if GRI changes than you see that the inquiries change. So, I think that the change in human rights changed the inquiries on the platforms as well, and our customers do not force us to be responsible, they ask us how responsible are you? And we are a responsible company of course, but then we have to take a look on reporting those topics a little bit more than in the past. Because I do not think that if a customer asks you to be responsible that this would work. It should be a matter of the culture, I can ask you to show me your responsibility and projects and processes but cannot ask you to be responsible, I don’t think that this would work.

I: So you mentioned that your general shareholder meeting was in the beginning of July, was CSR a big topic?

CK: That was the first question, really it was. It was not a question but more a statement that we have a very fine and structured CR report and this is a good sign for the company.

I: So your shareholders are quite happy with your CSR?

CK: I hope so! But it is not that, maybe the main shareholders ask us, but not the smaller ones.

PF: Not the retail investors, but also from the retail side there is a big awareness on energy consumption, in every GSM we get the same question about energy consumption, what we do to reduce energy consumption and to become more efficient, which is of course an

132

everyday topic anyway because energy is money. It is a CSR topic but it is not driven by CSR efforts but rather by cost efficiency efforts.

CK: We also have some questions about for example prendancies which is a topic in my report, of the CSR report but is not asked in CSR but is asked as an employee topic, also a lot of ecological topics.

PF: Right, I would say for us as an industry the topics we are confronted with from most stakeholders I would say is ultimately environment topics, ecological topics, emissions, water, water treatment systems, energy consumption. I think these are the main topics what we get questions about. CR of course is a lot broader and this is why the CR report is containing all the other aspects as well. But when I say the structure of industry as we are, like to give an example: child labour is not a big issue for us, I mean this is heavy labour, heavy industrial work, it is a grown-up work and in our particular case child labor is not an issue. In our particular case it is more ecological and environmental issues. Nevertheless of course we have a code of conduct about human rights treatment and so on and so on. This of course as well, we do all this as well, but this is not a typical question we are getting.

CK: But the code of conduct is maybe a good example for what happens if customers ask us, because we now included human trafficking in the code of conduct, which is for us of course not aloud, and we alongside the human rights Charta, now we released it that we are against human trafficking. This is because our customers ask us, this is because of the UK modern slavery act and keeping the supply chain clean.

I: And you had your general shareholder meeting, are there other sorts of communications with your shareholders? Or is this the only point in time.

PF: No, its we have, my main field is investor relations, so my daily business is to talk to investors every day and there is, as mentioned, these two areas. In the daily business we get questions about the ETS system in Europe, it’s a big topic for every shareholder because it is money finally. And then we have these particular funds where they ask particular questions about our behavior and I need Claudia Korntner to answer these questions as she is the expert on these topics. I would say it’s daily business speaking to shareholders about sustainability topics.

I: And what kind of questions, just as a simple example, what kind of questions do these social responsible investors ask?

133

PF: Well, they think a lot about, my first impression was that they have a sort of system, sort of requirement catalogue so to speak on how they rank companies, on whether they are investable for them or not, this is a very broad discussion I would say. Really covering basic, all CSR topics, its GRI the generally accepted guideline and you get the impression that most investors, most CSR funds are sort of aligning with GRI principles.

I: And was a change in the shareholder structure noticeable since the start, where you started to be really, focused your efforts on CSR or consciously did CSR?

PF: I would say we meet more and more responsible funds, sustainable investment funds, but I think for us the biggest topic is to have NORGES on board as an investor, right now they hold close to 4% which is quite a big stake and NORGES is very strict in their sustainability requirements and to have NORGES as a shareholder, we are quite proud about it. They built up their stake in the last 10 years I would say, especially in the last 5-6 years, more or less when we started really actively communicating our CSR efforts, before Claudia Korntner joined us we more or less only replied to specific questions but we were not actively communicating our efforts and also not in such a structured way. And since Miss Korntner joined us we are having a CSR position, which is also very helpful.

I: So you say the active communication towards your shareholders is helping in getting new shareholders?

PF: Yes, I would say so.

I: Do they use different methods from the conventional shareholders, those new shareholders, those CSR shareholders?

PF: Yes, I would say so, I mean we don’t know their investment process, so we just can answer this question by listening to the questions they have. I would say they have a different approach, whereas conventional investors are very much focused on figures. With sustainability funds you have a much broader area of discussion.

I: And you said before that they use a catalogue of different questions

PF: That is what I think. I get the impressions that we sort of get a score and then depending on how good or bad we are, maybe we have to cross a certain limit to be investible, for it to be safe for them, this is the main question. And then we have from time to time, we have really funds who are quite deep in details with certain topics and then we also are using in

134

this discussions the head of the environmental system, of the environmental function of voestalpine in this case. What we can see quite clearly is that our approach, or lets say our experts here are technician and they have a very technical approach whereas the investors are financial guys and at a certain point the discussion is getting quite difficult. Also Miss Korntners work is a sort of translating.

CK: I think if I understand they would too.

I: And how do you think the future of CSR will look like?

CK: I saw this question and I thought it is very interesting, because if you compare to the past we had the one extreme and we had these tree-huggers, so I think, we are far beyond this, it is more and more getting daily business and as well as there is little requirement like the NADEWEG in Austria, big companies have to be transparent and show how they are sustainable for example but I think we haven’t reached the peak now. So maybe a little bit increasing but then it will be a usual department in a company, small or big.

PF: Yes, the way what we experience in the last years was the increasing interest of stakeholders, customers are becoming more and more demanding with regards on information on CSR topics and my personal view is that it will be more part of the daily business in the future. When you sell a product, a part to a car manufacturer you might have to bring in the qualities and the certificates and you might have to bring in the CO2 footprint or the water footprint or the NG footprint. This is what I could imagine from the questions we are getting today and how detailed they are what type of information they are asking for I really getting the impression that the supply chain will have to become very transparent, this is my impression and it will become part of the daily business in the future. If you cannot provide the data I guess you will just be excluded from the bidding process.

CK: Yes, it is now part of the supplier ranking and it will get more important in the future. It is also a matter of money, what price you might gain.

PF: And also in public bidding processes every type of this business, for example in the railway infrastructure industry it is already part of the documents you have to supply.

CK: And also for example in the UK and in France and of course in the Scandinavian countries it is a big part of the bidding. If you do not have these reports (Raggi report) you are immediately excluded, out of the process.

135

I: Would you say that conventional shareholders will become more interested in CSR or do you think they will for the near future be focused on figures?

PF: No, I would not separate it too much, because as mentioned in the beginning with the ETS system the CSR topics are becoming part of your financial success, and I think the more important it gets in your daily business the more important for the conventional shareholders. This is then the question of how much turnover you can generate, how much profit you can generate, on not only how good you are in managing your costs, but also how good are you in managing your CSR topics.

CK: And also the shareholders, the young people that are now becoming shareholders are more interested in these topics, maybe a little bit more than the older ones.

I: You are saying that with the changing society and the changing values CSR is getting more important.

CK: Yes, if you are transparent it is always the same topic you will also be attractive as an employer.

I: So CSR is not only important for getting money but also to keep the employees?

CK: Yes and also for attracting new employees.

PF: Yes, I think it will be part of your competitiveness.

CK: Not to much, but the right way, to feel secure and safe.

I: Thank you very much, this was already it.

PF: You’re welcome!

136

Transcript Interview 2

Participant 3

Name Stefan Grafenhorst Position Head of CSR

Company Greiner AG Years active in company 1

I: Could you tell me something about your general experience with CSR efforts and activities about your personal experiences with CSR and in which fields your company, the Greiner Holding is active in CSR?

SG: Well let’s start with personal experiences, I started within Greiner only recently, actually only a couple of months ago, in early 2017 and before that I actually started my professional career in a consultancy that was dealing with sustainability issues in Brussels at the European Union level. I worked there for a couple of years, then moved on did some other work in the field of development work and for the last couple of years I worked in the German Parlament (Deutscher Bundestag) in the area of Enviroment and sustainability issues and then moved to austrai in early 2017. So that is something about my sustainability/CSR experience, within Greiner and within our different divisions, you probably know that we are the Greiner Holding which is kind of the umbrella organization for the four different divisions with different products and services, we have a CSR strategy for the whole group I would say. We also have a sustainability strategy within the group and I am kind of the coordinator of all the CSR and sustainability issues and activities.

I: That sounds really interesting. Why would you say is your firm active in CSR? What were the main motivators or the main reasons for being active in CSR?

SG: Well, within Greiner CSR is kind of like a term that we use for a number of activites. Wether you call it sustainability of CSR, that is an academical question. For both we have internal as well as external reasons. First of all the easiest is, that we are in packaging, we are producing plastic and which has obviously a huge environmental impact on that product. You can see if you watch TV you always see documentaries and kind of movies about like plastic in the ocean, plastic in the environment, about coffee cups to go and you know the

137

environmental impact of that. So that is one key driver obviously on why we deal with CSR issues within Greiner. The other one is that of course, we are producing packaging, for a lot of companies. If you buy butter or if you buy yoghurt or if you buy milk products you will most likely find that in a Greiner packaging. And our clients obviously also have questions and demands also because if the consumer asks questions, how is the product produced, under what circumstances, what is the impact of the product, what does the supply chain look like and so on and so on. And also like you know how are you engaged with society and how do you tackle problems that result from your business and that obviously brings us to CSR and how we deal with these issues

I: OK, so you would say, to sum it up, the biggest influencers are your clients because of the consumers in general, because the mindset of the consumers is changing and it is more present nowadays that it is important that one is sustainable?

SG: Right, exactly, the internal driver is the consumer/clients and internally I mean we have the same questions, we have like people working for us, and in the past they didn’t feel really happy or they had questions what are we producing here? You see our employees also watch telly at home and ask themselves “ok, what is going on here? We are producing plastics and it is obviously ending up in the environment and we also need to internally answer questions.

I: OK, and obviously Greiner is a family held business, what were their reactions of the shareholders when you started CSR activities or were they mainly influenced by the shareholders, the family?

SG: Well, we basically have one shareholder, which is the Greiner family, so that is actually very easy and the history of the company is that the company was managed by the family til 2009, I believe, and then it was given into external management hands. So ever since that the family is part of what you call the “Aufsichtsrat” controlling board, the controlling group. So they are not really active in the daily management anymore, so they gather up on what we do here, but they are not really involved in the daily business. In genereal they of course welcomed the initiative to be more active in the area of sustainability and be more active in CSR activities.

I: So it is just like they are more passive or do they really engage themselves and motivate you to be more active in CSR and even maybe, maybe they even suggest some incentives?

138

SG: No, they do not. I would say they are quite passive, I mean we (the management) choose the partners we work with. I mean we inform them on what we do, but it is not that they suggest us something and have a stake in the discussions with the partners on where we engage and with whom, the partners we work with. That is not something we discuss with them.

I: On the other hand for example if just hypothetically that you would choose a partner, or any of the subdivisions would choose a partner to work with, that is not sustainable, they would use their power and say “no this is not in our interest and we are not okay with that”

SG: Well that is quite hypothetical, that never happened so far. They of course have their power through the board, so you know, I don’t know, they can hire and fire the CEO of course but it never happened that they kind of like took any actions on that level. But I mean I would say theoretically, they could you know change the management and through that change the overall CSR strategy, but I do not think it is that important to go that far.

I: To ask some questions about Greiner, because you are a plastic producer, because I read your annual report, and there is quite a nice citation from your CEO “plastic and sustainability is not a contradiction” is that really your, for your sustainability division is that really your, , the Leitbild?

SG: I believe that there is obviously one huge issue, plastic has a pretty bad reputation, if you talk to your family and your friends about plastics, they would say that the reputation in general is pretty bad. That is one thing, and there is surely good reasons for that reputation. On the other side we use plastic everyday, not only when you open your fridge, half of your car, going on a plane, if you look around at home you will find like furniture from plastic. Plastic is basically everywhere, so there is obviously good reason to use it. It is cheap to produce, there’s a number of advantages that come with plastics but there is also a couple of problems, and in general we believe there is a problem with waste on how to deal with plastic after we’ve used it, but there is really no problem in using plastic in general. To give you an example: if you think about plastic bottles. Plastic bottles are fine as long there is a recycling process in place, as long there is a waste management in place, you know it needs collection and then you can recycle them and then, you know, it is all fine. There is a problem if you, fly to India, if you go to China, if you go to Indonesia, where you don’t have recycling systems, where you don’t have waste management systems, where there is no “Müllabfuhr” that comes on Thursday morning and picks all the things up, then it becomes a problem because then it ends up in nature, it ends up in the oceans and that is exactly what happens. So 139

that’s, you know, we need to have a look from two different angles on, when we talk about plastics I believe.

I: And to come back to the divisions and, because I read that Greiner has working groups, and sustainability council. Would you like to elaborate on that? How that works?

SG: Yeah, what we have done here we had a very long internal discussion on about how we are gonna start it and what we actually want to do when it comes to sustainability. The challenges that we have is, that we have four different divisions, that do pretty different stuff. There is one division that produces food packaging, there is another that produces medical devices, there is one that does home furnituring, matresses as an example, and we have a fourth division that does machinery. So the question was, like, okay how do we move together, how do we move forward as four different divisions, so what we had done here was we thought about what do we need to tackle, where do we have sustainability issues and we’ve come to like five different areas I would say. One is there is obviously a process needed were we need to reflect on products, that you know, one area where we said like, okay we need a working group here that deals with sustainability and products. The other one is the supply chain, you probably know that buying your clothes or for instance, I don’t know, stuff that is made in Asia for instance you could ask, what does the supply chain look like, is there child labor involved, and so on and so on. So we have the same problem, where do we buy our stuff, who made it? Is it coming from risk countries, does our supplier kind of follow legal frameworks etc., so Supply chain is another working group. Then there is obviously looking at our products, an issue about the environmental resources, so we made environment and resources another working group. Then comes communications and then the other one is employees. Though we have those five issue areas, we thought we should concentrate on and the flagship behind this we set out working groups for each area and since we have four divisions, every division kind of sends a representative to one of the working groups and in my position, I am actually trying to coordinate and support those five working groups and then on top of the five working groups we have a sustainability council where our CEO is part of that group, where we have our head of the legal department and some other people and now the working groups, they work and try to initiate sustainability projects and they also do recommendations which they submit, which are discussed within the sustainability council. And then the sustainability council decides on what issues are actually taken and which issues are going to be tackled.

140

I: Okay, so would you say that this kind of organization of the working groups and the sustainability council is like, more or less state of the art or is it already something that other companies could strive for or is it more or less given?

SG: About the, if you look at the issues that we tackle, products, employees, supply chain, environment and resources and communication. That is something that you find in 99% of all other companies. I mean we all have a supply chain, we all have products, we all have employees, so there is really no surprise when talking about the issues. I also believe that 60-70% of all companies or at least multinational companies have the same structure. Maybe they have another working group or they have less divisions, but they also need to work I believe on those issues and then you know the management has to decide on how to move forward. I don’t think that it is rocket science and there is surely no revolution in that structure.

I: You said that you, , also control your supply chain: do you follow any standards? Or do you have your own company standards that you follow or is it some given standards from, for example, , the United Nations or some other institution?

SG: Like in general we, when it comes to sustainability there’s different standards and in general we use the GRI, which are the Global Reporting Initiative Standards, which is a thing like, the most important, the most dominant standards. When it comes to supply chain, we just developed the code of conduct for Greiner suppliers, that is basically a longer document outlining on what we demand when it comes to supplies. That is what we do right now in supply chain and of course we discuss whether we specially monitor, our supply chain in RISC countries. Knowing where we buy stuff we probably focus on countries that are tricky when it comes to child labor for instance, we need to have a special focus, we need to have a special look on our suppliers when we buy stuff in India or in Africa for instance.

I: Also seeing that you have, I think over 130 locations, how much would you say that local legislations is in fluencing your behavior in these locations? Is it differing in influence, or is it more or less everywhere the same?

SG: Probably not, I mean, it is very different, it is of course a huge difference whether you produce in Romania or whether its Brazil or whether we move onto India. That is one of the main challenges for like multinational corporations operating in different countries, different continents, this can be very different.

141

I: Would you say, that current political situation, for example with Brexit, is influencing sustainability, not per se, but like that it is pushing sustainability out of the picture, that sustainability becomes less important?

SG: No, I don’t think so. There is not going to change much. Taking your example I mean, we are operating in the UK and Ireland for instance. England is quite an important market and we are not really influenced by Brexit discussions and negotiations. We do what we have to do, we believe that sustainability is important whether the Brexit comes or not, there is still going to be the United Kingdom, so it is not really influencing our work on CSR or sustainability, it is more a public debate.

I: How would you say that the future of CSR will look like? Is it increasing in importance, will it be more or less the same as it is now or will it even decrease, for companies and the public?

SG: Well, for us, I mean looking at my position and seeing what we do here and how much resources we spend on finding the right answers, at least for us I can say that it is dramatically increasing. Looking at our clients and the questions they have, when it comes to supply chain, when it comes to emissions, when it comes to, you know, where we buy products, how we get our energy into our production sites, I can see that some companies, if you look at IKEA for instance, they have a lot of questions already, where others have just started. I believe that in 10 years we will have to need a reporting for all our clients, you will need to have like an ecological footprint for all our products for instance. That is an example we don’t have right now, looking at your coffee cup you have in the morning it doesn’t say much whether the ecological footprint of that cup is neutral, negative or positive but I am sure that in about 10 years we will need to have knowledge about the ecological impact of all our products. We are heavily investing on getting the data, the information that we need.

I: Okay, so that would be all from my side. Do you have any remarks or would you like to add anything?

SG: No.

I: Thank you very much for your time and your insights!

SG: You’re welcome!

142

Transcript Interview 3

Participant 4

Name Hannes Roither Position Konzernsprecher, Vice President Corporate Communications und IR Company Palfinger AG Years active in company 18

I: Was können Sie mir zur generellen Erfahrung mit Corporate und Social Responsibility sagen? In welchen Feldern ist das Unternehmen Palfinger AG aktiv bzw. Welche Aktivitäten das Unternehmen verfolgt?

HR: Wir haben gestartet Anfang 2000, konkret 2003, zum ersten mal überlegt, es war die Zeit wo die ersten Öko Fonds, Umweltfonds groß geworden sind; Palfinger ist ja eine börsennotierte Gesellschaft und wir haben uns dann überlegt, wie könnten wir, oder konkret ich selbst, es war sozusagen mein project auch, ich war damals für Investor Relations zuständig, also für die Aktie, für Corporate Communications, die interne Kommunikation, wie könnten wir diese neuen Fonds für uns gewinnen, wie könnten wir interessant für sie sein, damit sie bei uns einsteigen? Und haben dann auch 2003/2004 den ersten Nachhaltigkeitsbereicht gemacht, allerdings nicht vergleichbar mit den integrierten Berichte wie wir sie heute machen oder auch den Nachhaltigkeitsbereichten danach 2005, 2006, 2007 usw. Es war eigentlich nur der Versuch interessant zu sein es war auch nur auf Österreich beschränkt und wenn ich ganz ehrlich bin, es waren eigentlich nur, ja, schöne Phrasen, die wir damals aber nicht gelebt haben.

I: Aber mittlerweile leben sie die Phrasen?

HR: Mittlerweile leben wir die Phrasen, die wir damals sozusagen uns ausgedacht haben. Wir versuchen ein Arbeitgeber zu sein, der auf seine Mitarbeiter schaut, der auf die Umwelt schaut, es gibt wirklich viele Initiativen im Haus für verschiedenste Stakeholder, natürlich auch für die Mitarbeiter aber auch für andere Stakeholder wo wir versuchen einfach ein verantwortungsbewusster Arbeitgeber zu sein. Das geht von nachhaltig produzierten Produkten bis zu fairer Wirtschaft. Wir haben uns mehrere Bereiche ausgedacht, wo wir uns fokussieren wollen und eines davon ist ein ökoeffiziente Produktion, wir sind ja ein Unternehmen – damit wir uns verstehen – das eine sehr hohe Wertschöpfungstiefe hat, das heißt, dass 75-80% von allen Teilen, die wir für unsere Produkte brauchen wenn wir sie

143

bauen, warden in-house gefertigt und nur ungefähr 20% ist outgesourced, kaufen wir zu, das heißt wir haben einen sher großen Anteil am Produkt und wir versuchen natürlich unsere Produktionen ökoeffizient zu gestalten. Anderes Thema ist, Produkte die besonders nachhaltig sind, wie z.B.: wir produzieren Krane für Offshore Windanlagen, oder wir haben, wir versuchen sozusagen unsere Produkte zu elektrifizieren, das heißt z.B. Ladeportwände waren früher ein rein hidraulisches Produkt, heute gibt es auch schon elektrische Ladebühnen, hat recht viele Vorteile, nicht nur dass sie komplett leise sind, sondern man brauchtauch kein Hydrauliköl mehr usw. Wenn wir Öl verwenden, verwenden wir ein Bio- Rapsöl für unsere Krane, also da gibt es ganz viele Ideen dazu, auf unseren Produkten, die wir in den letzten Jahren gestartet haben.

I: Verstehe ich das richtig, dass einer der größten Motivatoren oder Ansporne für CSR Aktivitäten in ihrer Firma wirklich der Wunsch diese neuen Investoren bzw. Diese Umweltfonds zu gewinnen?

HR: Das war am Anfang, das war einfach Mittel zum Zweck, aber was sich in den letzen, ich sage mal zumindest 10-12 Jahren entwickelt hat, das ist wesentlich mehr, das hat nichts mehr damit zu tun, irgendwo attraktiv zu sein. Wir verstehen uns – wir sind kein Riesenunternehmen, aber wir sind ein mittelgroßes Unternehmen und wir wollen verantwortungsvoll mit unseren Mitarbeitern, aber auch mit der Umwelt, unseren Kunden umgehen. Und das wird inzwischen wirklich seit Jahren gelebt, also aus einer leeren Worthülse ist wirklich etwas entstanden in den letzten 10-12 Jahren weil auch alle darau stolz sind.

I: Und wer war innerhalb der Firma der größte Einfluss auf die CSR Aktivitäten, die ethischen Aktivitäten? Hat es hier jemanden besonderen gegeben, oder war das mehr ein gemeinsamer Zug?

HR: Der Treiber war immer meine Abteilung von Anfang an aber wir haben auch, und das ist einer der Vorteile, wir haben ein Unternehmen das von einer Familie sozusagen mehrheitlich im Besitz ist, der Familie Palfinger, und das hat große Vorteile, da bei den Aktionären nicht unzählige Fonds sind und Hedgefonds Manager sondern wirklich eine Familie dahintersteht, weil die natürlich auch sehr langfristig denkt und wir haben immer Unterstützung in der Familie Palfinger gefunden. Aber getrieben haben wir es selbst, die Abteilung, und haben, das ist auch wieder ein Vorteil, ich in meiner Person reporte direkt dem Vorstandsvorsitzenden und den konnte ich auch dafür gewinnen. Ich kenne auch viele Kollegen in anderen Unternehmen, wenn das nicht wirklich ganz oben angesiedelt ist, beim 144

Vorstand und idealerweise beim Vorstandsvorsitzenden dann wird man das auch nicht wirklich durchsetzen können.

I: Also es muss dann wirklich ein gemeinsamer, also dann vom Vorstand bzw. dem Vorstandsvorsitzenden, der das von oben runtergibt und auch vom Unternehmen selber rauskommen?

HR: Richtig. Man braucht ja irgendwo einen Rückhalt und wenn der Rückhalt vom Vorstand da ist, dann kann man auch Dinge umsetzen. Es reicht ja nicht irgendwo eine Bestandsaufnahme zu machen, wir haben ja jedes Jahr ein neues Maßnahmahmenpaket schnüren, das wir umsetzen, wir machen alle zwei Jahre eine Stakeholderbefragung, die letzte jetzt im Jahr 2017, wo die Rücklaufquote bei 33% lag, wir haben 600 Stakeholder befragt und haben Antworten von 200 bekommen, da waren Analysten dabei, da waren Investoren dabei, Lieferanten, Mitarbeiter, von der Familie, vom Aufsichtsrat, vom Top Management wo wir eben abgefragt haben, was sind denn die Themen für die nächsten Jahre, was sollte Palfinger wichtig sein, was ist den Stakeholdern wichtig zum umsetzen. Aus dieser Umfrage, die sehr umfangreich ist, die wir alle zwei Jahre durchführen, kristallisieren sich einfach die Themen für die nächsten Jahre heraus: was wollen die Stakeholder, in welche Richtung sollen wir gehen? Das ist ein sehr hilfreiches Instrument sozusagen, um was auf Schiene zu bringen.

I: Und, als sie jetzt mit den Aktivitäten begonnen haben, was war die Reaktion der konventionellen Aktionäre? Hat es hier überhaupt eine Reaktion gegeben?

HR: Nein, am Anfang überhaupt nicht. Ich muss auch sagen, heute noch. Wir machen ja viele Investoren Meetings in Europa in Nordamerika, nach wie vor wird sehr selten über CSR Aspekte gesprochen. Wenn dann sind das richtige Nachhaltigkeitskonferenzen, da wo auch speziell Fondmanager aus Umweltfonds, Nachhaltigkeitsfonds dort sind, aber wirklich von 10 Meetings, die ich in London habe, ist ein Meeting dabei, der tendenziell diese Thematik abfragt. Aber auch nicht so tief rein, sondern nur wie wir das sehen, ob es hier Aktivitäten gibt. Es wird eigentlich immer noch nach wie vor von konventionellen Investoren eher ignoriert das Thema. Es wird sich vielleicht auch ändern, es gibt ja viele Dinge, die Unternehmen werden ja auch in diese Richtung gedrängt. Ich nehme an, dass vielleicht zukünftig es da mehr Fragen daraus gibt. Aber bis dato, und ich mache den Job jetzt doch bereits seit fast 20 Jahren, ist es nie ein großes Thema gewesen, außer man ist wirklich auf bestimmten Konferenzen, da wird man da auch als Unternehmen, als nachhaltiges Unternehmen eingeladen, da sind auch spezielle Investoren dort, da gibt es Konferenzen in 145

Frankfurt, es gibt ein paar weiter große, und da wird dann auch nachgefragt, ist vollkommen klar. Aber bei normalen Meetings eher nicht.

I: Also da liegt der Fokus dann immer noch mehr auf dem finanziellen bzw. dem monetären?

HR: Das monetäre ist natürlich eine wichtige Geschichte und ist immer noch, verändert sich zwar im Laufe der Zeit, so die Schwerpunkte, die die Investoren setzen, mal ist es die Verschuldung, mal sind es andere Themen. Aber der Nachhaltigkeitsaspekt ist leider unterrepräsentiert bei dei den Fragen.

I: Sie haben erwähnt, dass sie alle zwei Jahre diese Stakholderbefragung durchführen, nur auf die Shareholder bezogen, abgesehen von den Konferenzen, die Sie auch bereits genannt haben, gibt es hier noch weitere Interaktionen, bzw. wie wird hier die Kommunikation gehandelt sozusagen?

HR: Wir werden ja auch gerated, wir lassen uns auch raten, es gibt ja verschiedene Rating Agenturen, es gibt in Österreich ja auch einen Nachhaltigkeitsindex, Phönix, seit vielen Jahren, wo wir auch seit Anfang an drinnen waren. Da lauft die Kommunikation schon, wir wollen auch drin sein, wir wollen jedes Jahr bestätigt werden, es zeigt auch, dass die Unternehmen, die in dem Index sind auf alle Fälle Schwerpunkte haben, was Nachhaltigkeit angeht. Und da bekommt man ein Rating und je nachdem wir gut das Rating ist, bleibt man drin, oder muss den Index verlassen und die Fragen dazu, das ist wirklich fast schon eine eigene wissenschaftliche Arbeit die zu beantworten, also wenn man jetzt z.B. keinen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht hat, oder wie wir einen integrierten Bericht, da tut man sich schon relativ schwer die ganzen Daten, die abgefragt werden zusammen zu bringen. Und es war auch anfangs 2003/2004 eine der Motivationen einen solchen Bericht zu machen, weil verstärkt Fragebögen von Investoren gekommen sind, von diesen Umweltfonds, aber die waren nicht in einem einheitlichen Schema, aber jeder hat was anderes abgefragt. Und es war sehr aufwändig diese Fragen zu beantworten, da gab es ja auch noch keinen GRI, Global Rating Index, GRI-Standard, wir haben natürlich auch 2003/2004 weit weg von jedem Standard reportet und wir dachten auch wir könnten mit so einem Bericht zumindest ein Großteil dieser Fragen, die von den Investoren kommen, vorwegnehmen. Das ganze ist jetzt leichter geworden seit es den GRI-Standard gibt und wir reporten ja auch danach, da merkt man schon, wenn man diesen Standard einhält, kommt dann relativ wenig noch von Investoren, was sie zusätzlich wissen möchten. Wer den Bericht gelesen hat, sehr viele Themen werden damit abgedeckt.

146

I: Also das hat sich dann auch gelegt, dass hier so viele Fragebögen kommen von den Umweltfonds und so weiter?

HR: Das hat sich dann eingestellt, weil wir auch proaktiv unsere Berichte zuschicken und was dann noch fehlt, ist leicht zu beantworten. Klar hat jeder Investor verschiedene Interessen und auch Schwerpunkte, der eine fragt das nach, der andere das, aber ein Großteil erschlagen wir mit diesem Bericht.

I: Und wenn wir jetzt auf die CSR Aktivitäten zurückkommen, gibt es hier welche, die von den Shareholdern begonnen haben, oder wo es den Anstoß von den Shareholdern gegeben hat, jetzt z.B. von diesen Umweltfonds, dass hier eine Idee von außen kam, oder passiert das mehr von innen, man reflektiert über die Prozesse und dann kommt man darauf hier und hier könnte man was machen?

HR: Naja die Aktivitäten hängen schon sehr stark auch mit unserer Stakeholderbefragung zusammen, ich weiß Sie haben den Schwerpunkt bei Investoren, aber Investoren werden auch abgefragt und unsere Analysten, wir haben nur 8 Analysten, die uns covern, da kommen schon Schwerpunkte, die sich die Investoren und die Analysten wünschen, dass wir sie umsetzen, immer wieder.

I: Darauf wird dann logischerweise auch eingegangen und die werden dann auch umgesetzt?

HR: Genau, wir werten diese Stakeholderbefragung aus, daraus ergibt sich eine Reihung, was sind die Topthemen für die Stakeholder, dann werden die Topthemen nochmal mit dem Top Management in einem Workshop besprochen. Sehen wir auch dieselben Themen wie die Stakeholder? Gibt es eine große Schnittmenge? Manchmal sieht das Palfinger Management verschiedene Schwerpunkte anders wie die Stakeholder, dann kann schon mal sein, dass man etwas runterreiht, oder hochreiht, das ist auch möglich. Aber im wesentlichen werden schon die Impulse, die wir aus dieser Stakeholderbefragung bekommen versuchen wir auch umzusetzen. Schaffen wir nicht jedes Jahr, aber wir begründen das dann auch. Erstmal wird das Ergebnis der Stakeholderbefragung im Bericht veröffentlicht, können Sie auch auf der Homepage finden, und dann wenn wir etwas nicht umsetzen, begründen wir auch warum wir das nicht machen. Ich kann mich auch erinnern in der Krise 2009 hatten wir einfach auch wirtschaftliche Probleme, da haben wir 50% Umsatz verloren, da haben wir zum ersten mal seit vielen Jahren kein Geld verdient, sondern Verlust gehabt. In so einem Jahr ist es natürlich schwieriger, wenn man sparen muss, Dinge umzusetzen. Wir haben das

147

dann auch begründet und es dafür 1-2 Jahre später umgesetzt. Wir versuchen schon die Impulse, die wir aus der Befragung bekommen in ein Maßnahmenprogramm zu setzen.

HR: Ich habe auch in Ihrem Bericht gelesen, dass Sie mit den Social Development Goals (SDG), dass Sie sich hier auch was rausgesucht haben, ich glaube es waren 4-5, die Sie dann auch umsetzen bzw. einhalten wollen. War dies dann auch in Zusammenarbeit bzw. in Abstimmung mit dieser Stakeholderbefragung oder wieder mehr ein interner Prozess bzw. auch mit dem Einfluss von außen?

HR: Beides. Intern beschäftigen wir uns natürlich mit welcher dieser SDG’s wollen wir, können wir umsetzen, aber die haben auch sozusagen abgefragt, manche kommen ja gar nicht in Frage für unser Unternehmen, aber es war beidseitig. Interne Beschäftigung damit und wiederum ganz oben, also auch mit dem Vorstand, was können wir, was kommt für uns in Frage, und auch extern abgefragt.

I: Und Sie haben erwähnt, Sie haben angefangen mit CSR, um attraktiver für die Umweltfonds zu sein, hat das geklappt? Hat sich die Aktionärsstruktur verändert, sind viele dieser Fonds eingestiegen oder war das eher ein mäßiger Erfolg?

HR: Gefühlsmäßig ist es nicht so, dass ich das Gefühl habe, dass viele Umweltfonds Palfinger in den Fonds drin hat, ich lese aber immer von externen Umfragen und Untersuchungen, dass wir eigentlich immer überrepräsentiert sind in diesen Fonds, also stärker drin gewichtet sind als es unsere Unternehmensgröße eigentlich zulassen würde. Gefühlsmäßig aber auch, weil ich viel weniger Meetings habe in diesem Bereich, würde ich eher sagen umgekehrt, aber von externer Seite hören wir eigentlich immer dass wir sehr stark vertreten sind in diesen Fonds.

I: Sie haben gesagt, Sie haben nicht so viele Meetings mit diesen Fonds, bzw. in diese Richtung, aber verwenden diese Fonds eine andere Art von Kommunikation als konventionelle Aktionäre oder gibt es hier Unterschiede? Was ist Ihre Meinung hierzu?

HR: Naja sie haben andere Schwerpunkte und die kommunizieren sie auch uns gegenüber, was sie auch wissen wollen und ansonsten, ja das Verhältnis ist, ich mache so ca. 30-40 Roadshow Tage im Jahr, Roadshow Tage nennt man wenn man auf der Straße ist um Investoren zu treffen und hier sind ungefähr 29 konventionelle und 1 Tag CSR. Also hier ist schon mal das Verhältnis wirklich ganz eindeutig zu konventionellen Investoren, ist aber gar nicht so beabsichtigt, sondern die wollen uns stärker sehen, vielleicht ist es auch so, das – wir werden ja jedes Jahr ausgezeichnet für unseren Bericht, ich glaube wir haben jetzt 148

bereits zum 7. Mal in Folge den besten Bericht in Österreich gemacht - vielleicht decken wir ja mit unserer Berichterstattung viele Fragen ab dieser Umweltinvestoren und deswegen sind sie auch weniger präsent um uns zu treffen. Ich kann diese Frage gar nicht wirklich beantworten, nur gefühlsmäßig. Wir haben einen guten Bericht, für den wir ausgezeichnet werden, vielleicht ist es auch so, dass viele Themen damit abgedeckt sind, sie fragen wesentlich weniger nach als konventionelle Investoren.

I: Und jetzt eigentlich schon zum Abschluss: Wie sehen Sie die Zukunft von CSR und welche Rolle werden Shareholder darin spielen?

HR: Ich erinnere mich, vor ein paar Jahren haben Kollegen von anderen Unternehmen noch gesagt „Dieses CSR Thema sitze ich aus. Das ist ein Trend, der geht vorüber und ich werde keinen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht machen.“ Wenn ich heute schau, nach 5-6 Jahren, vielleicht 10 Jahren, habe eigentlich alle einen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht von denen die das gesagt haben. Ich glaube schon, dass das Thema nicht mehr wegzudiskutieren oder im Eck zu verstecken ist. Es ist ein wichtiges Thema, Resourcen sind ein wichtiges Thema, die wir verbrauche, auch die gesetzlichen Anforderungen, die es jetzt gibt, verglichen mit denen vor 10 Jahren, die sind ganz anders. Österreichische Unternehmen werden dazu gezwungen so einen Bericht zu machen. Das Thema wird allein schon vom gesetzlichen Rahmen vorgeschrieben, das kann man auch nicht mehr wegdiskutieren und ich glaube auch, dass es ein Thema ist, dass stärker und stärker wird. Ich weiß es gibt Vorreiterländer, auch in der Berichterstattung, wie Südafrika, die schon seit vielen Jahren integriert berichten. Wir sind wahrscheinlich in Österreich sicherlich nicht die ersten oder hintendran, aber das Thema wird immer wichtiger werden weil wie gesagt die Resourcen sind beschränkt und wenn ich heute energiesparender bei meiner Produkton bin, wenn ich weniger Wasser verschmutze, es gibt ja ganz viele Themen, dann ist es einfach gut für die Umwelt und das kann man nicht mehr wegdiskutieren. Ich sehe CSR ist ein absolutes Zukunftsthema, wird sicherlich in der Zukunft noch wichtiger werden wie es heute ist. Und für die Investoren: in den letzten Jahren sind speziell diese Nachhaltigkeitsfonds, oder das Geld das in diese Fonds geflossen ist von den Kunden, diese Fonds sind wesentlich stärker gestiegen in den letzten Jahren vom Volumen her, als traditionelle Fonds, also glaube ich auch, dass die Wichtigkeit von CSR auch hier abgebildet wird. Es ist ein Zukunftsthema und ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass hier nochmal einen Rückschritt gibt. Besonders mit dem ganzen Klimawandel. Es gibt natürlich immer noch Personen und Präsidenten, die das ignorieren, wie der amerikanische und alles firlefanz, aber das ist so ein präsentes Thema, ich glaube nicht, dass man hier nochmal einen Rückschritt machen wird und man kann ihn auch nicht machen. Man kann eigentlich

149

nur in diese Richtung gehen, die man schon eingeschlagen hat. Hier rede ich natürlich vor allem über die Umwelt, CSR ist ja nicht nur Umwelt, es ist ja ein Teilbereich daraus. CSR für ein Unternehmen, das verantwortungsvoll umgehen möchte mit seinen Mitarbeitern, seinen Stakeholdern, mit seiner Umwelt, das ist nicht wegzudenken.

I: Gut, von meiner Seite wäre es das schon gewesen, wollen Sie vielleicht noch etwas ergänzen?

HR: Sie haben sich natürlich unseren Bericht angeschaut, da gibt es ja auch eine Folie der History of Sustainability bei uns, dort sehen Sie ganz genau, was Palfinger gemacht hat, welche Schritte das Unternehmen gemacht hat. Die Milestones gehen los ab 2003, und dort sehen Sie wichtige Projekte von Facility Management, elektrischen Stapler, Dinge, Produktinnovationen, wichtige Dinge, die in Produktionsprozessen große Fortschritte gemacht haben, wir haben z.B. alle Lackierlacke auf wasserlöslich umgestellt, was wesentlich umweltverträglicher ist. Ich glaube da sehen Sie ganz genau, was ist von 2003- 2017 passiert und dann gibt es auch ein Maßnahmenprogramm, das im aktuellen Bericht enthalten ist, was haben wir uns für 2018 vorgenommen, was wollen wir umsetzen für die nächsten 1-2 Jahre. Ich glaube das ergänzt ziemlich gut, das was ich jetzt auch gesagt habe, das sind die wesentlichen Sachen.

I: Okay, gut, dann sag ich nochmal recht herzlichen Dank für Ihre Zeit und Ihren Beitrag.

HR: Gern geschehen.

150

Transcript Interview 4

Participant 5

Name Stephanie Kniep Position Head of IR Company Lenzing AG Years active in company 6

I: Ich würde gleich loslegen mit der ersten Frage, eine generell Einführungsfrage: Was ist den Ihre generelle Erfahrung mit CSR, was sind Ihre persönlichen Erfahrungen damit und in welchen Feldern ist Lenzing AG in CSR aktiv?

SK: Da wir ja Holz aus nachhaltigen Quellen verwenden, ist für uns Nachhaltigkeit sehr sehr wichtig. Wir haben auch gerade wieder einen neuen Nachhaltigkeitsbericht, wo wir alle Aspekte, oder versuchen alle Aspekte abzudecken, deswegen hat das einen sehr hohen Stellenwert für uns.

I: Sie verwenden jetzt Holz aus nachhaltigen Quellen und es zieht sich sozusagen durch das ganze Unternehmen, die ganze Unternehmensstrategie durch?

SK: Ganz genau, Sie haben auch die nachhaltigste Produktion für Viskose und dann haben wir auch noch eine Faser, die nennt sich Kenze, das ist der Markenname. Das Verfahren für die Herstellung dieser Faser ist das umweltfreundlichste Verfahren zur Herstellung überhaupt weil man dort fast überhaupt keine Chemikalien mehr einsetzt. Also insgesamt ist es ja so, dass man bei Viskose Chemikalien einsetzen muss, Polyester ist auch nicht so ein umweltfreundliches Material, das ist auch teilweise ölbasiert und wenn man sich das so anschaut gehört also die Lyozel Faser zu den nachhaltigsten Fasern.

I: Wenn man jetzt an den Beginn von CSR, bzw. der Nachhaltigkeitsstrategie in Ihrer Firma denkt, wer waren dort die größten Motivatoren oder was war hier der größte Grund dafür?

SK: Ja, wie gesagt, für uns ist es wichtig, dass wir nicht nur auf unsere eigene Produktion sondern auf die gesamte Wertschöpfungskette schauen und deswegen haben wir schon relativ frühzeitig die gesamte Branche im Blick gehabt und für uns ist es nicht nur wichtig mit unseren eigentlichen Kunden, das sind die Spinnereien zusammenzuarbeiten, sondern auch zu schauen, wo können wir in der weiteren, insbesondere Textilwertschöpfungskette einen Beitrag leisten, um diese gesamte Textilindustrie auch nachhaltiger zu gestalten. Und das ist schon sehr sehr lange implementiert worden. Bereits in den 80 Jahren des vergangenen

151

Jahrhunderts stark investiert um diese Viskose Produktion nachhaltig zu gestalten. Sie wissen ja, dass wir hier am Attersee sind und wenn man da nicht in den Umweltschutz investiert hätte oder nicht so eine Produktion hätte wie wir sie heute haben, dürfte man da gar nicht mehr produzieren, davon bin ich überzeugt. Deshalb war es wichtig, dass wir überall geschaut haben, dass wir nachhaltige Prozesse aufsetzen.

I: Also hat jetzt auch die Gesetzgebung auch eine Rolle gespielt?

SK: Ja natürlich. Wie gesagt wir sind hier in einer top Touristenregion und wie gesagt, das geht natürlich nicht, dass man da eine dreckige Produktion hinsetzt, bzw. sie haben schon lange geschaut, dass alles besser und nachhaltiger wird.

I: Und wenn man jetzt auf Ihre Aktionäre zu sprechen kommt, was war denn die Reaktion? War das eher positiv, dass man auf Nachhaltigkeit setzt oder war die Reaktion eher gleichgültig und Hauptsache die Zahlen stimmen weiterhin?

SK: Es hat ja schon seit einigen Jahren ein Wandel eingesetzt, überall gibt es mehr nachhaltige Anlagen und Fonds, was wir sehen ist, dass es zum Einen noch immer den klassischen Investor gibt, der vor allem auf die Zahlen guckt, das tun auch die nachhaltigen Investoren, aber dieses Nachhaltigkeitskonzept, das wir haben bzw. dass wir ein nachhaltig arbeitendes Unternehmen sind, hat uns auch viele Türen geöffnet für neue Zielgruppen und wir stehen auch viel in Kontakt mit Investoren, die auch Nachhaltigkeitskriterien haben. Da gibt es ja zum einen die externen Organisationen, die Kriterienkataloge aufstellen, die Ökom zum Beispiel, da haben wir natürlich auch geschaut, wie wir da abschneiden, wo können wir selber etwas verbessern, denn es sind auch viele hilfreiche Dinge, als Benchmark zu anderen Unternehmen und natürlich gibt es Investoren, die ihre eigenen Kriterien haben und da geht es natürlich auch im direkten Gespräch mit diesen Investoren darum ‚haben wir alles erfüllt?’ dann gibt es auch vielleicht den Hinweis, was man sich noch mehr wünscht, da geht es nicht nur um Umweltschutz, da geht es auch um soziale Kriterien, wie Sie sich vorstellen können, die Frauenquote usw. Das geht auch teilweise in die Gespräche mit rein, aber wie gesagt der überwiegende Teil der Investoren pocht schon noch darauf, dass beides zusammenpasst, dass die Zahlen stimmen und wenn es dann noch nachhaltig ist, ist es gut, vielleicht noch einen Satz zum Schluss ist, dass wir auch schon gesagt haben, dass nicht nachhaltig arbeitende Unternehmen sicherlich einen Abschlag bekommen an der Börse, die werden viel, viel mehr Probleme bekommen, dass in sie investiert wird. Das ist eine allgemeine Haltung, das kommt jetzt nicht von uns, sondern das ist etwas, das wir als Feedback schon oft gehört haben. 152

I: Sie haben jetzt gerade die ethischen bzw. sozialen Fonds erwähnt, aber bei Lenzing AG ist es noch so, dass der Großteil der Aktionäre sehr zahlenorientiert ist. Hat sich die Aktionärsstruktur in den letzten Jahren oder auch schon Jahrzehnten in eine Richtung bewegt, wo jetzt auch mehr von diesen socially responsible investement Fonds dabei sind, oder ist das wirklich noch eine geringe Zahl der Aktionäre?

SK: Nein, in den letzten zwei, drei Jahren sind wesentlich mehr nachhaltig orientierte Fonds dazugekommen und die haben, wir haben auch gerade bei den grösten Investoren gibt es da auch welche, die darauf Wert legen.

I: Und wenn man jetzt, klar die nachhaltigen Investoren, die ethischen Investoren, die haben ihre Kritierienkataloge, aber wenn man jetzt auf die Kommunikation schaut, Sie machen ja eine Roadshow, wenn ich das richtig verstanden habe, und treffen Sie dort auch die ethischen Investoren, oder wie läuft die Kommunikation ab?

SK: Es gibt auch Konferenzen, die auf Nachhaltigkeit ausgerichtet sind, da sprechen wir natürlich auch überwiegend über die Nachhaltigkeit, das mache ich auch zusammen mit unserem Leiter für Nachhaltigkeit, dass wir sogar zusammen dort hinfahren, weil er besser auf die Detailfragen antworten kann als ich. Und wir haben auch häufig Anfragen zu verschiedenen Themen, die dann auch oft vom Direktor der Nachhaltigkeitsabteilung übernommen werden und das sehen wir schon, dass das sehr, sehr stark zugenommen haben in den letzten zwei drei Jahren, exponentiell, das kann man auf jeden Fall sagen.

I: Gibt es dann auch Investoren, die eher aktiv Ihre Aktivitäten beeinflussen? Die auch Vorschläge einbringen?

SK: Es ist so, dass mir Investoren schon gesagt haben, dass sie nicht in Lenzing Aktien investieren können, weil wir diese externen Nachhaltigkeitskriterien seiner Zeit nicht erfüllt haben. Also es ist auch ganz wichtig, dass man auch mit diesen Nicht-Regierungs- Organisationen zusammenarbeitet, wie Ökom oder sustainalytics, dass man sich das genau anschaut, welche Kriterien sind da, um sich zu verbessern, denn wenn wir da die Anforderungen nicht erfüllen, gibt es Investoren, die sagen ‚wir können da nicht investieren’, es ist aber auch so, dass wir direkt mit den Investoren sprechen und auch, das ist ganz wichtig, mit den Nicht-Regierungs-Organisationen, die Analysen über die Nachhaltigkeit in unserem Unternehmen machen. Da sind wir auch in engem Kontakt um insgesamt natürlich auch noch Lücken, die sie haben weiter zu schließen, um noch nachhaltiger zu werden.

153

I: Dann sind wir eigentlich schon bei meiner abschließenden Frage: wie glauben Sie denn, welche Aktionäre in der Zukunft von CSR und Nachhaltigkeit spielen? Sie haben bereits schon kurz erwähnt, dass Sie glauben, dass Firmen die nicht nachhaltig arbeiten einen Bruch in der Börse zu erwarten haben, gibt es hier noch weiter Auswirkungen, oder wie sehen Sie das?

SK: Also Einbruch an der Börse würde ich es nicht formulieren, was wir eben hören von Experten ist, dass diese Unternehmen einen Abschlag im Aktienkurs haben werden. Das spiegelt sich dann sicherlich auch darin wieder, es gibt ja auch sogenannte Risikoprämien, die eben auch immer mit in die Überlegung eingezogen werden eine Aktie zu kaufen und da wird es laut Expertenmeinungen, dass besonders nachhaltig arbeitende, und natürlich profitable Unternehmen, eben diesen Abschlage nicht mehr haben werden, aber sich andere anstrengen müssen, um auch auf diesen sogenannten fairen Wert zu erreichen, wenn sie viele Kriterien nicht erfüllen.

I: Das war es dann schon von meiner Seite, gibt es von Ihrer Seite noch etwas zu ergänzen?

SK: Eigentlich nicht, also wie gesagt, wenn Sie uns nochmal charakterisieren, ist es wirklich so, dass wir ganz stark auf Nachhaltigkeit setzen, Sie können sich dann gerne auch nochmal unseren Nachhaltigkeitsbericht anschauen, der ist ja auch unserer Internetseite. Da gibt es auch einen Einführungstext, ich glaube auch unser CEO sagt auch noch was dazu, das steht aber auch im Geschäftsbericht drin und da können Sie sich auch noch Anregungen holen für Ihren Text, wie wir das ganze sehen, das ist dann etwas offizieller formuliert.

I: Den habe ich mir auch schon angeschaut. Gut, dann bedanke ich mich recht herzlich.

SK: Gerne!

154

Transcript Interview 5

Participant 6

Name Florian Hauer Position Fund manager Company Kepler Ethik Fonds KAG Years active in company 7

I: Können Si emir etwas über sich selbst erzählen, über Ihre professionelle Karriere und was ihre Erfahrungen mit ethischen Fonds sind?

FH: Gute Frage, weil man sehr weit ausholen kann, ich werde versuchen einen Mittelweg zu finden. Ich bin nicht der gewesen, der sich im Studium oder in der Schule schon mit dem Thema auseinandergesetzt hat, was ich sehr wohl getan habe, war dass ich mich mit Investments sehr bald auseinandergesetzt habe und habe auch irgendwie auch durch die Eltern etwas geprägt, schon mit dem Thema Nachhaltigkeit immer wieder auseinandergesetzt, sei es über die clean clothes Kampagne, die auf einmal irgendwo im Postkasten gelandet ist und meine Mutter mich darauf aufmerksam gemacht hat, dass es in der Bekleidungsindustrie Sachen gibt. Schon auch eine gewisse Sensibilisierung für das Thema auch in jungen Jahren da gewesen, aber rein Uni mäßig war es, dass ich Auslandsjahr in Großbritannien, an der Cardiff Business School gemacht habe und dort einen Business Ethics Kurs gemacht habe, den aber eigentlich ausgewählt habe weil ich gewusst habe, den kann ich mir schön anrechnen lassen, mein wirkliches Interesse war damals wirklich Finance, Optionen und diese ganzen Sachen. Aber irgendwie habe ich diesen Kurs, der war wirklich sehr spannend und sehr prägend auch, wir hatten auch einen super Vortragenden, der uns auch Videos gezeigt hat und dadurch bin ich auf das Thema gekommen, dass ich das auch mal aus der Business Perspektive betrachtet habe und ein ganzes Jahr, zwei Semester lang, mich intensiv mit Business Ehtics auseinandergesetzt habe und allerdings nicht so stark oder eher gar nicht aus der Kapitalmarkt Perspektive mit Investments und das war für mich dann, als ich zum arbeiten begonnen habe, war es das erste mal wo ich damit in Berührung gekommen bin, dass es auch Fonds gibt, die das Thema abbilden und da war ich der Meinung, ok das mit den Firmen ist mir klar, dass der Konsument einen gewissen Einfluss hat und dass das sinnvoll ist sich damit auseinanderzusetzen wie Firmen agieren war mir klar, aber ich habe mir dann die Indices angesehen, die es im Nachhaltigkeitsbereich gibt und ich habe festgestellt, dass die sich so ähnlich entwickeln wie klassische Indices, mit ein paar Ausnahmen, dass ich mir gedacht habe ‚ja, das ist ein bisschen green-washing und das ist eigentlich sowieso dasselbe’, aber 155

ich habe mich schon mal damit auseinandergesetzt und was ich auf jeden Fall sind, ist Brancheinvestments, Naturaktienindex hat es damals schon gegeben. Ein Index, der sehr auf einige Unternehmen ist und ja, das war meine erste Berührung mit den Investments, wo ich auch einen Workshop gehalten habe für Kunden in der Bank und wo ich zu Kepler Fonds gekommen bin, das war etwa 5 Jahre später, in der Zwischenzeit habe ich auch auf der Uni gearbeitet, mich aber mehr mit Optionsstrategien beschäftigt und mehr finanzmathematisch interessiert und habe meine Doktorarbeit in dem Bereich geschrieben und die Möglichkeit bekommen, den Kepler Ethik Aktien Fonds zu übernehmen, sprich bei Kepler Aktien haben sie jemanden gesucht, der Vorgänger von mir hat eben diesen Fonds gemanaged und auch den Ökofonds und ich habe mir gedacht ‚ja Ökofonds find ich cool, das mit den Ethikfonds schau ich mir noch an’ weil nach dem ersten kritischen Auseinandersetzen habe ich gedacht vielleicht ist da trotzdem mehr dahinter, als ich gedacht habe, aber richtig draufgekommen bin ich was dahinter steckt, ist mir auch klar geworden, warum die Indices sich auch ähnlich entwickeln, weil wenn man globale Investments hat mit allen Branchen, allen Regionen, dann ist es natürlich von der Performance her natürlich nicht so, dass es eine komplex gegensätzliche Entwicklung von einem klassischen Index ist zu einem nachhaltigen Index bzw. nachhaltigen Fonds, weil trotzdem die Korrelationen der Unternehmen, die zwar nachhaltig sind und die nicht so nachhaltig sind relativ groß sind wenn sie aus derselben Region, derselben Branche sind. Aber es macht einen großen Unterschied inhaltlich wie ein Portfolio ausschaut: ob ich eben einen Indexfonds habe, der einen Index abbildet einen weltweiten und da habe ich 1.200 Firmen drin mit einem kleinen Gewicht jeweils und habe alles drin, oder ob ich einen Fonds habe, wo ich 60, 70 vielleicht 100 Titel drin habe und wo ich dann auch wirklich von der Nachhaltigkeitsanalyse weiß, die Firmen im Fonds sind wirklich die, die sich in dem Bereich wirklich anstrengen, die etwas gemacht haben in den letzten Jahren und jetzt was machen, die von unserem Partner, in dem Fall Ökom Research auf Herz und Nieren überprüft worden sind, wo es trotzdem noch viele Kritikpunkte gibt, aber man weis okay, das sind Firmen, wo man auch als Konsument denkt, die kann man noch eher unterstützen als andere Firmen. Und so bin ich auch draufgekommen, auch wenn es ähnlich ausschaut ist das was drinnensteckt ist doch was anderes. Und dass sich der Ökofonds oder der Naturaktienfonds sich ganz anders entwickeln ist klar, das sind ganz wenige Aktien, ein sehr starker Branchenfokus ist da, wenn man an eine breite Veranlagung denkt ist das einfach zu spezifisch und dann kommt man nicht drüber hinweg, dass man einen globalen Ethikfonds nimmt, der natürlich performance-mäßig sich ähnlich entwickelt und in der Finanzmarktkrise auch stark verlieren wird, aber inhaltlich, qualitativ ganz andere Titel drinnen hat und das Schöne ist ja, dass die Vergangenheit und ganz viele Studien

156

belegt haben, dass man keinen Nachteil performance-mäßig hat und trotzdem mit einem guten Gefühl, einem guten Gewissen den Firmen das Geld anvertraut, wo man sagt, die will man unterstützen.

I: Sie haben jetzt schon die Ethik- und Ökofonds erwähnt, was sind denn jetzt weitere Felder von den Kepler Fonds?

FH: Also Kepler Fonds an sich ist mal sehr breit eine Kapitalanlage Gesellschaft, wo wir um 60 Milliarden Euro managen und wo wir verschiedene Strategien im Aktenbereich und im Anlage und eben Mischfonds, die beide Assetklassen abdecken und nur ein Teilbereich, der absolut gesehen einen sehr hohen Betrag ausmacht relativ gesehen trotzdem irgendwo nur bei 7% liegt ist der Bereich der nachhaltigen Investments, die auch wieder von-bis sind, von sehr strengen nachhaltigen Investments bis zu eher lockereren Ansätzen, wo gewisse Kriterien erfüllt werden müssen aber nicht so streng wie bei den Ehik Fonds. Bei den Ehtikfonds gibt es auch wieder einen Aktien- einen Renten- und einen Mischfonds und diesen Ökoenergienfonds als Branchenfonds mit Aktien aus dem Bereich erneuerbare Energien. Das ist auch die Art von nachhaltigem Investieren wie wir denken, dass es auch für den Anleger am sinnvollsten ist, natürlich gibt es daneben auch noch andere Möglichkeiten, Asset-Klassen, angefangen von Mikrofinanz bis theoretisch auch andere Asset-Klassen wie Immobilien, da wird es dann aber auch schon schwieriger und man muss genau schauen. Es gibt eine breite Palette, aber wir sind auf die großen Asset-Klassen Aktien und Anleihen eigentlich konzentriert und haben hier unsere nachhaltige Fonds- Palette.

I: Es gibt ja mehrere Gründe, dass man ethisch investiert, was ist Ihrer Meinung nach, was sind hier die wichtigsten Gründe für Ihre Anleger und generell? Gibt es hier eine Entwicklung in den letzten Jahren, die sich herauskristallisiert?

FH: Ja im Wesentlichen gibt es zwei Stoßrichtungen, die eine ist die, dass man sagt, man will gewisse Sachen vermeiden, weil man es mit dem eigenen Gewissen, dem eigenen Unternehmen, der eigenen Organisation nicht vereinbaren kann. Das ist typischerweise, und hier haben wir einige Anleger in dem Bereich, die vielleicht aus dem kirchlichen Bereich kommen und sagen ‚ok, das was wir am Sonntag predigen, das sollten wir eigentlich auch, so gut es möglich ist im privaten Leben leben und im beruflichen auch.’ Und wenn es dann um die Veranlagungen der Pensionsgelder der Priester geht, ist genau die Frage, ob man in solchen Veranlagungen Waffen, Atomenergie, oder sonst irgendwas drinnen haben will und das ist für viele eben aus dem Bereich – großer institutioneller Investoren – ein Thema und 157

natürlich für viele Private auch, das muss jetzt nicht mit allen Punkten, allen Ausschlusskriterien, aber es gibt viele Anleger, die sagen ‚ok, bei den Kepler Ethik Fonds steht ein Ethik Beirat dahinter, wo auch Leute aus der Kirche, aber auch aus dem wissenschaftlichen Bereich, aus dem Umweltbereich zusammensitzen’, diese treffen sich zweimal im Jahr und ein Kritierienset festlegen und wo ich auch persönlich der Meinung bin, da sind viele Sachen ausgeschlossen, da will ich eh mein Geld nicht investieren, aber gleichzeitig verfolgen wir auch einen best-in-class Ansatz, dass man innerhalb der Branche, die man grundsätzlich ok findet und das sind auch kontroversielle Branchen, weil man nicht alles ausschließen kann – da ist die Luftfahrtindustrie noch drinnen und die Autoindustrie, weil wir im Moment noch nicht ohne diese Industrien können, natürlich wäre es besser ohne sie, oder wenn es nur noch Autos gäbe ohne Emissionen, oder wenn auch die Flugzeuge die Umwelt nicht massiv verschmutzen würden, aber das ist momentan der Status und ohne Atomenergie könnte man aus meiner Sicht auskommen, das ist ein politischer Wille, das ist voll ok, dass wir dies ausschließen, bei anderen denke ich mir, dass wir über den best-in- class Ansatz die Firmen, die innerhalb der Branche vorbildlich sind. Es gibt Firmen, die einfach vorbildlicher sind und andere die weniger vorbildlich sind und wir unterstützen die, die bei den nachhaltigsten dabei sind. Das war die eine Gruppe, wo man eben in Richtung Ausschluss geht, wobei es bei unseren Fonds eben mit dem best-in-class Ansatz verbunden ist und da gibt es sicherlich auch die Anleger, die das eher pragmatisch sehen und die auch einfach die Chancen aus dem Bereich sehen und sagen und es gibt historisch die Studien und viele Fonds haben schon bewiesen, dass wenn ich auf Themen und Firmen setze, die langfristig denken, die nachhaltig agieren, dann hat das Vorteile bei der Finanzierung, was das Image betrifft etc. und dass es auch viele Investoren gibt, die sagen ‚ok, nicht nur will ich was gutes tun, aber auch den Performance und Risiko Aspekt beachten’.

I: Sie haben jetzt schon ein paar Sachen erwähnt, auch zum Beispiel recht zu Beginn, dass sich die ethischen Indices und die konventionellen relativ gleich entwickeln und was würden Sie jetzt sagen was die größten Vorteile von ethischen Investments? Und was sind Nachteile eventuell?

FH: Ich beginne mit den Nachteilen, wenn ich den weltweiten Aktienindex MSCI all country world hernehme, der hat 2.500 Firmen, die dementsprechend gering gewichtet sind, die ganz die großen Firmen, wie Apple sind dann schon mit Gewichten, die dann in Richtung 1% gehen können, aber viele Titel, die ganz gering gewichtet sind. Dadurch habe ich eine möglichst breite Diversifikation im klassischen Portfolio Theorie. Wenn ich jetzt ein Anlage Universum, wie bei unseren Ethikfonds hernehme, für den Aktienfonds beispielsweise, dann

158

sind da ca. 400 Titel, die ich kaufen kann, wobei ich dann sagen muss, manche sind von der Liquidität her haben so eine geringe Liquidität, dass ich mich mit dem Fonds, der doch schon deutlich über 100 Millionen Euro groß ist, und es gibt auch noch Spezialfonds, die ähnliche Strategien durchführen, dass wir hier einfach ein Liquiditätsthema haben. Wir haben an die 300, ein bisschen drüber, Titel zur Verfügung. Hier kann man natürlich immer noch recht breit streuen, regional, sektoral, aber in Summe habe ich eine Spur geringeres Diversifikationspotential. Das heißt das ist sicher ein Nachteil, allerdings sehe ich jetzt die Vorteile deutlich im Vordergrund und deutlich überwiegend, weil ich ja indirekt ein Risikomanagement durch die Nachhaltigkeitsanalysen habe, das ich beim klassischen breiten Index nicht habe, weil ich einfach alles drin hab, sprich gewisse Risiken, die man statistisch quantitativ nicht sieht mit Korrelationen und Volatilitäten, die aber irgendwo drinnen stecken und das beste Beispiel war die BP, die von Nachhaltigkeitsanalysen damals schon jahrelang, von unserem Partner Ökom Research, schon jahrelang sehr schlecht beurteilt worden sind, aufgrund dessen dass sie beispielweise im Umweltbereich immer sehr knauserig waren und sehr viel eingespart haben und die Pipeline-Sicherheit immer schon als sehr kritisch gesehen worden ist und wo man dann gesehen hat, dass man es im Kurzverlauf nicht gesehen hätte, aber dann ist etwas passiert und wir waren damals zum Glück auch nicht investiert, und wenn man sich den Chart seither anschaut, die hat deutlich underperformed und da denke ich, auch wenn ich nicht so viele Titel im Fonds habe, rein statistisch keine perfekte Diversifikation und vielleicht auch nicht die perfekten Möglichkeiten, die ertragreichsten Firmen alle auszuwählen, ich werde nicht die Firmen kaufen können, die auch langfristig ertragreich sind, z.B. Firmen aus der Tabakindustrie, die wir ausgeschlossen haben, die langfristig möglicherweise historisch zumindest sehr gutes Geld verdient haben, oder aus der Gücksspielbranche, aber wir haben auch viele Firmen nicht drinnen, die auf einmal ein massives Problem haben, wie es z.B. bei der Tabakindustrie sein könnte, weil sich die Regulatorik etc. verschärfen wird. Langfristig glaube ich wirklich, dass man sich auch vieles erspart und dass man dadurch risikoseitig als auch performance seitig auf jeden Fall keinen Nachteil hat. Idealerweise werden wir sogar besser abschneiden, aber ich sage jetzt zumindest dass man keinen Nachteil haben wird und dadurch dass man auch ein fokussierteres Portfolio hat, hat man da vielleicht auch tolle Titel drinnen, in beide Richtungen, Chancen und Risiken, Risiken wahrscheinlich ein bisschen größer, aber auch Riesenchancen wenn man die richtigen drinnen hat und es ist trotzdem, man weiß ja, rein statistisch gesehen ab 20, 30 Positionen das Risiko nicht mehr so stark abnimmt, als wenn man noch 20 Titel dazu nimmt. Ich sage jetzt mal 60 Titel, da ist das Portfolio dann auch relativ gut diversifiziert.

159

I: Sie haben auch schon Ihren Partner, die Ökom Research erwähnt, welche Screening Methoden verwenden Sie?

FH: Wir screenen einerseits die Staatsanleihen, machen da ein Urteil über einzelne Länder und Regionen und dann Unternehmen. Ich als Aktienfondsmanager schaue mir natürlich mehr die Unternehmensratings an.

I: Für ethische Fonds ist es ja sehr wichtig die richtigen Investments zu suchen und dafür werden screenings gemacht, bzw. ratings verwendet. Sie haben auch erwähnt, dass Unternehmen in der Tabakindustrie oder der Waffenindustrie ausgeschlossen werden. Welche Kriterien müssen vom Unternehmen erfüllt werden?

FH: Im Wesentlichen bietet die Ökom Research zwei Sachen an, das eine sind die Ausschlusskriterien, wo wir einfach sagen, welche Ausschlusskriterien wir gerne haben würden und da ist es so, dass wir die auch offenlegen auf unserer Homepage und ein Beispiel wäre die Atomenergie: hier muss man wieder unterscheiden und zwar in Produzenten, in die Händler und dann gibt es noch einmal die Unterscheidung zwischen Produzenten der Atomenergie, aber dann gibt es auch Produzenten, die Uran produzieren und dann gibt es Produzenten, die Kernkomponenten für die Kraftwerke bauen, das gleiche gibt es auch bei den Händlern, wobei die Händler dann eher im Bereich des Handels mit Atomstroms zu finden sind. Und hier gibt es Umsatzgrenzen, die auch auf der Homepage aufscheinen und bei Atomenergie ist die Umsatzgrenze 0%, also ab dem ersten Euro Umsatz ist das ausgeschlossen und hier gibt es immer eine ganze Liste von Ausschlusskriterien und die kann man als Kunde von Ökom Research auch individuell immer wieder anpassen. Das ist dann eine Komponente, viele Unternehmen werden dadurch ausgeschlossen und bei denen die nicht gegen Ausschlusskriterien verstoßen ist es, wie ich vorhin bereits erwähnt habe, dieser sogenannte best-in-class Ansatz, wo innerhalb der Branchen die nachhaltigsten ausgewählt werden. Hier ist jede Branche etwas anders, aber im Wesentlichen schaut sich Ökom Research die zwei großen Kategorien Umwelt und Soziales an und im Umweltbereich kommt es auf die Branche drauf an, bei einer Bank werden andere Sachen angeschaut als wie bei einem Industriekonzern, aber im Wesentlichen geht um die Produkte und Dienstleistungen, die angeboten werden und ob es hier ein Environmental Management gibt, wie die Firma selbst sich mit Strom versorgt, wie energieeffizient sie sind etc. all jene Sachen die Teil des Umweltthemas sind und im Sozialbereich geht es sehr stark darum, wie wird mit den Stakeholdern umgegangen, mit Mitarbeitern, werden faire Löhne gezahlt etc. und hier macht Ökom Research je nach

160

Branche Gewichtungen für jeden dieser Bereiche, es werden auch drei Unterbereich geschaffen und dann geht die Analyse in die Tiefe rein, eine genaueste Analyse, wo am Schluss ein numerischer Wert herauskommt, der in ein Rating übersetzt wird und wo es dann in jeder Branche eine Mindestschwelle gibt. Also die Branchen, die eher kontroverser sind, ist die Schwelle, die Anforderungen höher, als Beispiel Öl und Gas, Bergbau, hier ist es schwieriger, dass man in der Branche überhaupt zu den Besten dazugehört, weil die Branche schon so kontrovers ist, dass wirklich nur die außergewöhnlich guten es überhaupt schaffen. In anderen nicht so kontroversen Branchen, der Bereich der Bildung mit Privatschulen z.B. hier ist die Ratinanforderung nicht so hoch, aber auch hier gibt es eine Schwelle und wenn ein Unternehmen drüber ist, sind sie grundsätzlich investierbar. Aus dem ergibt sich mal unser Anlagemöglichkeiten, das sind dann ca. 350 Firmen. Hier ist aber noch keine finanzielle Kennzahl dabei. Hier kommen dann wir als langjährige Aktienmanager ins Spiel und mit diesem Universum machen wir noch zusätzlich ein Screening wo wir die ökonomische Komponente berücksichtigen. Der Anleger will ja schlussendlich Firmen haben, wo er sagt, hier kann er gut damit leben, aber er will natürlich auch langfristig einen Ertrag haben für seine Pensionsversicherung hat oder was auch immer und das ist dann unser Part diese Finanzanalyse durchzuführen. Hier haben wir einen Ansatz wo wir verschiedenste finanzielle Kennzahlen anschauen, wieviel das Unternehmen kostet an der Börse oder auch enterprise value, sozusagen wieveil das Unternehmen kostet wenn man börsennotiertes Eigen- und Fremdkapital dazuzählt abzüglich Cash und das in Relation setzt zu verschiedenen Kennzahlen, wie beispielsweise dem EBITDA oder dem EBIT, dem Cash Flow oder was auch immer. Solche Sachen schauen wir uns an, oder auch in Richtung Stabilität und Wachstum, ob die Firmen mit starken Schwankungen gewachsen sind, hier schauen wir uns auch statistische Kennzahlen an und das dann in Kombination mit den anderen Kennzahlen und der Nachhaltigkeitskomponente, kommen dann in einer klassischen Portfolio Optimierung mit gewissen Einschränkungen, dass man z.B. eine gewisse Branchenstreung noch hat, kommt unser finales Portfolio noch raus. Das sind die vorgelagerten Analysen, zuerst die Nachhaltigkeit, dann die Finanz. Man könnte das auch integrieren, das machen andere, dass man neben den Kennzahlen das Ökom Rating anschaut oder Teile daraus miteinzubeziehen, wir haben uns dazu entschieden, momentan das so zu machen und es funktioniert auch sehr gut und sofern das Rating von Ökom Research passt und keine Ausschlusskriterien irgendwo vorhanden sind, passt das Unternehmen und die finanzeille Analyse kann beginnen.

I: In der Theorie, bzw. auch in anderen Interviews, die ich geführt habe , herausgehört, dass das Problem mit ethischen Investments oder SRI jenes ist, dass zu wenig Kommunikation 161

herrscht zwischen den Investoren und den Unternehmern. Dass es mehr eine entry und exit Strategie ist und dass dies eher weniger fördernd für die Unternehmer ist sich zu verändern in ihrem gesamten Verhalten. Was sagen Sie hierzu?

FH: Grundsätzlich ist es natürlich so, als Aktieninvestor, auch als großer Aktieninvestor mit dem 150 Millionen bei dem Fonds z.B. habe ich natürlich einen Minianteil an einem Unternehmen und kaufe es jemandem anonym an der Börse ab oder verkaufe und die Firma kriegt davon nichts mit. Entscheidend wird sein in den nächsten Jahren wird es mehr Investoren und mehr Fonds geben, die ähnliche Strategien durchführen, weil dann wird es irgendwann so sein wenn man den entsprechenden Marktanteil hat, wir bei Kepler haben um die 7%, das ist auch in Östereich ungefähr der Schnitt, wenn der bei 20%, 25% oder 30% liegt an nachhaltigen Investoren, die dann alle ähnliche Firmen gut oder schlecht finden, dann wird es natürlich für Firmen, wenn sie an den Kaptialmarkt herantreten, einerseits weil sie das Geld auf der Fremdkapitalseite brauchen, aber auch andererseits auf der Eigenkapitalseite und da ist es für Unternehmen entscheidend, dass ich Investoren habe, die bereit sind meine Aktien zu kaufen, also neue Aktien die ausgegeben werden zu kaufen. Wenn der Marktanteil dementsprechend groß sein wird, werden die Firmen noch viel mehr als jetzt darauf schauen müssen, dass sie ein gutes Nachhaltigkeitsrating haben, weil sonst fällt ein Viertel der Investorenschaft weg und dann führt es genau dazu, dass die Kapitalkosten ansteigen. Ist momentan nicht so spürbar, wird aber denke ich mal, weil der Trend ist ganz klar da und wird sicher noch anhalten oder sich verstärken, dass mehr und mehr Gelder in nachhaltige Geldanlagen fließen und da glaube ich schon, dass das bei den Unternehmen ankommt und wir nehmen das auch jetzt schon wahr, dass es den Firmen immer wichtiger wird, dass es ihnen bewusst wird, dass viele Investoren dran hängen und dass einige Unternehmen sich hier auch weiterentwickelt haben. Das ist jetzt nur mal dieser Choice Ansatz, welche Firmen wir auswählen, es gibt dann auch den Voice Ansatz, nämlich direkt in Kontakt zu treten. Auch hier haben wir einen Ansatz, den wir seit vielen Jahren umsetzen und wo wir der Meinung sind dass das auch sehr wichtig ist und wo ich mir am Anfang gedacht habe, ok dann schreiben wir mal einen Brief hin und wahrscheinlich kratzt das keinen bei der Firma und jetzt bin ich doch schon 7 Jahre bei Kepler und als Ethik Aktienfondsmanager tätig und habe schon viele Briefe an Firmen geschrieben. Wir machen das so, dass wir Firmen, die entweder knapp unter der Schwelle sind, dass wir investieren könnten, dass wir die anschreiben und mit Info von Ökom Research ihnen bewusst machen, dass wir gerne investieren möchten, aber nicht können, da diese und jene Punkte im Nachhaltigkeitsrating noch problematisch sind. Das ist der eine Ansatz, der andere Ansatz ist, dass wir einfach Firmen, die wir im Fonds drinnen haben, die sich verschlechtern, wo auf 162

einmal irgendein Ausschlusskriterium aktiviert wird von Ökom Research weil es irgendeinen Skandal gegeben hat oder weil sich das Rating verschlechtert hat. Dann schreiben wir die Firmen auch an und informieren sie, dass wir jetzt leider verkaufen, aber sie können uns auch gerne ein Feedback geben und wir leiten das auch an Ökom Research weiter, es kann auch sein dass Ökom Research gewisse Informationen noch nicht hat, weil die Firma im Ratingprozess nicht so viel Mühe gegeben hat weil sie sich gar nicht Bewusst war, dass das eigentlich wichtig ist. Und das ist für uns schon ein wichtiger Ansatz, dass wir Firmen anschreiben, das wir denen bewusst machen, wir als Investoren ist es wichtig, dass sie investierbar sind und wenn Ökom Research das nächste mal anfragt, werden sie sich vielleicht mehr bemühen den Fragenbogen gewissenhaft auszufüllen mit dem Bewusstsein, dass hier Investoren dahinter sind. Insofern habe ich am Anfang gedacht, das interessiert die Unternehmen nicht so, jetzt komme ich aber mehr und mehr drauf, dass es die Firmen doch interessiert, sie schreiben jetzt auch mehr und mehr zurück und sind draufgekommen, dass es wichtig ist und zu einer Investor Relations Abteilung sehr stark dazugehört, dass man auch die nachhaltigen Investoren wichtig sind und dass dadurch die die im Haus bei den Firmen für Nachhaltigkeit stehen, da gibt es ja in jeder größeren Firma einen Nachhaltigkeitsverantwortlichen, die stehen natürlich total hinter diesen ganzen Ideen, die auch Ökom Research hat und wenn dann die von Investoren Briefe bekommen und die dann zu den Vorständen gehen können mit etwas handfestem, dann stärkt man deren Position und das haben wir schon immer wieder rückgemeldet bekommen, dass dadurch die Firmen immer wieder auf Sachen aufmerksam gemacht werden. Das geht natürlich auch von bis, wir sind gerade am evaluieren, ob wir hier auch einen Partner hinzuziehen sollten, gibt es ja eigene Engagement Dienstleister, die dann auch in längeren Dialogen und in einer Beratungsphase eintreten mit den Firmen. Hier sind wir gerade am evaluieren, aber grundsätzlich ist es für nachhaltige Anleger wichtig nicht nur diese Choice Komponente, sondern auch die Voice Komponente irgendwie auszuüben und eben genau dieses Problem, dass Sie angesprochen haben zu verringern zumindestens, dass es den Firmen mehr und mehr bewusst wird und je mehr Investoren das sind und je mehr Briefe sie bekommen und je mehr Millionen und Milliarden da dahinter stecken, desto mehr Druck kann man auch machen. Dementsprechend ist es wichtig, dass es Privatanleger, institutionelle Anleger gibt, die dann auch Geld in solche Fonds investieren.

I: Also Sie sagen, das Problem ist auch beidseitig, also einerseits von den Unternehmen, die in der Vergangenheit oft nicht auf Ihre Kontaktaufnahme reagiert haben, aber auch vielleicht von den Investment Fonds, die nicht unbedingt wie Sie das machen, den Kontakt aufnehmen? 163

FH: Genau, sondern einfach nur verkaufen und die Firmen bekommen das nicht mit, weil das irgendwo in der Börse passiert. Es ist auf jeden Fall ein wichtiger Punkt auch.

I: Die Kepler Ethik Fonds haben einen Kepler Ethik Beirat, was sind denn hier die Grundaufgaben?

FH: Grundsätzlich ist das Gremium einfach zweimal im Jahr tagend und ist für uns als Kepler Fonds eine sehr gute Diskussionsrunde, wo man aktuelle Nachhaltigkeitsthemen mit Leuten diskutieren kann, die nicht vom Finanzmarkt kommen, sondern die vielleicht technische Chemie studiert haben, an der katholisch theologischen Universität in Linz als Professor arbeiten, die aus Sozialwissenschaftler in einer beratenden Tätigkeit mit dem Thema Nachhaltigkeit auseinandersetzen. Die meisten sind auch irgendwo im Finanzmarkt integriert, zumindest als Berater, manche sind Klosterschwestern und haben von daher ihre Sicht der Dinge und das ist einfach mal entstanden weil auch kirchliche Investoren diese Ethikfonds auch mitbegründet haben und große Investoren waren und natürlich hat man sie dann mit an Bord genommen. Aber inzwischen ist es eine breit gestreute Runde, wo jeder seine Expertise einbringt und wo man intensich über Themen diskutiert. Vor einigen Jahren war es Atomenergie, zuletzt war es sehr stark das Thema Kohle, diese Ansichten mit einbringen und wir schauen dann natürlich wenn wir ein neues Ausschlusskriterium definieren oder die Schrauben enger ziehen muss man natürlich immer schauen, ob das nicht dazu führt, dass statt 300 Firmen nur noch 200 Firmen habe. Natürlich hat man immer diesen Spagat zu gehen und das ist ein sehr spannender Austausch den wir dann haben und die Entscheidungen schlussendlich treffen dann wir bei Kepler, aber für uns ist das immer eine sehr gute Möglichkeit in dieser Runde uns selber mit aktuellsten Themen auszutauschen und das Feedback, das wir auch bekommen in den Diskussionen, die Ausrichtung der Fonds weiter zu entwickeln.

I: Und wie würden Sie jetzt die Entwicklung von Ethikfonds bzw. SRI sehen? Sie haben bereits am Anfang und auch immer wieder gesagt, dass immer mehr Privatpersonen sich dafür interessieren und auch immer mehr von der Unternehmensseite kommt und auch mehr von der Investorenseite.

FH: Von den Unternehmen hat man das Gefühl, dass das eher vom Druck der Investoren kommt, dass sie etwas tun müssen, es gibt sicher den ein oder anderen der vorausgeht und ganz bewusst auch als Nachhaltigkeitsführer positionieren wollen und das als Wettbewerbsvorteil sehen, viele glaube ich machen wegen des Drucks der Investoren jetzt mehr. Von den Investoren selber kann man schon sagen, wir sehen vor allem in 164

Oberösterreich reges Interesse von der privaten Seite, hier geht es aber um kleinere Volumina, das richtig große Volumen kommt von den großen institutionellen Investoren, die sind teilweise auch durch regulatorischen Druck gezwungen mehr und mehr in diesem Bereich zu investieren, da gibt es auch verschiedenste Initiativen die laufen, auch auf EU Ebene, wo man merkt es geht einfach stark in die Richtung wo man sich bewusst ist, dass viele Investitionen nötig sind um Dinge wie das Klimaziel zu erreichen, dass es sinnvoll ist auch von der EU her in die Richtung Sustainable Finance geht und die Gelder, die grundsätzlich da sind in die richtige Richtung zu lenken. Das sind viele Entwicklungen, die wahrscheinlich noch einige Jahre dauern werden, aber die Richtung geht ganz klar dahin, dass auch viele institutionelle Investoren gezwungen sind weil eben einerseits Regulatorik, Gesetzgeber Sachen fordern, aber auch weil der Anleger sagt, dass sie nicht in kontroverse Firmen investieren, in den Pensionsinvestments drinnen haben und somit sieht man schon wieder die privaten Investoren, die den Druck machen. Ich habe schon den Eindruck, dass die Entwicklung auch weiterhin in diese Richtung gehen wird, dass das mehr und mehr kommt und dass es sich keiner mehr leisten kann, dass er sowas nicht anbietet, keiner der Versicherungen, der Banken etc. und das Volumen ist in den letzten Jahren stark gestiegen. Man muss bei den ganzen Volumen Statistiken auch dazu sagen, man muss schauen, wir sehen es bei uns intern, wir haben ganz strenge Fonds und wir haben nicht ganz so strenge Fonds, bei den Publikumsfonds, die sind alle sehr streng und wir sehen es auch bei den Mitbewerbern, dass es von Nachhaltigkeitsfonds statt 2.500 Titel, die im all coutnry world drin sind, vielleicht 2.000 sind investierbar, 500 nicht; bei den Nachhaltigkeitsfonds sind es nicht 80% die investierbar sind, sondern eher 10% oder 15%, die investierbar sind. Insofern muss man sich anschauen wie die Qualität dieser Nachhaltigkeitsfonds ist, aber grundsätzlich merkt man, dass der Trend besteht und das ist nicht nur ein Trend in Österreich oder im deutschsprachigen Raum, das ist europaweit, weltweit ein ganz klarer Trend, dass es mehr und mehr in die Richtung geht, dass auch diese Kriterien auch in der Geldanlage mitberücksichtigt werden. Von vielen auch nicht nur weil sie die Welt verbessern wollen, sondern weil sie erkannt haben, dass es einfach ein Puzzlestein in der Analyse von Unternehmen, der gefehlt hat und wenn man das mitberücksichtigt ist es auch aus Risikoertrags-Gesichtspunkten Vorteile bringt.

I: Das wäre es dann schon von meiner Seite, gibt es von Ihrer Seite noch etwas zu ergänzen?

FH: Eigentlich denke ich das wars so weit, falls es weitere Fragen oder Unklarheiten gibt, können Sie sich gerne melden.

165

I: Vielen Dank!

FH: Gern geschehen!

166

Transcript Interview 6

Participant 7

Name Melanie Gschwenter Position HR and CSR manager

Company Loacker AG Years active in company 1

I: Good, then let’s start with the first question: what is your general experience with CSR efforts and activities, could you tell me a little bit about your personal experience with CSR so far and in which fields of CSR is your company active?

MG: Talking about myself, my personal experience with this issue, it is often seen as a lit service, a service that companies feel they have to do where they should believe in it. Instead they sometimes just write it on a wall or in a book or somewhere on their internet page, but it’s more an issue they have to cover instead of them really wishing to do so. The recent experience, and now I’m talking about Loacker, it’s very much different because the company, Loacker is maybe a company that does not have the CSR policy on the homepage but it lives it instead. So what we really can see here is that it’s an issue, it’s a way of life more than anything else and you can find it in many different senses. So what the company has is the governance about it, that they really, the whole management, really tries to live it this way of working in our everyday experience. Every new governance you make, every company decision it always has to be based on this general sense of responsibility towards the company in an economical sense, but also a very strong social sense and from an ecological point of view.

I: You now mentioned the ecological point of view, I read on your homepage on your sustainability efforts, that you’re planting hazelnut trees in the Toscana; what other efforts is Loacker doing right now? What are the main achievements so far and what are the activities right now?

MG: Well, there are many things going on, what I can tell you about operational activities: we have, you know we bake waffels and the oven we bake the waffels in they obviously heat up a lot, they produce a lot of heat and we use this heat to heat up the offices. So this is just one

167

simple very small thing were you can make an ecological choice in a simple way so you don’t waste all the heat and use other resources to heat up the offices, you can do it in one process. The thing about the hazelnut plants: this is a collaboration together with the local farmers. What we really try to do is to have the whole supply chain, as much as we can, under our supervision. So that we can see which Nahrungsstoffe (=nutritional substances) we put in the soil and all the the techniques that are used to grow the plants and also to award them afterwards. It’s an issue also of policy control to be honest, but this is just to complete our supply chain. What we really look to do is to work together with our suppliers in the long term, so we look how they work, in case we can not produce the raw materials for ourselves but we have to rely on others we try to build up long term connections or relationships with out suppliers and choose the ones that are really having the same ethical approach as we have, working in an ecological way with social responsibility. Not only to work with and for the planet but also to work with the people that work on their farms.

I: What are the main reasons that your firm is active in sustainability issues or in CSR? What were the main motivators for being active?

MG: You have to know that Loacker is a family company, maybe you already know because you read the homepage, the company is owned by a family today too, so the shareholders are the family members and the issue of social responsibility is deep in their own believes. They have always chosen the business ways, which are aligned to their ethical believes. So what did they do, they did build a production plant here in Unterinn, Ritten and also made it bigger and bigger, always trying to have local working force. The didn’t want to outsource the production to somewhere because they were from here and they wanted to employ their neighbors and sons and daughters of their neighbors contributing to the growth of the whole community. This has always been a goal and this is also an example to show that the family has this type of approach to their own lives but also to the business in their own believes. Another example: we have a mensa (=canteen) here in the company and what they do is cook local food in cooperation with the farmers around here, like cheese producers or vegetable producers to have high quality food with no transport costs or environmental footprint.

I: You mentioned that it’s a family owned business and you also mentioned that they try to incentivize the regional and to have local people, are there also other motivators, like maybe your clients or maybe also your suppliers that have motivated you to be active in CSR?

168

MG: Well, I think it is also a marketing issue: we say that we are a quality food from the alps and that is something that works, we can guarantee a high quality that based on the higher price – the segment is a bit higher, but it’s high quality food – so behaving like this and guaranteeing this quality has shown us that we enter markets very well, so this is our selling proposition.

I: Okay, and I knew that it is a family owned business but the family is also in the management board, is that right?

MG: Yes, that’s right.

I: Okay, and how does the interaction work when it comes to CSR: are they directly influencing it or are they just giving some input, what kind of method does the family, the owners use?

MG: The family members active in the board are third generation Loackers, so the second generation is still in the company but less and less active. Then you have three sons, three men from the family who are in the board, in the sales position and also in the R&D position. Obviously they have an influence that is bound to their role but also to their name, so it’s a combination. In the board you have members, who are in the company since 13, 15, 20 years, so the very unique culture of the board is very familiar even if other members do not belong to the family but they are in the company for so long, so they feel about the same way. They have different opinions on everything, that is true, but their position towards society and towards ecology is very similar. Generally the ideas and the decisions are taken together, let me think about an example… we have the hazelnuts, the ones we have now are not ours, because ours take another five years to be ready, so we have a supplier ring for the hazelnuts and the question is then, what do we do with the big bags that the hazelnuts are delivered in. What do we do with that, it is actually rubbish, then the board decided that the bags had to be given to the wielding/yielding industry, because they use it very much, so we don’t have any costs of throwing them away and the live a second life. This is one of the simple decisions taken, but it is taken together.

I: So the sustainability or the thoughts towards sustainability is really deeply rooted in the business and also in the family?

MG: Yes in the everyday life. We have a pretty high budget on development – this is a HR theme – we have a very high budget obviously focused on some technical competences, for example chocolate producing and everything that belongs to our product. But we have a 169

quarter to a third of our budget which is bound to personal development, like for example managing stress or communication among each other, also we have a pretty high budget on safety and health issues, which are not only the ones the Italian law obligates us to do, but a higher budget for the employees to get their health up. This is not something we have to do but something we want to do, because this is also a way of experiencing and living your social responsibility as a company.

I: Yeah and it is also a way to keep the good employees connected to the company.

MG: Yes for a long term relation.

I: Any other CSR efforts, because you are an HR manager, any other efforts in the HR department, that you might want to speak about?

MG: We do help employees to get together and practice sports, which is nothing really new or different than other companies around here do, because the region is very known for this kind of activities, but the company really wants to incentivize these activities, we have the tennis club, we have the runners club and so on. Not only employees but also Vereine (=sports club), who ask for sponsor ship we help them as long as they are doing something either a in a social or ecological sense. Not only sports but also culture, musical bands, local bands, we are trying to support them. What we usually do is, that we do not put our Logo on these sponsorships, we like to sponsor them but we do it quietly. It’s not a marketing tool for us.

I: Okay, yes, seen that..

MG: Maybe I can add something more: we have tried as a company to base our being together on a let’s call it circle culture, Kreiskultur. What we do is – we have obviously a hierarchical organigramma, company chart maybe, otherwise the company couldn’t work. But we have a lot of decisions together as a group, were everyone can contribute with their own competences and expertise, regardless of their hierarchical position.

I: What topics do you work on in these groups?

MG: All of them, general topics. Obviously not every single small decision is taken by the group, but for example we had to develop leadership guidelines these days, it is not official yet, but we are working on it, we are almost there and we are working together on it to develop and create it. We have taken a group of people from different people coming from

170

different units, different ages, gender free, everything is in, and together we have developed these guidelines. So this is one example of this way of working and also of the company attitude. If you work like this in your everyday business the value and importance of every single person is very high and empowered.

I: Yes that’s really important. Seen that Loacker is a family held business, most of my questions, we can skip them. But one of the most important questions is how do you think the future of CSR will look like? Would you predict a decreas or an increase in importance and maybe you can also tell me a little bit about what the role of CSR will play in your firm, in Loacker in the future?

MG: I think and also the people I interviewed internally think that it’s going to have an increase in importance. Not only from a marketing point of view, its not a service but it’s really something you have to do. Because we have to honest, the children of the children of tomorrow are our future consumers so we have to promise them something too, not just the customers from today to look at. It’s a long-term promise, which is going to have an increase in importance. For what concerns us: we as an employer are taking the responsibility very serious and are continuing to work hard on the way we behave among each other, the way of communication, we want to treat everyone equally, regardless of their gender, their background or religion and this is something we really, really want to do and we are doing it already but it is having an increase in importance obviously because of the immigrant situation in the working markets and we are really keeping up the thought that you have to work with the resources responsibly, to use as little as you can and if you have any discard products to use them somehow.

I: That was it from my side, do you have any remarks or would you like to add something?

MG: Not for now, maybe you can send me your transcript and I can go over it again. I hope I could answer all your questions.

I: Yes, yes you did, it was very helpful, thank you!

171

Transcript Interview 7

Participant 8

Name Antonio Pieressa Position IR officer Company Buzzi Unicem Years active in company 10

I: Can you tell me a little bit about your experience with CSR? In which fields of CSR is your company active?

AP: I was a controller before and came then into the field of Investor Relations in Buzzi Unicem and of course the reporting of the environmental performance and the sustainability of the company is very important. We are publishing the sustainability report for sixteen years now. I was immediately involved not only in the investor relation, but also in the sustainability report. So, I have to say that is just the beginning you know, sixteen years ago the sustainability report was, we were publishing it but it was not so much requested. There was not so much request from outside to read our sustainability report. Recently the interest is much more, is not only referring to the economical information, financial information, but also to the, generally speaking, on the sustainability, it means particularly structure, the environmental performance, because the company determinates this strong effort to reduce environmental tax or social performances like human local communities and responsible social impartial is important for the company.

I: And what are current CSR activities of your company? Could you name an example, you mentioned environmental impact, is there some special project going on?

AP: So, the company has three main interests: of course the economic performance, the environmental performance and the social performance. Since now I have to say that we are not publishing targets probably we will too be starting with 2017, so I suggest to you, this could be very interesting for you, you can find a lot of information if you read our sustainability report and you can easily find out, I don’t know if you have already read the report, but you can easily find it online, it is in Italian and in English too. It is real interesting and full of information referring to all over the world where we have plants. So as I told you particularly we are showing in the reports our economic performance, at the end showing how we perform in each country, how much is going to the enterprise system, how much to the human resources, how much to the state of the institution, how much to the shareholders

172

how much to the sponsor and how much to the communities and environment. How much of our income is spent through all these categories. There is a second part that refers to the environmental performance and the main, we are very much focused on the use of fuel. So we are showing the energy mix we are using in each state, the thermal substitution which is important, greenhouse gases, because you know our industry has an important production of greenhouse gases, so we are showing our main indicator, we showing other atmospheric emission too, we are showing our waste, our total waste in each country. Also we are showing health and safety results, so mainly, as I told you, energy consumption, use of raw material, emission, the main emission, waste generation and water consumption too. Then we have social, mostly we are showing statistics on the employees, divided by gender, age, and then we have also information on absentees, hours of training of our employees, accident indicators by geography, accident indicators including contractors in the cement sector and in the ready mix sector. So these are the main indicators that we are showing.

I: Why is your firm active in CSR or sustainability, what were the main motivators for being active?

AP: The main motivator is, generally speaking the ethics of the company, and then also I want to tell you that our industry, is not a short period activity, a cement plant normally stays in an area for 50, 60, 70 years. So we want to stay here for a long, long, long time, in a certain area, we want to have a good relationship, with the environment, with the people, with the local people, with the community, so this is the main reason. Because our industry not like other kind of production. We stay in an area for a very very long time.

I: Who are the main influencers in your company? Are they your workers, your management, also maybe your shareholders? Has this changed in recent years? You said that the ethics of the company are very important and a main motivator for being sustainable. Who started with this?

AP: Another important point. The first is, as I told you before, we stay in an area for a long time, second these, another characteristic of our industry is that the main shareholder is the family. You know that the Buzzi family owns 58% of the company. So the family is really, really involved. Not only as shareholders, but also in managing the company. You could say that we are kind of a family company. The company will celebrate its 110 years since the first production of cement. So again a long time ago, the family decided they want to stay in business for a long time and so even in the beginning. Between the managers and the family there is a common interest, that we, the company stays in business for a long time, and we 173

think that sustainability and CSR is the way to achieve that. We want to have the best relation we could have with the people and the environment in an area. So, of course, to say that we listen particularly to the interests, and you know that the non-financial information of a report will become as important as the financial information. So, recently the information on sustainability is much more important.

I: You said that the family owns 58%, what was the reaction of the other shareholders? Were they more like, yes that is a good idea that you’re sustainable or didn’t they care much? That you’re thinking on the long term: as you said your plants remain there for 50, 60 years or longer. Are they for sustainability or are they more focused on the financial numbers?

AP: Personally I have to say, that my relationship with investors, that during the communication with investors I mainly focus on the financial information. That is 95%, but you know I have seen that for investors and shareholders, the fact that we are a sustainable company is considered a plus. So they already know that we are sustainable and do good for the environment and the people, so they don’t have to worry about that. They are probably not asking so much information on non-financial indicators, but they feel fine investing with us, because we also communicate our sustainability. In my opinion it is important and probably will be more important starting from 2017 on. What I told you now was generally speaking, but particularly speaking there are some investors that are mainly focused on sustainability. There are not many but I remember some particularly from Finnland, they do not only ask about financial information but mostly are asking for sustainable indicators. They are very much interested in our sustainability indicators.

I: Do they use the same means of communication as the other shareholders? Because you said they ask a lot about sustainability, is the communication between the shareholders or is it the same?

AP: As I told you, regarding to my experience, I am receiving many many requests of information. And I have to say that they come mostly investors and shareholders based in London or the U.S., 80-90% of the information they want to know are financial information. But, sometimes they are asking information about corporate responsibility and sustainability information.

I: As you already said the family owns 58%, how is the power, or the influence of the other shareholders on the company and also the sustainability? You said that the family is very involved, also as managers, but are other shareholders also involved?

174

AP: The family and the CEO, that is a member of the family, really take care social responsibility and also they take care, as I told you they own 58% so they have the majority, they take care of the these issues. In our board the independent members of the board are the majority and the independent directors they keep track and they are really open to listen to the requests of all the shareholders. There is really an openness towards the requests, also made by shareholders.

I: You said before that you think that sustainability will be of much more importance in the future and in your opinion which role will the shareholders play in this future?

AP: Starting from 2017 the value of the non-financial information is equal to the financial information. This year we will publish at the same time the financial report and the sustainability report. So non-financial information will start to be more important and this is the way, this is the direction in our opinion. The fact that the company is acting in the best way with the environment with the population, this is a plus, absolutely a plus. And also the investors and shareholders will be more interested in non-financial information.

I: That was already it. Thank you very much! Do you have anything to add, anything that comes to mind?

AP: No, I want to thank you for your attention to our company and I suggest to you to look on our website and read the sustainability report and you will find a lot of interesting information.

I: Yes I already read the report, it was very interesting.

AP: Okay, so thank you and if you have in the future some other curiosity you have my address and you can contact me.

I: Thank you very much!

175