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Analysis and Critics of a Professional Service Company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report Bachelor Project submitted for the Bachelor of Science HES in Business Administration with a major in International Management Mark ANDRIAMANGA Bachelor Project Advisor: Eric MAEDER, Professor Geneva, 15.08.2014 Haute école de gestion de Genève (HEG-GE) Économie d’entreprise (International Management) i Declaration This Bachelor Project is submitted as part of the final examination requirements of the Geneva School of Business Administration, for obtaining the Bachelor of Science HES- SO in Business Administration, with major in International Management. The student accepts the terms of the confidentiality agreement if one has been signed. The use of any conclusions or recommendations made in the Bachelor Project, with no prejudice to their value, engages neither the responsibility of the author, nor the adviser to the Bachelor Project, nor the jury members nor the HEG. “I attest that I have personally accomplished this work without using any sources other than those cited in the bibliography. Furthermore, I have sent this document by email, to the address supplied by my adviser, for analysis by the plagiarism detection software URKUND (http://www.urkund.com/int/en/student_gorsahar.asp). ” Geneva, 15.08.2014 Mark ANDRIAMANGA Analysis and Critics of a Professional Service Company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report Mark ANDRIAMANGA ii Acknowledgements First of all I would like to thank Mrs. Fanny SULMONI and Mrs. Elaine COHEN for their collaboration and interesting inputs on the subject of my Bachelor Thesis. Furthermore, I wish to express my sincere thanks to Mr. Eric MAEDER for his advising work, comments and feedbacks on my Thesis, as well as providing me with books and articles related to the subject. I also would like to thank one of my classmates and friend for constantly sending me emails and providing me with articles in relation with the subject of my Thesis, as well as his listening and feedbacks skills. Last but not least, I place on record, my sense of gratitude to those who took on their free time to read and review my work, and all who, directly or indirectly, helped me throughout the writing process of my Bachelor Thesis. Analysis and Critics of a Professional Service Company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report Mark ANDRIAMANGA iii Executive Summary The thesis explores a topic that has been insignificantly addressed in Corporate Social Reporting (CSR) literature: CSR within professional service companies, more specifically the quality of CSR reporting within a professional service company. Considering that Sustainability and CSR have become hot topics in the recent years, it is with no surprise that CSR reporting, which measures and reports sustainable impacts, has become a worldwide mainstream business practice. Companies engage in CSR for several reasons, such as for competitive advantage, to be an attractive place to work in or to reduce cost. However, considering that CSR is not mandatory in many countries and for all companies, many still drag their feet in implementing CSR. PwC UK is one of the rare PwC firms within the PwC Network to publish a CR report. Using a Grid Analysis specifically created for the purpose of this thesis, the analysis performed on the report shows that the company produces a qualitative CR report in terms of content and quality. However, to be able to provide its stakeholders with the best CR report, the company should add certain factors, which have not been found in its CR report, include more details and update certain information disclosed. Improvements, such as updating its vision statement to include the company’s environmental concern, revising its objectives to be measurable, implementing an economic, social and environmental risk assessment and reporting on the results, are part of the thesis’ recommendations. Moreover, the thesis suggests switching to an Integrated Reporting method, in order to provide the company’s stakeholders with a broader view of the value creation, and encourages the company to take advantage of its leading position to be a “catalyst for change” (Appendix 1: 3) and engage its customers and employees to embrace sustainability. Finally, to raise the overall quality of its CR report, the thesis proposes to the company to be critical in its CR report and to offer a balanced CR report to its stakeholders. Analysis and Critics of a Professional Service Company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report Mark ANDRIAMANGA iv Contents Declaration .................................................................................................................... i Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................... ii Executive Summary ................................................................................................... iii Contents...................................................................................................................... iv List of Tables ............................................................................................................... v List of Figures ............................................................................................................. v 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Presentation of the subject ........................................................................ 1 1.2 Brief Presentation of the Professional Service Company ........................ 3 1.3 Literature review ......................................................................................... 5 1.3.1 Context ............................................................................................ 5 1.3.2 Definitions ........................................................................................ 7 1.3.3 Corporate Social Responsibility report ........................................... 11 1.4 Statement of the Business Administration Challenges and Context .... 13 2. Analysis............................................................................................................... 14 2.1 Methodology ............................................................................................. 14 2.1.1 Objective and limit of the analysis .................................................. 14 2.1.2 Documents used for the analysis ................................................... 14 2.1.3 Definition of the Grid Analysis ........................................................ 15 2.2 Corporate Social Responsibility within the company ............................ 18 2.3 Corporate Social Responsibility Report .................................................. 19 2.3.1 Content Factors ............................................................................. 21 2.3.2 Quality Factors ............................................................................... 41 3. Discussion .......................................................................................................... 47 3.1 Identification of potential improvements ................................................ 47 3.1.1 Content Factors ............................................................................. 47 3.1.2 Quality Factors ............................................................................... 50 3.2 Recommendations .................................................................................... 52 3.2.1 Content Factors ............................................................................. 52 3.2.2 Quality Factors ............................................................................... 56 3.3 Limits of the Thesis .................................................................................. 58 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 59 Bibliography .............................................................................................................. 60 Appendices ................................................................................................................ 67 Analysis and Critics of a Professional Service Company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report Mark ANDRIAMANGA v List of Tables Table 1 – Content Factors, Strategy & Governance .................................................... 26 Table 2 – Content Factors, Analysis ............................................................................ 31 Table 3 – Content Factors, Economic.......................................................................... 33 Table 4 – Content Factors, Social ............................................................................... 37 Table 5 – Content Factors, Environmental .................................................................. 40 Table 6 – Percentage Content Factors ........................................................................ 44 Table 7 – Quality Factors ............................................................................................ 45 Table 8 – Detailed Percentage Content & Quality Factors ........................................... 46 List of Figures Figure 1 - Sustainability Scheme ................................................................................... 1 Figure 2 – Grid Analysis .............................................................................................

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