Abstract
Research into corporate responsibility (CR)l often relies on company publications and third party reports. Critics have argued that since such research does not take into account employee perceptions and attitudes to CR activities, it is not a satisfactory proxy for actual CR success. Motivated by the belief that employees are crucial stakeholders in the fulfillment of CR, this study aimed at investigating employee perceptions of and attitudes to CR importance and success as well as perceived incentives for CR activities. Furthermore, the study aimed at discerning to what extent external ratings are satisfactory proxies for actual CR success, as perceived by the employees. The sample consisted of 120 employees in three multinational industrial companies in Sweden. In brief, the study contributes the following four results: 1) There was a significant discrepancy between environmental responsibility (ER) and social responsibility (SR) ratings. This was true both regarding the perceived importance as well as the perceived success, where in both cases ER was considered more important and more successful than was SR. 2) Various personal attitudes and (corresponding) behaviors related to environmental issues was found to correlate with rated importance of CR. 3) PR and marketing incentives, compliance with regulation, and profit incentives were rated as more important reasons for CR than were external stakeholders such as customers, competitors, NGOs, and the financial markets. 4) There was support for the use of external ratings as a proxy for actual CR success, as perceived by the respondents.