The Role of Community Influences on Socially Responsible Activity within SMEs

Context: Research examining small business social responsibility (SBSR) is largely centred on internal motivations of the organisation, such as owner/manager attitudes and beliefs. This study examines relational aspects of the business – community relationship, and accounts for profit-oriented SMEs as well as social enterprises. This responds to calls for further research for knowledge development in this area (Spence et al., 2018, Soundararajan et al., 2018). Increasingly, private and social businesses are looked upon by stakeholder groups to provide support to local communities, therefore this study examines the following question: “What interactions, relationships and contexts are identifiable in businesses, within their communities, that influences their socially responsible activity? (A view of multiple SMEs).” Methodology: The study uses qualitative data from 30 semi-structured interviews and surveys. The analysis is thematic, and data sets are structured to support analysis from different perspectives, and as a single data corpus, therefore accounting for differentiation in SMEs. Findings: Contribution #1: Cross-Pollination of SBSR, community and social enterprise theory has enabled a deeper understanding of community relations within and between smaller organisations. Contribution #2. SMEs engaged in SBSR experience growth and development stages in community relationships, as demonstrated in a 4 stage typology of business-community relations. Contribution #3. The concept of community parenting bridging the gap between reciprocity (giving back) and strategic SBSR is introduced, recognising stages of relational development between businesses and their communities. Limitations: As with all research there are limitations. For this study the need for rich qualitative data led to the limitation of the sample size. Based on this the sample is primarily in one geographic concentration, therefore, to replicate the study in other locations, and on a larger scale would be advantageous to test and compare the results.