CSR and Competitiveness European SMEs - KMU Forschung Austria

8 CSR and Competitiveness - European SMEs’ Good Practice - Consolidated European Report
• Link between increased competitiveness and CSR
• Innovative and non-standard measure
On the basis of these criteria the international research team identified a variety of more than 80
potential case studies from which 35 (i.e. 5 per country) have been selected to be analysed indepth.
Thereby, some “balancing criteria” have been taken into account to safeguard a heterogeneous
picture of the case studies as refers company size class, sector/industry, CSR topic
etc. The main characteristics of the analysed case studies can be found in the following table, a
more detailed overview is given in Appendix 1.
Table 1 Overview on analysed case studies
Characteristics Number of analysed case studies
By size class 1
Micro 4
Small 12
Medium-sized 19
By industry
Construction 4
Manufacturing 16
Real estate, renting and business activities 8
Whole sale and retail trade, repair of motorvehicles, motorcycles
and personal and households goods
Others (education, financial intermediation, other community,
social and personal service activities)
By type of CSR activity (“target group”) 2
Workplace (employees) 3
Market (customers and/or suppliers/business partners) 4
Society 3
Comprehensive approach (combining at least two of the above) 25
1 micro = 0 – 9 employees; small = 10 – 49 employees; medium-sized = 50 – 249 employees
2
among the analysed case studies no initiative solely focusing on environmental activities was identified; nevertheless,
many of the comprehensive approaches include measures targeting at the environment
Source: Austrian Institute for SME Research
Both, the context analysis as well as the detailed case studies have been included in individual
national reports for the 7 countries under consideration. Furthermore, on the basis of the
included literature and secondary data as well as the analysed case studies, national conclusions
have been derived with regard to SMEs’ engagement in CSR and the relationship
between CSR activities and the companies’ competitiveness.
This consolidated European report constitutes a compilation of the national reports, partly
supplemented by a supra-national perspective at European level. Chapter 3 provides a brief
overview on what is generally understood by “Corporate Social Responsibility” at European
level and within the countries covered in this study, respectively. Thereby, also shifts of emphasis
over time are considered. Furthermore, forms and types of CSR in terms of “potential
target groups” in general and for SMEs in particular are dealt with. Chapter 4 shows the most
important public and semi-public actors dealing with CSR issues at European and/or
national/regional level as well as their major strategies/measures as to this regard. This is not
supposed to constitute a taxative list of all relevant entities. It rather intends to pinpoint what
kind of (semi-)public bodies may be approached by SMEs, if they seek for support with regard
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