All modifications are highlighted in the document
Response to reviewer # 1
Point # 1: In the page 3 the authors should include the header Introduction.
Response 1.
A. Thank you for your comment, the “introduction” section has been included on page
3.
Point # 2: In page 4 the authors explain the objective of the research like this:
"to offer a valid and reliable Spanish adaptation of the ICSR Q developed by Mory
using a sample of workers from Bogotá, Colombia". This claim is confusing, they are
refering to the language, not to the country. Maybe they should use the word "Spanish-speaking"
(and throughout the whole paper).
A. Thank you for your observation, The word "Spanish - speaking" has been adjusted
throughout the document to refer to the language in which the instrument has been
validated (ICSR).
Point # 3: In page 6 they refer to the Mory´s questionnaire tested in Germany. It
would be advisable to explain the sample characteristics. In this page there is also
a mistake: workface (maybe workforce?)
A. Thank you for your comment, additional information about the sample was included
(pp. 9-10):
“The original questionnaire was developed using a sample of 2081 employees from an
international operating pharmaceutical company with its headquarters located in Germany,
the sample distribution was 50.6 male, 17.9% were under 29 years, 24.8 from 30-39
years, 35.2% from 40-49 years, and 22% were older than 50 years. The tenure of the
sample was up to 2 years 17.3%, from 2-5 years 16.7%, from 6-10 years 22%, and 10
years and more 44% (7).”
B. The typo was corrected (now in page 9)
Point # 4: hypothesis 1 needs more theorical support.
A. Thank you for your observation, regarding to hypothesis 1: The Spanish – speaking
version of the ICSR Q retains a seven factor structure. We have included addition
support, included a description of ISO 26001, KLD, and OHSHA, the description of the
original sample, and information about the inclusion of Colombia in the OECD, and
how the HRM practices have changed during the last decades. now this section reads
as follows (pp 6-11):
CSR have evolved from their beginning as philanthropic activities to an structured
area of management that deals with the impact of organizations in their context. Within
the evolution of this area of management, the responsibilities with external stakeholders
were the first to become accepted the communities that could be impacted by the operations
of the company. Later, the responsibilities of organizations were extended to their
employees, primary to their contractual and compensation duties; this inclusion is
present in major models of CSR as for example the Global Compact, which includes four
labour principles related to the respect of association, elimination of forced labor,
abolition of child labor and discrimination (9), CSR certifications as in ISO 26000,
which includes a “core subject” of labour practices (10), or in burse indexes as KLD,
which include a factor called employees and supply chain (11).
ISO 26001 considers an organization's labor practices, including all work-related
policies and practices of the organization, such as labor relations, working conditions
and social protection, social dialogue, health and safety development of workers and
people. ISO 26001 focuses on 5 topics in the framework of labor practices, which are:
labor and labor relations, working conditions and social protection, social dialogue,
occupational health and safety, and human development and workplace training (12).
In addition to the above, it recommends that organizations provide skills development,
training and learning, and career advancement opportunities to all workers at all
stages of their work experience in a fair and non-discriminatory manner.
Social rating agencies are responsible for determining whether a company complies
with the principles of social responsibility, i.e., they perform a social audit, and
then the agency is responsible for certifying a company when it complies with all
the requirements of responsible practice. Another task of these agencies is to collect,
analyze and organize information on the social behavior of companies to provide investors
with homogeneous and comparable information. The MSCI ESG STATS index, known as KLD
Research & Analytics Inc, ranks 3,000 companies located in the United States. One
dimension considers social aspects and links community investment, diversity and equal
employment opportunity, human rights and labor relations. They are also responsible
for rating investments by companies seeking to promote women or minorities to senior
executive positions. They also highlighted investments by companies working on labor
rights initiatives in the U.S. and ultimately focused on understanding employee concerns
and retirement benefits (13).
Likewise, the overall objective for the creation of the OHSAS 18001 standard was "to
support and promote good practices in the field, maintaining a balance with the socioeconomic
needs of the organization", and as a general objective to improve the working environment.
in terms of health and safety, which in turn has greatly helped to help prevent accidents.
OHSAS 18001 has become an important standard, accepted by different business sectors
and companies of all sizes, and certified organizations are highly competitive companies
(14). Items considered in OHSAS 18001 include: understanding workers' needs and expectations,
leadership and worker participation, and risk assessment in occupational health and
safety systems. In addition, the standard covers all aspects of the physical environment
consisting of physical, biological and, most importantly, ergonomic factors that can
present risks to the health and safety of workers and is generally designed to ensure
personal health. opportunities and flexibility that companies provide to their employees
to monitor and promote their own health (15).
It is important to note that, although included in standards, certifications and indexes,
the “workers dimension” is generally understood from a legal perspective (i.e., if
the organization fully respect the local labour normative), leaving aside the stakeholder
expectations component of the CSR definition, as not all expectations are tied to
the legal duties of organizations. This is also true from the standpoint of organizational
reputation, as there is growing number of consulting firms and databases that rank
organizations based on their quality of human resources practices (e.g., benefits
plan, engagement practices). However, although popular among managers, these evaluations
are by no means congruent to any conceptual framework, as their objective is related
to consulting and professional advice. Some theoretical analyses have been developed
based on the consequences of CSR on individuals, as organizational commitment, job
satisfaction, OCB or job performance (2), but these outcomes cannot be considered
responsibilities per se.
A theoretical framework that can include these responsibilities is the social exchange
theory, which is based in reciprocity, if one party voluntary provides a benefit to
another, invoking an obligation to reciprocate by providing some benefit in return
(16). These exchanges between individuals goes beyond the monetary level; these social
relations are characterized by a continuous exchange process in which the individual
trade resources (e.g. their knowledge) while striving for a balance in the give-and-take
of these process (17). In social exchange theory, there are six different resources
that individuals can exchange: love, services, goods, money, information, and status
and could be present in any social relation (18).
“The rule of reciprocity applies in the case of CSR, because it implies voluntary
actions by the firm to support well-being of employees […]. Therefore, employees may
feel obliged to reciprocate these voluntary investments” (11: p.567). Following this
logic, Mory et al. (7) translated this framework to the organizational context, in
which, love is the care that organizations dedicate to employees (including job stability);
Services are company activities directed to the development of employee skills, as
training and education, or a healthy work-life balance. Goods are products and objects
creating an appropriate physical and psychological work environment, as well as preventing
discrimination against groups and minorities. Money consists of symbolic gifts, involvement
with financial resources, and sharing of profits with employees in a voluntary way.
Information is education, while status is prestige and recognition provided by the
organization resulting in empowerment (7).
Based on this classification of resources from the social exchange theory, Mory et
al. (7) developed the ICSR Q built on seven dimensions: “...the resource ‘love’ [is
related] to companies’ assurance of employment stability, ‘services’ to the promotion
of employees’ skills development, workforce diversity and work-life balance, ‘goods’
to a working environment which ensures health and safety at work, ‘money’ to companies’
tangible employee involvement through shares as well as ‘information’ and ‘status’
to employees’ empowerment in the decision-making process” (p. 5). This questionnaire
was tested in Germany were the seven-factor structure was confirmed with adequate
levels of validity and reliability.
The original questionnaire was developed using a sample of 2081 employees from an
international operating pharmaceutical company with its headquarters located in Germany,
the sample distribution was 50.6 male, 17.9% were under 29 years, 24.8 from 30-39
years, 35.2% from 40-49 years, and 22% were older than 50 years. The tenure of the
sample was up to 2 years 17.3%, from 2-5 years 16.7%, from 6-10 years 22%, and 10
years and more 44% (7).
Although Germany and Colombia have very different cultural profiles; for example,
Colombia have higher power distance, but Germany is far more individualistic and long-term
oriented (19), during the last 30 years, Colombia have opened its borders to international
commerce, and modified its labor regulations, what has resulted in Colombian companies
being more aligned with current global management practices. In addition, Colombia
was accepted at the OECD in 2020 after a seven year process in which the country had
to introduced major reforms to align its legislation, policies and practices to OECD
standards (20), improving several aspects on employment and work, as the strength
of the labor legal codes which give more guaranties to employees to improve their
employment stability, working environment and workforce diversity. In relation with
the organizations, the human resources management have been changing during the last
15 years, as skill development, diversity, work-life balance and empowerment are considered
key factors in the current HRM in Colombia (21). Finally, in the last decade, human
resource management consulting firms have entered in the local market, assessing the
quality of human resource management practices and how “attractive” organizations
are to potential employees; these consulting firms, also known as third party employment
branding have become very popular in Colombia, and being listed in their rankings
is very appreciated by organizations, for its reputational value, but also because
these certifications are associated with lower turnover rates among employees (6).
In particular, these consulting firms evaluate some practices that are common to ICSR,
as skill development, work environment, diversity, work-life balance, empowerment
and compensation.
Because of this, it is reasonable to expect that a Spanish – speaking adaptation of
the ICSR Q should preserve the original seven-factor structure (figure 1), leading
to the first study hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1: The Spanish – speaking version of the ICSR Q retains a seven-factor
structure.
Point # 5: In the page 7 authors should explain and theoretically support the variables
affective organizational commitment and normative organizational commitment in order
to support hypotheses 2a and 2b.
A. Thank you for your comment, a theoretical explanation to support affective and
normative organizational commitment was included. Now this section reads as follows
(pp. 11-13)
Workers are more attracted to organizations that promote ICSR practices and hence
demonstrate greater interest in fairness, equality, and loyalty. “The organization
provides benefits to its employees beyond its legal and financial obligations (voluntary)
and employees feel obliged to pay back these voluntary investments. Consequently,
it stimulates direct social exchange relationships between employees and their organization”
(16, p. 567). There is evidence that higher levels of ICSR components are positively
associated with higher organizational commitment. For example, Tarcan et al. (22)
proposed that organizational commitment reacts positively to initiatives related to
transformational leadership, job satisfaction and organizational trust. In addition,
in a study of 191 hotel employees in Indonesia (23), a confirmatory factor analysis
revealed that ICSR practices were associated with a decrease in employee turnover
and increase in organizational commitment (β = 0.27). These findings suggest that
ICSR practices may help employees to address challenges and opportunities from the
external environment and facilitate the development of a highly talented, motivated,
and committed workforce (24). Mory et al. (7) also reported a positive and significant
relationship between ICSR and both affective and normative components of organizational
commitment.
The relation between CSR and organizational commitment have been explored, as “more
socially responsible corporations are more attractive to potential employees and that
they may therefore benefit from larger applicant pools […] and a more committed workforce
because ‘employees will be proud to identify with work organizations that have favourable
reputations’ (25, p. 1702).
Farooq et al. (2014) reported that CSR toward employees (which includes actions as
career opportunities, organizational justice, family-friendly policies, safety, job
security, and union relations) is the strongest predictor of employees´ trust, identification,
and affective organizational trust (16).
In relation to ICSR, Brammer et al. (2007) reported a positive relation between organizational
justice and organizational commitment, in particular, these authors understand organizational
justice as an special kind of ICSR, as “beneficial actions directed at employees create
a reason for employees to reciprocate with their attitudes and their behaviours. At
the same time a positive relationship may be expected between procedural justice and
affective commitment because employees may be expected to identify with ethical organizations”
(25, p. 1705). Following this argument, we can expect that, as all the dimensions
considered in the ICSR Q are beneficial actions directed to employees, there could
be a relation between these seven actions and organizational commitment.
Affective commitment refers to identification, involvement, and emotional attachment
to an organization. Therefore, employees with strong Affective commitment stay with
the organization because they want to. Normative commitment refers to commitments
based on a sense of obligation to the organization (26).
Recent studies based on theory of social exchange establish a positive link between
employee’s perceptions of their companies and CSR, developing CSR practices creates
a good reputation among employees. Likewise the CSR toward employees the firm´s actions
must ensure the well – being and support of its employees, including career opportunities,
organizational justice, family – friendly policies, safety, job security, and union
relations (16).
A study conducted in different business sectors in Romania investigated the relationship
between factors such as organizational commitment and social responsibility towards
employees, and the survey response rate was 70%, showing a correlation of 0.447. The
results showed that social responsibility to employees was positively correlated with
organizational commitment and was the variable with the highest value, probably because
the sample was composed of employees. This was one of the first articles to show the
construction of a solid relationship between employees and employers (27).
We therefore expect ICSR to be positively and significantly related to affective and
normative organizational commitment.
Point # 6: In the page 10 they say: both English and Spanish versions are shown in
the Appendix. I have only seen the Spanish version.
A. Thank you for your observation, we have included both English and Spanish versions
(pp. 33-37)
Point # 7: In the page 11 there is another mistake: firs (maybe first?).
A. Thank you for your comment, the spelling error on page 18 was corrected.
Point # 8: To test the second set of the hypotheses they examine the correlations.
I think it is a very poor analysis, there are much more appropriate test to carry
out this.
A. Thank you for your observation, we changed the method, and now we used the standardized
values of the CFA. We have included the new results in page 21 and included an additional
figure (number 3) in this same page. The new results about H2 now reads as follows:
Our second set of hypotheses involved exploring whether ICSR was related to both affective
and normative organizational commitment. To test this, we examined the standardized
values of the CFA between ICSR and organizational commitment. As we can see in figure
3, ICSR was significantly related to both affective organizational commitment (β=
.81, p≤ .01) and normative organizational commitment (β= .80, p≤ .01). These results
indicate full support for Hypothesis 2a and 2b.
Fig. 3. Structural model for ICSRQ and organizational commitment
Note. Standardized loadings. **p < .01.
Point # 9: They say: “the proportion of informal work is lower” (informal? Is it right?).
A. Thank for your observation, the paragraph was confusing, we have modified in order
to gain clarity, now the paragraph reads as follows (p.26):
Despite our positive results, two limitations can be highlighted. The first is the
sampling method. Although two different samples were obtained, they were collected
in the urban context of Bogotá, where there is a greater representation of certain
service organizations and the quality of job positions is higher; however, the proportion
of the informal labor sector is around 50%. Although our conclusions characterize
the sample of urban workers, future research should aim to represent other regions
and economic sectors.
Response to reviewer # 2
Point # 1: Abstract/Introduction
No clear introduction or research framework that provides a foundation for a research
problem. In fact, there is not any section entitled as “Introduction”. The purpose
of this study is “to validate a Spanish version of the internal corporate social responsibility
questionnaire”. This purpose is weak. First, it is crucial to define a tangible research
question or problem. Readers need a strong reason why this study is necessary, what
is the contribution after considering the paper of Mory et al. (2016)? Why is necessary
a Spanish validation of the Mory et al. (2016) survey?
A. Thank you for your comment, the “introduction” section was included in the document,
we also have modified the introduction section, including more information about why
is necessary to have an Spanish version of the ICSR Q. Finally, we have also modified
the purpose. Now this section reads as follows (pp. 3-6)
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the “context-specific organizational actions
and policies that take into account stakeholders’ expectations and the triple bottom
line of economic, social, and environmental performance” (2: p.855). However, although
CSR is a highly dynamic area of research and practice, it have been primarily studied
from the institutional or organizational level, with far less emphasis on the individual
level (2). In addition, the majority of CSR research at the individual level deals
with the impact of CSR policies and practices on workers, with very limited research
considering the workers themselves as subjects of responsibility.
This is somehow contradictory, as CSR includes in the social performance dimension,
characteristics as fair labor practices and wages. However, due to the inclusion of
decent work as a sustainable development goal (3), the rise of talent management as
a new approach to improve attraction and retention of employees (4), job quality as
a goal (5), and third party employment branding organizations as legitimate players
in the building of reputation of organizations (6), organizations are more prone to
offer workers certain practices that improve their quality of working life and goes
beyond the minimum requirements stablished by labor law.
These sets of practices that traditionally are attached to human resources, are also
known as internal corporate social responsibility (ICSR) which is defined as “socially
responsible behaviour by a company towards its employees. This behaviour is mainly
expressed through employee-oriented CSR activities such as fostering employment stability,
a positive working environment, skills development, diversity, work-life balance,
empowerment and tangible employee involvement” (1: p.2). These practices of ICSR are
not by any means new to organizations, as they are nowadays present as standard work
practices following the trend of talent management and quality of work; however, what
have changed is that these practices are now understood not as additional benefits,
but as responsibilities that should be guarantee to all workers.
Several authors have revealed that actions aimed at internal social responsibility,
considering employee training and equal opportunities, contribute to increase job
satisfaction and, organizational commitment. To achieve this objective, this study
traces internal social responsibility from the social exchange theory to provide theoretical
background and explore the relationship between internal social responsibility and
organizational commitment in companies in Bogota, Colombia. To our knowledge, no model
has been proposed to explore the impact of employers on employees' internal perceptions
of social responsibility. Therefore, a theoretical synthesis of the impact of intra-organizational
social responsibility on affective and normative commitment is needed. Numerous surveys
have revealed that internal social responsibility leads to better organizational performance,
especially financial performance, but more recent studies, such as Mory et al. (2016)
tried to find out the relationship with organizational commitment (8).
To date, few studies have empirically examined various aspects of the dimension of
internal social responsibility and its impact on employees' organizational commitment,
as existing research has employed rather basic empirical methods.. This study focuses
on how employees perceive internal social responsibility from the individual as well
as organizational perspective and, therefore, to explain employees' perceptions of
social behavior imposed by the organization on employees. In addition, employees'
organizational commitment depends on the organization's efforts to develop internal
social responsibility practices, so it is based on social exchange theory and applies
a structural model linking individuals' perceptions of internal social responsibility
versus employees' emotional and normative commitments.
In addition, there is a lack of validated instruments that assess these components
of responsibility from the standpoint of workers, one of the few available is the
one developed by Mory et al. (7) which is based in the social exchange theory and
assess seven factors of ICSR. To our knowledge, there are no available Spanish-speaking
adaptations of this instrument, which will allow organizations to assess the full
range of key ICSR dimensions. This kind of measure will help organizations to check
the congruence between their own efforts to improve talent management and quality
of working life, and the actual perception of these variables by their workforce.
Although various instruments are available to measure different aspects of ICSR, to
our knowledge, there is no other instrument as comprehensive as the ICSR Questionnaire
(ICSR Q), which offer the possibility to evaluate seven different practices of ICSR,
and their availability Spanish language is limited. Such scale would enhance our understanding
of how internally motivated practices could improve organizational commitment and
could give managers a snapshot of the current state of these practices in their organizations,
offering actionable information about what their employees appreciate in their organizations.
The present study aimed to determine the psychometric properties of the ICSR Q in
its Spanish – speaking version, in particular, our objectives are: 1) to present an
Spanish version of ICSR Q, 2) to confirm the seven-dimension structure of the scale,
3) to determine the internal consistency of the ICSR Q, 4) to explore the relation
between the ICSR Q and organizational commitment, and 5) to examine the association
between ICSR dimensions and type of contract.
The remainder of our article is structured as follows. The ensuing section presents
the ICSR theory and hypotheses development, we then explain the methodology and present
the empirical data used for testing the hypotheses. Finally, the results of the empirical
analysis are discussed and their implications for both practice and research are presented.
Point # 2: Internal Corporate Social Responsibility section. The paper mentions ISO
26000 guidelines for social responsibility and KLD indexes, however, it is necessary
to explore in depth the content of this standards regarding the labor aspects. Other
fundamental standards regarding occupational health and safety such as OHSAS 18001
have been not considered.
A. Thank for your observation, we have included additional information about ISO,
KLD, and OSHAS. Now this section reads as follows (pp.6-8):
CSR have evolved from their beginning as philanthropic activities to an structured
area of management that deals with the impact of organizations in their context. Within
the evolution of this area of management, the responsibilities with external stakeholders
were the first to become accepted the communities that could be impacted by the operations
of the company. Later, the responsibilities of organizations were extended to their
employees, primary to their contractual and compensation duties; this inclusion is
present in major models of CSR as for example the Global Compact, which includes four
labour principles related to the respect of association, elimination of forced labor,
abolition of child labor and discrimination (9), CSR certifications as in ISO 26000,
which includes a “core subject” of labour practices (10), or in burse indexes as KLD,
which include a factor called employees and supply chain (11).
ISO 26001 considers an organization's labor practices, including all work-related
policies and practices of the organization, such as labor relations, working conditions
and social protection, social dialogue, health and safety development of workers and
people. ISO 26001 focuses on 5 topics in the framework of labor practices, which are:
labor and labor relations, working conditions and social protection, social dialogue,
occupational health and safety, and human development and workplace training (12).
In addition to the above, it recommends that organizations provide skills development,
training and learning, and career advancement opportunities to all workers at all
stages of their work experience in a fair and non-discriminatory manner.
Social rating agencies are responsible for determining whether a company complies
with the principles of social responsibility, i.e., they perform a social audit, and
then the agency is responsible for certifying a company when it complies with all
the requirements of responsible practice. Another task of these agencies is to collect,
analyze and organize information on the social behavior of companies to provide investors
with homogeneous and comparable information. The MSCI ESG STATS index, known as KLD
Research & Analytics Inc, ranks 3,000 companies located in the United States. One
dimension considers social aspects and links community investment, diversity and equal
employment opportunity, human rights and labor relations. They are also responsible
for rating investments by companies seeking to promote women or minorities to senior
executive positions. They also highlighted investments by companies working on labor
rights initiatives in the U.S. and ultimately focused on understanding employee concerns
and retirement benefits (13).
Likewise, the overall objective for the creation of the OHSAS 18001 standard was "to
support and promote good practices in the field, maintaining a balance with the socioeconomic
needs of the organization", and as a general objective to improve the working environment.
in terms of health and safety, which in turn has greatly helped to help prevent accidents.
OHSAS 18001 has become an important standard, accepted by different business sectors
and companies of all sizes, and certified organizations are highly competitive companies
(14). Items considered in OHSAS 18001 include: understanding workers' needs and expectations,
leadership and worker participation, and risk assessment in occupational health and
safety systems. In addition, the standard covers all aspects of the physical environment
consisting of physical, biological and, most importantly, ergonomic factors that can
present risks to the health and safety of workers and is generally designed to ensure
personal health. opportunities and flexibility that companies provide to their employees
to monitor and promote their own health (15).
In this part, the authors mentioned the social exchange theory as a framework for
the theoretical part of the paper. However, the presented hypotheses need a strong
connection with this framework. In particular, the Hypothesis 3 requires a further
argumentation, and it is important to explain the justification of this hypothesis,
since it seems that, permanent contracts present higher employee stability and consequently
higher evaluations of ICSR.
B. Thank for your observation, we have included additional information about the connection
between social exchange theory and our hypotheses. In relation to H3 we also included
additional justification related to the usefulness of this hypothesis to test construct
validity. Now this section reads as follows (pp. 11-15):
Additional evidence of ICSR Q validity
Workers are more attracted to organizations that promote ICSR practices and hence
demonstrate greater interest in fairness, equality, and loyalty. “The organization
provides benefits to its employees beyond its legal and financial obligations (voluntary)
and employees feel obliged to pay back these voluntary investments. Consequently,
it stimulates direct social exchange relationships between employees and their organization”
(16, p. 567). There is evidence that higher levels of ICSR components are positively
associated with higher organizational commitment. For example, Tarcan et al. (22)
proposed that organizational commitment reacts positively to initiatives related to
transformational leadership, job satisfaction and organizational trust. In addition,
in a study of 191 hotel employees in Indonesia (23), a confirmatory factor analysis
revealed that ICSR practices were associated with a decrease in employee turnover
and increase in organizational commitment (β = 0.27). These findings suggest that
ICSR practices may help employees to address challenges and opportunities from the
external environment and facilitate the development of a highly talented, motivated,
and committed workforce (24). Mory et al. (7) also reported a positive and significant
relationship between ICSR and both affective and normative components of organizational
commitment.
The relation between CSR and organizational commitment have been explored, as “more
socially responsible corporations are more attractive to potential employees and that
they may therefore benefit from larger applicant pools […] and a more committed workforce
because ‘employees will be proud to identify with work organizations that have favourable
reputations’ (25, p. 1702).
Farooq et al. (2014) reported that CSR toward employees (which includes actions as
career opportunities, organizational justice, family-friendly policies, safety, job
security, and union relations) is the strongest predictor of employees´ trust, identification,
and affective organizational trust (16).
In relation to ICSR, Brammer et al. (2007) reported a positive relation between organizational
justice and organizational commitment, in particular, these authors understand organizational
justice as an special kind of ICSR, as “beneficial actions directed at employees create
a reason for employees to reciprocate with their attitudes and their behaviours. At
the same time a positive relationship may be expected between procedural justice and
affective commitment because employees may be expected to identify with ethical organizations”
(25, p. 1705). Following this argument, we can expect that, as all the dimensions
considered in the ICSR Q are beneficial actions directed to employees, there could
be a relation between these seven actions and organizational commitment.
Affective commitment refers to identification, involvement, and emotional attachment
to an organization. Therefore, employees with strong Affective commitment stay with
the organization because they want to. Normative commitment refers to commitments
based on a sense of obligation to the organization (26).
Recent studies based on theory of social exchange establish a positive link between
employee’s perceptions of their companies and CSR, developing CSR practices creates
a good reputation among employees. Likewise the CSR toward employees the firm´s actions
must ensure the well – being and support of its employees, including career opportunities,
organizational justice, family – friendly policies, safety, job security, and union
relations (16).
A study conducted in different business sectors in Romania investigated the relationship
between factors such as organizational commitment and social responsibility towards
employees, and the survey response rate was 70%, showing a correlation of 0.447. The
results showed that social responsibility to employees was positively correlated with
organizational commitment and was the variable with the highest value, probably because
the sample was composed of employees. This was one of the first articles to show the
construction of a solid relationship between employees and employers (27).
We therefore expect ICSR to be positively and significantly related to affective and
normative organizational commitment.
Hypothesis 2: ICSR is positively correlated to affective organizational commitment
(hypothesis 2a) and normative organizational commitment (hypothesis 2b).
Workers with permanent contracts tend to have more advantages than workers with fixed-term
contracts. Employees with permanent contracts react to job stability with increased
well-being and organizational commitment (28), while employees with fixed-term contracts
tend to exhibit low satisfaction and limited organizational support, and as a result
commitment to the organization decreases and acquired knowledge is lost when employees
leave (29).
Numerous studies have revealed that unemployment has negative psychological and physical
effects on the unemployed. Social dynamics in employment have a positive impact on
workers' self-awareness and well-being. However, the employment relationship has changed
considerably and, with the liberalization of labor laws in the mid-1980s, the number
of fixed-term contracts has increased. In general, fixed-term employment has increased
in most OECD countries over the last 20 years, and in Spain workers with fixed-term
contracts seem to be trapped in a situation of fixed-term contracts and unemployment
(30).
Workers on fixed-term contracts are more likely to lose their jobs than those on permanent
contracts, simply because their contracts end for a short period of time, usually
one to two years. The economic hardships faced by the unemployed, in addition to the
potential functions that employment provides and those that are important to personal
well-being, are the consequences of the inability of fixed-term workers to plan and
control their own lives, given the nature of employment as they leave their jobs for
short periods of time. Job insecurity due to the risk of unemployment and relatively
low productivity in some jobs with long-term contracts, in addition to being associated
in most cases with relatively low wages and poor working conditions, so that job insecurity
can affect the mental health of workers, worsening their health status (30).
There are several reasons why employers hire workers on fixed-term contracts, companies
turn to flexible staffing to reduce contract labor and associated costs. By using
flexible staffing arrangements, companies can adjust staffing levels based on fluctuations
in workload during a day, week, month or year, avoiding the need to maintain staffing
levels continuously during peak hours. Similarly, companies can hire temporary agents
when employees are sick or on vacation, rather than paying overtime to regular workers
when employees are absent. Another reason is that companies are responding to competitive
pressures to reduce labor costs, and managers are looking to make their organizations
more efficient, in part, by using more flexible contracts (31).
Taking into account that employees under permanent contracts are expected to have
higher employment stability, and are compensated with higher levels of practices of
ICSR, we will use the employment contract as another way to validate the ICSR Q, as
if our validation is able to detect differences between type of contract. Thus, employees
with permanent contracts are likely to have higher levels of ICSR practices. We thus
expect that workers with permanent contracts report higher values of ICSR than workers
with fixed-term contracts.
Hypothesis 3: Workers on permanent contracts report higher evaluations of ICSR than
workers on fixed-term contracts.
Point # 3: Method
Misunderstanding with the information included. In the measures, it is mention that
both English and Spanish versions of questionnaires are included and only the Spanish
version is presented.
A. Thank you for your observation, we have included both English and Spanish versions
(pp. 33-37)
The internal corporate social responsibility is measured by 48 items, however in the
Spanish version of questionnaire only 45 questions are included. This requires a further
explanation.
A. Thank you for your observation, as we have explained in p. 19, we eliminate three
questions due to a low loading of the items in their dimension, this is a procedure
recommended in the validation of questionnaires (Hair et al., 2010). In addition,
we explain that the elimination threshold was .50. Now this section reads as follows
(p. 19):
We analyzed 48 items of the ICSR Q to test whether the Spanish - speaking version
retained the structure reported in the original article. After initial analyses, three
items were dropped due to small loadings of the items within the construct: one item
from skill development, one from work-life balance, and one from tangible employee
involvement. The loadings were below .50 which is below the recommended threshold
(41).
Hair JF, Black WC, Babin BJ, Anderson RE. Multivariate Data Analysis (7th Edition).
7th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ, USA: Prentice Hall; 2010.
Could the data collection bias the results? Almost 50% of the sample comes from a
university and the rest from private participants in a human resource management course.
A. Thank you for your observation, it is important to note that the original ICSR
Q was developed using the sample of a single pharmaceutical organization. We consider
that our sample is heterogeneous enough to include a wide range of job positions and
organizations, as the sample included jobs from 20 of the 21 economic activities listed
in the International Standard Industrial Classification of All Economic Activities
(ISIC) (p. 16). In addition, we included an specification of the original German sample
in p. 9-10:
The original questionnaire was developed using a sample of 2081 employees from an
international operating pharmaceutical company with its headquarters located in Germany,
the sample distribution was 50.6 male, 17.9% were under 29 years, 24.8 from 30-39
years, 35.2% from 40-49 years, and 22% were older than 50 years. The tenure of the
sample was up to 2 years 17.3%, from 2-5 years 16.7%, from 6-10 years 22%, and 10
years and more 44% (7).
Much more description is needed to improve confidence in the data being used, for
instance, when the data was accessed?
A. Thank you for your observation. We consider that the procedure we used in the collection
of our sample was quite rigorous and we have to highlight that before we collected
the data, the ethics review board of the Business department at Pontificia Universidad
Javeriana approved the procedure before the study began. In addition, we included
in p. 19 the information in which the data was collected (2019)
Point # 4: Results
The comments in this section are very superficial. And additional explanation and
argumentation of the results is needed.
A. Thank you for your observation. Maybe the reviewer refers to the discussion section,
as we consider that the results section is very descriptive and precise (pp. 18-23).
We have expanded the discussion and conclusion sections. Now these sections reads
as follows:
Discussion
Our aim was to validate the Spanish - speaking version of the ICSR Q proposed by Mory
et al. (7). Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that the seven original factors
were preserved due to adequate levels of reliability and validity. Like the original
instrument, the Spanish - speaking version showed a significant relation with both
affective and normative organizational commitment. Finally, as expected, workers with
permanent contracts also reported higher levels of ICSR and organizational commitment.
With these results, we have accomplished our five original objectives: 1) to present
an Spanish version of ICSR Q, 2) to confirm the seven-dimension structure of the scale,
3) to determine the internal consistency of the ICSR Q, 4) to explore the relation
between the ICSR Q and organizational commitment, and 5) to examine the association
between ICSR dimensions and type of contract.
By validating the Spanish - speaking version of the ICSR Q, this study contributes
to the field of internal social responsibility by confirming the relevance of the
identified factors despite differences in cultural context, workforce, economic sectors,
and hierarchical levels. The fact that Colombian workers in our sample evaluated questionnaire
items similarly to German workers is not surprising, since over the last 25 years
Colombia has undergone increasing integration into world markets through attraction
of multinational companies as well as adoption of international practices of human
skills management. Furthermore, uncertainties felt by workers as the economy and labor
relations become more flexible were also expressed.
Our results are in accordance with previous efforts as 26001, KLD, or OSHAS 18001,
as all these standards and indexes have components that look to assess the level of
responsibility that organizations have with their own employees in components as work
conditions, safety, training, or diversity. However, we consider that the Spanish-speaking
version of the ICSR Q offers additional advantage to these standards and indexes as
are the organizations which can apply the questionnaire and obtain valuable information
about how the organization is perceived among their employees, offering and insightful
evaluation of each one of the seven dimensions of ICSR, either for internal change
or as first approach to ICSR before opting for a more complex evaluation of ISO or
OSHAS.
At the theoretical ground, we have tested an instrument based on the social exchange
theory and our results are in accordance with previous research highlighting the exchange
between “good employee practices” and the retribution that employees offer to their
organizations trough organizational commitment, not just as normative commitment,
in which commitments is based on a sense of obligation to the organization, but also
as affective commitment, which is based on the identification, involvement, and emotional
attachment to an organization. These positive relations lead to higher job satisfaction,
and lower turnover rates and absenteeism.
We argue that the inclusion of a greater number of items per dimension in the Spanish
- speaking version was beneficial, since higher factor loadings were achieved than
in the original study. The only exception was the empowerment component, which showed
adequate but slightly inferior indicators than the original instrument.
In relation to contracts, our results have offered additional evidence of the importance
of a long-term relation between the organization and its employees, as they perceived
the relation with the organization in a more deep level (i.e., more responsible),
and then, they feel that they are really important to the organization, and in return,
they offer additional organizational commitment. In the comparison between the groups
with permanent and fixed-term contracts, empowerment was the only factor that showed
no difference among groups; this may be explained by cultural traditions in Colombia.
While the empowerment component reflects the autonomy of workers to perform their
tasks, Colombia has been traditionally classified as a collectivist country with a
high distance to power (19). Such values may clash with the promotion of individuality
typical of Anglo-Saxon or Germanic countries. The explanation may be that in contrast
to the other ICSR Q variables, it does not relate to a skill management practice,
but rather reflects a set of values cutting across skill management practices. As
for the remaining dimensions, the greatest differences were found in job stability
(directly related to type of contract), and in affective organizational commitment,
which may be related to other job outcomes, such as job performance or intention to
stay.
Social exchange theory postulates that voluntary benefits from employer to employee,
among other actions promote employee well-being (16). Employees in our sample positively
evaluated organization investments in well-being and affective commitment, with our
findings suggesting that ICSR also positively influences their attitudes. The results
are thus consistent with the theory of social exchange and with initiatives promoting
the development of employee skills.
Implications for practice and research
Our results have several implications for professional practice and research. Among
the practical implications, the availability in Ibero-American countries of a reliable
and valid practice measurement tool may allow the evaluation of ICSR practices by
employees. Monitoring may serve a dual purpose: to evaluate organization ICSR or skill
development (diversity management, work-life balance), and to use the relationship
between the questionnaire and organizational commitment as an indirect indicator of
the intention of permanence and involvement, especially with the strategic organization
personnel.
Implications for research follow from the validation of internal social responsibility.
Most research so far has traditionally focused on external stakeholders to the organization,
and as far as employees are concerned, research has focused only on compliance with
labour laws. Therefore, the validation of a measurement instrument in Spanish - speaking
may help to consolidate the ICSR phenomenon in Ibero-American contexts.
Finally, we hope that the validation of this questionnaire will promote research on
ICSR in Ibero-American countries, targeting the identification of ICRS profiles in
different countries of the region, or the relationship of ICRS dimensions to other
outcome variables such as organizational performance or talent keeping.
Limitations
Despite our positive results, two limitations can be highlighted. The first is the
sampling method. Although two different samples were obtained, they were collected
in the urban context of Bogotá, where there is a greater representation of certain
service organizations and the quality of job positions is higher; however, the proportion
of the informal labor sector is around 50%. Although our conclusions characterize
the sample of urban workers, future research should aim to represent other regions
and economic sectors.
Non-representative samples may not adequately describe the workforce as a whole, and
estimates may include a selection bias preventing generalization of results to the
Colombian labour context. For this reason, an alternative longitudinal analysis may
be able to investigate the effects of ISCR factors on affective and normative commitment
from a different perspective. Future research should also focus on companies representing
different environments or economic activities.
Conclusion
Our validated Spanish - speaking version of the ICSR Q proposed by Mory et al. (7)
offers a reliable instrument to identify factors constituting ICSR and its relationship
with organizational commitment. Our investigation provided evidence of preservation
in the Colombian labour context of the same seven factors underlying the original
ICSR Q.
The ICSR Q also offered evidence of the link between internal responsible practices
for employees and organizational commitment, a relation that have also been reported
in general CSR. Finally, our findings also give additional evidence about the importance
of long term-contracts in the organizational commitment of employees, at the normative
and affective level.
We expect our study to stimulate further academic research as well as further ICRS
practices in the business context.
- Attachments
- Attachment
Submitted filename: Response to reviewers.docx
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6260-8095
