The Performance Implication of Corporate Social Responsibility: The Moderating Role of Employee's Prosocial Motivation

Abstract

Although there has been extensive research on the corporate social responsibility (CSR)-performance link, full understanding is still elusive. A possible reason for this is the limited understanding of the underlying processes that affect the relationship. Grounded in institutional theory, which emphasizes the importance of micro-level intermediating processes (e.g., employees' perceptions and attitudes) to explain a macro-level association (i.e., CSR to organizational performance), we built a moderated mediation model where: (i) organization commitment mediated the influence of CSR on organizational performance, and (ii) an employee's prosocial motivation moderated the relationship between CSR and organizational commitment. Using three-wave time-lagged survey data obtained from 302 Korean workers, we found that organizational commitment is an important micro-level process in the CSR-performance link, and that the level of an employee's prosocial motivation can positively moderate that link. We discuss theoretical and practical implications, along with limitations and future research directions.