Organizational Culture and Strategic Performance
har412
6csr.pdf
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’
Marc Ingham1 • Christelle Havard1
Received: 24 April 2015 / Accepted: 2 November 2015 / Published online: 11 November 2015
� Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015
Abstract More and more companies are developing
corporate social responsibility (CSR)-related programs
which imply strategic and organizational changes. This
article focuses on a public utility organization, the Groupe
La Poste, in which CSR issues and practices are linked to
its specific mission as a public service, thus defining and
explicitly structuring its CSR programs. We explore the
following research questions: Why did the Groupe La Poste
formulate explicitly its CSR program? What is the content
of this program and how it is perceived by managers? To
provide answers to these questions, we have developed a
conceptual framework based on a literature review linking
CSR to strategic and organizational change and we apply it
to the Groupe La Poste. The analysis shows a progressive
convergence between strategic and CSR trajectories and
sheds light into how an organization can progressively
integrate CSR as a central part of its strategic plan. It
confirms the role of central dimensions that support the
integration of CSR programs within the organization. CSR-
related mission and vision aim at orienting the organization
toward sustainability and responsibility. CSR-related
principles and policies transpose vision and mission into
commitments and guide the implementation and adoption
of responsible behavior while CSR-related shared values
underlie the whole program.
Keywords Corporate social responsibility � Strategic change � Strategic alignment � Groupe La Poste � French postal service � Public utilities
Introduction
Companies are facing increasing pressure and incentives
from their internal and external stakeholders to integrate
social and environmental concerns in their strategies and
core activities. To this end, they develop and implement
corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs which imply
strategic and organizational changes. Much research has
been done on the commitment of companies to CSR. To our
knowledge, however, only a few studies (Ngaha 2012;
Charbonneau and Caron 2009; Tirilly 2015) have addressed
these processes and trajectories in public utilities organiza-
tions. However, these companies, by their mission of uni-
versal service, have in their genes CSR concerns: the
provision of services to all citizens throughout the national
territory, and at affordable rates, a duty to set exemplar social
practices and dialogue. Nonetheless, these companies have
formulated a CSR program in the last 10 years. This is the
case for EDF (the French energy supplier) which has, for
example, negotiated an international framework agreement
on CSR in 2005 and 2010 (Sobczak 2012). These companies
are undergoing profound changes in their external and
internal environments, as it has been the case for France
Telecom (Ngaha 2012) or for Postes Canada (Charbonneau
and Caron 2009). These changes have led public utilities
organizations to define and explicitly formulate CSR pro-
grams to be an integral part of their specific mission espe-
cially since being a public service is part of their genetic
make-up, so to speak. We found it interesting to further
explore the issue: Why this type of organization elaborates
an explicit CSR program and what is the content of this
program? To provide answers to this issue, we developed a
conceptual framework based on a literature review linking
CSR and strategic and organizational change, and especially
the work of Maon et al. (2009).
& Christelle Havard [email protected]
1 Burgundy School of Business, Dijon, France
123
J Bus Ethics (2017) 146:563–589
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-015-2941-5
We used the case of a French public utilities organiza-
tion, the Groupe La Poste, which is an interesting case to
investigate our research questions. Indeed, the Groupe La
Poste showed its responsible footprint through its historical
public service mission delivered since the organization
exists. It is also known for its exemplary social and human
resource management policy developed over several dec-
ades (Vezinat 2011) and for its environmental and societal
actions implemented since the 2000s. However, this orga-
nization has quite recently formulated a CSR program and
communicated on it. Changes in its external and internal
contexts and their interplay triggered the evolution from
implicit to explicit CSR (Matten and Moon 2008).
Increasing competition and decreasing activity in mail due
to the development of e-mail coupled with increased
autonomy and diversification in the banking sector led to
the definition of new CSR-related programs which became
more comprehensive and more integrated in the strategic
plans. The issues relating to the implementation of strategic
and organizational changes, like employee mobility and
stress led to add responsible management as part of the
CSR program. Moreover, because of its size and its geo-
graphic scope (four business lines and about 17,000 outlets
in France), it is a big challenge to implement and integrate
the CSR program at all organizational levels.
Using Pettigrew’s perspective (1987) to analyze a
strategic change around the why (the context), the what
(the content), and the how (the processes), our research
questions are focused on the why and the what. Firstly, we
investigate why the Groupe La Poste formulated explicitly
its CSR program in 2010–2011 by addressing the following
questions: (1) What are the main contextual elements
which led to explicit the Groupe La Poste CSR Program?
(2) To what extent is this CSR program linked to the
corporate strategy of Groupe La Poste? Secondly, con-
cerning the content of the program, we focus on two
questions: (1) What are the main dimensions covered by
the Groupe La Poste’s CSR Program? (2) How are these
dimensions perceived by managers?
In order to answer the first questions related to the
‘‘why,’’ we will track the context variables which underlie
the program and the stages of the strategic and CSR tra-
jectories using Pettigrew’s perspective (1987, 1990). The
second set of questions requires the identification of the
key dimensions that have been made explicit in this pro-
gram referring to Maon et al. (2009).
The paper is organized as follows: the two first sections
present the literature review on the two theoretical frame-
works mobilized to answer our research questions (the
Corporate Social Performance and the CSR as strategic and
organizational change) and lead to the conceptual frame-
work used to start our empirical research. The fourth sec-
tion introduces the research design and methodology used
to conduct our case study on La Poste and provides
information on this organization and on the context in
which it operates. The fifth section presents the findings of
the case study structuring around the strategic trajectory
which has marked the evolution of CSR programs at La
Poste over the last 10 years and which has led to the
development of a more explicit and integrated CSR pro-
gram since 2011 and the analysis of the content of the
program. The sixth section develops a discussion around
the contextual perspective of CSR as change, the strategic
trajectory analysis of a CSR program, and the main
dimensions of the CSR program. Lastly, we present our
conclusions from this research.
Corporate Social Performance (CSP): A Framework to Analyze the Dynamic of CSR Program
From CSR to CSP
The flourishing literature on CSR has developed in many
directions. Garriga and Melé (2004) identify four groups of
CSR theories: (a) ‘‘instrumental’’ (maximizing the share-
holder value, strategies for achieving competitive advan-
tages, cause-related marketing); (b) ‘‘political’’ (corporate
constitutionalism, integrative social contract theory, cor-
porate citizenship); (c) ‘‘integrative’’ (issues management,
principle of public responsibility, stakeholder management,
corporate social performance); and (d) ‘‘ethical’’ (norma-
tive stakeholder theory, universal rights, sustainable
development, common good approach).
We referred to integrative theories, specifically CSP
models (at the organizational level), to start building the
foundations for our study. These models integrate and
complement streams of literature on CSR and corporate
social responsiveness and help identify the central dimen-
sions of CSR programs and assess their dynamics.
Models of CSP (Carroll 1979, 1991; Schwartz and
Carroll 2003; Wartick and Cochran 1985; Wood 1991;
Swanson 1995, 1999) bridge, integrate, and complement
two main streams of literature CSR and Corporate social
responsiveness. The first stream (following Bowen 1953)
views CSR as a social and/or moral contract and insists on
the adoption of behaviors acting in harmony with the val-
ues of the society in which the company operates. This
approach primarily deals with ethical, philosophical, and
moral stances and considers CSR as having long-term
motivations and objectives (Wartick and Cochran 1985).
The second stream ‘‘corporate social responsiveness’’
(Ackerman and Bauer 1976; Acquier et al. 2011) focuses
both on corporate receptiveness regarding social issues,
expectations, and their dynamics, and how companies meet
564 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
these expectations (i.e., what processes, programs, and
policies they set up to meet the objectives). According to
Wood (1991), Ackerman (1975) already suggests three
behaviors that characterize a responsive firm: (a) it moni-
tors and assesses environmental conditions, (b) it attends to
stakeholders’ demands, and (c) it designs plans and policies
to respond to changing conditions. This approach focuses
on the means and is more dynamic than the previous one,
and hence more oriented toward short- or mid-term results
(Wartick and Cochran 1985). Authors who are represen-
tative of this stream (Frederick 1978; Murphy 1978; Sethi
1975, 1979) insist on the practical and effective responses
to both stakeholder’s expectations and demands from
society (economic, social, and environmental), organiza-
tional realities, and managerial aspects. This stream of
literature also stresses the strategies and behaviors adopted
(reactive, defensive, accommodating, and proactive) as
well as their involvement in CSR-related issues and
activities.
An Overview of CSP Models
According to Carroll (1979), CSP consists of integrating
three dimensions: a definition of social responsibility,
social problems and issues, and responses to social issues.
For Carroll (1979) in order to fully address the entire range
of obligations business has to society, the definition of
social responsibility must embody the economic, legal,
ethical, and discretionary categories of business perfor-
mances. Carroll (1991) developed his conceptualization in
his ‘‘pyramid of corporate social responsibilities’’: eco-
nomic (be profitable), legal (obey the law), ethical (be
ethical), and philanthropic (be a good corporate citizen).
Economic and legal responsibilities are required, ethical is
expected, and philanthropic is desired. This categorization
of CSR domains has been used in the CSP literature pre-
sented in this section and in other fields. Schwartz and
Carroll (2003) develop a new model to address issues
raised from their categorization/domains in the pyramid
framework: the idea that there is a ‘‘hierarchy’’ in the
importance and the value attributed to these domains:
economic as the least valued and philanthropic the most
important and valued. The pyramid cannot fully capture the
overlapping nature of CSR domains—the philanthropic
domain might not be considered as a responsibility. The
new model proposes that this domain would be better
subsumed into ethical and economic responsibilities.
Finally, the development of economic, legal, and ethical
domains is incomplete. ‘‘A major feature of the three-do-
mains model is the depiction of economic, legal and ethical
domains of responsibility in a Venn diagram which high-
lights the overlapping nature of the domains and the
resultant creation of seven categories in which CSR may be
conceptualized, analyzed, and illustrated’’: (1) purely
economic, (2) purely legal, (3) purely ethical, (4) eco-
nomic/ethical, (5) economic/legal, (6) legal/ethical, and (7)
economic/legal/ethical. The ideal overlap is at the center
where economic, legal, and ethical responsibilities are
simultaneously fulfilled (Schwartz and Carroll 2003,
p. 513).
Watrick and Cochran (1985, p. 767) develop a CSP
model based on the three main dimensions:
– Principles that are related to corporate social respon-
sibilities (economic, legal, ethical, discretionary), thus
defining business as a social contract and business as
social agents. These principles have a philosophical
orientation.
– Processes that characterize social responsiveness and
are related to behaviors (reactive, defensive, accom-
modative, proactive), dealing with the capacity to
respond to changing societal conditions and managerial
approaches to developing responses. These processes
have an institutional orientation.
– Policies that consist of social issues management:
identification, analysis, and response development.
These policies have an organizational orientation.
Wood (1991) presents and discusses a CSP model that is
based on the previous ones (Carroll 1979; Wartick and
Cochran 1985) and goes a step further by integrating social
outcomes as a central dimension. According to Wood
(1991, p. 708), ‘‘outcomes are divided into three types: the
social impacts of corporate behavior, regardless of the
motivation for such behavior or the process by which it
occurs; the programs companies use to implement
responsibility and/or responsiveness; and the policies
developed by companies to handle social issues and
stakeholder interests.’’ For Wood (1991, p. 693), CSP is ‘‘a
business organization’s configuration of principles of social
responsibility, processes of social responsiveness, and
policies, programs, and observable outcomes as they relate
to the firm’s societal relationships.’’
Swanson (1995) reoriented Wood’s model by introduc-
ing normative principles, organizational culture, and
managerial decisions. This reoriented CSP model ‘‘for-
mulates decision-making in terms of ethical and value
processes that are linked across individual, organizational,
and societal levels.’’ Swanson (1999) reformulated corpo-
rate social performance topics according to research strat-
egy enabling to overcoming the lack of integration between
normative and descriptive approaches of business and
society. This research strategy consists in organizing
responsibility and responsiveness according to values,
conceptualizes responsibility and responsiveness as deci-
sion-based value processes, and interprets value processes
as ideal types of responsiveness.
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 565
123
Using her model to review the debated literature on
corporate social performance (including their links with
financial ones—FP), Wood (2010, p. 75) notices that
‘‘there is a theoretically strange focus on the firm rather
than stakeholders and societies’’ and draws three major
conclusions from her review. (1) The CSP-FP connection is
now reasonably well established in general, despite the
remaining measurement, methodological, and theoretical
issues surrounding it. (2) A huge volume of empirical CSP
works focus on outcomes of ‘‘socially responsible’’ (or
irresponsible) behaviors of various sorts on the firm itself—
not just its FP per se, but also reputation, innovation, access
to needed resources, and so on. (3) A lot more is known
about CSP than many imagine—it is just not called CSP.
As an illustration for this last conclusion, Wood mentions
the dimensions of Swanson’s (1995) reoriented model as a
new research area for the measurement of CSP.
CSP models form an important theoretical foundation
from which to address CSR-related programs as organi-
zational change processes and numerous researches in the
field referred to them as a part of their conceptual back-
ground and/or in the discussion of their researches
(Maignan et al. 2005; Maon et al. 2010; Mirvis and Goo-
gins 2006; Halme and Laurila 2009, …).
CSR Programs as Strategic and Organizational Change Processes
The elaboration and implementation of CSR programs are
viewed as strategic and organizational change processes.
Even if they can overlap, we identified three principal
streams of literature we used to interpret our case: the first
stream focuses on stages and phases of CSR development;
the second identifies levels and degrees of CSR integration;
and the third focuses on the dimensions in designing and
implementing a CSR program and their interplay.
CSR Trajectories1
A first set of publications focuses on stages and phases in
CSR development (Dunfy et al. 2007; Maon et al. 2010;
Mirvis and Googins 2006; van Marrevijk and Werre 2003;
Zadek 2004).
Dunfy et al. (2007) identify six phases (three waves) and
their characteristics : first wave, rejection, non-respon-
siveness, and compliance; second wave, efficiency (system
design: systematic EMS and HRM, reporting, risk avoid-
ance, improved efficiency and engagement) and strategic
proactivity (innovative capacity: proactive and strategic,
high-level interpersonal/soft skills, structural redesign for
flexibility, stakeholder management); and third wave, sus-
tainability (partnering for renewal: transformative culture,
redefine business relationships and context). The authors
discuss pathways toward sustainability than can be per-
formed through incremental processes or transformational
change strategies.
Using Nike as a case study to link organizational
learning stages as companies develop a sense of CSR with
issue maturity, Zadek (2004) identifies five stages in the
learning curve: (a) defensive; (b) compliance (adopt a
policy-based compliance approach as a cost of doing
business to mitigate the erosion of economic value in the
mid-term because of ongoing reputation and litigation
risks); (c) managerial (organizations embed the societal
issue in their core management processes to mitigate the
erosion of economic value in the medium term and to
achieve longer term gains by integrating responsible busi-
ness practices into their daily operations; (d) strategic
(organizations integrate the societal issue in their core
business strategies to enhance economic value in the long
term and to gain first mover advantage by aligning strategy
and process innovation with the societal issue); and
(e) civil (organizations promote broad industry participa-
tion in corporate responsibility to enhance long-term eco-
nomic value by overcoming any first mover disadvantage
and to realize gains through collective action).
van Marrevijk and Werre (2003) describe six types of
organizations at different developmental stages with dif-
ferent forms of corporate sustainability (CS) and show
multiple levels of CS ambitions, related value systems and
supporting institutional structures. Starting with the iden-
tification of six ambition levels, the differentiation in (CS)
levels is obtained by starting off from the underlying
principles (or value systems) adding a fourth P to the
existing triple P (Profit, People, Planet). This leads to six
levels of Corporate sustainability: ‘‘Pre-Cs’’ (basically no
ambition for CS; ‘‘Compliance-driven CS’’ (CS perceived
as an obligation-correct behavior providing welfare to
society within the limits of regulation ? some philan-
thropic and stewardship); ‘‘Profit driven CS’’ (integration
of social-ethical-ecological aspects into business operations
and decisions provided it contributes to the financial bot-
tom line); ‘‘Caring CS’’ (balancing economic social and
ecological concerns—the motivation for CS is that human
potential, social responsibility, and care for the planet are
as such important); ‘‘Synergistic CS’’ (search for a well-
balanced functional solutions creating value in the eco-
nomic, social, and ecological realms of corporate perfor-
mance in a synergetic way, win together approach with all
relevant stakeholders, the motivation for CS is that sus-
tainability is important in itself); and ‘‘Holistic CS’’ (CS is
fully integrated and embedded in every aspect of the
1 In this section, we briefly present the characteristics associated
to the stages that are used to interpret our case study.
566 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
organization, aimed at contributing to the quality and
continuation of life of every being and entity, now and in
the future, the motivation for CS is that sustainability is the
only alternative since all beings and phenomena are
mutually interdependent).
Mirvis and Googins (2006) used the Greiner’s (1972)
model of stages of evolution and revolution as organization
grows to build their development path of Corporate Citi-
zenship focusing on seven dimensions of citizenship that
vary at each stage: citizenship concept (CC), strategic
intent (SI), leadership (L), structure (S), issues manage-
ment (IM), stakeholder relationships (SR), and trans-
parency (T). They identified five stages: (1) ‘‘elementary’’;
(2) ‘‘engaged’’; (3) ‘‘innovative’’ (CC: stakeholder man-
agement, SI: business case, L: steward on top of it, S: cross
functional coordination, IM: responsive programs, SR:
mutual influence, T: public reporting); (4) ‘‘integrated’’
(CC: sustainability or triple bottom line, SI: value propo-
sition, L: champion in front of it, S: organizational align-
ment, IM: proactive systems, SR: partnership, T:
assurance); and (5) ‘‘transforming’’ (CC: Change the game,
SI: market creation or social change, L: Visionary, ahead of
the pack, S: mainstream business driven, IM: defining, SR:
multi-organization alliances, T: full disclosure).
Finally, the most elaborated model we found to interpret
our case is Maon et al. (2010) consolidative model. The
logic behind this model ‘‘stems from the assumption that an
organization’s CSR development state reflects certain
characteristics of its cultural, moral, strategic and organi-
zational features’’ (p. 29). The authors start with the
identification of three cultural phases: (a) ‘‘cultural reluc-
tance-phase’’ (CSR ignored or considered only in terms of
constraints), (b) ‘‘cultural-grasp phase’’ (organizations
become familiar with CSR principles); and (c) ‘‘cultural
embedment-phase’’ (the organizational culture fully
embraces morally based principles that influence its orga-
nizational outcomes). Then Maon et al. (2010) present and
discuss their key features (in terms of approach to CSR:
social responsiveness, purpose of commitment to CSR,
CSR influence on organizational goals, and nature of CSR-
related goals) and the three corresponding stakeholder
culture types (limited morality: corporate egoist, limited
morality: instrumentalist, and broad morality). This leads
to the development of a seven-stage model of CSR
development associated to these phases; one stage for the
cultural reluctance phase (1 dismissing stage), three for the
cultural grasp phase (2 Self-protecting, 3 Compliance
seeking, and 4 Capability seeking), and three for the cul-
tural embedment phase (5 caring, 6 strategizing, and 7
transforming). For each stage, the authors indicate the CSR
view and prominence in the organizational culture and a set
of dimensions (and sub-dimensions) of CSR development:
knowledge and attitudinal (organizational sensitivity to
CSR issues, drivers of CSR initiatives development, and
support of top management), strategic (social responsive-
ness, rationale behind CSR initiatives, performance
objectives, transparency, and reporting), and tactical and
operational (stakeholders relationship, resources commit-
ment, structuring of CSR initiatives, coordination of CSR
issues).
These different models allow in building a framework to
analyze the CSR strategic trajectories presented below.
Levels and Degrees of Integration
A second set of publications focuses on the degree of CSR
integration in organizations in a more ‘‘static’’ view by
identifying CSR types and ‘‘states’’ and levels of integration
(Frederick 1986).
Halme and Laurila (2009) distinguish three CSR types:
philanthropy, CSR integration (emphasis on conducting
existing business operations more responsibly), and CSR
innovation (emphasis on developing new business models for
solving social and environmental problems) and explore the
potentialof CSRtype forexpectedfinancial andsocial benefits.
Martinuzzi and Krumay (2013) present and discuss a
referential stage model for CSR implementation by linking
CSR to four business operations: project management
(project-oriented CSR: ‘‘doing good!’’), quality manage-
ment (quality-oriented CSR: ‘‘avoiding doing bad!’’),
strategic management (strategic CSR: ‘‘Rethink your
business!’’), and organizational learning and change
(transformational CSR: ‘‘Stay flexible’’). Martinuzzi and
Krumay (2013) discuss the increasing impacts on the
company, its competitiveness, the society, and the envi-
ronment that are associated to these stages (from project-
oriented to transformational CSR).
Based on Siggelkow’s (2002) analysis of organizational
change, Yuan et al. (2011) develop an ‘‘organizing
framework’’ which shows how a firm can integrate CSR
initiatives. The authors identify seven patterns through
which new recurring CSR initiatives can be included and
integrated as practices in conventional core operations and
routines (p. 81): (1) Born CSR-oriented: new CSR initia-
tives are integrated in CSR core practices which are core
business routines; (2) Patching: creating new CSR core
practices; (3) Thickening: creating peripheral, core-ex-
tending CSR practices; (4) Positioning: creating peripheral,
independent CSR practices; (5) Relabeling: recognizing
peripheral, core-extending, and independent routines as
CSR practices; (6) Trimming as precursor of reconstruct-
ing: eliminating routines detrimental to CSR practices
(often followed by pattern 2-3-4 or 7); (7) Cooperating:
creating CSR practices through alliances.
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 567
123
Designing and Implementing CSR Programs
A third set of publications focuses on the central dimen-
sions of CSR programs and their integration (Cramer 2005;
Maignan et al. 2005; Maon et al. 2009; Asif et al. 2013;
Werre 2003). This stream focuses on the practical guide-
lines to successfully design and implement these programs
(Maon et al. 2009).
In his analysis of the Chiquita Case, Werre (2003) views
CSR implementation as a change process. Three aspects
are particularly relevant to successfully implement CSR:
sensitivity to the organizational environment, awareness of
values and clear leadership. The CSR implementation
model consists of four stages that have to be covered in
order to achieve a lasting change: (1) raising top manage-
ment awareness; (2) formulating CSR-vision and core
corporate values; (3) changing organizational behavior;
and (4) anchoring the change.
For Werre (2003, p. 248), ‘‘The extent to which it is
useful to cover a certain phase and the manner in which the
phase is covered however should be tailored to the specific
context of an organization.’’ Change in awareness can both
be reactive and left open (example negative coverage in
press, pressures by NGOs, can induce top management in a
reactive manner to take an increased interest in CSR) or
proactive. Proactive awareness raising has two main ori-
entations: raising awareness of core values (internal driving
force) or/and raising the sensitivity for developments in the
environment (external drivers). An effective vision and a
set of core corporate values have two main characteristics:
they are an appropriate reaction to the external environ-
ment and they are sources of inspiration for the employees
of the company. Change in organizational behavior can be
supported by numerous dimensions and actions (translate
the implications of the vision and core values, use general
change cycle (Plan-do-check-adapt), continuous commu-
nication to increase the awareness, energizing people, etc.).
Cramer (2005) identified 6 main activities to design a
structured approach of CSR within organizations: (1) to list
the expectations and demands of the stakeholders; (2) to
formulate a vision and a mission with regard to CSR and, if
desired, a code of conduct; (3) to develop short- and
longer-term strategies with regard to CSR and, using these,
to draft a plan of action; (4) to set up a monitoring and
reporting system; (5) to embed the process by rooting it in
quality and management systems; and (6) to communicate
internally and externally about the approach and the results
obtained. The sequence of implementing these various
activities differed among the companies that participated in
the research project.
Maignan et al. (2005) developed a stakeholder model for
implementing social responsibility in marketing based on a
step by step approach consisting of seven stages (with
feedback loops): step 1. discovering organizational norms
and values; step 2. identifying stakeholders and their sal-
ience; and step 3. identifying stakeholder issues. These 3
steps lead to step 4. assessing the meaning of CSR, step 5.
auditing current practices, and step 6. implementing CSR
initiatives that lead to both step 7. promoting CSR and step
8. gaining stakeholder feedback. The model contains a
short-term feedback loop from step 8 to step 5 and a long-
term feedback loop from step 8 to steps {1, 2, and 3}.
Asif et al. (2013) developed an integrated management
system approach to CSR by applying the ‘‘plan, do, check,
and adapt’’ sequences (PDCA cycle) to characterize the
top-down approach of CSR integration into organizational
processes while considering ‘‘bottom-up’’ inputs from the
relationships with stakeholders community. The central
dimensions in this framework are the systematization of
stakeholder demands (thanks to environmental scanning to
identify and prioritize stakeholders’ demands leading to an
integrated management system for the organization (inte-
grated manual, procedures, and processes). This top-down
integration of CSR through integrated management sys-
tems is nurtured by the evaluation of CSR indicators (in-
tegrated auditing and benchmarking) leading to CSR
reporting/stakeholder communication. The framework
shows a feedback loop for continual improvement from
reporting/stakeholder communication to environmental
scanning and an innovation and learning development loop
from report/stakeholder communication to interactions
with stakeholders/community.
Maon et al. (2009) adapted Lewin’s model of change
(Lewin 1951) composed of three main phases: unfreeze
(Plan)—move (Do-Check/improve)—refreeze (Main-
stream) to develop a very rich integrative framework
grounded in theory and practice for designing and
implementing CSR. This framework covers nine stages/
dimensions (and sub-dimensions); all these stages are
supported by a continuous stakeholder dialogue: (1)
Raising CSR awareness within the organization; (2)
Assessing corporate purpose in a societal context; (3)
Establishing a vision and a working definition of CSR;
(4) Assessing current CSR status; (5) Developing a CSR-
integrated strategic plan—embedding CSR in organiza-
tional strategy; (6) Implementing CSR-integrated strate-
gic plan—implementing organizational initiatives and
strategies linked to CSR; (7) Communicating about CSR
commitments and performance (this dimension underlies
steps 8 and 9); (8) Evaluating CSR-integrated strategies
and communication—evaluating, verifying, and reporting
on CSR progress; (9) Institutionalizing CSR—anchoring
changes into organizational systems as well as corporate
culture and values.
568 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
Conceptual Framework
Our conceptual framework is based on three main ele-
ments: a contextual framework for analyzing the change
taken from Pettigrew’s perspective, a grid for analyzing the
CSR program trajectories based on the first stream of
researches on CSR stages/phases and a simplified
scheme of the dimensions underlying the design and the
implementation of a CSR program drawn from the third
stream of literature presented above.
A Contextual Approach of Change
We refer to the Pettigrew’s contextual approach of strategic
and organizational change which focuses on the dynamic
interplay between contexts, content, and processes (Petti-
grew 1987). According to Pettigrew (1990, p. 268), the
overall challenge of the contextual approach is ‘‘to link the
content, contexts, and processes of change over time to
explain the differential achievement of change.’’ This
approach is based on a double (vertical and horizontal)
analysis. ‘‘The vertical level refers to the interdependencies
between higher or lower levels of analysis with phenomena
to be explained at some further level. (…) The horizontal level refers to the sequential interconnectedness among
phenomena in historical, present, and future time. An
approach that offers both multilevel or vertical analysis and
process or horizontal analysis, is said to be contextual in
character’’ (Pettigrew 1990, p. 269).
Compared with other frameworks, the strength of Pet-
tigrew’s approach is not only to focus on the contextual
dimensions of change, but also to adopt a specific
methodology for analyzing a case study. Our intent is to
follow Pettigrew’s recommendations (Pettigrew 1990) to
conduct our case study analysis of La Poste. This article
focuses on the analysis of the links and interplay between
the context and the content of change associated with the
CSR programs over time. These analyses are necessary to
conduct a study of the process.
As a consequence, we firstly use this framework to
identify stages/phases in the evolution of the strategic and
CSR trajectories to better understand their dynamics and
progressive integration in a horizontal perspective. This
identification enables to better understand the situation of
the company, the characteristics of this integration, and the
antecedents and characteristics of the last stage we focus on
in this article. The framework provides insights on the
contextual variables associated to this stage and answers to
the research question regarding the reasons why La Poste
made explicit the content of its program at this stage/phase.
Then we use Pettigrew’s framework in a vertical per-
spective to identify the key dimensions underlying the
design and implementation of the CSR program and their
interplay during this last stage/phase and to conduct our
analysis of the managers’ perceptions concerning these
dimensions, focusing on the content of the program.
Strategic Trajectories of CSR Program
Based on the literature review on strategic CSR trajecto-
ries, Table 1 presents the stages we used to describe the
evolutions of CSR programs and Strategic trajectories and
their progressive integration at Groupe La Poste from 1990
to 2014. We focus on the stages/phases we found the most
representative (in bold in the table, in italic the stages that
are not pertinent to our research and in bold/italic the
stages we found as an aspiration for or partly integrated by
the organization in the last period) and identify key
dimensions presented in the empirical part of this article.
These dimensions vary along the trajectory.
Dimensions of a CSR Program
The third element of our conceptual framework aims at
identifying the key dimensions underlying the design and
implementation of a CSR program. Common points found
in the third stream of researches presented above led us to
build a simplified conceptual framework to understand
dimensions and implementation CSR program (see Fig. 1).
We used this simplified framework to start our case study
analysis of the CSR program at Groupe La Poste in
2011–2014, focusing on the content of this program.
This framework contains key concepts and dimensions
identified in the stream of literature on designing and
implementing CSR (Cramer 2005; Maignan et al. 2005;
Maon et al. 2009; Werre 2003) presented above and ‘‘fo-
cusing on practical guidelines and success factors that can
help organizations to design and implement their CSR
initiatives’’ (Maon et al. 2010, p. 26).
A set of central dimensions, primarily deal with the
content of the vision and mission as they are defined by the
organization Vision and mission, are relatively stable and
oriented toward the long term, while dimensions relating to
implementation are more dynamic and contextual in the
sense that they are adapted to the different contexts in
which the CSR program is carried out. CSR-related prin-
ciples and policies play a central role in the integration of
the more dynamic ‘‘downstream’’ (implementation) and
more stable ‘‘upstream’’ dimensions (vision and mission).
Mission Related to CSR
Defining the mission related to CSR and using it as a ref-
erence to make decisions and assess their outcomes has
been viewed as a central dimension in the literature on CSR
as organizational change. This definition implies a set of
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 569
123
Table 1 Stage models of CSR development: principal dimensions used to interpret strategic and CSR trajectories at Groupe La Poste (1990–2014)
Authors and
stages
Stages
relevant for
the postal
case study
Links strategy/CSR
Contents, CSR dimensions, issues Stakeholders Values/culture
Dunfy et al.
(2007)
1. Rejection
2. Non-
responsiveness
3. Compliance
4. Efficiency
5. Strategic
proactivity
6. Sustaining
Efficiency CSR issues (waste management,
environmental/employees, HRM)
introduced in operations to increase
efficiency
Stewardship
Strategic
proactivity
(proactive
strategists)
CSR (social/human and environmental)
as an important part of Business
strategy
Stakeholder Management: CSR
initiatives that build
stakeholder support
CSR-related Values introduced in
organizational culture
Sustaining CSR fully integrated in corporate and
business strategies: societal issues
addressed
Partnering for renewal
Active and strong relationships
with stakeholders
Transformative culture
Senior executives and the majority of
members have strongly internalized the
ideology of working for a sustainable
world
Zadek (2004)
1. Defensive
2. Compliance
3. Managerial
4. Strategic
5. Civil
Managerial CSR issues embedded in managerial
processes
not central in the model not central in the model
Strategic Integration of CSR issues in core
business strategies
Gaining first mover advantage
not central in the model not central in the model
Civil Promote broad industry participation in CSR
To enhance long-term economic value to overcoming any first mover
disadvantage and to realize gains through collective action
Van Marrevijk
and Werre
(2003)
1. Pre-CS
2. Compliance-
driven CS
3. Profit-driven
CS
4. Caring
5. Synergistic
6. Holistic
Caring CS Balancing economic social and
ecological dimensions
Decisions taken after consensus
or at least with consent of all
relevant stakeholders
Personal values and beliefs (top
management and all participants that
social and environmental care are
important as such)
Synergistic
CS
Search of a well-balanced, functional solutions in the economic, social,
and ecological realms of corporate performances
In a synergistic win with all relevant stakeholders.
Decisions taken in a long-term view perspective
Personal values and beliefs of all
stakeholders as well as top management
that sustainability, social and
environmental aspects are important as
such and inevitable given long-term
trends
Holistic CS CS fully integrated in every aspects of the organization aimed at
contributing to the quality and continuation of life of every being and
entity, now and in the future
Conviction that sustainability on a
worldwide scale is the only alternative
Mirvis and
Googins
(2006)
1. Elementary
2. Engaged
3. Innovative
4. Integrated
5. Transforming
Innovative Strategic intent based on business case
(environmental, social).
Issues management thanks to
responsive programs: monitoring of
social and environmental
performances
Stakeholder management
central at this stage
Mutual influences
Not central in the model at this stage
Integrated Strategic intent: value proposition
Triple bottom line central at this stage
Proactive systems to manage CSR
issues
Integration of CSR at the corporate
level
Partnership with stakeholders is
central at this stage
Citizenship based on corporate values
more than on business case
Transforming Strategic intent: motivation to
changing the game, market creation,
or social change
Issues management: defining
Multi-organization alliances:
active role in a broad range
of partnerships and alliances
with various stakeholders
Corporate values are central and a
driving force
570 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
tasks such as identifying key stakeholders and critical
stakeholders’ issues, their concerns, expectations,
demands, and salience (Cramer 2005; Maignan et al. 2005;
Maon et al. 2009). Mission related to CSR covers the
translation of stakeholders’ social and environmental needs
and expectations the organization intends to serve and
meet. Literature focuses on the content of the mission as it
is defined, the sensitivity to stakeholders’ needs/expecta-
tions (their identification and analysis) to come out with
this definition and its use as a reference to make decisions.
Mission related to CSR is defined and used to elaborate and
implement CSR programs, and to assess their outcomes.
CSR-Related Vision
The importance of formulating and communicating a
vision with regard to CSR, in line with the mission and
values, has been stressed in the literature on CSR as
Table 1 continued
Authors and
stages
Stages
relevant for
the postal
case study
Links strategy/CSR
Contents, CSR dimensions, issues Stakeholders Values/culture
Maon et al.
(2010)
1. Dismissing
2. Self-
protecting,
3. Compliance
seeking
4. Capability
seeking
5. Caring
6. Strategizing
7. Transforming
Caring Competitive advantage as the rationale
behind CSR- active management of
CSR issues and definition of
business-wide opportunities
Stakeholder dialogue
perspective dominant at this
stage and CSR and reciprocal
influence
Cultural embedment of CSR: CSR as
embodied in organizational culture
Strategizing Value proposition as the rationale
behind CSR initiatives, Strategic
proactivity,
Leading the pack
Collaborative Stakeholders
relationships
Cultural embedment of CSR
Sustainability perspective/CSR as
prevailing
Transforming Enlarged finality and social change as
the rationale behind CSR initiatives,
Diffusion of expertise and
maximization of positive externalities
as performance objectives.
Joint innovation Cultural embedment of CSR/change the
game perspective, CSR as ingrained
SHARED CSR-
RELATED
VISION
INTERNAL STAKEHOLDERS: INVOLVEMENT AND BEHAVIOUR
CORPORATE
MISSION RELATED
TO CSR CSR-
RELATED
OUTCOMES
IMPLEMENTATION
Differentiated Contexts
CSR-Related Supporting
activities (dedicated units –
managerial and control
systems)
CSR-RELATED
POLICIES
CSR-RELATED
PRINCIPLES
CSR RELATED SHARED VALUES AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE
RELATIONSHIPS WITH EXTERNAL STAKEHOLDERS
Fig. 1 Key dimensions of a CSR Program
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 571
123
organizational change (Werre 2003; Cramer 2005; Maon
et al. 2009). The CSR-related vision defines the organiza-
tion’s desired future and its intent in terms of social and
environmental goals and contributions. This definition
translates the organization’s sensitivity regarding societal
issues and expectations and it has to be communicated and
used to assess contributions and outcomes linked to the
CSR-related mission and values; this vision serves as a
guide and a reference to elaborate and implement CSR
programs and to evaluate their contributions and outcomes.
A shared vision supports the employees ‘integration and
their motivation which both influence positively proactive
strategies and performances as it has been shown in the
case of environmental corporate engagement (Alt et al.
2015).
CSR-Related Principles
CSR-related principles express the ‘‘right way’’ of doing
things. As codes of conduct (Maignan et al. 2005; Werre
2003), these principles make explicit values that are pro-
fessed and what is considered as ethical/moral/fair. They
express a ‘‘common way’’ or ‘‘norm’’ in dealing and
interacting with stakeholders and are used to assess atti-
tudes and behaviors as well as decisions and actions taken
during the implementation of the CSR program. They are
linked to the vision, mission, professed values, and policies
and play a central role in the whole process.
CSR-Related Policies
CSR-related policies define the set of orientations that
indicate the ‘‘right things to do’’ to implement the CSR
program (Maignan et al. 2005; Cramer 2005). They are
established and used to guide decisions in line with the
CSR-related vision, mission, and principles as they are
defined (CSR). Policies are used to deal with CSR issues
management and to assess the alignment of CSR-related
outcomes with the CSR-related vision and mission.
Implementation ‘‘Mechanisms’’
Companies develop and use organizational and managerial
artifacts (design, communication, management tools, and
control systems) to support the deployment of CSR pro-
grams. These ‘‘mechanisms’’ cover organizational units
dedicated to CSR and a variety of managerial tools to
prioritize and implement CSR changes and initiatives:
long-term and short-term strategic plans (Maignan et al.
2005), monitoring and reporting systems (Cramer 2005),
training programs, internal and external communication,
reward and punishment systems for behaviors that are (or
not) conform (Maon et al. 2009). These mechanisms are
central in the literature and used to integrate the central
dimensions identified in our framework, from mission–vi-
sion to outcomes.
CSR-Related Outcomes
CSR-related outcomes are the set of results achieved dur-
ing the implementation of the CSR program and their
associated social, environmental, and economic impacts
and performances. These outcomes are evaluated in com-
parison to those that are expected to serve the CSR-related
vision and to fulfill the CSR-related mission. These results
are obtained through the deployment of the CSR program
in specific contexts and cover ‘‘what has been done and
achieved’’ thanks to this implementation. Besides their
alignment with the vision and mission, emphasis is put on
how they are achieved in conformity with policies and
principles as they are defined.
Two supplementary dimensions play a central role in
supporting the elaboration and implementation of CSR
programs: (1) CSR-related values and organizational cul-
ture and (2) relationships with stakeholders.
Values and Organizational Culture
The literature on CSR as strategic and organizational
change stresses the importance of both corporate values
associated to CSR and organizational culture as pre-req-
uisites for proactive CSR. According to Maon et al. (2009),
organizations must build on their current values to create
an organizational culture that is receptive to change and
can sustain CSR strategy over the long term. Authors insist
on the instrumental role of shared values and culture in the
alignment and integration of CSR programs and in the
relationships and interactions with stakeholders (Maignan
et al. 2005). Explicit CSR-related values as they are for-
mulated, communicated, and professed are linked to CSR-
related vision and mission, policies and, more specifically,
principles. As a set of shared values, ways of thinking, and
acting among groups within the organization, organiza-
tional culture forms the foundation underlying the elabo-
ration and implementation of CSR programs.
Relationships with Stakeholders
The literature on CSR states that companies are facing
increasing demands regarding CSR from a greater number
and variety of stakeholders (Maon et al. 2009). These
demands reflect evolutions in the external and internal
572 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
context in which companies operate and act as external and
internal drivers for CSR-related changes. As a conse-
quence, regular communication and dialogue with stake-
holders and the continuous involvement of internal
stakeholders play central and instrumental roles in sus-
taining the elaboration and implementation of CSR pro-
grams (Ingham 2011; Werre 2003; Maignan et al. 2005;
Maon et al. 2009). Transparent information and regular
dialogue and feedback are used to review and revisit key
stakeholders’ expectations as well as the content of the
CSR program and its outcomes. Interactions with external
stakeholders and the involvement of specific stakeholders
depending on the CSR issue addressed help identify these
issues and shape the program if appropriate. Implementa-
tion mechanisms are used to guide internal stakeholders’
decisions and actions regarding CSR and to support their
individual and collective engagement and involvement at
different stages of the process, depending on their roles and
positions in the hierarchy and on the context in which they
operate.
In this article, we focus on the stages and dimensions
that are situated upstream in the conceptual framework.
These dimensions, relating to the elaboration of the CSR
program (CSR-related mission, vision, policies, and prin-
ciples). These dimensions are relatively stable, oriented
toward the long term, and used to guide and sustain the
implementation and assess CSR outcomes.
These three elements of our conceptual framework form
the foundation on which we analyze the case of CSR as a
strategic and organizational change at the ‘‘Groupe la
Poste.’’
Methodology and Context of the Study
To understand the specific context and processes which
govern the formulation of a CSR program, the most appro-
priate methodology is the case study (Maon et al. 2009;
Lamberti and Lettieri 2009). The case study is an empirical
method which analyzes a current phenomenon embedded in
its real context and difficult to understand (Yin 2008). It
helps isolate a specific situation to better understand its
specificities and complexity. Acase studycan also contribute
to complete an existing knowledge (Siggelkow 2007) and to
reveal new dimension of a social reality (Strauss and Corbin
1998). Our case study tries to illustrate a phenomenon pre-
viously defined by a conceptual framework; it is then an
instrumental case study (Stake 1994).
The case study concerns the Groupe La Poste which is a
major group delivering postal, parcel, and banking services
(see box below). It is characterized through its historical
public service mission and its growing competitive activities.
The Groupe La Poste is a major service group currently
ranked as being among the 25 largest French groups
according to revenue. It is the second leading employer in
France after the French government with nearly 267,000
employees. In 2012, the Groupe made €21,658 million in revenue (17 % made abroad), and made €816 million in operating profit. Composed of the parent company (La
Poste SA) and its subsidiaries, the Groupe La Poste has
opted for a multi-business group structure. It is organized
around three major business lines: Mail (50 % of the
Group’s 2012 operating revenue), Parcels-Express (26 %
of the Group’s 2012 operating revenue), and Banking
activities via La Banque Postale (24 % of the Group’s
2012operatingrevenue).‘‘Inordertoofferitsproductsand
services to the population, La Poste has a distribution
network of more than 17,000 public outlets in France,
which makes it the largest local network in the country’’
(source: Le Groupe La Poste: registration document 2012,
Annualfinancialreport,p.10).Regionalstructuressupport
the relationships between the Group, regional communi-
ties, and overseas territories.
The reasons why we have chosen this organization are pri-
marily linked to its specific missions (see above), but in a
methodological point of view, the authors had the opportu-
nity to establish a partnership with the Groupe La Poste to
analyze the implementation and the CSR program, and then,
had easier access to data and persons while keeping a real
autonomy to lead the research. Data used in this early stage of
our research program is based on both internal documents
and information drawn from interviews.
The internal documents such as strategic annual reports,
social reports, and specific internal reports on CSR, deon-
tology guide, collective agreements, and records of deci-
sions have been collected and used through a qualitative
content analysis (see Table 2). Following the method of
deductive content analysis (Weber 1990; Cresswell 2013),
we identified elements in the different documents corre-
sponding to categories relating to the central dimensions of
our conceptual framework. This documentary analysis
provided the main elements on the history of the strategic
plan and especially the CSR policy.
To complete our documentary analysis, we interviewed
ten persons, all managers in the organization who had
different responsibilities at the head office or in region: the
head of the department of CSR, one manager in charge of
executive training programs in CSR at the group level,
three representatives of the regional delegation (repre-
senting the Groupe in a region and including two persons in
charge of CSR), one executive manager in charge of the
mail and parcel services in region, and four operational
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 573
123
managers (one director of a sorting center, one director of a
mail preparation and distribution center, and two directors
of postal office). The tape-recorded interviews were from
1h30 to 2h30 long and based on a semi-structured inter-
view guide built on the conceptual framework. Wide
ranging open questions were used, covering themes such as
the definition of CSR for the interviewees, the content of
the CSR program of the company, the implementation of
the CSR program, and the responsible practices of the
Groupe La Poste before and after the formulation of the
CSR policy. The interviews have been transcribed and
analyzed following the rules of qualitative data analysis
(Cresswell 2013) and through the Nvivo research software.
The transcribed interviews were red by the two authors
who made a first coding and a second finer recoding. We
discussed then the ideas and interpretations that emerged
and we presented the results to top executive managers of
the Groupe La Poste to increase the credibility of analysis
(Patton 2002).
For the purpose of this article, we selected answers
corresponding to the research questions presented in the
introduction. These questions fall into two categories: (1)
the CSR concept as it is defined by the respondents (2) the
knowledge on CSR program at La Poste namely the con-
tent, the key dimensions, and implementation as known
and perceived by the respondents. Some questions were
adapted to identify possible differences among the
respondents depending on their position in the organiza-
tion. We use quotations from interviews in the main body
of the text to make it easier for the reader to evaluate our
interpretations. The analysis of these interviews contributes
to the specification of the content of the CSR program as it
is perceived by respondents. The quotations are essentially
illustrative. At the stage of our research, it is not possible,
nor the objective, to highlight the overall implementation
process of the CSR program.
Results
This section presents and discusses the results of our
analysis on the links between CSR and strategic trajectories
and on the content of the CSR program that has been
elaborated in 2011. The ‘‘historical’’ perspective aims at
clarifying stages that marked the evolution of CSR and
strategic plans, taking into account the contexts in which
they took place. This analysis helps us to better understand
the status of CSR in the early 2010s and sheds light on how
CSR programs have been more and more integrated in the
strategic plans. It enables to stress the importance of the
CSR-related mission and values that characterizes the
history of the Groupe La Poste as a public utility company.
It also provides insights on how respondents perceive these
changes as incremental/continuous or as being more pro-
found and deeply integrated.
The analysis of the content of the CSR program aims
at explaining how the central dimensions presented in
the conceptual framework are integrated and interact and
how they are perceived by key actors. This analysis,
which is central to our research, enables to shed lights
into the dynamics that marked the evolutions in this
program.
Strategic and CSR Trajectories of the Groupe La
Poste (1990–2014 …): Toward the Integration
This section presents the strategic and CSR trajectories that
show the evolution of the organization since 1990. These
trajectories have been marked by changes in the external
and internal contexts in which La Poste has evolved.
The external context is mainly characterized by the EU
policies regarding postal services, which have been pro-
gressively implemented in member States with the full
market opening in 2012. These policies, set up in France
Table 2 Documentary resources used in the case study
External documents
Strategic annual reports Convergence and performance (2003–2007), Performance and confidence (2007–2012), and Ambition 2015
(2010–2015)
Annual reports Annual report 2011, Annual report 2012
Social reports Social report 2011, Social and environmental responsibility report (2011–2012)
Collective agreements Collective agreement on equality (2005), Framework agreement on quality of work 2013
Internal documents
Internal report on CSR 2012 Responsible performance, Report on ‘‘major dialogue’’ 2012 (Kaspar)
Internal communication
documents
Deontology guide, Guide of good practices for managers ‘‘Living our values’’
Records of decisions On CSR policy (2011, 2013), on prevention of psychosocial risks related to work (2012), on health and safety
at work (2012)
574 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
and coupled with national policies, have had a huge
impact on both the status and positioning of La Poste as a
major organization in France and Europe. This evolution
has led to increased competition in many business activ-
ities while public service obligations have been main-
tained on the basis of contracts between the State and the
Groupe La Poste. The public service missions concern the
universal postal service, the public service transport and
delivery of press materials, the mission of accessibility to
banking, and the national planning and development
mission (Lefebvre 2011). During this period, La Poste
also experimented with significant socio-technological
evolutions, such as the digitization of mail (e-mails, etc.)
which has had a considerable impact on traditional paper-
based mail, but La Poste was also subject to significant
external forces which affected its banking activities.
Some significant changes operated in the nature and the
influence of the Groupe La Poste’ stakeholders. Initially,
two main stakeholders had a significant influence on the
organization (State, employees, and their representatives).
The Groupe La Poste evolved to a multi-stakeholders sit-
uation in which State and employees are still important but
the organization has to deal with new stakeholders. In this
new landscape, local authorities express directly (and not
through the State anymore) their demands regarding CSR.
Additionally, the Groupe La Poste has to take into account
new CSR-related expectations coming from their economic
partners (suppliers, individual, and professional clients).
To face these external changes, the Groupe La Poste
elaborated strategic plans over the last twenty-year period
(see Table 3) and implemented many internal changes. La
Poste changed its status to become an autonomous public-
sector service provider in 1990 and became a limited lia-
bility company in 2010. The Groupe La Poste developed a
new collective agreement to manage the employment
relationships with its employees at the beginning of the
1990s and significantly changed its human resource man-
agement practices. For twenty years, significant transfor-
mations have occurred in the organizational structure and
in the different productive processes of the firm (in the mail
and parcel services—’’Cap Qualité Courrier’’ Cap Quality
Mail, but also in the banking activities). As this manager
explained:
I am talking about those 20 years between 1990—
first transformation of the company’s status—and
2010; we completely upset our human resource
management. We have evolved from an administra-
tion with users to a company with clients. We com-
pletely redesigned the product and service lines and
the territorial organization. Everything fell apart
during this period.
These major internal transformations occurred in a rel-
atively short period, over 20 years, and have led La Poste
to modify its managerial practices.
The pace of external and internal changes accelerated in
the period (1990–2010) due to more pressing demands
coming from a greater variety of stakeholders. The inte-
gration of CSR issues in the strategic plan became neces-
sary (Lefebvre 2011). The strategic and CSR trajectories,
which were more or less considered separately in the
1990s, became more and more integrated in strategic plans
so that today CSR is a more explicit dimension of the
organization. Several stages in the process of building the
CSR strategy can be identified and are associated with
different focuses. The early stages focused on sustainability
issues (environmental/green) and progressively added new
dimensions such as equality, diversity and, more recently,
responsible management. Little by little these dimensions
have been integrated in the CSR program and designed to
be aligned with the group’s vision, mission, strategy, core
activities, and practices. Five periods of evolutions are
presented in Table 3. Their duration indicates an acceler-
ation and convergence between strategic and CSR
trajectories.
The first period (1990–2002/2003) corresponds to
‘‘start-ups and early developments’’ In this period, both
external and internal contexts were loosely linked, but they
laid the foundations for the future developments and
transformations of La Poste. Strategic and CSR trajectories
(sustainable development) remained loosely coupled. This
period shows several characteristics that have been iden-
tified in the stage models presented above (Table 1).
Emphasis has been put on environmental issues in CSR and
these actions have been developed and implemented dif-
ferently in operational activities, more specifically in those
in which environmental issues are more present or prob-
lematic (mail and parcel distribution and overhead). The
main objective was to increase efficiency (Dunfy et al.
2007) and reduce costs (coupled with a positive environ-
mentally friendly reputation) and to focus on ‘‘business
cases’’ and local implementation through an approach that
was not part of the business-level strategies. It might be
argued that this stage corresponds to stage/phases that we
did not present and develop in Table 1: ‘‘compliance-dri-
ven,’’ ‘‘profit-driven’’ (Van Marrevijk and Werre 2003);
‘‘engaged’’ (Mirvis and Googins 2006); and ‘‘compliance-
seeking,’’ ‘‘capability-seeking’’ (Maon et al. 2010). Firstly,
the approach at Groupe La Poste was not principally ori-
ented to cost-reduction or profit driven. Secondly, the aim
to comply to legal or social norms and obligations were not
central (such is it the case). Thirdly, they are proactive and
deliberate rather than reactive or defensive. One
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 575
123
supplementary argument can be found in the long-lasting
orientation toward CSR in the organization’s mission,
values, and culture. We will further discuss these aspects.
The second stage (2002/03–2007/2008) ‘‘experimenta-
tion and acceleration’’ was more proactive. Changes in the
external environments and internal drivers led La Poste to
be more autonomous, to elaborate and to implement its
strategic plans, and finally, to transform its organization
into business units leading to its objectives of ‘‘conver-
gence and performance.’’ Strategies and CSR were more
integrated; the concept of sustainable development being
based on social (including equality, diversity) and envi-
ronmental concerns became central in the strategic plan
‘‘convergence and performance.’’ This period, that could
be spilt into two sub-stages, forms the corner stone and is
pivotal in the integration of strategic and CSR trajectories
in the following stages. Firstly, the Groupe La Poste put in
place different CSR-related projects in its central and core
activities thanks to CSR programs which were not inte-
grated in the strategic priorities and plans at the corporate
level but at the business level. The transformation of the
organization into business units facilitated those experi-
mentations (due to differentiations among its business units
operating in different contexts). The second step (sub-
stage) was marked by a progressive acceleration and con-
vergence of the strategic and CSR trajectories. This led to
an accelerated integration of CSR, based on societal and
environmental concerns in the framework of the ‘‘conver-
gence and performance’’ plan, which served as a guideline
for this integration and paved the way for further integra-
tion (next stage).
The characteristics of this period of experimentations
and acceleration can be viewed as a transition from ‘‘effi-
ciency to strategic proactivity’’ (Dunfy et al. 2007),
Table 3 Overview of the strategic and CSR trajectories
1990–2002/03 Start-up-
early developments and
foundations
2003–2007/08
Acceleration and
experimentation
2007/08–2010/11
Integration and
exploitation
2010/11–2015
Alignment,
diffusion,
adaptation, and
consolidation
2014–2020 Integration of
CSR principles in the
design of the strategic plan
External
drivers
EU policy EU: progressive
opening of
competition (some
activities), new
entrants
Increased competition,
EU landscape, loss
of business due to
electronic mail
Full open
competition in
2012–2014
Economic, regulatory,
technological,
environmental, and social
evolutions
Internal
drivers
French act, La Poste
becomes more
autonomous, changes in
the status of the
company
Autonomy and
proactive strategies
French act: control
by state authority
Service agreement
with the state
Legal and financial
continuity
(agreement)
New Chief executive
officer with a new profile
and culture (coming from
banking activity)
New framework for
employment
relationships
Major transformations in the organizational
structure, in the productive processes
Major dialogue,
Kaspar
Commission
Significant anticipated
decreasing of the mail
activity
Strategic
plans
Agreement with the
French government
‘‘Convergence and
performance’’
Vertical and
horizontal
diversification
New organizational
structure
‘‘Performance and
confidence’’
Profitability–quality–
trust
‘‘Ambition 2015’’
A European Leader
Profitability and
responsibility
‘‘La Poste 2020’’ : conquer
the future
Developing new markets
and changing the
business model
CSR Before 2002/03
sustainability
(environmental issues)
Sustainable
development
(environmental,
diversity)
Responsible
development
integrated
Closely integrated
and central in
strategic
alignment
Confirmed in the strategic
plan, a new vision
integrated with CSR
values
Stakeholders The State as unique
shareholder but also as
regulator plays a central
role
A traditional social
dialogue is organized
with the employees
representatives (unions)
The State keeps a central role as unique shareholder
The social dialogue is sustained with unions
Other stakeholders issues are considered Diverse
stakeholders are
progressively
associated (Major
Dialogue)
Stakeholders are more
involved (present in the
executive board)
576 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
‘‘managerial to strategic’’ stages (Zadek 2004), ‘‘caring to
synergistic’’ (Van Marrevijk and Werre 2003), ‘‘innovative
to the integrated’’ (Mirvis and Googins 2006), or ‘‘capa-
bility-seeking to caring’’ (Maon et al. 2010).
Firstly and mainly they shared characteristics associated
to ‘‘efficiency,’’ ‘‘ Managerial,’’ ‘‘innovative,’’ ‘‘caring’’
(Van Marrevijk and Werre 2003), ‘‘innovative,’’ and
capability seeking because of the emphasis put on local
CSR initiatives and actions (business cases), taking into
account the interests of (more numerous and various)
concerned stakeholders and making decisions with their
consent. Lessons drawn and the experience accumulated in
performing CSR activities increase the familiarity with
CSR issues and contribute to enhance and extend capa-
bilities and skills. However, the multiplication of these
experimentations and experiences and the acceleration of
this move led to integrate them at the business level, as part
of their core activities, depending on the contexts in which
they operate.
The third period (2007/08–2011—’’integration and
exploitation’’) was critical. Increased competition and
internal drivers inherent to transformations led La Poste to
focus on performance and trust. Strategies and CSR tra-
jectories became even more integrated (the concept of
responsibility replacing sustainability). At this stage, the
Groupe La Poste faced strong external and internal pres-
sures that speeded up the integration of CSR programs in
its strategic plan at the corporate level in the framework of
the ‘‘Confidence and Performance’’ plan. The concept of
responsible development and its dimensions became cen-
tral in the ‘‘Confidence and Performance’’ strategic plan
that integrated the notions of quality and trust. The mes-
sage conveyed is that the Groupe ‘‘La Poste’’ had not only
to be sustainable and trustworthy but confident, in its
relationships with its stakeholders and in its future.
On the other hand, emphasis laid on performances (eco-
nomic, social, environmental) drew the attention of internal
stakeholders (employees) and their representatives (unions)
to the necessity to better integrate its historical social
responsibility toward ‘‘internal/external stakeholders (state,
employees, and their representatives, communities) that was
(and is still) deeply and internally embodied in organiza-
tional strategies, culture, structure, and processes, with the
more recent environmental/ecological ones. The economic
dimension (profitability) has been reaffirmed and put for-
ward, drawing the attention to it. Even if it was present in the
organization, the economic responsibilities and financial
performance were not that prominent or central.
Relations with multiple stakeholders and their active
participation in the elaboration and implementation of
these plans and CSR-related actions at the business level
were reinforced (to a lesser extent at the corporate level). It
is also at this stage that the engagement of Groupe La Poste
as a Responsible organization was more professed in an
active way in direction or its internal and external stake-
holders. CSR-related projects led at the business level
increased in quantity and quality and CSR-related issues
and have been more integrated in the business-level
strategies taking into account the contexts in which they
operate and their evolutions.
The evolution in strategic and CSR trajectories during
this third period suggests that the Groupe La Poste reached
the ‘‘strategic proactivity’’ (Dunfy et al. 2007), ‘‘strategic’’
(Zadek 2004), ‘‘innovative’’ (Mirvis and Googins 2006),
stages and combined characteristics of the ‘‘Caring and
synergistic’’ (Van Marrevijk and Werre 2003), and the
‘‘Caring and strategizing’’ stages (Maon et al. 2010).
However, some key dimensions associated to these stages
are missing. Firstly, even if the CSR strategic intent was
part of the plan at the corporate level, and an entity in
charge of CSR has been created at the headquarter, CSR
issues and activities were mainly performed and integrated
in strategies and strategic plans at the business level.
Secondly, even if they are important progress made both at
the business and corporate levels, this third period did not
enabled to consolidate CSR as part of the core business
processes. As a consequence, this period can be viewed as
a transition to the following stage.
‘‘Strategic alignment and consolidation’’ characterize
the fourth period, as part of the ‘‘Ambition 2015’’ project
where the CSR program is to become central to the
strategic alignment at the business and group levels. We
will discuss in detail the CSR program that has been put in
place in the Ambition 2015 strategic plan in the following
section.
Two commitments, which are significantly CSR related,
are made in this strategic plan to respect the social model
of the Groupe La Poste and to put the sustainable devel-
opment in midst of preoccupations. The priorities for sus-
tainable development focused on using electric vehicles,
significant reduction in energy consumption, and waste
management. The respect of social model has been a
central pillar in the corporate strategy for many years but in
this changing time, the top management wanted to reaffirm
this commitment. The main axis of this engagement were
‘‘no imposed redundancy scheme,’’ recruiting apprentices,
developing competences, ‘‘concern for quality of working
life and for safe working conditions,’’ and ‘‘sharing the
fruits of growth’’ (Ambition 2015). These strategic reori-
entations have helped to explicit the vision and mission of
CSR at the Groupe La Poste and to formulate a more multi-
dimensional CSR program at the beginning of the 2010s.
Presently, the CSR program has been expanded and inte-
grated as a central dimension of the ‘‘Ambition 2015’’
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 577
123
strategic plan. This integration covers several aspects
relating to content, contexts, and processes which are clo-
sely related.
This integration has been reinforced in the new strategic
plan (2014–2020) ‘‘La Poste 2020: conquer the future’’)
launched in early 2014 after a broad consultation of
150,000 postal employees and external stakeholders (con-
sumers, local and territorial authorities, and communities).
This consultation produced more than 40,000 suggestions
made by participants and resulted in the formulation of the
new strategic plan. The focus of this new strategic plan is
on developing new markets and changing the business
model of the company in a context of significant economic,
regulatory, technological, environmental, and social evo-
lution. The new chief executive officer coming from the
banking activity of the Groupe wants to put the human
factor and the trust at the core of the relationship with
clients and build the development on the Groupe’s values
which are linked to CSR. Some decisions have been made
concerning notably the governance confirming the inte-
gration of a stakeholders’ participation and the more sig-
nificant integration between the strategic plan and the CSR.
Firstly, the executive committee of the company composed
with internal and external stakeholders is officially now in
charge of the definition and the deployment of the CSR
program. Secondly, the new governance of the Groupe is
now structured around five branches which are led by
strategic committees opened to external stakeholders. And
thirdly, the top executives organized a collective bargain-
ing in 2014 for negotiating a collective agreement
accompanying the strategic transformations (The ‘‘Social
Pact’’). This specific collective bargaining aimed to prepare
with the trade unions the future changes and limit the
potential undesirable effects on the employees.
The convergence and deeper integration of CSR and the
Strategic plan during this period suggest that La Poste
reached the ‘‘strategic’’ (Zadek 2004), ‘‘strategic proac-
tivity’’ (Dunfy et al. 2007), ‘‘synergistic’’ (Van Marrevijk
and Werre 2003), ‘‘integrated’’ (Mirvis and Googins 2006),
and ‘‘strategizing’’ (Maon et al. 2010) stages/phases.
Some dimensions associated to this stage can be viewed
as an aspiration toward the ultimate stages/phases pre-
sented in the literature. The definition of CSR as it has been
formulated in the last version is a signal of a broader and
more ambitious intent of the company (see below).
A CSR Program Explicitly Formulated in 2011
and Confirmed in 2014
The CSR program formulated in 2011 is based on two
commitments which are connected to the two strategic
engagements of Ambition 2015. The first commitment
aims at ‘‘being always more responsible in the exercise of
our responsibilities’’ and the associated actions are ‘‘being
a responsible employer’’ (e.g., to guarantee quality jobs,
promote permanent social dialogue, develop employees’
competencies, protect health, and improve working con-
ditions), reducing the environmental footprint, developing
responsible management, and changing employees’
behaviors. The second commitment aims at ‘‘being an actor
involved with one’s stakeholders in long term shared
sustainability.’’
This explicit CSR program has been reviewed and
adjusted in 2012 when social problems (suicide of two
managers) have revealed the gap between the social com-
mitments of the CSR program and the effective responsible
practices. These problems have been extensively covered
by the media at the beginning of 2012 and highly
denounced by union representatives. These crisis events
revealing a gap between the responsible engagement of the
company and the effective practices have been managed at
two levels. Building on its experience in public relations of
a big company (Huang and Su 2009), the company
developed firstly a ‘‘reactive’’ communication strategy
(Lotila 2010) toward media and external stakeholders
based on press releases and conferences. This short-term
‘‘tactic approach’’ (Lotila 2010) aimed to reassure mainly
the internal stakeholders (employees and their representa-
tives) on the consideration of these events and the
responsibility of the organization. These comments made
by a communication manager revealed this strategy: ‘‘We
will support the different investigations, we will consider
concretely their conclusions in our action to prevent and
improve the quality of working life. Our attitude is to
support the relatives and the colleague of the postman, a
psychological support unit has been set up.’’ 2 But more
substantially, the ‘‘tactic approach’’ has been completed
with an ‘‘active approach’’ (Lotila 2010 3 ) aiming to lis-
tening to the different stakeholders and specially the
internal ones (employees and their representatives).
The top management launched in March 2012 the
‘‘Major Dialogue’’ operation. The process brought together
all units with the participation of 125,000 workers at the
local level. At the same time, an independent commission
was created, chaired by Jean Kaspar and composed of
union representatives, executive management, and quali-
fied key actors. The Kaspar commission’s report published
in September 2012 formulated recommendations notably to
2 http://emploi.strategies.fr/article/imprimerMg/id_management/2092
48W. 3 ‘‘An active approach seeks to convince the publics. Using two-way
communication methods, e.g., by organizing public forums or by
asking feedback, the firm addresses stakeholders who are considered
as an inevitable part of business. The firm appears to be listening to
the stakeholders but they do not necessarily feel that they have been
heard’’ (Lotila 2010, p. 399).
578 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
better support the necessary changes in the company and
implementation of the strategy, to make the social model of
the Groupe La Poste evolve to focus more on well-being at
work, to secure employees career, and favor the involve-
ment of the internal stakeholders (management, union
representatives, and stockholders) in a jointly developed
interest. These recommendations led the Groupe La Poste
to reformulate its CSR program and to focus it on
responsible management (see below). A monitoring com-
mission has been created and produced a report at the end
of 2013 to assess the follow-up of the reorientations
implemented in the company.
In 2014, the CSR program has been confirmed around the
two engagements which have been marginally evolved to fit
with the new strategic plan ‘‘La Poste 2020.’’ The priority of
the new CSR program is to ‘‘facilitate access to the diverse
services and contribute to the sustainable development of the
territories.’’ Two engagements echoing the previous
engagements have been specified: (1) ‘‘to be exemplary in
proposing responsible supply, accessible to everybody and
reducing the negative impacts of its activities on human,
social and environmental aspects’’ and (2) ‘‘to accompany
the economic development in the territories for the general
interest and contribute to the employment, the autonomy, the
social inclusion and the quality of life.’’ These recent evo-
lutions in the CSR program confirm the alignment of the
strategic plan (La Poste 2020) and the CSR strategy: the
business strategy embeds the missions related to CSR (ac-
cessibility, integrating the stakeholders’ expectations, social
inclusion, quality of working life …) and the CSR program is a declination of the business strategy.
This 20 years review shows how the CSR priorities have
been progressively integrated in the strategic plans in
response to external and internal drivers that stimulated this
integration. The process of (re)formulating the CSR pro-
gram is still running.
The perceived dimensions of the CSR Program
in the Groupe La Poste
This section analyzes the dimensions of the CSR program
from 2011 to 2013 and their interplay by following the
conceptual framework described above. For this, we use
specific documents but also mainly the data collected
during the interviews. The views of actors provide signif-
icant information on the program and especially the way it
is elaborated and implemented in organizational processes.
This is relevant with the literature on CSR implementation
as change processes which insists on the role of the actors’
perceptions (Hine and Preuss 2009) and sense-making
(Basu and Palazzo 2008; Cramer et al. 2004, 2006).
Mission Related to CSR in the Groupe la Poste
The mission related to CSR in the Groupe La Poste, which
is the way the organization translates the stakeholder’s
social and environmental needs and expectations into its
mission and responds to them, is related to the core
activities of public service. For all the interviewees, the
CSR program is historically and intrinsically linked to the
company’s mission as a public utilities service intrinsically
oriented toward meeting its stakeholders’ demands.
What is specific to La Poste, is to have a positive
societal footprint because we are a public utilities
company.
This public utility mission means to deliver services to
each citizen equitably and on all of the national territory
(mail and banking accessibility). But this historical mission
needs to be balanced with economic issues.
We need to keep this essential public utilities which
is the DNA of the company, without forgetting the
necessity to generate economic resources to perpet-
uate the model.
Relationships with Stakeholders
Linked to its mission and to its strong territorial anchorage,
La Poste maintains privileged relationships with many and
diverse stakeholders (suppliers, clients, territorial authori-
ties, unions, employees). These stakeholders are invited to
participate to the CSR process at the national and local
levels. The interviewees mentioned particularly the clients
and the territorial actors.
There is a good example of a manager in a sorting
center which succeed to set up a dynamic of co-
building with the clients and the employees of the
center.
Since few years, with the implementation of the CSR
program, we are asking to our managers for being the
incarnation of the company on the territory.
But fundamentally, for the interviewees, the employees
were historically and are still today the primary stake-
holders of La Poste. Effectively, what characterizes La
Poste, and what is deeply linked to its mission, is that it is a
labor-intensive company which can produce results and
quality service only if men and women working for La
Poste are considered to be important. Therefore, La Poste
must be committed to fulfilling the employees’ needs first.
La Poste is a company which can do nothing without
its employees. That means the main stake, the heart
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 579
123
of quality, the heart of results and the heart of the
functioning of this company are the postmen and
women.
CSR-Related Values in the Groupe La Poste
According to the interviewees, the mission related to CSR
is also linked to the values held by the company with the
following terms: openness, equity, consideration, accessi-
bility, proximity, and sense of service. These values are
linked to the CSR content as stated by this respondent.
We find CSR elements in these values. Openness: we
cannot promote diversity if we are not open-minded.
Equity is also fundamental, specifically when we are
managers; if we don’t have this value, we cannot
manage for a long time particularly with young
employees. Consideration: if we don’t consider peo-
ple with whom we work… it is the same for the sense of service and accessibility.
These values are written in the company’s documents
but the respondents explained these values should be
incorporated in their practices. These values should make
sense for employees and be translated into practices to be
shared and recognized as ways of thinking and acting
among members of a social group.
If one self, we are not capable to show daily that we
hold those values, it is not necessary to write and
decline them. (…) these values have to be embodied and we don’t embody them 24 h/24 because we are
not saints!
This incorporation of CSR-related values in practices is
particularly important for the respondents in implementing
the responsible management and especially human values
(see below).
CSR-Related Vision of the Groupe La Poste
The CSR-related vision of the Groupe La Poste (how it
defines its future in terms of social and environmental goals
and contributions) is explicitly formulated in the CSR
Program developed for ‘‘Ambition 2015’’ and its revision
for the ‘‘La Poste 2020’’ strategic plan. The CSR program
aims at creating long-term value and social links with each
stakeholder. The executives and managers’ vision related
to CSR aims at ensuring the long-term existence of the
company. They want to transmit a long-term vision for the
Groupe not only by considering change in technology
(specifically in mail services) but also by being keenly
aware of the stakeholders’ interests and survival.
We must work for future, think to the long term when
the operational managers think to the short term. (…) As manager in charge of CSR we must convince every
manager that it is good to solve daily problems but they
must also think about long term, put the long term in the
short term. With buyers for example, remind them not
to kill their suppliers by lowering prices too much. At
the same time, prices should not be too high for the
economic survival of the company.
The CSR can thus be considered as a guideline to help
employees focus and perceive the company as a single
organization even though it is geographically dispersed, as
mentioned by an interviewee.
When we belong to a company which has values, a
history, which is in the core of many economic,
managerial and social activities, CSR is something
which must be explicated and summarize over the
specificities of the activities and the branches. It must
give a visibility, a vision or an axis where everybody
meets, no matter which activity they are involved in.
It is maybe a kind of guiding star.
This vision contributes to making sense for postal
employees and also helps managers give sense to their
teams (Balogun and Johnson 2004).
Whatever the topic of CSR, we must be able to give
the sense of the action and be able to communicate.
(…) Sense making is indispensable.
CSR-Related Principles of the Groupe La Poste
The CSR-related principles (the set of principles which
give guidelines for acceptable behavior) are contained in
the two main commitments formulated in Ambition 2015
(‘‘being always more responsible in the exercise of our
responsibilities’’ and ‘‘being an actor involved with one’s
stakeholders in long term shared sustainability’’) and in the
CSR program for 2014 (‘‘to be exemplary in proposing
responsible supply, accessible to everybody and reducing
the negative impacts of its activities on human, social and
environmental aspects’’ and ‘‘to accompany the economic
development in the territories for the general interest and
contribute to the employment, the autonomy, the social
inclusion and the quality of life’’).
These commitments are significantly integrated by the
interviewed executives and managers who want to promote
a ‘‘right way’’ to carry out CSR by ‘‘being virtuous in
everything we do.’’ The other principle is also stressed by
executives and managers, they want ‘‘to build together for
the future’’ with the different stakeholders. La Poste used to
580 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
negotiate bilaterally with the trade unions and more gen-
erally with employee representatives, but the managers
want to broaden the consultation or building process to
include other stakeholders. The company also had bilateral
discussions with consumers, business clients, or local
public authorities, but it now wants to set up a place of
exchange with its stakeholders to help achieve a kind of
consensus whenever possible.
Working collectively with the stakeholders on the
future of the company, to their benefits and to the
benefit of the company, is a real task. Often we
manage bilateral relationships with our stakeholders:
we negotiate with unions, we consult clients, we try
to have relationships with politicians. But really
associating them to the co-building of the company’s
future collectively, so that the contradictions can
emerge and decisions can be made to the benefit of
each, today it is always difficult.
These two commitments have been completed by a
new principle derived from the Major Dialogue opera-
tion, the responsible management. The concept of
responsible management is defined in the CSR program
in 2011–2012 in this way: ‘‘Responsible management
integrates: managerial identity (i.e. a manager who is
both efficient and responsible for the consequences of
his/her decisions, innovative and true to the values of the
Group, cooperative and attentive to everyone, courageous
and respectful of men and women); balanced decision
making (i.e. consideration of all aspects, economic,
social, environmental and societal in decision-making;
decision making at the right moment; paying attention to
the balance of benefits between involved parties impac-
ted by the change’’ (Registration document 2012, p. 76).
Responsible management was extended to include the
pace of change as mentioned in the Registration docu-
ment 2012: ‘‘Responsible management of change is
based on the desire for real quality of employment and
work life and the concern for developing employability,
enabling functional mobility.’’
The recent focus on responsible management emerged,
according to the respondents, after a period of time during
which the Groupe La Poste identified specifically difficult
situations for some of its managers. Because of a structural
reorganization at the group level in 2007–2008 (the county
divisions were deleted), a significant number of managers
have been assigned to new positions. These job realloca-
tions have been hard to endure for some managers. Con-
sequently, the issue of well-being (a pillar of the social
dimension of CSR) came to the forefront to become one of
the top priorities for La Poste.
For the interviewed managers, the responsible manage-
ment is definitively linked to the CSR policy and concerns
the role of managers as mentioned the director of the CSR
program:
I think responsible management is the incarnation of
the CSR program for the manager.
But several interpretations of this notion exist among
managers. Some of them emphasize ethical behavior with
their colleagues or subordinates based on respect, listening,
exemplarity, courage, and recognition.
I think that responsible management is to manage
people with the concern to the wellbeing at work,
quality of working.
On these values linked to the responsible manage-
ment, I want to point out sense-giving, attentiveness
to employees and respect.
Others respondents put forward the co-building of
decisions with stakeholders or the necessity to consider
different dimensions and their complexity in decision
making.
Each manager must analyse the consequences of his/
her decisions. There is no perfect decision and there
is always negative effects to every decision. But the
more decisions were made with stakeholders based
on a consensus, the easier were the negative effects of
the decision to manage
In a decision making process, we must observe every
dimensions to find the best equilibrium. Ok I agree
with this definition, but how to do? Take only the
environmental dimension, how to optimise the
reduction of the gas emission and the economic
concern. (…) the system is complex with diverse variables. Then I think the stake for managers is to
broaden the spectrum of constraints—economic,
social and environmental.
The Groupe expects we practice a responsible man-
agement, but there is so many missions that a man-
ager should assume, it is complicated. The difficulty
is to be the best orchestra conductor as possible. The
harmony of the group is may be the responsible
management and each musical instrument is one of
the aspect of CSR. And we must try to manage things
so that the team carry out its mission at best.
This principle of responsible management is a big
challenge for the Groupe La Poste to federate managers
and to improve managerial practices.
CSR Policies of the Groupe La Poste
The CSR policies (set of orientations which established a
guideline for the implementation) are presented by the
interviewees as being an evolving process. When speaking
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 581
123
about the CSR policy, postal employees first mention sus-
tainability (environmental actions) and social responsibility.
Responsible management made its appearance only recently
in the last CSR policy. However, the managers believe
responsible behaviors were present before without neces-
sarily having had to explain them. Because CSR dimensions
are linked to La Poste’s mission and values, CSR is consid-
ered to be, in fact, ‘‘part of the genes’’ of La Poste.
For a long time, we did it and we didn’t need to write
and to say it, it was deeply rooted in behaviors and in
what was considered as normal.
When we were a pure public utility company, we
practiced CSR. This is a long tradition with social
concerns as part of our DNA.
Previously, it seems there was no need to formulate a
CSR policy to expect responsible behaviors from managers
and employees. The formulation of the CSR program in
2011 is not viewed as a change in direction but more as
continuity for the postal employees.
I don’t think we discovered CSR in La Poste in 2011.
Many things already existed even if the panorama
was not as complete as today.
The CSR policy is seen as transversal and must be
present in every action of the Groupe La Poste.
For me CSR policy is everywhere; Everybody must
think and be oriented toward CSR.
But the executive in charge of the CSR program and
managers recognize that CSR policy must be implemented
differently in each branch of the Groupe. The mail and
parcel activities emphasize on environmental dimension of
CSR and the network of postal agencies and banking
activities focus on social dimension and responsible
investment.
The mail activity which is based on logistic and needs
many resources in terms of transportation and loca-
tion has been soon engaged in sustainable develop-
ment and reducing the environmental impact. The
parcel activity similarly has chosen an orientation on
energy optimization and rationalization of the trans-
portation means.
At the opposite, the activity of postal agencies is a
commercial profession based on contacts with cus-
tomers and civil society, based on the management of
sales team. In this case, orientations have been taken
in managerial and social dimensions. This orientation
is historic.
This differentiation is necessary because it helps the
different postal employees to make sense to CSR, but can
be difficult to manage and control to keep the coherence of
the CSR policy at the level of the Groupe. But the
responsible management concerns every activity and can
be considered as a guideline for every managers and postal
employees. It is the reason why the company has developed
implementation mechanisms to deploy the responsible
management and make it more effective.
Implementation Mechanisms Developed by the Groupe La
Poste
The implementation mechanisms set up by La Poste
(defined as a set of organizational and managerial vari-
ables and artifacts to support the deployment of the CSR
program) deal with changes in its structure, management
tools, and communication, training and concerted
actions.
The Groupe La Poste has established a specific organi-
zational structure to support, pilot, and implement the CSR
program at the group and business levels by
– Creating a CSR unit at the group level (in February
2011) to support the implementation and appointing of
CSR delegates in each business and region (today this
unit has 15 people); a previous sustainable develop-
ment unit existed before 2011, but was not really
transversal.
– ‘‘Today, the direction of branches have integrated the
CSR national engagement clearly in their strategy and
have structured themselves with CSR teams and CSR
experts’’;
– Integrating CSR in the governance structure: a quality
and sustainability committee at the board level to
follow up strategy implementation, and an executive
committee in charge of defining the CSR strategy;
– Establishing CSR committees (for the group, per
business and for the inter-businesses)
– Setting up an ethics committee at the group level
composed with top executives (including the head of
CSR unit, the HR Director, … and representatives in charge of deontology in the four branches);
– Appointing a lead expert on CSR in each territorial area
since 2011.
Management tools have been set up to pilot and control
implementation, taking into account specificities and action
plans developed in each business. As part of the road map,
these tools take the form of ‘‘score cards’’ specific to each
business activity and are consolidated at the group level.
This consolidated ‘‘score-card’’ contains two main dimen-
sions: co-workers and environment (including responsible
products/services for the Banque Postale) with corre-
sponding indicators, scores, and objectives. Progress is
monitored yearly and indicators are reported for each
business to the top executive management level.
582 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
We took in place a diagnosis based on a referential
which has been built with the branches. This yearly
diagnosis helps to control the implementation to the
CSR policy and the action plans. It helps also to
spread the good practices and to advise the directors
of units on the good behaviors and to understand why
some results don’t progress.
The Groupe La Poste has also developed a framework
which includes the definitions and specifications for the
ISO 26000 certification. Yearly diagnosis enables the
organization to monitor the implementation of the ISO
26000 principles.
Having said CSR is translated into ISO 26000,
everybody and every tool must be CSR-oriented (…). It has to be integrated in the control system, in the
tools used by buyers.
At the individual level, since 2013, each operational
manager has objectives related to CSR or responsible
management (developing well-being at work, favoring
responsible purchasing, developing in-company training,
etc.). Managers’ contributions are evaluated during the
annual assessment interview and a variable component of
the compensation is dedicated to the achievement of these
CSR objectives.
In terms of objectives, we can favor purchasing from
the protected sector (workers with social-mental
physical handicaps); we can also have everything
linked to well-being at work, implement training, and
favor diversity in recruitment.
I have missions in my roadmap and some of them
have a managerial dimension, for example quality of
working life, health to work, the way we manage
change. Do you realize the importance? This
table will be used for my annual appraisal.
My subordinates have performance objectives at the
beginning of the year, among which there are CSR
objectives. (…) With these objectives, I examine how they have evolved in managerial terms and I meet
them regularly. (…) And at the end of the year, I estimate how much it is valued in their variable
portion of the remuneration.
Significant communication actions were developed in
2011–2012 to increase awareness and to promote and
diffuse a culture of CSR and responsible management.
At the group level, many documents were made avail-
able to the employees in all the business activities
(Report on the CSR program, Code of deontology,
Guide of good practices, ‘‘Living Our Values ‘‘). In all
the regions of France, the Groupe organized general
meetings dedicated to responsible management in order
to foster CSR implementation in its businesses and
departments. These awareness campaigns were extended
by the development of managerial communities at the
regional level. Communication actions have been lar-
gely directed at managers.
The discourse on the responsible management has
been widely diffused inside the firm through every
possible means.
Information through documentation has been circulated
inside the company and was available on the company’s
intranet. But some managers found sometimes difficult to
sort the information and to select the right one. Awareness
actions through many conferences and managerial com-
munity have been also implemented so that the message
specifically on responsible management could be more
understandable and give sense to the managers and the
employees. Some informal exchanges between managers
have been also developed during the ‘‘Grand Dialogue.’’
We have much downwards information, and after-
wards we must select. I saw information but not
really via our branch. It is more through intranet on a
dedicated website. But toward the teams it is not yet
so clear.
Saying we will cover the communication needs with
one only formal and structured communication plan, I
don’t believe. This documents can be only a peda-
gogical tool. But the message must be transmitted
from person to person.
During the Grand Dialogue, managers started to
discuss with each other. This informal exchange have
been developed and some places tried to continue.
That’s good because solutions can be found in peer
exchange.
Training programs concerning responsible development
and diversity have been organized since 2005 for strategic
managers at the group level. In 2011, a specific training
program has been designed on CSR and responsible man-
agement and extended to every new or senior strategic
manager in 2013. The manager in charge of this training
program stated:
Today, we organized around seven training session
each year. These sessions involve between 15 and 20
participants and our ambition is to double the number
of trainees per session.
According to the training leader, the three objectives of
this training program are as follows:
Firstly everybody should be informed about CSR in
general; secondly what is CSR at La Poste and in
each branch; and thirdly to inform participants on
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 583
123
responsible actions which can be implemented in
their job and who could help them to do it.
Many respondents considered the training efforts were
strong and covered many areas (discrimination, quality of
working life, negotiation).
There have been training organized for directors of
units and agencies, for managers. Honestly there has
been a significant investment to give knowledge and
know-how.
The issue of these training is to give a culture of social
and managerial responsibility so that managers could really
practice responsible management. But some managers
found those training not sufficiently operational, to help
them to practice responsible management.
I got from this training not more than awareness. I
didn’t get concrete things not operational and
declinable.
According to the respondents, the responsible attitude is
also linked to personal values and experiences which are
not addressed by the training program.
To practice responsible management, I believe we
need to have and respect values. La Poste has some
values, then we should be in coherence with the
strategy, but one must have personal values, respect
for people.
The practice of responsible management can be different
according to business lines. Additionally, each business line
tries to develop an exchange of best practices resulting in a
manual of best practices prepared for publication in 2013.
We try to organize transfers of best practices but there
are limitations because we cannot reproduce things
everywhere in the same way. There is really a cultural
issue; there are different managers’ personalities.
CSR-Related Outcomes in the Groupe La Poste
The effects or outcomes produced by the implementation
of the CSR Program are underlined at different levels by
the interviewees. At the group level, different functional
units progressively take into account the CSR program and
try to make responsible decisions and adopt a more
responsible behavior. For example, the financial services
are beginning to introduce extra-financial aspects in their
activity because these extra-financial aspects are asked for
by administrators. The purchasing department also under-
stands that it is in its best interest to better consider the
suppliers (not always apply pressure for lower prices), and
to contract new suppliers who employ disabled persons.
According to one respondent, it seems more difficult,
however, to convince the Human Resource department to
adjust its practices for long-term objectives even if the HR
has been negotiating practices that fit fundamentally with
the CSR commitment (to build with stakeholders) for a
long time.
We work a lot on the professionalization of the CSR
channels, then for management, purchase, commu-
nication. The sector which resist, is HR and in a
certain point finance. Surprisingly, sustainability is
difficult to be incorporated for the HR function.
The impacts of the CSR program vary depending on the
context of the 4 businesses since problems and stakes are
not the same for mail, parcel, finance, and the network of
the agencies. For the financial business, the economic crisis
has reinforced responsible investment products. For the
parcel business, green products recently have become a
market opportunity. Executive management has increased
its commitment to responsible choices. Concerning the
mail business, transportation has been a long-time concern
resulting in the implementation of green actions: for
example, the return logistics is not only an opportunity to
reduce the carbon footprint, but also maintains activity for
postmen in a context of reducing mail volume.
CSR implementation in managerial practices and
adapting these practices to specific contexts is a long pro-
cess. When the managers identify the interest of engaging
in CSR practices, they change their attitude, as mentioned
by this top manager:
The senior manager of the daughter International
postal parcel was reluctant at the beginning, but one
day his managers informed him that a competitor had
taken market shares with a new green service, then
providing green products became strategic. Now he
comes to us for assistance.
One issue for the Groupe La Poste is to maintain the
integration of different activities and to move them toge-
ther toward more responsible practices despite the different
contexts and stakes involved.
Concerning responsible management, every respondent
perceives it as a necessity for operational managers to have
the CSR policy successfully carried out. The managers seem
to know what responsible management is, even if it is defined
in different ways by the different interviewees. Responsible
management gives a sense to action and has to fit with the
organization’s values. Managers seem to be aware of the
necessity of adopting responsible behavior. However,
according to one interviewee, a minority of managers
behaves in a responsible manner much more out of fear than
out of conviction. La Poste is not totally free from the risk of
having non-responsible managerial behavior.
584 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
Concerning the responsible management of change, it
has become more difficult for managers to constantly go
from one change to another because social warning
mechanisms are activated by local trade unions to respect
the commitment to responsible management of change.
An executive manager of the mail business who was
about to retire wanted to implement a reorganization
without following the compulsory steps of a change
process to facilitate his successor’s work. But the
local trade unions came forward and the reorganiza-
tion was immediately stopped.
Our analysis leads us to suggest that our respondents
perceive continuity in the development of CSR programs,
and agree and insist on CSR as being a part of the DNA of
their public utilities company. However, besides its mis-
sion as a public service, the scope of these CSR programs
has been broadened to cover dimensions relating to sus-
tainability and responsibility. Respondents are not yet
totally satisfied with their implementation and their prac-
tices. Considering the perceptions of the respondents and
the effects produced by the CSR program, it may be argued
that the majority of respondents agree on their positive
outcomes. However, what is presented as a positive and
proactive commitment toward responsible management
could be perceived by some managers as a reactive attitude
aiming at limiting negative risks, mainly social ones.
Discussion
The discussion is structured around three points: firstly, the
use of Pettigrew’s methodological framework to analyze
the formulation of a CSR program; secondly, the use of
Yuan et al.’s patterns to identify the trajectory leading to a
deeper integration of CSR in the strategic plans; and
thirdly, the integrative framework developed by Maon
et al. (2009) to show the processes followed by La Poste to
elaborate its strategic CSR program.
Around the Contextual Perspective of CSR Program
as Change
Our study shows the relevance of the methodological
framework initiated by Pettigrew to analyze the formula-
tion of a CSR program as a strategic change. Indeed, the
‘‘horizontal’’ perspective highlights the necessity to take
into account the historical events that marked the evolution
of the organization to consider the present situation
(identify the current issues and resources) and to prepare
the future (define the strategy and the CSR program). The
‘‘vertical’’ analysis enables to identify the interplay
between (1) the content of the CSR program and the
strategic plan, (2) the process leading to the elaboration of
the those programs, and (3) contexts (internal and external)
in which the organization evolves.
Among the contextual elements, our study reveals the
importance of the 2012–2013 social events which lead the
Groupe La Poste to explicit and modify its CSR program.
The suicides reported by the media and the trade unions’
communication created a crisis situation for the company
to which it must answer. The nature of the crisis was
‘‘preventable’’ (placing people at risk) and could affect the
corporate reputation (Coombs 2007). The company reacted
throughout a ‘‘primary crisis communication strategy’’
which was accommodative, showing concern for victims
(the employees) and reassuring the internal stakeholders by
considering the responsibility of the company (Coombs
2007). But, the top management triggered also a ‘‘sec-
ondary crisis response strategy’’ (Coombs 2007) on a
longer term aiming to understand the crisis origins through
a consultation plan (the ‘‘Grand Dialogue’’) and to rebuild
the corporate reputation, specifically for internal actors.
The company focused on the employees which were the
(potential) victims and based on its rooted dialogue prac-
tices with employees and on the CSR principles oriented
through the employees and the clients. This study shows
then, as mentioned by Lotila (2010), the importance of the
principles of CSR for defining the practice of public
relations.
For the Groupe La Poste, the internal elements (CSR
principles, CSR-oriented values) played a significant role
in the way the organization managed the crisis which are
other organizational factors not analyzed in the Huang and
Su’s study (2009). Other ‘‘internal tools’’ described by
Valand and Heide (2005) played a significant role in the
way the Groupe La Poste managed the ‘‘CSR crisis inci-
dents.’’ The processes developed by the firm to commu-
nicate on the reoriented CSR strategy, to train the managers
on the responsible management, and to control the effec-
tiveness helped the Groupe La Poste to implement its
‘‘management strategy’’ (Valand and Heide 2005). Finally,
the way the Groupe La Poste managed the events and
reoriented its CSR program following the crisis confirms
the arguments defended by Coombs and Holladay (2015)
on the risks which can be generated by the formulation of a
CSR strategy when stakeholders denounce practices
viewed as irresponsible and not respecting the responsible
engagements.
Around the Strategic Trajectory of the CSR
Program
Concerning the strategic trajectories, our analysis shows a
deeper integration of CSR in the two last strategic plans
(‘‘Ambition 2015’’ and ‘‘La Poste 2020’’) and suggests that
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 585
123
it has been performed mainly thanks to relabeling placing
CSR at the very center of the organization (Yuan et al.
2011). In the previous strategic plans, CSR practices were
spread within the organization, but in the Ambition 2015
and ‘‘La Poste 2020’’ strategic plans recognized those
routines as CSR practices that must be integrated in the
strategic plan. The analysis shows that new CSR practices
relating to responsible management have been defined and
created (‘‘patching’’) in the course of the Ambition 2015
and its CSR program’ implementation. Beforehand there
was a need to denounce and try to eliminate routines
detrimental to CSR practices (‘‘trimming as precursor of
reconstructing’’). This led to redefine the CSR-related
principles and policies, putting emphasis on responsible
management and to set up additional organizational
arrangements and managerial mechanisms to support its
implementation.
Around the Main Dimensions of the CSR Program
The analysis presented in this article confirms the impor-
tance of central dimensions in a CSR program and their
interplay that have been identified by Maon et al. (2009)
for a variety of organizations. Our study goes in depth in
one given organization by analyzing the strategic plans and
CSR programs, we detailed the content of the final CSR
program. The case study allows also to interview diverse
actors placed at different levels within the organization
(persons in charge of CSR, top and middle managers). This
diversity of the sample helps us to better identify the pro-
cesses deployed within the company to implement the CSR
program, the difficulties to diffuse the responsible princi-
ples throughout the organization, and also to appreciate the
different perceptions of the program. We found not only
communalities but also differences with the conceptual
integrative framework grounded in theory and practice
developed by Maon et al. (2009).
Even if our conceptual framework is less exhaustive and
focused on the elaboration of the CSR program (corre-
sponding to steps 1–7 in Maon et al. 2009), our analysis of
the strategic and organizational changes in the period
2011–2014 in the Groupe La Poste sheds some comple-
mentary light and is more detailed on specific ‘‘upstream’’
dimensions (vision, mission, policies, and principles) and
their interplay as they are perceived by key actors.
Even if our analysis did not focus on the ‘‘top man-
agement’ role in the elaboration of the CSR program that
has been developed as an integrated part of the Ambition
2015 strategic, and in the Major social dialogue, most of
the interviewees mentioned its instrumental role, commit-
ment, and involvement in these processes.
In their framework, Maon et al. (2009, p. 77) identify a
preliminary stage called ‘‘sensitize’’ and consisting of
‘‘raising CSR awareness inside the organization.’’ This
awareness is driven by the perception managers have about
evolution in the ‘‘external’’ political, social, and economic
issues and the risks associated with the impact on the
company’s operations, as well as by their CSR-related
individual values. Raising CSR awareness is a prerequisite
for a proactive CSR and influences the definition of the
CSR-related vision. Our analysis suggests that such
awareness ‘‘pre-existed’’ in the Groupe La Poste for a long
time. However, they focused on specific dimensions (en-
vironmental, sustainable development) that were only
partially made explicit. These dimensions were more
developed, enriched, and integrated in the CSR-related
vision that has been made explicit in the ‘‘Ambition 2015’’
strategic plan. On the other hand, ‘‘unexpected’’ events,
issues, and problems regarding stress and well-being at
work appeared which triggered the emphasis to be put on
responsible management since 2011.
The second step ‘‘assessing corporate purpose in its
social context’’ (Maon et al. 2009) covers two dimensions:
‘‘uncovering corporate norms and values’’ (p. 78) and
‘‘identifying key stakeholders and critical stakeholders’’
issues (p. 79). It may be argued that, concerning the first
dimension, the CSR programs developed at the Groupe La
Poste are rooted in its corporate values and organizational
culture as a public service utilities company. However, the
set of CSR-related values and corporate values have been
more closely linked, integrated, broadened, and made more
explicit and professed in the Ambition 2015 strategic plan.
Such is also the case for the identification of key stake-
holders and critical stakeholder’s issues. It may be argued
that, for the Groupe La Poste, the principal and key
stakeholders have long been the employees, the unions, and
the state and local authorities. The Groupe La Poste
developed a mission statement that is inherent to its public
utility service activities and naturally oriented to meeting
its key stakeholders’ demands and expectations. The evo-
lution in the external and internal contexts led the Groupe
La Poste to foster interaction and dialogue with these
stakeholders. However, it recently increased the number
and the diversity of its stakeholders (clients; specifically
professional ones, and suppliers) to take into account their
expectations and concerns (including CSR-related issues)
in the elaboration of the strategic plan, as is the case for the
Ambition 2015 plan and the new strategic plan launched in
2014.
The establishment of a CSR-related vision and a work-
ing definition of CSR (step 3, Maon et al. 2009, p. 79) are
central in our analysis of the Groupe La Poste
(2011–2013). This vision is based on (and linked to) its
mission, the perceptions regarding the evolution in its
external and internal contexts and key stakeholder’s
demands. Moreover, the CSR-related vision reflects
586 M. Ingham, C. Havard
123
corporate and CSR-related professed values and is
anchored in the organizational culture. It is worth stressing
that the Groupe La Poste’s working definition of CSR has
been elaborated in the framework of the Ambition 2015
strategic plan through the definition of CSR principles and
commitments and a working definition of the concept of
responsible management.
Assessing current CSR status (step 4—Maon et al. 2009,
p. 80) requires auditing current CSR practices and bench-
marking competitors’ practices and CSR norms and stan-
dards. Even if our analysis does not address these issues, it
suggests that such auditing is regularly conducted in the
Groupe La Poste, at least internally.
Developing an integrated CSR strategic plan (step 5—
Maon et al. 2009, pp. 80–81) is at the core of our analysis.
Defining a clear and explicit CSR-related vision and mis-
sion, which integrate social and environmental issues, and
translating them into explicit CSR-related policies and
codes of conduct, helps set priorities and achieve objectives
thanks to the successful implementation of the CSR pro-
gram. These policies and principles are used to guide
decisions, actions, and behaviors and to assess them.
To perform these tasks and support the implementation of
this integrated CSR strategic plan, companies also put in
place governance mechanisms and CSR-enabling organi-
zational structures, units dedicated to CSR, to appoint CSR
managers and experts within the organization, and create
cross functional and divisional teams, committees, and for-
ums to share knowledge and experiences (Maon et al. 2009).
Such is the case at the Groupe La Poste, with the creation of a
CSR unit located at the headquarters, the appointment of
CSR correspondents in each region, business, and central
function, and the organization of intra- and cross-regional
business committees, meetings, and forums.
Besides these arrangements in the organizational struc-
ture, companies put in place a great variety of managerial
methods and tools to support and help middle managers in
their task of implementing the CSR-integrated strategic plan,
putting in place managerial methods and tools to assess
progress made as well as behaviors, etc. (step 6–Maon et al.
2009, pp. 81–82). Our analysis shows that the Groupe La
Poste developed and deployed a great number and variety of
managerial artifacts between 2010 and 2013, like education
programs dedicated to CSR, the integration of CSR-related
score cards adapted to each business, CSR-criteria for the
individual and collective evaluation of progress made and
behaviors adopted included in the annual assessment,
methods, and tools related to ISO 26000, etc.
One of the key issues is to communicate the vision,
mission, professed values, policies, and principles as well
as the progress made in the implementation not only
internally but also to the external stakeholders (step 7—
underlying steps 6–8 and 9 in Maon et al. 2009, pp. 82–83).
Our analysis shows that the Groupe La Poste has put in
place a great number and variety of tools to support
extensive internal communication more specifically since
2012 and also communication to external stakeholders as
has been the case in early 2014.
The analysis of CSR as strategic and organizational
change at the Groupe La Poste, focusing on the Ambition
2015 strategic plan, leads us to conclude that these changes
rest on the interplay between key dimensions that have
been identified in the literature. However, emphasis has
been put on the central role of CSR-related shared values
and cultural traits that are deeply rooted in the organiza-
tion, according to our respondents. This is the reason why
our conceptual framework presents these dimensions as
being deeply integrated and underlying the whole process.
Conclusion
Returning to our research questions (why the Groupe La
Poste has formulated an explicit CSR program and what
was precisely the content of it), our analysis leads us to
conclude that these missions and values are closely linked
and underlie central dimensions associated to the elabora-
tion of the program.
Our analysis shows a progressive convergence between
strategic and CSR trajectories and sheds some light on the
processes with which an organization can progressively
integrate CSR as a central part of its strategic plan. How-
ever, compared to stage models that are presented in the
literature, particularly the consolidated one (Maon et al.
2009) that stresses three cultural phases (CSR cultural
reluctance, CSR cultural grasp (stages 2, 3, 4), and CSR
cultural embedment (stages 5-6-7)), we can consider that,
at Groupe La Poste, implicit CSR-culture was embedded
since a very long time due to its mission and core values
that are part of its DNA. These core values have been
awakened, brought to light, and formulated as integrative
dimensions of the CSR program and strategic plan.
Our analysis confirms the role of central dimensions that
support the integration of CSR programs and their interplay.
CSR-related mission and vision aim at orienting the orga-
nization toward sustainability and responsibility. CSR-re-
lated principles and policies transpose and translate vision
and mission into commitments and guide the implementa-
tion and adoption of responsible behaviors. Ad hoc organi-
zational structures and managerial artifacts support the
implementation and adoption. CSR-related values and
organizational culture underlie the whole process and act as
the foundations on which other CSR dimensions are based.
The case study presented in this article has been based
on the analysis of published documents and interviews with
key actors, some of them executives who are involved in
CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’ 587
123
the elaboration process or hold senior positions in the
company, but also operational managers. This provides
insights on how the major dimensions presented in the
conceptual framework and their interplay are not only
formulated and professed but also on how they are per-
ceived and interpreted.
Our case study leads us to formulate some managerial
implications. Firstly, it seems difficult to implement inte-
grated CSR program from scratch and in a very short
period of time. CSR programs must rest on some organi-
zational foundations that are progressively built: some
dimensions of the corporate mission and some shared CSR-
related values. Those foundations create ‘‘stable’’ variables
on which the change (thanks to responsiveness) is made
possible. Moreover, the strategic intent is necessary but not
sufficient to engage the company in CSR processes. Actors
all along the organization perceive the CSR processes with
their own interpretations. Then it is not sufficient to com-
municate on the content of the program, but it is necessary
to help managers and operators to make sense of it. And the
shared CSR values facilitate this process.
Our research has two main limits. Firstly, it focuses on
the context in which strategic and organizational changes
associated to CSR take place and on their content but not
on their related processes. Secondly, the case study is based
on a limited number of interviews. However, we believe
that the diversity of positions held by these respondents,
who are informed about CSR programs and involved in
their elaboration sheds light on the key dimensions and on
their interplay. These respondents also have significant
experience because of their seniority in the organization
and of their knowledge about the different company
activities and the strategic and CSR trajectories which have
been followed for many years.
The next stage of our research on the Groupe La Poste
will be focused on the process of the implementation of
CSR programs. Indeed, the success of a CSR program
rests on its implementation. Gaps may exist between the
CSR commitments and how actors live and experience the
implementation of organizational changes. In order to fill
these gaps, companies are invited to question their CSR
practices and to review and revisit their CSR-related
principles and policies. We will investigate the roles of
key actors and specifically the middle managers. Early
findings presented in this paper suggest differences in
perceptions depending on their position and responsibili-
ties and the contexts in which they live. More precisely,
we will focus on the managers’ practices and on the sense
these middle managers give to these CSR-related changes
for themselves and for their team members, sense which
is directly linked to the values professed and shared by
postmen and women. A third avenue will consist of a
more in depth analysis of gaps that could exist between
CSR as it is professed, and what is truly happening. We
hope to shed new light on the downstream phases in the
implementation of CSR programs and the evaluation of
their outcomes.
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- CSR as Strategic and Organizational Change at ‘‘Groupe La Poste’’
- Abstract
- Introduction
- Corporate Social Performance (CSP): A Framework to Analyze the Dynamic of CSR Program
- From CSR to CSP
- An Overview of CSP Models
- CSR Programs as Strategic and Organizational Change Processes
- CSR Trajectories
- Levels and Degrees of Integration
- Designing and Implementing CSR Programs
- Conceptual Framework
- A Contextual Approach of Change
- Strategic Trajectories of CSR Program
- Dimensions of a CSR Program
- Mission Related to CSR
- CSR-Related Vision
- CSR-Related Principles
- CSR-Related Policies
- Implementation ‘‘Mechanisms’’
- CSR-Related Outcomes
- Values and Organizational Culture
- Relationships with Stakeholders
- Methodology and Context of the Study
- Results
- Strategic and CSR Trajectories of the Groupe La Poste (1990--2014 hellip): Toward the Integration
- A CSR Program Explicitly Formulated in 2011 and Confirmed in 2014
- The perceived dimensions of the CSR Program in the Groupe La Poste
- Mission Related to CSR in the Groupe la Poste
- Relationships with Stakeholders
- CSR-Related Values in the Groupe La Poste
- CSR-Related Vision of the Groupe La Poste
- CSR-Related Principles of the Groupe La Poste
- CSR Policies of the Groupe La Poste
- Implementation Mechanisms Developed by the Groupe La Poste
- CSR-Related Outcomes in the Groupe La Poste
- Discussion
- Around the Contextual Perspective of CSR Program as Change
- Around the Strategic Trajectory of the CSR Program
- Around the Main Dimensions of the CSR Program
- Conclusion
- References
