CORPORATE

SOCIAL
RESPONSIBILITY
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a company’s commitment to
manage the social, environmental and economic effects of its operations
responsibly and in line with public expectations.

1. Lead-in Ask and answer the questions with a partner.

Should companies have a sense of responsibility towards the community

and the environment in which it operates?
Do you know companies that have bad reputations? What for?
Are there products you won’t buy for ethical reasons? If so, what are
they?

Here you have the 3 main types of CSR.

2. Speaking What initiatives do each of them involve? Work with a partner
and brainstorm some ideas.
Corporate social responsibility

Environmental Ethical Philanthropic

responsibility responsibility responsibility
(behave in a way that is (ensure an organization is (a business’s aim to actively
as environmentally operating in a fair and make the world and society a
friendly as possible.) ethical manner.) better place.)
 Here you have a few CSR initiatives.
3. Vocabulary Decide which category each of them belongs to
(environmental, ethical or philanthropic).
a) employ people at risk of exclusion (e.g. people with disabilities, single
mothers, unemployed people over the age of 45)
b) use less single-use plastics
c) produce less waste
d) fund education programs
e) increase reliance on renewable energy
f) offset negative impact e.g. planting trees, funding research
g) source materials that meet fair trade standards
h) donate to charities and non-profits
i) provide equal pay for equal work
j) disavow child labor
k) reduce greenhouse gas emissions
l) set higher minimum wage

Which of the initiatives above would be especially interesting for a

company to highlight as part of its CSR strategy?

4. Pre-listening Match the phrases in bold to their definitions.

1.I try to set an example for my

a) inform and educate people
employees by always arriving to work about a topic or problem
on time and taking care of problems
as they arise. b) to plan for a specific purpose
to set an example means:
c) achieve an objective
2.Green machines took another giant
leap this week with the first solar d) behave in a way that other
powered car factory. people should copy
to take a (giant) leap means: e) make important progress
3.We have reached our goal to
become carbon-neutral 2 years ahead
of time.
to reach a goal means:

4.The movement has succeeded in

raising the world's awareness of the
climate emergency.
to raise awareness means:

5.The measures aimed at preserving

family life.
to aim at something means:
5. Suffixes Complete the words with the correct suffix. 2 are not used!

ness / tion / able / age / ment / ment / ship

CSR requires real 1. commit from businesses.

We really need to increase environmental 2. aware if we

want to address the climate crisis.

We aim to produce at least 50% of the energy from 3. renew

sources.

Cryptocurrencies are a risky 4. invest , but might be very

profitable as well.

We have developed important 5. partner with various non-

profit organisations and have funded several conservation projects.

6. Speaking Choose the correct option to create common collocations.

practice

A lot of hope is put in recycling, but we need to

awareness of overconsumption, which is the real problem.

The best way to teach children about ethics and sustainability is if

parents a good example with their own behaviour.

It is highly unlikely that the UN's 2030 sustainable development

goals (e.g. zero hunger, sustainable cities, affordable and clean
energy etc.) will be .

It is not enough for businesses to the environmental

standards established by law, they need to do more if they want to
be truly responsible.

Discuss the statements with a partner. Give reasons for your opinion.
 You are going to watch a video "Our LEGO responsibility: protect
7. Listening: A the planet for future generations".
Answer the questions below:
Video:
1.Who did LEGO partner with in 2013?

2.What did this commitment require from LEGO?

3.What was LEGO's goal for 2020?

4.How many European households are powered by the wind farms LEGO
invested in?

5.When did LEGO reach its 2020 goal?

6.What is LEGO's 2030 goal?

Watch the video again. Complete the sentences with the

Listening: B
words and expressions you hear.

1.These bricks to children and society through

creativity and learning.

2.As a company, we must and inspire children to

do the same.

3.Reducing our energy use across all our factories and offices formed the
first stage of our plan for our energy consumption to be 100% balanced by
by 2020.

4.But rather than taking small steps towards our 2020 goal, we decided to
instead.

5.Now the amount of energy generated by the 2 off-shore wind farms

the amount of energy used at our factories.

6.That means we of being 100% balanced by

renewable energy 3 years early in 2017.

7.This fantastic fun event helped of our planet saving

project.
8. Speaking Discuss the questions with a partner.

What is your opinion about LEGO's initiatives? Is it enough to offset

the huge amount of plastic used to manufacture the bricks?
Do you think companies practise CSR for legal or ethical reasons?
Do you think CSR is just a marketing tool?
Do you think making huge profits means companies can never be
responsible?
Can a company survive nowadays if it shows no corporate
responsibility?
Given a similar offer of services, would you choose a company that
also had a good CSR track record? Why/why not?
How would CSR initiatives be different for small businesses and
multinational companies?

9. Role play Work in pairs or small groups.

Create a CSR strategy for the company you work for

1. Hold a meeting to discuss CSR

2. Identify key areas for improvement (environmental, ethical,
philanthropic)
3. Brainstorm possible solutions
4. Discuss the pros and cons of each solution
5. Come up with a CSR strategy
6. Present your strategy to the class
 10. Reflection What would you like to take from this lesson?
and feedback Complete the table below. After that your teacher will give
you some feedback.

A) New vocabulary: B) Pronunciation: C) Error correction:

write 5 (or more!) write the words from write the mistakes your
words or expressions this lesson that you teacher corrected
from this lesson you find difficult to (e.g. expressions you
would like to pronounce. translate from your
remember and use in language that are actually
the future. different in English;
prepositions etc.)

Research one of the topics below.

11. Homework
Report your findings to your teacher in the next class.

1. CSR exemplary companies and what have they done

2. CSR as a competitive advantage
3. CSR as a marketing tool

12. Keep Keep learning outside of the classroom!

1. Pre-
learning! To reinforce and enrich the vocabulary from this class, check the
listening. "additional resources" section (videos and articles) here:

LINK TO ADDITIONAL
RESOURCES