A Human Resources Perspective on Responsible Corporate Behavior. Case Study: The Multinational Companies in Western Romania

This article aims to show the extent to which socially responsible Human Resource Management practices are implemented in multinational companies. As more recent studies highlight, the manner in which companies in Romania presently comprehend the social responsibility of their actions is mostly aimed towards the social component of the outer environment in which they function and less towards their own employees. In Romania, at the moment, there are only a few studies that catalogue the efforts made by companies in order to become more responsible towards their employees, or in other words, studies that present Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) within its relationship with Human Resources Management (HRM). The research method we used for our case study was the semi-structured interview, applied on 32 respondents from the multinational companies carrying out their activities in the automotive sector in western Romania. Our study shows that multinational companies from the automotive sector are aware that CSR effects a series of long-term advantages, either externally—enhancing the company’s reputation and consolidating its brand as employer, its competitive advantage on the market, its media visibility—or internally—fostering an organizational culture that may generate greater engagement from its own employees, and financial advantages.