Stakeholder identification in the shipping industry

Abstract

The goal of this thesis is to understand how stakeholders in the shipping industry is identified and prioritized, and what challenges might follow. This will be answered by looking at one case study: Grieg Philippines.

Stakeholder management is an increasingly important aspect of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Companies are involving stakeholders into their business strategies due to the increasing pressures that they face from various stakeholders. The identification and prioritization of stakeholders is particularly complicated in the shipping industry due to the industry’s presence in communities all over the world. The globalized nature of the industry creates a pressure to engage in corporate social responsibility in all the local communities that they are located. Shipping companies experience pressure to engage in CSR in order to deal with these complicated issues. However, it can be difficult to evaluate and prioritize which of these stakeholders the industry have to consider when working with CSR.

The dissertation is based on a qualitative research method by conducting semi-structured interviews with relevant employees in Grieg Star AS. The interviews have given the dissertation depth with regards to questions of corporate social responsibility and stakeholder management. The theoretical framework used in order to answer the research questions is theories of corporate social responsibility, stakeholder theory and stakeholder salience theory. The framework has provided a basis with an aim of understanding how Grieg Philippines identifies their stakeholders, what criteria’s that are present when identifying stakeholders and what challenges they face.