Responsabilité Sociale de l'Entreprise et pratiques de Gestion des Ressources Humaines

As far as human resource management practices (HRM) are concerned, how do French companies respond to corporate social responsibility (CSR)? Are they eager to develop practices beyond the existing legal rules? To answer these questions, we present the results of an inquiry involving 106 HR managers who mainly belong to large manufacturing companies. Their statements, collected by questionnaire, are focused on a few "responsible" HRM practices: - Recruiting practices in favour of disabled or non skilled persons - Training practices promoting the access or the return to work - Communication practices encouraging the dialog between the managers and the employees. According to our results, the HR management practices are still very slightly affected by CSR, they mainly respond to legal rules. Thus, this inquiry tends to show that, at the moment and for French companies, CSR is more than a business affair: it is an affair of society. Human Resource Management practices are not mainly defined by the will of stakeholders, but by employment laws.