The mediating role of employee well-being on the relationship between internal CSR practices and organizational loyalty: A case of banking sector in Sakarya city

The aim of this study is to explore the relationship between internal corporate social responsibility and organizational loyalty. Corporate social responsibility generally refers to organizations' policies and practices with respect to the environment and the betterment of society and disadvantaged groups. However, apart from these socially-beneficial practices, there are also a variety of legally non-binding policies and practices that promote employee well-being. These are referred as internal corporate social responsibilities. While the concept of corporate social responsibility has received a great deal of attention in the media and academia, the concept of internal corporate social responsibility has not sparked the same level of interest. In this context, when the relevant literature is examined, it is seen that the number of studies on this subject is quite limited. Thus, the aim of this study is to fill this gap and to explore the effects of companies' social responsibility policies towards their employees on organizational loyalty. The data in this study were obtained through a structured survey and analyzed with quantitative techniques. The population of the survey is the employees in the banking sector in Sakarya. The non-random, convenience sampling method was used to select participants and, 114 people working in public and private banks were reached. The results of the research demonstrates that there is a strong relationship between the internal practices of the organization (health and safety, work-life balance, training and development programs and, organizational justice) and the organizational loyalty of the employees, and that employee welfare has a mediating effect in this relationship. In practice, this finding implies that organizations should not only pay attention to the socially responsible activities that improve the welfare of the society but also they should invest in the activities that improve the well-being of their own employees. Because it has been found that these activities have a positive effect on organizational loyalty and this can, in turn, contribute positively to the organization by increasing employee productivity and reducing employee turnover rate.