Social return and organisational culture

‘Social return’ (SR) is a term in the Netherlands that summarises all efforts to integrate people with a mental or physical handicap in the labour market. It is an important political topic because government wants not only an inclusive society but also a decrease of expenditures on social benefits; an important topic for employers, because organisations can profile themselves as socially responsible; and a topic for applied research, finding ways and means of realising the concept.

The Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences is mainly involved because of the value of SR for applied research and the development of solutions that work. Several projects have been implemented with third parties, all of them involving students, e.g. through BA graduation research. However, the research also shows that there is no large-scale adoption among entrepreneurs yet. Three problems have been identified: (1) the SR policy currently has many negative side effects; (2) entrepreneurs must recognize that the involvement of employees with a SR indication not only costs money but may also contribute to profits; (3) insufficient attention is paid to finding the proper match between possible employees and suitable jobs (possibly with an adapted working environment). However, ‘social return’ is a feasible concept and the problems may be addressed. At the same time the initial efforts on realising ‘social return’ point at the importance of organisational culture.

The main aim of this paper is to show the link between organisational culture and the successful implementation of social return.