Drawing upon the theories of organizational attention, I explore how firms with firm-specific knowledge assets manage expectations from external stakeholders. I argue that, from consumers’ perspective of value creation, firms with a high degree of specificity in their knowledge assets focus their initial attention on reducing risks and bringing benefits for target consumers. Consequently, those firms have a high level of consumer corporate social responsibility (CSR). However, due to limited organizational attention and resources, firms with a high level of knowledge specificity may pay little attention to distal stakeholders and the public, such as environment and community, leading to a low level of general community CSR. Moreover, product safety concern may modify these effec...[ Read more ]

Drawing upon the theories of organizational attention, I explore how firms with firm-specific knowledge assets manage expectations from external stakeholders. I argue that, from consumers’ perspective of value creation, firms with a high degree of specificity in their knowledge assets focus their initial attention on reducing risks and bringing benefits for target consumers. Consequently, those firms have a high level of consumer corporate social responsibility (CSR). However, due to limited organizational attention and resources, firms with a high level of knowledge specificity may pay little attention to distal stakeholders and the public, such as environment and community, leading to a low level of general community CSR. Moreover, product safety concern may modify these effects by strengthening the positive effect of firm-specific knowledge on consumer CSR and mitigating the negative effect of firm-specific knowledge on general community CSR. Consumer CSR also strengthens the negative effect of firm-specific knowledge on general community CSR. Empirical results generally support these arguments. The implications of my findings for the theories of firm-specific knowledge, CSR, and organizational attention in management studies are discussed.

Keywords: firm-specific knowledge, external stakeholder, corporate social responsibility, value creation, organizational attention