Responsiveness

Responsiveness refers to the ability to public administration and private firms to be accountable toward stakeholders about their ability to achieve their interests and expectations. The concept of responsiveness is strictly connected with the concept of responsibility, this last referred to the motivations that lead an organization to use resources in the interest of the resources’ owners. Since the Eighties of the last Century the reform movements in the public sector emphasized the importance to overcome the mere compliance to formalized processes and procedures towards a more citizens’ needs and expectations centred approach. Also in the private sector, the debate about social responsibility starting in the Sixties of the last Century has resulted in the belief that responsiveness is not limited to the communication activities by companies, but it expresses the global corporate responsibility that is leading the business according with the awareness of stakeholders’ expectations and their engagement in activities and strategies. Therefore, the spread of concepts as social responsibility and sustainability induces a new way to interpret both the organizations’ responsibility, embracing economic, social and environmental impacts of their actions, and the organizations’ responsiveness, moving from the capability to response to external pressures and expectations to a more proactive approach as the stakeholder engagement.