Drawing on the true story of the actions of a middle manager in a major industrial company after the unexpected death of one of his employees, while participating in one of the most important social rituals to humans and society - the creation of meaning of death - we take an analytical approach to corporate social responsibility (CSR). This is done by discussing the overlap between CSR and human resource management (HRM). The story induces us to question the upholding of CSR an HRM as separate theoretical fields, since the managerial practice seems to indicate that these have merged into one. Also, the story indicates that the borders between the 'private' and 'public' roles in managerial practice are blurred and that to be a middle manager today is quite complicated. The article finishes with a discussion on why the writing of policies may not be the answer to this problem.
QC 20110414