Linking Stakeholder Behaviour with Disclosing Strategies of Environmental Sensitivity Companies

The main objective of the study is to examine adopted strategies by environmental sensitivity companies in disclosing environmental information for managing stakeholder behaviour in Sri Lanka. It also aims to identify main users of environmental information disclosed in annual report and their cooperation and threat with the companies. The study was conducted on positivist perspective by adopting deductive approach using qualitative method. The study considered nine environmental sensitivity companies. Data were collected through nine in-depth interviews from Managers who are directly involving in the process of environmental reporting. Content analysis was used to analysis qualitative data using NVivo 7 software. Interview data were converted into text through process of code and categories primary patterns or themes. Question by question and pattern matching techniques were used to analyse the data. Stakeholders’ cooperation and threat with the company were recognised by indirectly asking from the respondents based on three dimensions (stakeholder’s capacity, action and coalition). Types of strategies adopted by the companies were examined by providing four choices. The study reveals that shareholders, government and general public mostly use the annual report. Further, it shows that government, shareholders and bank are categorised as swing stakeholders while NGO is classified as defensive stakeholder. Customers, public, employees and supplier are categorised as offensive stakeholder. Moreover, whether stakeholder support or not, it depends on magnetite of environmental events or issues and environmental performance of the companies. Defend strategy is highly adopted by environmental sensitive companies while do nothing is least. It is concluded that the type of environmental disclosure strategy is determined by managerial perception on the stakeholders about their level of cooperation and threat