Social enterprises are focused on creating public value. Public value can be described as ‘what adds value to the public’ and ‘what is valued by the public’.
This interpretation leaves social enterprises with a problem. Due to the fact that these organizations are confronted with a complex multi-stakeholder environment, it is important to assess for which stakeholders the organizations should create public value, and what public value exactly means to the different stakeholders. This assessment is important because stakeholders determine whether a public organization is operating legitimate. When an organization is not operating in a legitimate way, stakeholders may withdraw their support, therewith threatening the autonomy or continuity of the organization.
In our research we elaborate on the aspects of legitimacy, public value and the interaction with stakeholders in order to fill in the relationship between public value, legitimacy and support.
We have found that stakeholder interaction at least consists of the choice of stakeholder groups, the assessment of their expectations and stakes, the way the organization should interact and the moments the organization should interact. We state that expectations and stakes towards public value are similar with aspects of reputation, due to the fact that it is hard to judge the choices, products and services and values and norms of social enterprises.
In our view, it is certainly possible to set up stakeholder interaction in an effective way. We think that the next challenge should be about the topics discussed with various stakeholders.