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This study investigates the influence of corporate culture on financial reporting transparency within Iranian firms.

Leveraging a dataset of 1,480 firm-year observations from the Tehran Stock Exchange spanning from 2013 to 2022, the study employs text mining to quantify linguistic features of corporate culture and transparency, specifically readability and tone, within annual financial statements and Management Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) reports.

Our results confirm a positive and significant relationship between corporate culture and financial reporting transparency. The distinct dimensions of corporate culture — Creativity, Competition, Control, and Collaboration — each uniquely enhance financial transparency. Robustness tests including firm fixed-effects, entropy balancing, Generalized Method of Moments (GMM), and Propensity Score Matching (PSM) validate the profound influence of corporate culture on transparency. Additionally, our analysis shows that corporate culture significantly affects the disclosure of business, operational, and financial risks, with varying impacts across risk categories. Cross-sectional analysis further reveals how the impact of corporate culture on transparency varies significantly across different industries and firm sizes.

The study’s scope, while focused on Iran, opens avenues for comparative research in different cultural and regulatory environments. Its reliance on text mining could be complemented by qualitative methods to capture more nuanced linguistic subtleties.

Findings underscore the strategic importance of cultivating a transparent corporate culture for enhancing financial reporting practices and stakeholder trust, particularly in emerging economies with similar dynamics to Iran.

This research is pioneering in its quantitative analysis of the textual features of corporate culture and its impact on transparency within Iranian corporate reports, integrating foundational theoretical perspectives with empirical evidence.

Firms are increasingly digitalizing their business processes and expanding them into digital platforms, which are believed to generate digital and relational resources that can facilitate and deliver innovations for firms. Instead of focusing on the extent of digital integration capability (DI), this paper seeks to empirically evaluate whether the DI asymmetry between the buyer and supplier firms influences bilateral information sharing and the buyer’s product innovation. We also examine the moderating effects of firms’ external (environmental dynamism) and internal (innovative climate) environments on these relationships.

Primary and secondary archival data on 180 buyer-supplier Chinese dyadic relationships were collected and analyzed using multiple linear regression models. Additionally, the Process macro was used to shed a nuanced light on the moderation effects of environmental dynamism and innovative climate.

The results show that DI asymmetry negatively impacts buyer firms’ product innovation through decreased information sharing. Environmental dynamism weakens the negative relationship between DI asymmetry and information sharing. Meanwhile, the innovative climate negatively moderates the relationship between information sharing and product innovation.

This study adds knowledge to the literature regarding the dark side of “one-sided digitalization.” By exploring the influences of unbalanced DI in buyer-supplier relationships, this study yields essential theoretical and managerial implications for product innovation success in a digital era.

Is access to finance a constraint for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) development or a result of SMEs constraint? Considering the demand-side of the credit market, this paper aims to assess the effect of nonfinancial services (NFS) on financial access through demand for financing (direct effect) and access to finance (indirect effect).

Using data from a five-year comprehensive entrepreneurship program on a package of technical assistance, the author uses two impact assessment methods: before/after and propensity score matching approaches.

The author found significant changes in business practices for treated SMEs and entrepreneurs since both the number and frequency of good business practices increased for most of the SMEs in the program with a positive turnover effect. Evidence of the positive effects of NFS on demand for financing is found in SMEs but this does not involve more access to finance. Despite positive changes in business practices, small-size entrepreneurs continue to self-exclude for financing.

Different pass-throughs are operating within this “recycling” of entrepreneurial resources over time. The author shows the effectiveness of the knowledge on financing mechanism, financial conditions and government financial support, even if these mechanisms do not seem to lead to a significant improvement in access to finance.

The impact of enterprise social media (ESM) on employees is not always beneficial. The constant connectivity of ESM can trigger emotional issues, threatening employees' psychological states. This study aims to explore the potential risks of ESM usage on thriving at work by examining how ESM usage affects thriving and for whom this relationship is amplified.

Drawing on Affect Event Theory, this study proposes a research model for investigating the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions of the negative impacts of different ESM usage patterns on employees' thriving at work. This study employed Smart-PLS 4.0 with structural equation modeling to analyze multi-wave survey data from 255 employees, testing the proposed model.

The results indicate the following: (1) ESM usage triggers employees' workplace fear of missing out (WFoMO), increasing their online vigilance and consequently hindering their thriving at work. (2) The impact of ESM usage on employees' WFoMO and thriving at work varies with their ambition levels, with high-ambition employees being more susceptible to negative effects and (3) Different types of ESM usage exert distinct effects on employees.

This study substantiates the potential negative impact of ESM usage on employees' thriving at work, contributing to the literature on the “dark side” of ESM usage and thriving at work. This study confirms the critical mediating role of emotion, offering a novel theoretical perspective on understanding the mechanisms linking ESM usage and its outcomes. Additionally, this study identifies the moderating role of employee ambition, complementing the boundary conditions of ESM usage.

Addressing the urgent issue of climate change and its impact on society requires immediate attention and innovative solutions. This chapter explores research that examines previous studies about the strategies companies use in their human resources (HR) departments to lessen the impact of climate change and support good social results.

This section conducted a thorough search of academic literature to find relevant studies on the connection between HR strategies, addressing climate change, and social impact. The inclusion criteria for this research targeted empirical studies on the relationship between HR practices and environmental and social outcomes. It employed particular keywords such as well-known academic databases.

This review discusses the important influence of HR strategies in addressing climate change and promoting positive social effects in companies. It evaluates successful HR practices that specifically endorse environmental and social goals through a comprehensive analysis of academic studies. The results offer useful knowledge for HR professionals and business leaders looking to align their HR strategies with climate change.

The findings of this chapter can benefit a diverse audience such as scholars who deal with human resource management, knowledge management and organizational innovation, HR personnel, business stakeholders and the employees.

This review offers a novel viewpoint by exploring the less-studied area of HR's potential to drive positive environmental and social changes. While past research has acknowledged HR's significance, this review goes further by analysing the specific HR approaches that have been successful in tackling climate change and enhancing social welfare.

The ever-evolving landscape of financial technology (Fintech) has revolutionised payment methods and raised questions about what drives user behaviour in adopting these innovative solutions. This study, using narrative transportation theory as an underpinning theory, aims to investigate into the dynamics of green user behaviour in adopting Fintech payments.

This study used a deductive approach, and with data obtained from 635 respondents through the purposive sampling technique, partial least squares structural equation modelling was employed to yield significant insights.

The study found a positive association between green brand positioning and product differentiation. However, it unexpectedly didn't impact user attitudes towards Fintech payments. Green brand image and perceived performance positively influenced product differentiation. Perceived product differentiation fully mediated the association between green brand positioning and user attitudes. The study introduced fear of missing out's (FOMO) moderating role, enriching eco-conscious marketing insights and user behaviour understanding.

This study reveals crucial implications for marketers, policymakers and user experience (UX) designers operating within the Fintech industry. It emphasises green brand positioning's impact on product differentiation, user attitudes and its mediating role. It advocates for sustainability integration, innovation, strategic messaging and user-centric improvements to optimise user perceptions and competitiveness in the evolving Fintech landscape. The study's cross-sectional design may limit the ability to establish causal relationships over time and overlook temporal changes in green Fintech adoption dynamics; thus, longitudinal studies are warranted to better understand the evolving nature of user attitudes and behaviours towards green Fintech payments.

This study adds novelty to the existing body of literature by introducing the dimension of innovation appeal to green brand positioning and employing narrative transportation theory in the Fintech realm. The findings also add novelty by highlighting the moderating impact of fear of missing out in predicting the association between green brand positioning and product differentiation in the realm of green Fintech and green use behaviour.

Our study aims to fill in the gap in corporate strategic silence in the fashion industry. Given the insights into the industry practices, we asked whether important sustainability issues, namely deadstock and overstock, are discussed or disclosed in corporate sustainability reports. We assumed that only the most fashion-forward corporations would address this pressing issue. However, based on our content analysis of sustainability reports of companies listed as the signatories of the UN Global Compact’s Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action (N = 95), we found out that only one-fifth of them touch the issues to a varied extent. Our study’s results point to a significant discrepancy between the sustainability claims of fashion companies and their communication about overproduction and demonstrate the existence of the shared industry practice of corporate silence strategy concerning uncomfortable issues, such as deadstock and overstock.

We conducted a content analysis of selected corporate reports (N = 95) available publicly on the company’s websites, such as sustainability, environmental or corporate social responsibility reports. Initially, we analyzed the documents to see if they addressed the issue of deadstock. Subsequently, we performed a detailed content analysis using NVivo on these reports, which mentioned the issue of deadstock (N = 23).

Our study reveals strategic silence in the fashion industry regarding deadstock and overstock. Analyzing reports of 95 signatories of the UN Global Compact’s Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action, only one-fifth address these issues. Our research, employing content analysis with NVivo, indicates a significant discrepancy between sustainability claims and actual communication practices. Most companies focus on recycling or materials management rather than addressing deadstock and overstock directly. The findings highlight an industry-wide practice of strategic silence and the practice of shared corporate silence, avoiding transparent discussion on overproduction and its environmental impact.

This study is limited by its focus on publicly available corporate reports from signatories of the UN Global Compact’s Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action, which do not fully capture all corporate communication practices (those companies shall be the “pioneers” of sustainability and transparency). Additionally, the reliance on content analysis via NVivo is subject to interpretative biases, and the findings may not be generalizable across all fashion industry sectors. Future research could explore broader datasets, including internal corporate communications and consumer-facing narratives, to provide a more comprehensive understanding of strategic silence in sustainability communication.

Despite ongoing environmental, social and governance (ESG) efforts and sustainability initiatives, this study suggests that fashion corporations may strategically employ collective silence as a communication tactic to avoid addressing complex issues like overproduction and deadstock. This practice can undermine stakeholder trust and transparency. Therefore, fashion companies genuinely committed to sustainability and corporate responsibility should proactively incorporate discussions of unsold goods and overproduction into their ESG, impact and Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive reports. By addressing these challenges openly, companies can enhance their credibility, foster greater consumer trust and lead the industry toward more responsible and transparent practices.

Our research presents alarming evidence of corporate silence being strategically used to avoid addressing pressing issues in the industry. Several cases have drawn public attention to this problem, such as using the Västerås power plant in Sweden by a fashion conglomerate to incinerate clothes and disposing a vast amount of textile waste in Africa and the Atacama Desert in Chile. Our findings demonstrate that fashion corporations are reluctant to openly address these issues.

Our study analyzes the quiet practice of corporate silence in the fashion industry, especially around deadstock and overstock to emphasize the overproduction problem. Its unique contribution comes from using content analysis and subsequently, cluster analysis with NVivo, offering a new approach to content analysis. This approach helps reveal the gap between what companies communicate about sustainability and what they actually do. The findings add to the discussion on corporate environmental practices, suggesting a need for more transparent and responsible communication in sustainability discourse – focus more on the unsaid than published data.

This study aims to understand the kind of content and context that effectively create higher fan social media engagement (SME) through pre-match content posted by sports teams.

This research examines the effect of inspirational, informational, entertaining and warmth content appeal on affective and cognitive responses from fans in the form of likes and shares. Messages on X (previously Twitter), chosen as a representative social media platform, from the teams participating in the Indian Premier League, were analysed using regression models to validate the proposed model empirically.

For sports clubs, entertaining, warmth and inspirational content is more effective than information content in generating likes on social media. Content with high vividness is effective only for sports teams with high performance. Fans of low-performance teams exhibit higher responsiveness to content with inspirational appeal.

This research contributes to the sports marketing literature by examining the influential role of warmth and inspirational content in generating higher SME in the pre-match context.

This study provides prescriptions to sports clubs for leveraging social media platforms to engage their fans through appropriate content. Given the growth of sports leagues in developing and developed countries, this study provides guidelines to sports clubs for effective social media marketing.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first to integrate social identity theory and elaboration likelihood model theoretical frameworks to study fan engagement with social media content posted by sports clubs.

Drawing on the need–supply fit perspective, this study aims to examine how (mis)alignment between customer orientation (CO) and the service climate (SC) influences the affective organizational commitment and indirectly impacts employees’ customer-oriented behavior (COB) and customers’ word-of-mouth (WOM).

This paper used data from three different sources. The data set comprises 1,420 time-lagged observations from 725 employees surveyed at multiple time points, a total of 19,630 customers from 34 retail stores across multiple time points and the managers of the 34 stores, surveyed multiple times.

Employees’ affective commitment was found to be higher when CO and SC were both high. In case of misalignment, commitment is higher when the SC is stronger than the CO (compared to when the CO is stronger than SC). Employees’ commitment was positively related to subsequent store-level COBs, which in turn boosted customers’ WOM.

Very few studies have looked for impact of (mis)alignment of frontline employee characteristics with business unit features and how it relates to employees and customers responses.

Halal brands are crucial in driving the growing global Islamic economy. Despite the importance of brand research and the rich brand literature, there has yet to be a comprehensive study of brand image across halal industries. This study aims to systematically review the existing literature on brand image in halal industries to provide a state-of-the-art understanding and identify opportunities in this research area.

Guided by the Scientific Procedures and Rationales for Systematic Literature Reviews protocol and the theories, contexts, characteristics and methods framework, this paper reviews 35 journal articles from the Scopus and Web of Science (WoS) databases that feature brand image as an underpinning theory in the context of halal economies.

Since the first study almost a decade ago in 2014, brand image research in halal industries has concentrated on consumers in the Islamic finance sector. Keyword co-occurrence analysis reveals that central research themes in halal brand image include outcomes of trust, satisfaction and loyalty. Most studies are focused on halal industries in Muslim countries. The cognitive operationalization of brand image remains dominant in halal industry studies. There is a lack of studies on the moderators of halal brand image. Several unique antecedents of halal brand image are uncovered in this review that are undetected in traditional brand image studies.

The studies in this review are based on the Scopus and WoS databases, which may be perceived as a study limitation. This paper also only considered English journal articles and studies that focused on brand image in halal industries rather than general industries with Muslim consumers.

To become a global brand, halal brands must effectively build and communicate their brand image. This review provides managers with an appreciation of brand image across different halal industries and a strategic lens on universal drivers and those that are faith/ethics related. The consequences of an effective halal brand image can inform and motivate managerial decisions with multiple stakeholders in brand-building campaigns. Researchers can use the results of this review to guide future multidisciplinary studies and contribute toward the development of this research field.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this paper is the first to comprehensively map the antecedents, dimensions, outcomes and moderators of brand image across halal industries. This study gives managers a strategic understanding of brand image across the halal economy. This review also develops a conceptual model that maps the halal brand image nomological network revealing three key antecedent categories of halal brand image. A research agenda on halal brand image with 18 future research recommendations is introduced to the literature.