Pat Auger, Timothy Devinney, Grahame Dowling and Christine Eckert
Socially responsible investment (SRI) funds have grown dramatically as an investment alternative in most of the developed world. The paper aims to discuss this issue.
Abstract
Purpose
Socially responsible investment (SRI) funds have grown dramatically as an investment alternative in most of the developed world. The paper aims to discuss this issue.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses a structured experimental approach to determine if the decision-making process of investors to invest in SRIs is consistent with the process used for conventional investments. The theoretical framework draws on two widely studied concepts in the decision making and investment literature, namely, inertia and discounting.
Findings
The authors find that inertia plays a significant role in the selection of SRI funds and that investors systemically discount the value of SRIs.
Research limitations/implications
The results suggest that SRIs need to be designed to cater to the risk/return profiles of investors and that these investors need to be better informed about the performance of SRIs vs conventional investments to reduce their systematic discounting.
Originality/value
Unique experimental approach applied to investment alternatives in a manner that captures individual level variation.
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Paul F. Burke, Christine Eckert and Stacey Davis
This paper aims to quantify the relative importance of reasons used to explain consumers’ selection and rejection of ethical products, accounting for differences in ethical…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to quantify the relative importance of reasons used to explain consumers’ selection and rejection of ethical products, accounting for differences in ethical orientations across consumers.
Design/methodology/approach
Reviewing previous literature and drawing on in-depth interviews, a taxonomy of reasons for and against ethical purchasing is developed. An online survey incorporating best–worst scaling (BWS) determines which reasons feature more in shaping ethical consumerism. Cluster analysis and multinomial regression are used to identify and profile segments.
Findings
Positively orientated consumers (42 per cent of respondents) purchase ethical products more so because of reasons relating to impact, health, personal relevance, and quality. Negatively orientated consumers (34 per cent of respondents) reject ethical alternatives based on reasons relating to indifference, expense, confusion and scepticism. A third segment is ambivalent in their behaviour and reasoning; they perceive ethical purchasing to be effective and relevant, but are confused and sceptical under what conditions this can occur.
Research limitations/implications
Preferences were elicited using an online survey rather than using real market data. Though the task instructions and methods used attempted to minimise social-desirability bias, the experiment might still be subject to its effects.
Practical implications
Competitive positioning strategies can be better designed knowing which barriers to ethical purchasing are more relevant. The paper challenges the benefits in altruistic-based positioning and outlines shortcomings in communication about ethical products, including those relating to product labelling.
Social implications
Through their purchase behaviours across a number of categories, ethical consumers aim to minimise the harm and exploitation of humans, animals and the natural environment. This research provides insights into the potential reasons why the uptake of ethical products is not being achieved and how it can be addressed to make improvements in making this movement more mainstream.
Originality/value
This research examines an extensive list of reasons for and against ethical purchasing used by a general population of consumers. By forcing respondents to make trade-offs, this is the first study quantifying the relative importance of reasons utilised by consumers. It also highlights the value in using cluster analysis on best–worst scores to identify underlying segments.
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Pat Auger, Timothy M. Devinney and Grahame Dowling
One of the hallmarks of strategizing is having a clearly articulated vision and mission for the organization. It has been suggested that this provides a compass bearing for the…
Abstract
Purpose
One of the hallmarks of strategizing is having a clearly articulated vision and mission for the organization. It has been suggested that this provides a compass bearing for the organization's strategy, helps in motivation, commitment and retention of employees, serves as a guide to internal sensemaking and decision-making, has a potential performance effect, helps establish the identity of the organization and positions its desired reputation. The compass bearing role is important because it guides the selection of the goals and strategic orientation of the organization which in turn shapes its overall strategy and much of its internal decision making. The inspirational role is important because it helps to motivate and engage employees and other stakeholders.
Design/methodology/approach
This study provides a more rigorous indication as to whether employees can, in the first instance, recognize and distinguish their corporate and environmental strategy from that of their competitors within their own industry and random other companies from other industries. This first issue addresses, to a degree, if and why, such strategic communiqués are effective inside a range of different organizations. Secondly, the authors examine whether there are any specific individual level effects that could explain variations in these responses. Finally, the authors examine the extent to which the recognition rates the authors observe, relate to how employees are rewarded through appraisals, promotions and salary increases. This helps in the authors’ understanding of the role of hard incentives versus soft motivations. The authors’ approach to assessing employee knowledge of their organization's strategy is unique. Rather than survey employees about their knowledge, the authors use a matching study and a discrete choice measurement model to assess if they can recognize their organization's strategy from those of their competitors and some other randomly selected organizations. This approach allows us to mitigate social desirability and common method biases and directly estimate the underlying behavioral model being used to assess their organization's strategy.
Findings
Overall, the authors found that few employees could correctly identify their corporate strategy statements. In the case of corporate strategy statements, the authors find that, on average, only 29 percent of employees could correctly match their company to its publicly espoused corporate strategy. When the authors look at the environmental sustainability strategy of the firm, this is worse overall, with individuals doing no better than random on average. When the authors look at company training and communication practices across the realm of different strategies, the authors see a number of factors leading to the general results. First, most of the authors’ respondents could not recall a significant effort being given to communication and training by their employer. Indeed, most communication/training is simply related to having documentation/brochures available. Second, respondents indicated that more effort is put into communicating corporate strategy to employees in a more systematic manner than communication about environmental/corporate social responsible (CSR) strategy. Third, the authors see that individuals are evaluated more on and give more weight to, evaluations relating to their ability to meet individual/group financial and market performance metrics (targets) and work as a team than their involvement in environmental and social responsibility programs. Finally, the employees studied seemed to be more confident in understanding the corporate strategy. When asked to put their corporate strategy into words – a task the authors asked respondents to do after the matching phase of the study – 40% of participants did so for the corporate strategy but only 14% did so for the environmental strategy and seven percent for the CSR strategy.
Practical implications
The primary implication of the study is that the values-mission-strategy logic of strategic motivation seems to have limited validity and with respect to the view that employees are a vector of corporate strategy. It is hard to argue that employees can be a vector for something they cannot recall or even distinguish between.
Originality/value
The study is unique in terms of (1) asking the very simple question of whether employees internalize their company's strategies and (2) in the methodological approach to examine employee knowledge and informativeness.
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Christine Nya-Ling Tan and T. Ramayah
To compete in a globally challenging environment, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are increasingly pressured to leverage their relational capital to stay competitive. The…
Abstract
Purpose
To compete in a globally challenging environment, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are increasingly pressured to leverage their relational capital to stay competitive. The purpose of this study is to model the KS behaviour of SMEs in an increasingly networked world through communities of practice (CoP).
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected using a survey instrument developed based on prior literature from SMEs operating only in the electronic manufacturing industry. A total of 120 responses were received of which only 100 were valid. SmartPLS, a second-generation analysis software, was used to analyse the model developed.
Findings
The findings indicated that affect, reward, perceived consequences and social factor were all positive predictors of KS behaviour of SMEs in communities of practice. Interestingly, the facilitating conditions were found to negatively influence KS behaviour.
Practical implications
The findings are helpful to SMEs who are embarking on knowledge management (KM) practices in their respective companies and may be used to leverage the drivers of KM to improve more sharing behaviour that keeps SMEs competitive.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors' knowledge, few studies have explored the individual (i.e. perceived consequences, affect), social (i.e. social factor) and organisational (i.e. facilitating condition, reward) predictors of KS behaviour among CoP’s in Malaysian SMEs.
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Christine Bieri Buschor, Esther Forrer and Katharina Maag Merki
This article presents some of the initial results of the National Young Adult Survey (YAS), which is currently collecting data on the cross‐curriculum competencies of 14,905 18�…
Abstract
This article presents some of the initial results of the National Young Adult Survey (YAS), which is currently collecting data on the cross‐curriculum competencies of 14,905 18‐ to 22‐year‐olds in Switzerland. Young adults show a willingness to continue their education during the first five years after school. Using a regression model, it was found that the willingness of these young people to continue their education and training is dependent on achievement motivation, contingency beliefs, self‐efficacy, cooperation, independence and level of education.
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Julien Calmand, Jean-François Giret and Christine Guégnard
In France, the vocationalization of higher education has resulted in an increase in the number of graduates and created new opportunities. The access of these vocational bachelor…
Abstract
Purpose
In France, the vocationalization of higher education has resulted in an increase in the number of graduates and created new opportunities. The access of these vocational bachelor graduates to the labour market raises the issue of their professional prospects amid changing economic and social circumstances. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
To provide insights into these issues, the employment situation of bachelor graduates during the first years of active working life will be compared with other tertiary graduates entering the labour market in the same years, using econometric models that estimate the effects of vocational courses “all other things being equal”, incorporating a range of individual characteristics.
Findings
Overall, vocational bachelor graduates experienced fewer difficulties in seeking to enter the labour market during difficult economic circumstances. They did not achieve upward social mobility with a lower probability of obtaining a managerial/professional occupation three years after graduation. These results confirm that diplomas continue to play a central and hierarchized role in France.
Originality/value
The originality of this paper is to highlight the labour market transition of vocational bachelor graduates during a period of economic crisis, inquiring on the social benefit of this new diploma in France: what were the impacts of the changing economic conditions and influx of vocational bachelor graduates on their labour market transition and their chances of upward social mobility?
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Christoph Dörrenbächer and Mike Geppert
This article takes stock of interdisciplinary research on Multinational Corporations (MNCs) by elucidating paradigmatic shifts in the world of MNCs in the new millennium and…
Abstract
This article takes stock of interdisciplinary research on Multinational Corporations (MNCs) by elucidating paradigmatic shifts in the world of MNCs in the new millennium and analysing more recent developments in the disciplines of International Business (IB) and Organization Theory (OT). The article also introduces the altogether 14 individual contributions of this 49th volume of the Research in the Sociology of Organizations series. It closes by looking into the questions of where interdisciplinary OT/IB research on MNCs is now and where it is likely to go in the future.
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Joshua Doane, Judy A. Lane and Michael J. Pisani
Volume 25 celebrates the 25th year of publication for the American Journal of Business (AJB). Launched by eight MAC schools of business in March 1986, the Journal has featured…
Abstract
Volume 25 celebrates the 25th year of publication for the American Journal of Business (AJB). Launched by eight MAC schools of business in March 1986, the Journal has featured more than 700 authors who have contributed more than 330 research articles at the intersection of theory and practice. From accounting to marketing, management to finance, the Journal prominently covers the breadth of the business disciplines as a general business outlet intended for both practitioners and academics. As the Journal reaches out beyond the MAC in sponsorship, authorship, and readership, we assess the Journal’s first quarter century of impact.