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Where Do Stakeholders Come From?

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... Thus, while the literature has frequently distinguished between stakeholder groups, scholars have typically assumed common stakes within groups (e.g., see for a review Kujala, Sachs, Leinonen, Heikkinen & Laude, 2022). However, recent work notes that even if stakeholder groups might be subject to similar stakes, the perceived stakes might vary among individuals within these groups, ultimately shaping their orientations toward and thus engagement and interactions with organizations (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Bridoux & Stoelhorst, 2016;Kujala et al., 2022). For instance, drawing on Fiske's (1991) relational theory, Bridoux and Stoelhorst (2016) distinguished between four different stakeholder orientations: communal sharing, market pricing, authority ranking, and equality matching. ...
... For instance, we know that pivoting narratives can directly affect stakeholders' expectations about the future of the organization, as well as their support (McDonald & Gao, 2019). Scholars have also recently suggested that narratives which emphasize common ground (i.e., shared beliefs, knowledge, and values) are most likely to resonate with very early-stage stakeholders before stable business models are developed (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023). Yet we know little about how different pivoting narratives might interact with stakeholders' orientations to affect expectations and the sustained flow of resource commitments over time (Kujala et al., 2022). ...
... Stakeholder theorists have long noted how strategy and organizing are fundamentally enabled and constrained by the multitude of different groups which inform and then react to organizational policies and practices. While early work relied on coarse stakeholder classifications to understand these effects (e.g., customers, employees, investors), more recent work has suggested how even within groups, stakeholders can vary based on their orientations, which in turn shapes how they interact with the organization and other stakeholders around joint value creation (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Bridoux & Stoelhorst, 2016;Kujala et al., 2022). These studies highlight how communal sharing, market pricing, authority ranking, or equality matching orientations can drive variation in stakeholders' approaches to joint value creation. ...
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In contrast to models of organizational transformation that focus on one-time episodes of change, this study reveals limits to the number of transformations an organization can make without losing the support of key stakeholder groups. To better understand the process of repeated transformation, we study an extreme case of a medical technology startup with a history of pivoting, focusing on the degree to which employees and investors continued to support the venture. Although new ventures are often advised to be highly adaptive, we find that repeated pivoting introduces relational liabilities for even highly flexible organizations. Drawing on our analysis, we develop a culturally-informed process model of resource commitments that reveals how differences in pivoting narratives and stakeholder orientations affect the flow of support from employees and investors, even as the organization repeatedly pivots. Our model contributes to existing theories of organizational transformation, offering an enriched understanding of how organizations can narratively sustain resource commitments to enable continuous adaptation.
... In this paper, we seek to build on and extend this literature by developing a theoretical framework for organizing transactions between entrepreneurs and the core human capital resources with whom they contract under conditions of Knightian uncertainty. Our theory notes that because of the uncertainty associated with the exercise of judgment, entrepreneurs may find it difficult to unambiguously specify and articulate skill requirements ex ante, particularly when pursuing novel resource combinations (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Bylund, 2016;Hendry, 2002). And, even if entrepreneurs are able to unambiguously specify initial skill requirements, they must often engage in an iterative process of experimentation, failure, and pivoting to different resource combinations when exercising judgment under Knightian uncertainty (Alvarez et al., 2013;Bylund, 2016;Foss & Klein, 2012)-potentially causing skill requirements to change in unpredictable ways (Hendry, 2002). ...
... Uncertainty about the value of a yet-to-be-created combination of resources is an important potential source of economic rents (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Barney, 2018;Bylund, 2016;Foss & Klein, 2012;Knight, 1921;Mahoney & Qian, 2013). According to the Knightian perspective (1921), uncertainty exists when, at the time an action is undertaken, the actor is unable to anticipate all the possible outcomes of that action and is unable to probabilistically assess the likelihood of any particular outcome occurring. ...
... Prior work suggests that it is often the case that entrepreneurs act under uncertainty (Alvarez & Barney, 2007;Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Alvarez et al., 2013;Bylund, 2016;Foss & Klein, 2012;Knight, 1921;McMullen & Shepherd, 2006;Packard et al., 2017;Shane, 2003;Townsend et al., 2018) for a number of reasons. First, because entrepreneurial action takes time and consumer preferences are unstable, entrepreneurial judgments of the value of an envisioned resource combination may turn out to be incorrect after the time-consuming production process is executed (Foss & Klein, 2012;Foss et al., 2007). ...
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This paper develops theory to explore when it is most efficient for entrepreneurs operating under Knightian uncertainty to contract with human capital resource providers through market governance as independent contractors or through firm governance as employees or holders of residual rights of control (i.e., co-ownership stakes in the entrepreneurial firm). We identify and develop the notion of unintentional adverse skill selection which can occur if skill requirements change as entrepreneurs experiment with the production of new resource combinations of uncertain future value. We explore the comparative efficiency of the cooperative flexibility of firm governance and the autonomous flexibility of market governance when unintentional adverse skill selection is salient. We develop a typology of human capital resources based on the breadth and depth of the skills they possess. We propose that skill breadth is positively associated with the expected efficiency of firm governance and that skill depth is positively associated with the expected efficiency of market governance. We then utilize this typology to theorize about which governance mechanisms are most efficient for transacting with four types of human capital resources: polymaths (high skill breadth, high skill depth), novices (low skill breadth, low skill depth), specialists (low skill breadth, high skill depth), and Jacks/Jills-of-all-trades (high skill breadth, low skill depth).
... However, the desire for distinctiveness is counterweighted by a desire for conformity (Navis & Glynn, 2011). Online communities are built around shared values and interests (see Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Hampel et al., 2020) and might thus benefit more from familiar content than from content outside expectations. It is thus not clear whether entrepreneurs are well advised to provide homogeneous content or diversify their content. ...
... Considering the differences between open and core communities, we propose that it depends on the type of online community if it is worth for entrepreneurs to invest in distinctive content. Specifically, we argue that members of the core community will expect both familiar content, strengthening the shared identity with the entrepreneurial venture (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Hampel et al., 2020), and interesting and stimulating novel input (Baker & Bulkley, 2014;Jeppesen & Frederiksen, 2006;Kane & Ransbotham, 2016). Picking up our arguments from above, we expect that core community members will become bored faster by repetitive content and satiated slower by diverse content than open community members. ...
... In open communities, where entry and exit barriers are low and membership and commitment are fluent (Argyris & Monu, 2015;Kane et al., 2014;Ren et al., 2007), the main role of entrepreneur-provided content will be to consistently (re)create community boundaries and (re)enlist community members (see Alvarez & Sachs, 2023). In open communities, the problem of information overload is exacerbated since the entrepreneur's content competes with other content in the community member's private feed. ...
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Entrepreneurs can benefit from the communities they build. Therefore, many entrepreneurs create online communities that allow self-selected stakeholders, such as customers, crowd investors, or enthusiasts, to interact with the venture and other like-minded individuals. However, research on how entrepreneurs can successfully engage community members and grow such online communities is only slowly emerging. In particular, it is unclear if, how much, and which content entrepreneurs should contribute to foster engagement in different types of communities and which role these community types play in the community’s overall growth. Based on a longitudinal case study in the video game industry, we first theorize and show that—depending on the community type—both too much and too little entrepreneur-provided content fails to leverage community engagement potential and that different communities require more or less diverging content. We then theorize and show that community growth is largely driven by engagement in open communities, such as those hosted on social media. We outline the implications this has for entrepreneurs, our understanding of online communities, and entrepreneurial communities more generally.
... We further argue that the ease of communication (Bresman et al., 1999) of SOEs with market-based firms affect their acquisition of market logic elements. Members of SOEs and market-based firms that share common assumptions and beliefs (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Clark, 1996), can easily communicate, thereby facilitating knowledge acquisition. Considering the above varying levels of accumulated knowledge stock and of ease of communication, this study discusses how SOEs obtain market logic elements from the three market-based forms in different ways. ...
... We argue that the ease of communication increases when the source and the acquirer share a common knowledge (Reagans & McEvily, 2008). Institutional logic is mainly adopted through individual interactions (Loewenstein & Ocasio, 2003;Suddaby & Greenwood, 2005;Thornton et al., 2012), which are facilitated by a common grounda set of knowledge, values, and language (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Clark, 1996). Managers and employees of SOEs and market-based forms with a better understanding of institutional logics (Thornton et al., 2012) can more easily communicate, facilitating SOEs' absorption of market logic elements. ...
... Privatized POEs are thus likely to understand both old and new institutional logics. Given their common understanding of state logic, SOEs can easily communicate (Reagans & McEvily, 2008) and interact with Privatized POEs to acquire market logic elements (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Clark, 1996). Moreover, in many cases, SOEs may maintain their formal or informal networking relationships with Privatized POEs and take advantage of their dominant status to obtain important resources. ...
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State-owned enterprises (SOEs) and their liabilities have been extensively examined in the literature. However, less attention has been paid to how SOEs overcome such liabilities and even flourish in a market transition from a centrally planned economy to a market-based one. This study explores how China’s SOEs continue to thrive in a system where state and market logics co-exist. The state appears to arrange an institutional field favoring SOEs, which are likely to transact and interact with co-located market-based firms, from which they acquire market logic elements through knowledge spillover. Three different market-based forms—previous SOEs that have been privatized, new privately owned enterprises, and foreign-owned enterprises—enhance the survival chances of SOEs. Each market-based form is established for different reasons and operate through different processes, incorporating market logic elements and developing the ease of communication that affect how SOEs obtain market logic elements. Furthermore, government affiliation and industry structure generate different levels of support and demands for SOEs, and thus not all SOEs benefit equally from obtaining market logic elements.
... Entrepreneurs make the future seem less uncertain by embedding their visions in stories that evoke a familiar, shared past. By embedding their entrepreneurial narrative in broadly held myths, the entrepreneur unites shareholders with different temporal orientations by creating a narrative "common ground" among potential stakeholders (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021). We draw on narrative theory, which has a similar interest in understanding how stories can create both individual and universal appeal (Czarniawska, 1997) to develop a model of narrative structure that explains how entrepreneurs embed stories of the future in collective memories of the past to overcome differences in individual temporal orientation and motivate collective action. ...
... By integrating retrospective and prospective historical tropes, such a narrative structure can allow an entrepreneur to construct a vision that appeals to the broadest possible community of stakeholders without diminishing the more targeted appeal offered by individual tropes. Entrepreneurs must be able to embed their individual narrative in a broader, cultural narrative that unites stakeholders by providing them with a common ground (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021). Drawing from linguistics theory, Alvarez and Sachs (2021) observe that individual differences between stakeholders can be overcome by story fragments that, through repetition, help diverse stakeholders find a common set of beliefs, knowledge and language that serves as a foundation for collective action. ...
... Entrepreneurs must be able to embed their individual narrative in a broader, cultural narrative that unites stakeholders by providing them with a common ground (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021). Drawing from linguistics theory, Alvarez and Sachs (2021) observe that individual differences between stakeholders can be overcome by story fragments that, through repetition, help diverse stakeholders find a common set of beliefs, knowledge and language that serves as a foundation for collective action. We extend this line of reasoning to suggest that cultural myths serve a similar, but already established common ground that skilled entrepreneurs can use as a foundational meta-narrative to motivate collective action among stakeholders. ...
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Research suggests that entrepreneurs persuade stakeholders to engage in risky projects in an uncertain future through visions, compelling narratives of the future. A unique challenge for entrepreneurs, however, is how entrepreneurs can construct a narrative that unites stakeholders with different perceptions of the degree of risk or uncertainty posed by the future. We address this question with a diegetic narrative model of stakeholder enrollment. Our primary argument is that to reduce variation in how potential stakeholders view the future, a story must embed a vision of the future in a coherent and collectively held narrative of the past. We introduce rhetorical history as the primary construct through which this occurs. We demonstrate how successful visions employ historical tropes at the intradiegetic level to appeal to individual perceptions of risk or uncertainty and how those historical tropes are combined into meta-narratives or myths drawn from the collective memory of a community to create broad, extradiegetic appeal to all stakeholders regardless of their temporal orientation. Finally we describe three categories of historical reasoning – teleological, presentism, and retro-futurism – that act as bridging mechanisms between past, present and future that provides stakeholders with an enhance sense of agency in the future.
... Second, our work contributes to research on prosocial organizations (Baker & Powell, 2020;Berrone et al., 2016) by suggesting how they may overcome their lack of saliency and navigate different forms of resistance by engaging diverse stakeholders and their coalitions. In this sense, our research also extends the literature on stakeholder theory and engagement (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Greenwood, 2007;Mitchell et al., 1997) by proposing a bidirectional perspective, where stakeholders are not only the recipients of organizational interest but also active players in shaping the processes to achieve organizational goals. Lastly, our results also provide useful public policy recommendations and offer practical implications for managers and entrepreneurs engaged in the process of revitalizing surrounding communities and territories. ...
... More recently, scholars have focused on identifying stakeholders (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021) and on characterizing their claims and interests (Wood et al., 2021), also proposing a typology of stakeholders based on three different attributes: power, legitimacy, and urgency (Mitchell et al., 1997). According to this distinction and its resulting typologies, stakeholders represent more or less salient actors in the eyes of the focal organization and are, thus, in varying degrees able to exert influence over it (Frooman, 1999;Mitchell et al., 1997). ...
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Prosocial organizations represent key actors in the quest to promote positive change, foster social impact, and revitalize cities. Notwithstanding their importance in tackling the increasing challenges threatening our society (e.g., pollution, socio-economic inequalities), these actors may not be perceived as salient in the eyes of different stakeholders, and thus their work may be jeopardized by multiple forms of resistance. Scant attention in research has been devoted to understand how prosocial organizations may acquire saliency and navigate these forms of resistance while pursuing urban revitalization. We address this gap by engaging in a qualitative investigation of a Sicilian cultural center. We found that the prosocial organization in our study could navigate different occurrences of resistance and acquire saliency by enacting mechanisms that leveraged the engagement of supporting stakeholders and the idiosyncratic characteristics of place. Our study contributes to the literature about urban revitalization, prosocial organizations, and stakeholder theory—while also complementing research investigating the role of place in management.
... Scholars taking up this task have found interactional framing theory especially useful for gaining insights into "how parties negotiate meaning in interactions" (Dewulf et al., 2009: 156;Gray & Purdy, 2018;Gray, Purdy, & Ansari, 2015; Reinecke & Ansari, 2021). By co-constructing collective interpretations through repeated interactions, it is argued, parties can attain the common ground needed for effective collaboration (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Ferraro & Beunza, 2018). Put simply, this is because interactions over time can foster "frame alignment" by affording opportunities for diverse parties to converge sufficiently to achieve "at least a minimal level of agreement about what action to take" (Ansari, Wijen, & Gray, 2013: 1032Donnellon, Gray, & Bougon, 1986). ...
... Ferraro and Beunza (2018) refer to this latter process as "creating common ground", whereby interacting parties build up a "sum of mutual, common, or joint knowledge, beliefs, and [communicative] suppositions" (Clark, 1996: 93;Cornelissen & Werner, 2014). In building common ground, interactants also co-create a common worldview (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021) that can lead them to greater shared commitment to joint action. ...
Article
One of the greatest challenges of multi-stakeholder partnerships lies in forging a shared understanding and obtaining and sustaining commitment among parties representing different interests and goals. While previous studies have emphasised the importance of developing shared frames for enabling collaboration and collective action through frame alignment, scant attention has been paid to how stakeholder representatives can attain commitment from their constituents "back home" to the frames negotiated on their behalf. Our longitudinal process study explores how participants in the German Partnership for Sustainable Textiles successfully confronted the challenge of aligning frames across multiple interaction arenas, highlighting how failing to tackle this "two-table-problem" can risk partnership collapse. Our process model captures how back-and-forth interactions enabled the stretching of shared frames across interaction arenas, thereby propelling the partnership from near-collapse to deepened commitments. While stretching frames heightens the risk of frame break, our analysis shows how such iterative ongoing efforts are essential for deepening commitments and advancing collaboration. We thus contribute to framing theory by highlighting how frame alignment can be achieved across multiple interaction arenas by "collaborating on the edge of failure". We further contribute to scholarship on multi-party collaboration by unpacking the multi-table negotiation dynamics that help explain collaborative outcomes.
... Gamers have built a well-defined worldwide community that transcends the virtual world and the physical one (Taylor, 2012;Wagner, 2007). That community shares a common body of knowledge, beliefs, social norms, and values (Alvarez & Sachs, 2019;Clark, 1996) that are not subject to national borders (Seo, 2015;Taylor, 2012), rather, in-game-out-of-game self-identification (Grooten & Kowert, 2015:77) gives rise to an esports gamer identity, which is semi-virtual and relatively free of physical world constraints (Eklund, 2015). When gamer identity is more salient, the focus is more likely to be on what is held in common, reducing the impact of biases and stereotyping (Kane, 2010;Rink & Jehn, 2010), and facilitating effective coordination and social integration in multicultural teams. ...
... Esports gamers share common ground free of extraneous social value systems and norms (Clark, 1996), and are also free of the stricture of physical borders (Karhulahti, 2017). Professional and amateur gamers, clubs, fans, game developers, tournament organizers, sponsors, traditional and new media, and other self-identified stakeholders constitute a new community that shares in the same knowledge, and that has in common a language, beliefs, and values which facilitates stakeholder communication and cooperation (Alvarez & Sachs, 2019;Fiol & Romanelli, 2012;Taylor, 2012). In addition, stakeholders build trust in one another by jointly forming social rules, based on which they make commitments and share resources that solidify trust (Fiol & Romanelli, 2012). ...
Article
How does cultural diversity influence the performance of semi-virtual teams? We use the prism of esports and insights from virtual identity research and social categorization theory to determine the effect on semi-virtual teams in which member interaction is not necessarily mediated or constrained by physical world sociocultural norms. The common ground that has developed in esports results in a superordinate, culture-free gamer identity that transcends the virtual and physical worlds, and thus multicultural teams can enjoy the benefits of diverse knowledge without suffering unduly from social disintegration when gamer identity is salient – a reality challenged less in the virtual world than in the physical one. We conduct an empirical study using data from 4035 League of Legends games played by 102 multicultural teams from 2017 to 2020. Our results show that cultural diversity improves the quality of team strategy when gamer identity becomes more salient, and that that may come about when players are intensely exposed to the game world, when they play with many different virtual characters, and when they play at home court.
... In this article, we follow the widely used understanding of stakeholders as individuals, groups, or organizations that affect or are affected by organizational activities (Freeman, 1984). Research has provided insight into the importance of stakeholder engagement in crucial organizational activities, such as value creation (Freudenreich et al., 2020;Harrison et al., 2010;Harrison & Wicks, 2013), strategic planning and decision-making (Castelló et al., 2016;Noland & Phillips, 2010;Ramus & Vaccaro, 2017), innovation (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Baltazar Herrera, 2016;Bendell & Huvaj, 2020;Goodman et al., 2017;Scuotto et al., 2020;Watson et al., 2020), learning and knowledge creation (Desai, 2018;J. R. Mitchell et al., 2022;Phillipson et al., 2012), and accounting and reporting (Böhling et al., 2019;Johansen, 2008;Manetti & Toccafondi, 2012;O'Riordan & Fairbrass, 2014) as well as corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability (Arenas et al., 2009;Banerjee & Bonnefous, 2011;Dobele et al., 2014;Lindgreen & Swaen, 2010). ...
... R. Mitchell et al., 2022;O'Riordan & Fairbrass, 2014), the moral dimension of stakeholder engagement (Calton, 2006;Noland & Phillips, 2010), organizational legitimacy (Arenas et al., 2009;Beelitz & Merkl-Davies, 2012;Castelló et al., 2016;Desai, 2018;Provasnek et al., 2018;Scholz et al., 2019), responsible leadership (Maak, 2007;Miska et al., 2014;Patzer et al., 2018), and deliberative democracy (Corus & Ozanne, 2012;Dawkins, 2021;Goodman & Arenas, 2015;Passetti et al., 2019). More recently, researchers have devoted increasing attention to innovation (Baltazar Herrera, 2016;Bendell & Huvaj, 2020;Chen & Liu, 2020;Scuotto et al., 2020;Watson et al., 2020) and entrepreneurship (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Leonidou et al., 2020;Nair, 2020). The diverse issues related to distinct theoretical backgrounds reveal the richness and fragmentation of stakeholder engagement research. ...
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Stakeholder engagement has grown into a widely used yet often unclear construct in business and society research. The literature lacks a unified understanding of the essentials of stakeholder engagement, and the fragmented use of the stakeholder engagement construct challenges its development and legitimacy. The purpose of this article is to clarify the construct of stakeholder engagement to unfold the full potential of stakeholder engagement research. We conduct a literature review on 90 articles in leading academic journals focusing on stakeholder engagement in the business and society, management and strategy, and environmental management and environmental policy literatures. We present a descriptive analysis of stakeholder engagement research for a 15-year period, and we identify the moral, strategic, and pragmatic components of stakeholder engagement as well as its aims, activities, and impacts. Moreover, we offer an inclusive stakeholder engagement definition and provide a guide to organizing the research. Finally, we complement the current understanding with a largely overlooked dark side of stakeholder engagement. We conclude with future research avenues for stakeholder engagement research.
... However, entrepreneurial communication might also lead to fundraising success for different reasons, for example, because it increases the level of identification with an entrepreneur's values or ideas (Alvarez & Sachs, 2023), because of the positivity that entrepreneurial communication spreads , or because the communication is entertaining (Steigenberger, 2017). The reasons might even be incidental (Dushnitsky & Sarkar, 2021). ...
... Fourth, most ventures have existing stakeholders (McVea & Freeman, 2005;Vandekerckhove & Dentchev, 2005) and potential stakeholders (i.e., those who may commit to a venture in the future [Alvarez & Sachs, 2023;Fisher et al., 2020]). Because we focus on exploring how ventures gain resources for future action, we use the term "stakeholders" to refer to existing and potential stakeholders. ...
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While we understand the importance of entrepreneurs listening to stakeholders, we lack a sufficient theory-driven understanding of why some entrepreneurs and their ventures can listen to their stakeholders more effectively than others. We offer a listening model of venture growth based on listening theories and the literatures on new ventures and capability development. Listening is initially facilitated by entrepreneurs’ cognitive and behavioral processes, but continued venture growth creates a paradox for entrepreneurs. Listening to stakeholders may also deplete entrepreneurs’ personal resources, diminishing their listening capacity. This paradox can be overcome by generating their ventures’ listening capability—behavioral routines and attention structures for listening—enabling them to acquire and interpret quality information from stakeholders more effectively to build or adapt the capabilities necessary for venture growth. The ventures’ listening capability acts as a dynamic capability, which itself can be dynamic. This listening model of venture growth contributes to the entrepreneurship literature on stakeholders, entrepreneurs’ abilities, and ventures’ capabilities and dynamic capabilities.
... There needs to be more advice detailing good practice and more consideration of who, amid the plethora of stakeholders, must be attended to. A stakeholder requires different management from an actor, and various stakeholders need different management strategies Alvarez and Sachs (2023). Also, there needs to be more discussion about when to perform stakeholder analyses, with some arguing for analysis at the beginning of the strategy development process and others at the end when considering strategy implementation. ...
Article
Purpose Conventional wisdom says stakeholders matter to managers as they develop strategy – but do they? If so, what type of stakeholders matter and what can managers do? Design/methodology/approach An in-depth exploration of five deep case studies where senior executives embarked upon strategy development. Analysis revealed five significant factors for managing stakeholders effectively. Findings These findings include: determining the nature of a stakeholder, separating those who care about the strategy and its implementation from those who do not but still could impact it; addressing stakeholders at an appropriate level; considering internal as well as external stakeholders and attending to the stakeholders’ responses to proposed strategies and the consequent dynamics created. Research limitations/implications (1) The research was conducted with senior managers, and the authors detail the difficulties involved in doing so within the introduction and (2) The research was specific to the healthcare sector, but has relevance to all strategy makers. Practical implications This paper explores five factors and their implications and suggests techniques to address them that are well established and available to promote the effective strategic management of stakeholders. Originality/value Empirical research in strategy formation with elites is rare because it is difficult to gain access and trust. Empirical research in stakeholder studies is even rarer. By combining the two elements, the authors gather and interpret a unique dataset.
... Вони мають власні інтереси, спрямовані на отримання користі від взаємодії з організацією та можуть впливати на її діяльність [4]. Існує досить широкий спектр зацікавлених сторін, до яких можна віднести різноманітні категорії [5][6][7]: ...
Article
Today, every modern enterprise or organization works in a constantly changing environment. These changes can have both positive consequences, contributing to the increase of competitive advantages and sustainable development of enterprises, and negative consequences, such as: a decrease in the competitive position in the market and a negative impact on the stability of economic activity. Organization of effective interaction and cooperation between various stakeholders is the most rational approach to take into account the numerous problems and challenges of the external environment by each player, be it an enterprise, organization or non-profit sector. Among key resources, such as financial, material and informational, relationships are an important strategic resource. The use of relationships is a valuable strategic resource that contributes to active development, the formation of new competitive advantages, and the strengthening of both internal and external image. In 1963, the concept of "stakeholders" was introduced by Stanford Research University, and the concept of stakeholders was developed and developed by Edward Freeman. In his 1984 work, "Strategic Management: The Role of Stakeholders," Freeman defined stakeholders as individuals, groups, or organizations that have significant influence on, or are influenced by, decisions made by the firm. Stakeholder theory includes the concept that management of an organization should take into account the interests of all groups or individuals involved in it. One of the significant steps in the progress of stakeholder theory is the development of the Accountability Stakeholder Engagement Standard, which is a significant achievement in this area. The development of cooperation with interested parties (stakeholders) is considered an important aspect of increasing the efficiency of foreign economic activity, and it is also a systematic process that includes the following points: definition of stakeholders; analysis of stakeholder needs; communication and engagement; establishment of mutual benefit; defining roles and responsibilities; development of mutual trust; training and adaptation; measurement of results.
... The dynamic processual element of this vision of business models becomes evident if interest in sustainability is considered to be their common ground, a concept which Sachs and R€ uhli (2011, p. 111) use to describe the similarity of firms' and stakeholders' perceptions of relevant strategic issues. Alvarez and Sachs (2023) take this concept to mean the existence of a common vocabulary as well as common norms and habits which enable meaningful communication between firms and stakeholders. The implication of the Hayekian processual approach is that the common ground of stakeholder interaction cannot be considered to be fixed; it is inherently dynamic, if for no other reason than that sustainability is a widely shared interest of all stakeholders. ...
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Purpose Sustainability has long been known to present an epistemic challenge. In the corporate setting, this challenge translates into the difficulties experienced by managers not only in devising solutions to corporate sustainability problems, but even in developing the awareness of the latter. The paper explores how these difficulties may be overcome by corporate stakeholder management policies. Design/methodology/approach The paper develops a conceptual framework that reconstructs the Hayekian theory of market process in the context of Williamson's (1996) distinction between autonomous and cooperative adaptation. Findings Applying the Hayekian theory of market process to the process of engagement and collaboration of corporate stakeholders, the paper shows how the latter process may address the epistemic challenge of corporate sustainability and derives implications for the design of business models for sustainability. Originality/value The paper informs stakeholder theory in two ways: first, stakeholder theory is given a novel justification in terms of reflecting the growing prominence of cooperative adaptation and second, corporate stakeholder management is shown to be crucial for maximizing not only economic but also sustainability performance.
... As such, these companies have encountered the challenge of integrating dispersed units without shifting local subsidiaries while fascinating crossborder resource and information transfers. Attention has been given to non-manufacturing firms (Freudenreich et al., 2020;Ramus & Vaccaro, 2017;Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Desai, 2018) with regard to stakeholder participation in organizational performance, prompting attention to the manufacturing sector. ...
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Manufacturing companies have a direct impact on national governments and value addition at large. Manufacturing, like other sectors, has felt the effects of a variety of stakeholder engagement factors. Although many companies engage their stakeholders in day-to-day business activities, studies have reported a challenge for them in managing diverse operations in dispersed markets. An examination of the effect of stakeholder participation in planning on the performance of Kenyan alcohol manufacturing firms, namely East African Breweries Limited, Kenya Wine Agencies Limited, and Keroche, was undertaken. The study concentrated on the performance of these firms for five years (2017–2021). Guided by stakeholder theory, the study adopted the descriptive cross-sectional research design. The target population was 608 stakeholders (senior management, middle management, and lower management) working in various employment cadres. The stratified random sampling design was used to sample 241 respondents from various departments. Data was collected through questionnaires and analysed descriptively and inferentially. Descriptive statistics involved means, standard deviations, frequencies, and percentages, while inferential statistics involved Pearson correlation and simple regression analysis. The Shapiro-Wilk test of normality was conducted, and since the p-values were above 0.05, the data was normal. The study found that stakeholder participation had a significant effect on organizational performance in selected alcohol manufacturing entities (t = -6.958, p<0.05). The study therefore rejected the null hypothesis formulated. The study recommends frequent engagement of stakeholders at work by firm management to enhance performance.
... Three theories are taken as the basis for the theoretical grounding of this paper: (1) Stakeholder Theory, which focuses on the interconnected relationships between a firm and different parties or groups -its customers, suppliers, employees, investors, communities, and others who have a stake in the organization (who are affect or are affected by, in the organization) (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021)-. The theory argues that a firm should create value for all stakeholders, not just shareholders (Busch et al., 2018); (2) Legitimacy Theory, which focuses on the firm's interactions with society. ...
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The situation created by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the confinement in many countries, has led to a global crisis, not only in health but also in economy and social issues. But it has also provoked a wave of solidarity and unprecedented donation behavior by many companies worldwide. Inditex, one of the main fashion multinationals, has become a referent for its reaction speed and has been ranked number one among the most significant companies for its Corporate Social Responsibility during the lockdown. Drawing from Stakeholder, Legitimacy, and Ethics of Care Theories, the aim of this paper is to analyze Inditex as a case study and reflect on the impact of its donation behavior on its corporate reputation. A desk research approach by using secondary data about the corporation, and a content analysis of press releases with ATLASti software during this time, let conclude that effective corporate donation impacts and improves the reputation of the corporation among its stakeholders.
... However, most research tends to focus on a company and its managers, while the agency of stakeholders has rarely been explored. We contend that this is a promising area of research, as exemplified by recent discussion on the role of stakeholders and their foundational role in the firm (Alvarez and Sachs, 2022;Brown and Bylund, 2022), which we believe can be extended to the digitalization of the SBM. ...
Article
New digital technologies are becoming widespread and have radically redefined business processes and practices. Simultaneously, numerous companies are implementing sustainable business models (SBMs), expecting to integrate sustainability considerations and increase competitive advantage. These two megatrends—digitalization and sustainability—are radically changing firms. However, the relationship between digitalization and the implementation of SBMs is yet to be investigated in detail. This is a key issue, as digital tools could assist companies in transforming their current business models toward sustainability. Through a literature review, we explore the link between digitalization and SBMs, illustrating the main potential impacts of digitalization for each block of SBM and propose a list of the potential benefits that digitalized SBMs can bring. We identify these potential benefits and elaborate on them considering their economic, social, and environmental impacts. Moreover, our study identifies a potential virtuous circle generated by digitalization, while highlighting the necessary alignment of digital tools and key business factors to attain economic, social, and environmental value.
... One such option is the linguistic theory of common ground (Clark, 1996). Common ground attempts to explain issues such as how people shape and comprehend human action, how cooperation emerges, and even how entrepreneurial endeavors develop (Alvarez & Sachs, 2021). Moreover, this linguistic theory does not try to divide linguistic and non-linguistic thinking. ...
... Warto zwrócić uwagę, że zgodnie z koncepcją samoidentyfikacji interesariusze identyfikują się z firmą, gdy uważają, że wpływają na nią i sami są pod wpływem działań firmy. Kiedy firma już funkcjonuje, wdraża określony model biznesowy i angażuje się w działania, które są mniej lub bardziej spójne z tym modelem biznesowym, interesariusze mogą ocenić, czy mają na nie wpływ i czy wpływają na firmę (Alvarez, Sachs 2021). Rodzi się zatem pytanie: jak tworzyć relacje i poczucie tożsamości interesariuszy, by przetrwały w czasie, gdy nie ma pewności? ...
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Celem badania, którego wyniki przedstawiono w rozdziale było znalezienie odpowiedzi na następujące pytanie badawcze: jakie czynniki wpłynęły na pozytywne wyniki podmiotów gospodarczych w podsektorze wyrobów z gumy oraz deweloperskim w okresie pandemii ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem kwestii kapitału relacyjnego i zorientowania na interesariuszy. Badanie przeprowadzono metodami: a) wywiadu telefonicznego wspomaganego komputerowo (Computer-assisted telephone interviewing - CATI); b) wywiadu pogłębionego (Individual In-depth Interview – IDI). Respondentami badania byli właściciele oraz menedżerowie polskich przedsiębiorstw z ww. sektorów. Potwierdzono, że kapitał relacyjny stanowi kluczowy czynnik przetrwania przedsiębiorstwa w czasie kryzysu. Za najważniejszych interesariuszy, w badanym kontekście, uznano właścicieli, kluczowych klientów i dostawców surowców/materiałów służących realizacji działalności podstawowej. Wyniki badania mogą służyć podmiotom gospodarczym jako fundament kształtowania polityki antykryzysowej. Natomiast z naukowego punktu widzenia, stanowią przyczynek do przeprowadzenia badań pogłębionych na reprezentatywnej grupie respondentów oraz badań porównawczych w innych sektorach.
... It is this fourth kind of sharing that reflects commonality in that it "captures people's experience that their inner state about some referent target or entity (such as their beliefs or feelings about a third person, a movie, a political party, or a moral issue) converges with the inner state of one or more others regarding that target" (ibid., p. 497). Such sharing reflects a common understanding held and experienced between actors (e.g., Alvarez, & Sachs, 2021). ...
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There is growing interest in understanding the role of stakeholders—including financiers, employees, customers, suppliers, and communities—in the process of new venture emergence. We see potential to advance this stream of research by bridging a gap we observe between recent research on stakeholder enrollment in new ventures and longstanding research on stakeholder identification in established firms. To do so, we seek to explain why, how, and when, through social action, stakeholder identification and enrollment may (or may not) occur as an entrepreneur goes from an imagined opportunity to a new venture with enrolled stakeholders. To this end, we develop a model that conceptualizes stakeholder identification and enrollment as iterative, recursive, and constitutive social processes involving action in: refining and justifying to result in commonality with other actors; probing and positioning to result in mutuality with specific stakeholders identified; and enrolling and engaging to result in reciprocity with identified stakeholders. We argue that these social processes constitute the means through which opportunities are formed, specific stakeholders are identified, and stakes in new ventures are created and maintained, respectively. In doing so, we offer a more nuanced explanation of the dynamism implied in stakeholder identification and enrollment in emerging ventures.
... According to Burns et al. (2016), in conditions of deep uncertainty, entrepreneurs must rely on their own qualities and talents in order to enrol various stakeholders chiefly through the formation of psychological bonds and networks. Similarly, Fisher et al. (2020) call attention to the role of entrepreneurial hustling in enrolling venture stakeholders, and McBride and Wuebker (2021) study the manner in which entrepreneurs can shape stakeholder beliefs in order to make them more receptive towards their ventures (see also Alvarez & Sachs, 2021;Suddaby et al., 2021). 5 As we will explain in greater detail in the discussion section, the meaningful question is not whether entrepreneurial agency matters. ...
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How can stakeholder theory contribute to opportunity theory? We suggest that stakeholder theory affords appropriate theoretical lenses for grounding the opportunity-actualization perspective more firmly within the real-world constraints of business venturing. Actualization departs from a strong focus on entrepreneurial agency to conceptualize how pre-existing environmental conditions determine what entrepreneurial action can achieve. We explain that stakeholder theory can strengthen the outward-looking orientation of actualization by 1) bringing the entirety of stakeholders center-stage – beyond a narrow focus on market stakeholders, and 2) stressing the importance of non-economic considerations for the actualization of economic opportunities. Our theorization culminates in the concept of “strategic opportunity thinking” (SOT). We conceptualize SOT as a way of protecting prospective entrepreneurs from the blind-to-stakeholders mindset that either sleepwalks them into the territory of non-opportunity or prevents them from the actualization of real yet difficult-to-actualize opportunities in the absence of stakeholder-centric thinking.
... Factor 2: Techniques to assist the strategic management of stakeholders: There needs to be more advice detailing good practice and more consideration of who, amid the plethora of stakeholders, must be attended to. A stakeholder requires different management from an actor, and various stakeholders need different management strategies Alvarez and Sachs (2023). Also, there needs to be more discussion about when to perform stakeholder analyses, with some arguing for analysis at the beginning of the strategy development process and others at the end when considering strategy implementation. ...
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Stakeholders are critical to the strategy process but, in much of the strategy literature, they are rarely seen or heard. This appears to contradict practice - where experienced strategy makers and their advisors hold them in eminent positions. These contrasting perceptions are the focus of the research in this paper. Herein, we investigate the content of academia’s pedagogy and contrast that with the significance of stakeholders to members of senior management teams seeking to develop strategy. This paper reports on the analysis and outcome of this empirical research, where the purpose of the research was to understand i) the significance of stakeholders about what matters for the strategic future of the organisation in the initial views of a management team, and ii) the characteristics of stakeholders mentioned. The research shows that stakeholders (and actors in general) were very significant to public/not-for-profit senior managers when thinking about their strategy and that the majority are stakeholders with an interest in the strategic future of the focal organisation. These finding are important as, in strategy development, explicating and exploring the response of stakeholders to proposed strategic action can be crucial to the success of the strategy.
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We advance the judgement-based approach at the foundational level to establish cognitive microfoundations and boundary conditions as a formal theory of entrepreneurship – entrepreneurial judgement theory (EJT). We build upon philosophy’s concept of intentionality to define and conceptualise judgement as the determination and instigation of intentions. Entrepreneurship begins when, through entrepreneurial judgement, intentions are turned entrepreneurial, that is, towards the pursuit of new economic value, and ends when those intentions are turned away again. We elaborate the dynamics of this process, which includes cascading judgements across nested intentions. We conclude by distinguishing EJT from its close relative, entrepreneurial action theory, and by connecting entrepreneurial judgement more explicitly to contemporary psychology research.
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Purpose This study aims to help develop “business principles for stakeholder capitalism” in two steps. First, the study defines internal logic of three theories of capitalism and two variants within each theory. Second, it examines approaches to integration into modern democratic capitalism. Treating the three theories as substitutes identifies relative strengths and weaknesses; complementarity and partial overlap approaches to integration study the institutional settings within which stakeholder capitalism operates. Empirical outcomes reflect competition between market and stakeholder businesses for participants, with institutional conditions determining the scope of collective action. Design/methodology/approach The approach aligns three typologies in a unique conceptual arrangement defining the three theories of capitalism: forms of capitalism, potential failures of each form and associated types of goods. The first method examines the internal logic of each theory of capitalism. The second draws on traditional narrative review of references documenting each theory of capitalism and variants together with modern Marxist anti-capitalism. Findings Three typologies align uniquely with the theories of capitalism, each having two variants. Both variants of stakeholder capitalism are compatible with compassionate capitalism, constitutional government or polycentric governance but not with self-interest capitalism, dictatorship or Marxism. A theory of modern democratic capitalism allocates roles for private, club and social goods with empirically variable mixes occurring across countries. Competition among different types of enterprises provides an empirical test for comparative advantages of stakeholder capitalism. Future research should consider approaches for testing the proposed conceptual scheme in practice concerning capacity to deal with grand challenges, wicked problems and black swan events. Research limitations/implications Research approach is limited to logical examination of theories and literature documentation without direct empirical confirmation. The study does not address practical implications for managers and public officials or social implications concerning private incentives, stakeholder cooperation or collective action. Originality/value Originality lies in shifting terms of debate about stakeholder capitalism from advocacy of substitute theories to understanding of its relationship to market capitalism and collective action capitalism. Value lies in explaining desirability of theoretical integration of three types of capitalism into a comprehensive framework for modern democratic capitalism.
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Currently, the most frequently used models for forecasting the probability of company bankruptcy in the housing and utilities sector lack accuracy. The hypothesis is put forward that crisis resilience of a company can be assessed based on its adaptive capabilities. The paper aims to construct a more accurate compared to the known regression model for predicting bankruptcies, as well as develop models for assessing the quality of crisis adaptation management at public utility companies allowing for the stakeholders’ interests and peculiarities of their interface. The methodological basis of the study consists of the theory of crisis management and a stakeholder approach. The methods include multiple regression analysis, stakeholder mapping, sociological survey, and expert assessments. The evidence comes from the accounting and statistical reporting of 49 public utility companies, materials of arbitration cases, survey results of 33 heads of organisations obtained in the period from February to March 2023. The theoretical developments are implemented within the empirical studies of public utility companies. To improve crisis adaptation and resilience of public utility companies the findings recommend to launch staff training programmes, establish mechanisms for horizontal intra-sectoral connections and maintain cooperation at the level of public authorities in order to control investments in the housing and utilities sector.
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his book discusses the role of whistleblowing in the detection of white-collar crime through examination of publicly available internal investigation reports and evaluation of allegations and suspicions of potential misconduct. The analysis focuses on offender convenience, considering factors such as motive, opportunity, and willingness to engage in deviant behavior. This process also evaluates the maturity of the investigation, critically reviewing the report for relevance, information sources, and basis of conclusions, in order to assign the investigation to a stage on the following growth models: • Activity oriented investigation • Problem oriented investigation • Detection oriented investigation • Value oriented investigation.
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Executing policies or interventions encounters various difficulties, particularly for initiatives aimed at aiding the most economically disadvantaged social segments. Policies are shaped by the environments in which they originate, including their content, the manner in which they're developed, the stakeholders engaged in formulation, and subsequent implementation. This chapter aims to elucidate the facets of policy implementation that encompass the dynamic elements of policy development and execution, facilitating their analysis. A thorough examination of existing literature was undertaken to grasp the theoretical perspectives on policy implementation and identify obstacles hindering its efficacy. The chapter places the aspects of policy implementation within the broader policy literature, explaining the significance of each dimension for successful policy execution. It contends that a conducive policy environment is pivotal for enhancing and ensuring effective policy implementation.
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Firms employ corporate social responsibility (CSR) to influence stakeholder perceptions and positively induce desirable business outcomes. The mechanism through which stakeholder management affects the sustainability of CSR projects has been under-explored despite the burgeoning literature on corporate social responsibility. In response, we systematically review empirical studies on stakeholder management in the sustainability of corporate social responsibility (CSR) projects to assess the status quo of literature to inform future direction in this study area. Four databases, including Scopus, Web of Science (WOS), Ebsco Host and Google Scholar, were searched to identify relevant articles published over the last two decades (January 2000 to November 2023). Peer-reviewed journal publications were systematically reviewed to come up with the findings of this study. The findings highlight that firms practice stakeholder management as part of delivering CSR projects. It also revealed the complexity of stakeholder management within the various sectors, with its stakeholder pool affecting CSR project sustainability. However, there is a need for more evidence of this finding since there were only a few relevant empirical publications in the literature to support this position. The study will draw CSR practitioners' attention to the fact that comprehensive stakeholder management is essential for the sustainability of CSR projects. This study used the systematic review based on clearly defined transparent processes and criteria to aggregate knowledge on the status quo of stakeholder management to ensure the sustainability of CSR projects.
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Managing allegations and accusations within organizations is crucial for maintaining focus on performance and preventing institutional decay. However, relying on external examiners for internal investigations can represent a form of leadership abdication. This study explores approaches to mitigate abdication, emphasizing the importance of client involvement in formulating investigation mandates, ensuring relevant expertise among external examiners, and selecting diverse information sources. Abdication becomes particularly concerning when investigation reports are treated as final verdicts without critical review by organizational leaders. Examples from various scandals illustrate the implications of abdication and the need for proactive leadership in managing internal issues. By actively engaging in investigation processes and selecting knowledgeable examiners, organizations can better address internal challenges and foster a culture of accountability.
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One of the most important concerns of companies is engagement with stakeholders. One of the main ways of engaging is using gamification. To create engagement is the principal aim of a gamification system. In this work, and from literature, the authors survey how it has gamified the relationship between companies and stakeholders. The aim is to gather data to create a dataset for training an artificial neural network model. Among the artificial intelligence (AI) models, this kind of model has been the one that has been shown to increase human analytical capacity and is responsible for the emergence of generative AI. The final aim of this work is to create a generative AI that enables the design gamification system to create engagement between stakeholders and companies in the more diverse areas. This AI will be used as a service in a platform as a service (PaaS), where companies can get the best way to engage the stakeholders.
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International business scholars have successfully applied transactions cost economics theories of the firm to understand a wide variety of global business phenomena. However, because this theory takes the value of a global exchange as given, and then examines how to organize this exchange most efficiently, it cannot be considered a “strategic theory of the firm.” Some of the key elements of such a strategic theory of the firm, and how their introduction to international business research could change both theory and practice, are discussed.
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The concept of “generation” in family business scholarship is primarily used genealogically to reflect family lineage. This approach fails to account for complementary perspectives that are more established in history: “generation” as a category of societal belonging and a form of rhetorical history. Using a constitutive history approach, we identify four usages of “generation” by which these narratives can establish continuity or change in how families talk about themselves and foreground either family dynamics or embeddedness in societal developments. The form of historical narratives and how they mark time, we argue, is core to understanding rhetorical history processes.
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Advocates of stakeholder theory have long known that grasping its key insights requires a specific worldview that is, unfortunately, still not prevalent within the community of strategic management scholars. We argue that this worldview encompasses a process ontology that is radically different from the substance-ontological outlook typical of the mainstream approaches to strategic management. The unquestioned commitment of strategic management scholarship to a substance ontology leads to the viewing of corporations as macro-entities comprising aggregations of discrete autonomous actors each relying on individual choice and instrumental rationality. In contrast, within a process-ontological worldview, corporations and their stakeholders are seen to be sustained and attenuated through social practices and relationships involving interlocking chains of coping actions taken in everyday interactions. We show that adopting a process-ontological worldview presents a much-needed step that may help strategic management scholars reach a better understanding of how stakeholder theory deals with three problems of today's capitalism, those value creation and trade, ethics of capitalism, and managerial mindsets. On this basis, we discuss how to process ontology may lead stakeholder theory to further refine its understanding of business strategy, corporate social responsibility, and the common ground between the firm and stakeholders.
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This paper explores the potential for stakeholder theory to illuminate what F.A. Hayek called “the knowledge problem”, pertaining to how a society manages to utilize “knowledge not given to anyone in its totality”. According to Hayek, this problem is addressed by the price system, which induces economic actors to harness local and dispersed pieces of knowledge that would not be available to a central planner. The present paper argues that the growing turbulence in the business environment, as pointed out by stakeholder theorists, poses a challenge to the ability of corporate managers to harness local knowledge. Stakeholder theory is shown to imply that, in a turbulent environment, managers’ ability to do so is increasingly dependent on their access to the knowledge held by corporate stakeholders. This argument suggests that the building of stakeholder relationships is a crucial institutional solution to the knowledge problem.
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There is growing interest in the processes by which entrepreneurial opportunities are cocreated between entrepreneurs and their stakeholders. The longitudinal case study of de novo firm Wakefield Seafoods seeks to understand the underlying dynamics of phenomena that play out over time as stakeholders emerge and their contributions become essential to the opportunity formation process. The king crab data show that under conditions of uncertainty, characterized by incomplete or missing knowledge, entrepreneurial processes of experimentation, failure, and learning were effective in forming and exploiting an opportunity. Moreover, contrary to existing literature that either emphasizes heroic entrepreneurs or downplays their value, this article shows that both the vision of the entrepreneur and the stakeholder contributions are critical. This detailed examination of process data shows that the cumulative actions made by entrepreneurs in concert with their stakeholders formed an opportunity that coalesced into a new market.
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Instrumental stakeholder theory considers the performance consequences for firms of highly ethical relationships with stakeholders, characterized by high levels of trust, cooperation, and information sharing. While research suggests performance benefits, an obvious question remains: If instrumental stakeholder theory–based stakeholder treatment is so valuable, why isn’t it the dominant mode of relating to stakeholders? We argue that the existing instrumental stakeholder theory literature has three shortcomings that limit its ability to explain variance in performance. (1) Little theory exists around how instrumental stakeholder theory–based stakeholder management could provide sustainable competitive advantage. (2) The literature has largely neglected the potential downsides (i.e., costs) associated with pursuing these sorts of stakeholder relationships. (3) There is a paucity of theory on the contexts in which the incremental benefits of instrumental stakeholder theory–based stakeholder relationships are most likely to exceed the costs. As our primary contribution, we develop a theoretical path from a communal sharing relational ethics strategy—characterized by an intention to rely on relational contracts, joint wealth creation, high levels of mutual trust and cooperation, and communal sharing of property—to a close relationship capability, which we argue is valuable, rare, and difficult to imitate and, thus, a potential source of sustainable competitive advantage. We also consider the potential costs of achieving this capability and identify contexts in which the resulting relationships are likely to have the greatest net value.
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Interest has burgeoned, in recent years, in how social networks influence individual creativity and innovation. From both the theoretical and empirical points of view, this increased attention has generated many inconsistencies. In this article we propose that a conceptualization of the idea journey encompassing phases that the literature has so far overlooked can help solve existing tensions. We conceptualize four phases of the journey of an idea, from conception to completion: idea generation, idea elaboration, idea championing, and idea implementation. We propose that a creator has distinct primary needs in each phase: cognitive flexibility, support, influence, and shared vision, respectively. Individual creators successfully move through a phase when the relational and structural elements of their networks match the distinct needs of the phase. The relational and structural elements that are beneficial for one phase, however, are detrimental for another. We propose that in order to solve this seeming contradiction and the associated paradoxes, individual creators have to change interpretations and frames throughout the different phases. This, in turn, allows them to activate different network characteristics at the appropriate moment and successfully complete the idea journey from novel concept to a tangible outcome that changes the field.
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Given the growth in usage of online social networks, such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat, which rely on videos and images (such as photos) to relay information between connections, new intuitive languages, though not yet formally recognized, have emerged. We also herein give the example of a new language we have created – the Business Narrative Modelling Language (BNML) – which communicates business perspectives based on pictorial representations, supported by the narrative. Currently, the concept of language is linked to the use of words. We foresee that such a definition of language will have to change to include other structured forms of communication, resorting and relying on graphics, also. We give examples of BNML representations, with regards to two case studies we have performed, based on face-to-face interviews and company visits. At ExpressGlass technology plays an important role, while at Yazaki Saltano a remarkable team effort between Toyota suppliers is made evident, to create innovation. © Universidad Alberto Hurtado, Facultad de Economía y Negocios.
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S. E. Taylor and J. D. Brown's (1988) position that mentally healthy people exhibit positive illusions raises a dilemma: How do people function effectively if their perceptions are positively biased? Using Gollwitzer's deliberative-implemental mindset distinction, we assessed whether people in a deliberative mindset show less evidence of positive illusions than people in an implemental mindset. Participants completed a mindset task and assessments of mood, self-perceptions, and perceived (in)vulnerability to risk. Deliberation led to worsened mood, greater perceived risk, and poorer self-perceptions, relative to implementation; control (no mindset) participants typically scored in between. Study 3 demonstrated that the mindset manipulation corresponds to how people actually make decisions or implement them. Results suggest that people use relatively realistic thinking when setting goals and more positive thinking when implementing them.
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Firms play a crucial role in furthering social welfare through their ability to foster stakeholders' contributions to joint value creation-value creation that involves a public good dilemma arising from high task and outcome interdependence-leading to what economists have labeled the "team production problem." We build on relational models theory to examine how individual stakeholders' contributions to joint value creation are shaped by stakeholders' mental representations of their relationships with the other participants in value creation, and how these mental representations are affected by the perceived behavior of the firm. Stakeholder theorists typically contrast a broadly defined "relational" approach to stakeholder management with a "transactional" approach based on the price mechanism- and argue that the former is more likely than the latter to contribute to social welfare. Our theory supports this prediction for joint value creation but also implies that the dichotomy on which it is based is too coarse grained; there are three distinct ways to trigger higher contributions to joint value creation than through a transactional approach. Our theory also helps explain the tendency for firms and their stakeholders to converge on transactional relationships, despite their relative inefficiency in the context of joint value creation.
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In this article, we offer an approach of how participative stakeholder innovation can be evaluated in complex multistakeholder settings that address wicked issues. Based on the principle of mutual value creation, we present an evaluation framework that accounts for the social interaction process during which stakeholders integrate their resources and capabilities to develop innovative products and services. To assess this evaluation framework, we collected multiple data from the case study of the Swiss Cardiovascular Network, which represents a multistakeholder setting related to the prevention of cardiovascular disease. Our findings indicate that the evaluation dimensions of the stakeholders’ mindsets, the process and context of the stakeholder interactions, as well as the outcomes are useful concepts to account for a cooperative process of innovation in a multistakeholder setting. We discuss both the theoretical and practical insights of our analysis for participative stakeholder innovation.
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Our ‘stakeholder synergy’ perspective identifies new value creation opportunities that are especially effective strategically because a single strategic action: (1) increases different types of value for two or more essential stakeholder groups, simultaneously, and (2) does not reduce the value already received by any other essential stakeholder group. This result is obtainable because multiple potential sources of value creation exist for each essential stakeholder group. Actions that meet these criteria increase the size of the value ‘pie’ available for essential stakeholder groups and, thereby, serve to attract exceptional stakeholders and obtain their increasing effort and commitment. The stakeholder synergy perspective extends stakeholder theory further into the strategy realm, and offers insights for realizing broader value creation that is more likely to produce sustainable competitive advantage.
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One stream of leadership theory suggests leaders are evaluated via inferential observer processes that compare the fit of the target to a prototype of an ideal (charismatic) leader. Attributional theories of leadership suggest that evaluations depend on knowledge of past organizational performance, which is attributed to the leader’s skills. We develop a novel theory showing how inferential and attributional processes simultaneously explain top-level leader evaluation and ultimately leader retention and selection. We argue that observers will mostly rely on attributional mechanisms when performance signals clearly indicate good or poor performance outcomes. However, under conditions of attributional ambiguity (i.e., when performance signals are unclear), observers will mostly rely on inferential processes. In Study 1 we tested our theory in an unconventional context—the U.S. presidential election—and found that the two processes, due to the leader’s charisma and country economic performance, interact in predicting whether a leader is selected. Using a business context and an experimental design, in Study 2 we show that CEO charisma and firm performance interact in predicting leader retention, confirming the results we found in Study 1. Our results suggest that this phenomenon is quite general and can apply to various performance domains.
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The empirical literature on charismatic or transformational leadership demonstrates that such leadership has profound effects on followers. However, while several versions of charismatic leadership theory predict such effects, none of them explains the process by which these effects are achieved. In this paper we seek to advance leadership theory by addressing this fundamental problem. We offer a self-concept based motivational theory to explain the process by which charismatic leader behaviors cause profound transformational effects on followers. The theory presents the argument that charismatic leadership has its effects by strongly engaging followers' self-concepts in the interest of the mission articulated by the leader. We derive from this theory testable propositions about (a) the behavior of charismatic leaders and their effects on followers, (b) the role of followers' values and orientations in the charismatic relationship, and (c) some of the organizational conditions that favor the emergence and effectiveness of charismatic leaders.
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Evaluating organizations according to an efficiency criterion would make it possible to predict the form organizations will take under certain conditions. Organization theory has not developed such a criterion because it has lacked a conceptual scheme capable of describing organizational efficiency in sufficiently microsopic terms. The transactions cost approach provides such a framework because it allows us to identify the conditions which give rise to the costs of mediating exchanges between individuals: goal incongruence and performance ambiguity. Different combinations of these causes distinguish three basic mechanisms of mediation or control: markets, which are efficient when performance ambiguity is low and goal incongruence is high; bureaucracies, which are efficient when both goal incongruence and performance ambiguity are moderately high; and clans, which are efficient when goal incongruence is low and performance ambiguity is high.
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Purpose – Successful visionary educational leaders promote a shared vision with great commitment and manage to connect other organizational members to it. In spite of this, the source of their personal commitment to the organizational vision has not yet been the subject of extended study. The purpose of this paper is to correct this by investigating leaders' personal ethos; the personal experiences and values which form their motives and personality. This paper furthermore considers the influence of personal ethos on the content of the vision promoted in educational organizations. Finally, it explores the link between leaders' personal vision and the organizational vision they promote. Design/methodology/approach – Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with visionary educational leaders. These interviews were narrative in nature and aimed to explore the development process and the interrelation of personal and organizational vision in an educational framework. Findings – Data indicate that visionary educational leaders do not separate their personal vision from their organizational vision. Furthermore, the educational leaders interviewed told of formative experiences which affected their worldview and shaped their personal ethos. Personal ethos proved to be a key element in formulating the leaders' personal and organization vision. Four prominent factors emerged as central to the personal ethos of educational leaders: identity, culture and values, professional experience, and family. Originality/value – The findings suggest that educational leaders should engage in a process of self‐reflection in order to form a significant personal vision to which they can fully commit. Furthermore, the insights of leaders about what is important to them can enable an open dialogue with other organizational members and the development of a shared vision.
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Given assumptions about the characteristics of knowledge and the knowledge requirements of production, the firm is conceptualized as an institution for integrating knowledge. The primary contribution of the paper is in exploring the coordination mechanisms through which firms integrate the specialist knowledge of their members. In contrast to earlier literature, knowledge is viewed as residing within the individual, and the primary role of the organization is knowledge application rather than knowledge creation. The resulting theory has implications for the basis of organizational capability, the principles of organization design (in particular, the analysis of hierarchy and the distribution of decision-making authority), and the determinants of the horizontal and vertical boundaries of the firm. More generally, the knowledge-based approach sheds new light upon current organizational innovations and trends and has far-reaching implications for management practice.
Book
Required reading at more than 100 colleges and universities throughout North America. “In a way reminiscent of Einstein, Goodman leads us to the very edge of relativism, only then to step back and to suggest certain criteria of fairness and rightness. More so than any other commentator, he has provided a workable notion of the kinds of skills and capacities that are central for anyone who works in the arts.” —Howard Gardner, Harvard University
Article
Research Summary: Using arguments derived from transactions cost economics and incomplete contract theory, this article shows that the assumption that shareholders are a firm's only residual claimants is logically inconsistent with resource‐based theory's model of profit generation. It follows from this conclusion that resource‐based theory's model of profit appropriation must incorporate a stakeholder perspective. Some theoretical and empirical implications of this conclusion for resource‐based theory's model of profit generation, profit appropriation, the role of managers and entrepreneurs in resource‐based theory, and how conflicting interests among stakeholders can be resolved are all discussed. Finally, some continuing differences between stakeholder theory and incorporating a stakeholder perspective into resource‐based theory's model of profit appropriation are also discussed. Managerial Summary: Some argue that since shareholders are the only stakeholder who have a claim on a firm's profits, managers should focus only on maximizing shareholder wealth. Not only will this satisfy shareholders, it will also satisfy a firm's other stakeholders, since—in principle—these other stakeholders get paid before shareholders. This article shows that this logic is deeply flawed. In particular, it shows that if the only stakeholder who has a claim on a firm's economic profits is shareholders, then—in most competitive settings—a firm will not be able to attract the kinds of resources it needs to generate these profits. To attract the kinds of resources that can generate profits, managers must recognize that stakeholders, besides shareholders, have claims on the profits that their resources help generate. This, in turn, suggests that managers seeking to generate economic profits must adopt a stakeholder perspective in how they manage their firm. This article explores the managerial implications of this conclusion.
Article
This essay aims to “materialize” organizational communication in three senses. First, we seek to make the field of study bearing this name more tangible for North American management scholars, such that recognition and engagement become common. To do so, we trace the development of the field’s major contribution thus far: the communication‐as‐constitutive principle, which highlights how communication generates defining realities of organizational life, such as culture, power, networks, and the structure–agency relation. Second, we argue that this promising contribution cannot easily find traction in management studies until it becomes “materialized” in another sense: that is, accountable to the materiality evident in organizational objects, sites, and bodies. By synthesizing current moves in this direction, we establish the basis for sustained exchange between management studies and the communication‐as‐constitutive model. Third, we demonstrate how these conceptual developments can “materialize” in empirical study, proposing three streams of research designed to examine communication as a central organizing process that manages the intersection of symbolic and material worlds.
Article
Research Summary : We advance the concept of organization–stakeholder fit (O–S fit) to explain cooperative behavior between an organization and its stakeholders. O–S fit describes the compatibility that exists between an organization and a stakeholder when their characteristics are well matched. We highlight two dimensions of O–S fit: value congruence , or the supplementary fit of organizational and stakeholder values, and strategic complementarity , or the complementary fit of strategic needs and resources. For each dimension, we detail the unique relational factors—including core elements of trust, predictability, attraction/exchange, and communication—that motivate cooperation. We then explicate the ways in which value congruence and strategic complementarity dynamically interrelate over time. Finally, we consider how organization‐stakeholder misfit may result in alternative relational behaviors, such as conflict or compromise. Managerial Summary : We develop a new way of thinking about the relationship between organizations and stakeholders. Recognizing that positive relationships require a degree of fit or compatibility, we argue that cooperative behavior between an organization and its stakeholders is maximized when relational partners share both core values and strategic priorities. We explain that high fit along these two dimensions increases trust, relational predictability, attraction/exchange, and communication. We also describe how positive relationships might be formed with fit along only one dimension, and how negative relationships might result in the presence of misfit. Ultimately, we suggest that managers who want to foster positive relationships with stakeholders should concentrate on aligning their values and priorities, rather than simply concentrating on one or the other.
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This article develops relational models leadership theory, which explains how shared cognition produces group-level leadership emergence effects. The theory proposes that contextual features present early in a group's life can cause members to quickly converge on one of two cognitive relational models for leadership. Some groups adopt an authority ranking model, in which leadership influence is consolidated in the hands of a few high-status members. Others adopt a communal sharing model, in which leadership is the collective responsibility of all members. A positive feedback loop develops between group members' relational model convergence and leadership emergence, such that members enact leadership in a manner consistent with their shared relational model and these interactions reinforce the model. The theory also identifies two types of "jolt" events that can radically shift group members' cognitions and actions related to leadership.
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Although research has begun to acknowledge the strategies by which entrepreneurs form and maintain network ties, most efforts to date present an incomplete picture of entrepreneurs as heroic network architects who search, plan, and pursue contact with targeted ties. Herein, we briefly review this nascent literature, argue that it has so far overlooked alternatives in favor of an overly planned and instrumental perspective, and consider the implications of incorporating the notion of uncertainty into investigations of how entrepreneurs engage in networking. We therefore take a novel perspective on entrepreneurial networking and theorize about how entrepreneurs act when desired ties cannot be identified in advance, networking outcomes cannot be predicted, and ongoing social interactions fuel the emergence of new objectives. Overall, we add important insights to the literature, as we flesh out a dynamic networking process that unfolds alongside efforts to create a new venture. We then discuss how this model, which highlights distinctive elements such as altruism, pre-commitment, serendipity, and co-creation, can stimulate a broader research agenda focused on the inquiry of networking agency under uncertainty.
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Research summary : T his article provides a review of real options theory ( ROT ) in strategic management research. We review the fundamentals of ROT and provide a taxonomy of this research. By synthesizing and critiquing research on real options, we identify a number of important challenges as well as opportunities for ROT if it is to enhance its impact on strategic management and potentially develop into a theoretical pillar in the field. We examine how ROT can inform the key tensions that managers face between commitment versus flexibility as well as between competition versus cooperation, and we show how it can uniquely address the fundamental issues in strategy. We conclude with suggestions on future research directions that could enhance and unify the thus‐far distinct main approaches to real options research . Managerial summary : R eal options theory ( ROT ) applies the heuristics and valuation models originally designed for financial securities to the domain of corporate investment decisions (e.g., joint ventures [ JV s], foreign direct investment, research and development [R&D], etc.) and strategic decision making under uncertainty. This article provides a synthesis of this body of research in strategic management and related disciplines. We suggest how ROT can address fundamental issues of strategy, including the dilemmas managers face between commitment versus flexibility as well as between competition versus cooperation. We discuss how three distinct approaches to real options analysis can complement each other, and we identify some of the main challenges and opportunities for ROT to become a theoretical pillar in strategy . Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Chapter
Context as a complex and dynamic notion has to be taken into account with reference to its multifarious components in order to analyze the different forms shaped by narratives in CMC. Like any communication, CMC is socially constructed and contextually constrained by structural parameters that differ according to the specific form. The following contextual constraints, relevant to the shaping of ‘narrative impulse’ in CMC, will be briefly examined: interactional goals, spatial and temporal contexts, number/identity/common ground of interactants, socio-emotional features, and relevant textual dimensions. Some crucial features of narrative in everyday communication and in CMC (especially with regard to blogs, an emergent genre) will be related to the notion of ‘prototypical dialogue’, and changes in CMC narratives will be discussed by referring to contextual issues.
Article
Research summary Entrepreneurs often need resources controlled by stakeholders to form and exploit opportunities. While many of these resources can be acquired through simple contracts, the acquisition of some may require efforts on the part of stakeholders that go beyond what can be specified contractually. Such efforts—extra‐role behaviors—generally involve the formation of deep psychological bonds between stakeholders and entrepreneurial endeavors. In an entrepreneurial context, the process of creating these bonds can be called stakeholder enrollment. Critical attributes of this process are shown to vary by the informational setting (risky or uncertain) within which entrepreneurship takes place. Managerial summary Entrepreneurs often need to gain access to resources controlled by other stakeholders to be successful. In some cases, entrepreneurs must induce these stakeholders to form deep psychological bonds in order to obtain the required resources. The process of creating these bonds is called stakeholder enrollment. This article notes that entrepreneurs can use information about the nature of the opportunity they are pursuing, information about themselves (i.e., the entrepreneurs' charisma, trustworthiness, and reputation), or both, to enroll stakeholders. This article suggests that the more uncertain a particular opportunity is, the less entrepreneurs can use information about the opportunity and the more they must rely on information about themselves to successfully enroll stakeholders.
Book
The dominant shareholder-value model has led to mismanagement, market failure and a boost to regulation, as spectacularly demonstrated by the events surrounding the recent financial crisis. Stakeholders Matter challenges the basic assumptions of this model, in particular traditional economic views on the theory of the firm and dominant theories of strategic management, and develops a new understanding of value creation away from pure self-interest toward mutuality. This new 'stakeholder paradigm' is based on a network view, whereby mutuality enhances benefits and reduces risks for the firm and its stakeholders. The understanding of mutual value creation is operationalized according to the license to operate, to innovate and to compete. The book develops a vision for a strategy in society in which, rather than the invisible hand of the market, it the visible hands of the firm and the stakeholders that lead to an overall increase in the welfare of society.
Article
We present a model demonstrating the role of organizational controls in managing organizational knowledge characterized by different combinations of knowledge attributes. Specifically, we show how particular controls (outcome, process, and clan) differ in their ability to acquire, transfer, interpret, and, finally, use knowledge. We argue that the use of different controls therefore creates distinguishably different knowledge management processes within the firm.
Article
We examine how streams of communication enable the reproduction and change of the underlying principles that constitute institutional logics. While past research has shown that communication provides instantiations of institutional logics, the link between specific instances of communication and the emergence of institutional logics has not been explicitly shown. To remedy this gap, we propose that collections of communicative events distributed throughout organizations and institutional fields can converge on systems of categories so as to yield the meaningful and durable principles that constitute institutional logics. We explore how four analytically distinct communicative functions - coordinating, sensegiving, translating, and theorizing - enable this emergent process of reproduction and change.
Article
Two distinct meanings emerge from a review of the literature on consensus: agreement, and co-orientation. Using the second meaning, a conceptual definition of degree of consensus is formulated which is based on a social system model, rather than on individual system models. Drawing upon earlier research, two operational definitions of this model are proposed. Finally, a set of propositions relate degree of consensus in a group to the type of coordination which occurs between members of the group.
Article
Moving beyond the historical and theoretical traditions that have defined teacher education in TESOL over the last quarter century, in this introductory piece we argue for a reconceptualization of the knowledge-base of ESOL teacher education. Essential to this reconceptualization is the premise that the institutional forms and processes of teacher education frame how the profession responds to the basic sociocultural processes of learning to teach. As such, our teacher education practices constitute our professional self-definition. We argue that the core of the new knowledge-base must focus on the activity of teaching itself; it should center on the teacher who does it, the contexts in which it is done, and the pedagogy by which it is done. Moreover, this knowledge-base should include forms of knowledge representation that document teacher learning within the social, cultural, and institutional contexts in which it occurs. Finally, we believe the knowledge-base of language teacher education needs to account for the teacher as a learner of teaching, the social context of schools and schooling within which teacher-learning and teaching occur, and the activities of both language teaching and language learning. This tripartite framework calls for a broader epistemological view of ESOL teacher education, one that accounts for teaching as it is learned and as it is practiced; we argue that it will ultimately redefine how we as teacher educators create professionals in TESOL.
Book
The relationship between language and identity has been a topic of interest for language scholars for centuries. As early as in the 1800s many philologists, including the famous brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, were proposing the idea that language reflected the collective identity of national communities. Benveniste (1971), one of the most important linguists of the 20th century, also stressed the centrality of identity in language through the notion of subjectivity. In his view, the direct or indirect presence of the speaker as a subject in the utterance had the power to transform language as an abstract system into discourse as an act of communication. In sum, theorizations about language and identity have always had a significant place in linguistics, but it is only in the last 20 years that this field has established itself as an area of investigation in its own right and as a field fundamentally concerned with discourse. Indeed, modern research on ways in which identity is constructed and conveyed in talk is firmly grounded in a view of language as discourse, that is as “actual instances of communication in the medium of language” (Johnstone, 2002, p. 2), and as phenomena embedded in concrete social contexts.
Article
Robert Jackall's Moral Mazes offers an eye-opening account of how corporate managers think the world works, and how big organizations shape moral consciousness. Based on extensive interviews with managers at every level of two industrial firms and of a large public relations agency, Moral Mazes takes the reader inside the intricate world of the corporation. Jackall reveals a world where hard work does not necessarily lead to success, but where sharp talk, self-promotion, powerful patrons, and sheer luck might. Cheerfully-bland public faces mask intense competition in this world where people hide their intentions, and accountability often depends on the ability to outrun mistakes. In this topsy-turvy world, managers must bring often unforgiving technology and always difficult people together to make money, an uncompromising task demanding continual compromises with conventional truths. Moral questions become merely practical concerns and issues of public relations. Sooner or later, managers find themselves wondering how to act in such a world and still maintain a sense of personal integrity. This brilliant, sometimes disturbing, often wildly funny study of corporate thinking, decision-making, and morality presents compelling real life stories of the men and women charged with running the businesses of America. It will interest anyone concerned with how big organizations actually function, or with the current moral malaise in our public life.
Article
In this paper, we challenge the traditional understanding of organizational routines as creating inertia in organizations. We adapt Latour's distinction between ostensive and performative to build a theory that explains why routines are a source of change as well as stability. The ostensive aspect of a routine embodies what we typically think of as the structure. The performative aspect embodies the specific actions, by specific people, at specific times and places, that bring the routine to life. We argue that the ostensive aspect enables people to guide, account for, and refer to specific performances of a routine, and the performative aspect creates, maintains, and modifies the ostensive aspect of the routine. We argue that the relationship between ostensive and performative aspects of routines creates an on-going opportunity for variation, selection, and retention of new practices and patterns of action within routines and allows routines to generate a wide range of outcomes, from apparent stability to considerable change. This revised ontology of organizational routines provides a better explanation of empirical findings than existing theories of routines and has implications for a wide range of organizational theories.
Article
The organizational problem firms face is the utilization of knowledge which is not, and cannot be, known by a single agent. Even more importantly, no single agent can fully specify in advance what kind of practical knowledge is going to be relevant, when and where. Firms, therefore, are distributed knowledge systems in a strong sense: they are decentered systems, lacking an overseeing ‘mind’. The knowledge they need to draw upon is inherently indeterminate and continually emerging; it is not self-contained. Individuals' stock of knowledge consists of (a) role-related normative expectations; (b) dispositions, which have been formed in the course of past socializations; and (c) local knowledge of particular circumstances of time and place. A firm has greater-or-lesser control over normative expectations, but very limited control over the other two. At any point in time, a firm's knowledge is the indeterminate outcome of individuals attempting to manage the inevitable tensions between normative expectations, dispositions, and local contexts.
Article
The Cuban missile crisis is a seminal event. For thirteen days of October 1962, there was a higher probability that more human lives would end suddenly than ever before in history. Had the worst occurred, the death of 100 million Americans, over 100 million Russians, and millions of Europeans as well would make previous natural calamities and inhumanities appear insignificant. Given the probability of disaster—which President Kennedy estimated as “between 1 out of 3 and even”—our escape seems awesome. This event symbolizes a central, if only partially thinkable, fact about our existence. That such consequences could follow from the choices and actions of national governments obliges students of government as well as participants in governance to think hard about these problems. Improved understanding of this crisis depends in part on more information and more probing analyses of available evidence. To contribute to these efforts is part of the purpose of this study. But here the missile crisis serves primarily as grist for a more general investigation. This study proceeds from the premise that marked improvement in our understanding of such events depends critically on more self-consciousness about what observers bring to the analysis. What each analyst sees and judges to be important is a function not only of the evidence about what happened but also of the “conceptual lenses” through which he looks at the evidence. The principal purpose of this essay is to explore some of the fundamental assumptions and categories employed by analysts in thinking about problems of governmental behavior, especially in foreign and military affairs.
Article
Entrepreneurs looking to exploit market opportunities and create economic value must concern themselves with both value creation and value appropriation. In this context, entrepreneurs face an unusual challenge; they must accomplish these two tasks before the economic value of the market opportunity is known, even probabilistically. The purpose of this article is to describe how entrepreneurs in these settings organize a firm to solve their resource coordination and profit appropriation problems. Three different ways of organizing firms in these settings are examined, and their implications for research in entrepreneurship and other fields are discussed.
Article
This article fleshes out a recently introduced and empirically grounded framework of organizational identity orientation, which refers to the nature of assumed relations between an organization and its stakeholders as perceived by members. I suggest that individualistic, relational, and collectivistic orientations engender distinct patterns of relations with external and internal stakeholders and provide unique potential to advance certain forms of social value. I pay particular attention to relationships with customers, nonprofits, and employees. This framework may advance stakeholder theory and research on interorganizational relationships, the employment relationship, and intraorganizational relationships.
Book
In 1984, R. Edward Freeman published his landmark book, Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach, a work that set the agenda for what we now call stakeholder theory. In the intervening years, the literature on stakeholder theory has become vast and diverse. This book examines this body of research and assesses its relevance for our understanding of modern business. Beginning with a discussion of the origins and development of stakeholder theory, it shows how this corpus of theory has influenced a variety of different fields, including strategic management, finance, accounting, management, marketing, law, health care, public policy, and environment. It also features in-depth discussions of two important areas that stakeholder theory has helped to shape and define: business ethics and corporate social responsibility. The book concludes by arguing that we should re-frame capitalism in the terms of stakeholder theory so that we come to see business as creating value for stakeholders. © R. Edward Freeman, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Andrew C. Wicks, Bidhan Parmar and Simone de Colle 2010.
Article
This paper argues that the notion of value has been overly simplified and narrowed to focus on economic returns. Stakeholder theory provides an appropriate lens for considering a more complex perspective of the value that stakeholders seek as well as new ways to measure it. We develop a four-factor perspective for defining value that includes, but extends beyond, the economic value stakeholders seek. To highlight its distinctiveness, we compare this perspective to three other popular performance perspectives. Recommendations are made regarding performance measurement for both academic researchers and practitioners. The stakeholder perspective on value offered in this paper draws attention to those factors that are most closely associated with building more value for stakeholders, and in so doing, allows academics to better measure it and enhances managerial ability to create it.
Article
Social cognitive theory provides an agentic conceptual framework within which to analyze the determinants and psychosocial mechanisms through which symbolic communication influences human thought, affect and action. Communications systems operate through two pathways. In the direct pathway, they promote changes by informing, enabling, motivating, and guiding participants. In the socially mediated pathway, media influences link participants to social networks and community settings that provide natural incentives and continued personalized guidance, for desired change. Social cognitive theory analyzes social diffusion of new styles of behavior in terms of the psychosocial factors governing their acquisition and adoption and the social networks through which they spread and are supported. Structural interconnectedness provides potential diffusion paths; sociocognitive factors largely determine what diffuses through those paths.
Article
The study of cognition in organizations has burgeoned in recent years. Top-down information processing theory suggests that individuals create knowledge structures to help them process information and make decisions. While the benefits of employing such knowledge structures are widely noted, there is a growing concern that they can limit decision makers’ abilities to understand their information environments and thus, compromise their decision making. This issue has captured the imagination of managerial and organizational cognition researchers. To date, their inquiry has been eclectic in focus and method. To order and advance this work, the author reviews extant research on the developmental origins and decision consequences of both the content and structure of knowledge structures at multiple levels of analysis. A host of research challenges are identified to help develop a better understanding of knowledge structure representation, development, and use in organizations.
Article
Firms are organizations that represent social knowledge of coordination and learning. But why should their boundaries demarcate quantitative shifts in the knowledge and capability of their members? Should not knowledge reside also in a network of interacting firms? This line of questioning presents the challenge to state an alternative view to the “theory of the firm,” a theory that has moved from Coase's early treatment of what firms do to a concern with ownership, incentives, and self-interest. We return to Coase's original insight in understanding the cost and benefits of a firm but based on a view that individuals are characterized by an “unsocial sociality.” Does the perception of opportunism generate the need to integrate market transactions into the firm, or do boundaries of the firm lead to the attribution of opportunism? This basic dichotomy between self-interest and the longing to belong is the behavioral underpinning to the superiority of firms over markets in resolving a fundamental dilemma: productivity grows with the division of labor but specialization increases the costs of communication and coordination. The knowledge of the firm has an economic value over market transactions when identity leads to social knowledge that supports coordination and communication. Through identification, procedural rules are learned, and coordination and communication are facilitated across individuals and groups of diverse specialized competence. A firm is distinct from a market because coordination, communication, and learning are situated not only physically in locality, but also mentally in an identity. Since identity implies a moral order as well as rules of exclusion, there are limitations and costs to relying upon a firm for exchange as opposed to the market. These costs are not necessarily those traditionally assigned to the category of decreasing returns to hierarchy. For example, an identity implies that some practices, and businesses, may be notionally inconsistent with each other. Norms of procedural justice that are identified with a firm imply that not all technically feasible complements are permissible within the logic of a shared identity. There is consequently a cost to an identity that offsets the benefits. Because the assemblage of elements that compose an organization are subject to requirements of consistency, identities rule out potentially interesting avenues of innovation and creativity. We illustrate these ideas by returning to the original prisoners’ dilemma game and by an analysis of the coherence of a firm as a search for complements that are consistent with norms of procedural justice. We argue that the underlying dynamic of a prisoners' dilemma game reveals the problems of coordination, communication, and conflicts in norms of justice when players are deprived of social knowledge and shared identity. Similarly, the determination of a firm's coherence arises out of the demand for a moral and notional consistency in the “categorization” of its activities, as opposed to a technological necessity. These ideas are illustrated through an empirical examination of logical complements in high performance work systems.
Book
This book, first published in 1996, argues that language use is more than the sum of a speaker speaking and a listener listening. It is the joint action that emerges when speakers and listeners - writers and readers - perform their individual actions in coordination, as ensembles. The author argues strongly that language use embodies both individual and social processes.