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Full-Text Articles in Business
How Applying Instrumental Stakeholder Theory Can Provide Sustainable Competitive Advantage, Thomas M. Jones, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Will Felps
How Applying Instrumental Stakeholder Theory Can Provide Sustainable Competitive Advantage, Thomas M. Jones, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Will Felps
Management Faculty Publications
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., …
How Applying Instrumental Stakeholder Theory Can Provide Sustainable Competitive Advantage, Thomas M. Jones, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Will Felps
How Applying Instrumental Stakeholder Theory Can Provide Sustainable Competitive Advantage, Thomas M. Jones, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Will Felps
Management Faculty Publications
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., …
The Volkswagen Scandal, Britt Blackwelder, Katerine Coleman, Sara Colunga-Santoyo, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Danielle Wozniak
The Volkswagen Scandal, Britt Blackwelder, Katerine Coleman, Sara Colunga-Santoyo, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Danielle Wozniak
Robins Case Network
Volkswagen is one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world. For years the company has focused on producing attractive and environmentally friendly automobiles, and recent initiatives have included a project to reduce CO2 production, along with advertisements claiming lower emission of greenhouse gases. The world was shocked to hear that Volkswagen had been producing diesel engines for its cars that were able to trick emissions testing equipment. The engines were producing many times the EPA standards for emissions, yet they passed emission tests. This case provides detailed information about the scandal as well as information about the history, …
Stakeholder Theory As An Ethical Approach To Effective Management: Applying The Theory To Multiple Contexts, Jeffrey S. Harrison, R. Edward Freeman, Mônica Cavalcanti Sá De Abreu
Stakeholder Theory As An Ethical Approach To Effective Management: Applying The Theory To Multiple Contexts, Jeffrey S. Harrison, R. Edward Freeman, Mônica Cavalcanti Sá De Abreu
Management Faculty Publications
This article provides a brief overview of stakeholder theory, clears up some widely held misconceptions, explains the importance of examining stakeholder theory from a variety of international perspectives and how this type of research will advance management theory, and introduces the other articles in the special issue.
India - Censorship For A Good Cause?, Judith Schrempf-Stirling
India - Censorship For A Good Cause?, Judith Schrempf-Stirling
Robins Case Network
Information technology (IT) companies face significant censorship challenges in countries such as China and India. This case deals with the ethical issues associated with government censorship, and specifically whether corporations that comply with such censorship are complicit in violating basic human rights. The context is India, and the case provides a summary of relevant cultural and legal issues in this very turbulent country.
Do Employers Have Obligations To Pay Their Workers A Living Wage?, Javier S. Hidalgo
Do Employers Have Obligations To Pay Their Workers A Living Wage?, Javier S. Hidalgo
Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications
Jeremy Snyder argues that employers have obligations to pay their workers a living wage if workers stand in relationships of dependence with their employers. I argue that Snyder’s argument for this conclusion faces a dilemma. Snyder can adopt either a descriptive or a moralized account of dependence. If Snyder adopts a descriptive account, then it is false that dependence activates obligations to pay a living wage. If Snyder endorses a moralized account of dependence, then Snyder’s argument is circular. So, Snyder’s argument fails to establish that employers have obligations to pay their workers a living wage.
Stakeholder Theory, Value, And Firm Performance, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Andrew C. Wicks
Stakeholder Theory, Value, And Firm Performance, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Andrew C. Wicks
Management Faculty Publications
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 …
Managing For Stakeholders, Stakeholder Utility Functions, And Competitive Advantage, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Douglas A. Bosse, Robert A. Phillips
Managing For Stakeholders, Stakeholder Utility Functions, And Competitive Advantage, Jeffrey S. Harrison, Douglas A. Bosse, Robert A. Phillips
Management Faculty Publications
This paper integrates some of the central concepts of stakeholder theory with the literatures on organizational justice and trust to explain firm competitiveness. It provides a detailed explanation of factors that facilitate acquisition of knowledge about stakeholder utility functions. In addition, it offers a knowledge-based analysis of how firms that manage for stakeholders can enjoy sustainable competitive benefits. These explanations provide a strong rationale for including stakeholder theory in the discussion of firm competitiveness and performance.
Stakeholders, Entrepreneurial Rent And Bounded Self-Interest, Douglas A. Bosse, Jeffrey S. Harrison
Stakeholders, Entrepreneurial Rent And Bounded Self-Interest, Douglas A. Bosse, Jeffrey S. Harrison
Management Faculty Publications
This paper examines how the change from an assumption of pure self-interest to an assumption of bounded self-interest alters basic propositions regarding the way entrepreneurs select, negotiate with and manage relationships with their initial set of stakeholders. Although a purely economic approach would focus on material cost as the sole consideration when conducting these activities, we argue that non-material factors such as reciprocity and fairness are potent forces during the initial resource acquisition process. We explain that non-material considerations are accounted for in negotiations with stakeholders and positive reciprocity is encouraged through openly sharing information with stakeholders about the value …
Stakeholder Theory In Strategic Management: A Retrospective, Jeffrey S. Harrison
Stakeholder Theory In Strategic Management: A Retrospective, Jeffrey S. Harrison
Management Faculty Publications
This chapter will provide a description of the personal journey of the author who, as a newly graduated Ph.D. in strategic management in 1985, embraced stakeholder theory. Perhaps one of the interesting aspects of this narrative is that the field of strategic management itself was in its infancy at the time of my graduation. So I have “grown up” in the strategy field while simultaneously observing and to some extent participating in the development of what we now call stakeholder theory. Over the past two and a half decades I have frequently found myself frustrated by my strategy colleagues’ lack …
Adam Smith And Greed, Jonathan B. Wight
Adam Smith And Greed, Jonathan B. Wight
Economics Faculty Publications
The virtues of greed have been widely promoted by some economists in the 20th century. Allegedly it is Adam Smith who provides this new dignity to greed (Lerner, 1937, ix). Kenneth Arrow and Frank Hahn in the General Equilibrium Analysis (1971), for example, implicitly assume that Adam Smith's self-interest is the greed that promotes economic efficiency (quoted in Evensky, 1993, 203). Walter Williams (1999), a devoted follower of Smith, writes in his column that, "Free markets, private property rights, voluntary exchange, and greed produce preferable outcomes most times and under most conditions." These pronouncements have become part of the cultural …
The Bite Could Be Out Of Noncompete Clauses, Porcher L. Taylor Iii
The Bite Could Be Out Of Noncompete Clauses, Porcher L. Taylor Iii
School of Professional and Continuing Studies Faculty Publications
While Virginia is generally a pro-business state, the courts do not favor employee noncompete agreements because they are restraints of trade.