Moral identity and the Quaker tradition: moral dissonance negotiation in the workplace

Moral identity and moral dissonance in business ethics have explored tensions relating to moral self-identity and the pressures for identity compartmentalization in the workplace. Yet, the connection between these streams of scholarship, spirituality at work, and business ethics is under-theorized. In this paper, we examine the Quaker tradition to explore how Quakers’ interpret moral identity and negotiate the moral dissonance associated with a divided self in work organizations. Specifically, our study illuminates that while Quakers’ share a tradition-specific conception of “Quaker morality” grounded in Quaker theology and the Quaker testimonies to truth, integrity, peace, equality, and simplicity, they often foreground the pursuit of an undivided self through seeking work that enables an expression of Quaker moral identity, or by resigning from work organizations that do not. In most cases, however, Quakers’ face moral dissonance at work and engage in either identity compartmentalization and draw upon the metaphor of a ‘spiritual journey’ as a form of self-justification, or reframe, compartmentalize and engage in work tasks that are both subjectively moral and meaningful. We present a model that elaborates these negotiation processes and invite further research that examines how the spiritual traditions influence moral identity construction at work

Seeing More than Orange: Organizational Respect and Positive Identity Transformation in a Prison Context

This paper develops grounded theory on how receiving respect at work enables individuals to engage in positive identity transformation and the resulting personal and work-related outcomes. A company that employs inmates at a state prison to perform professional business-to-business marketing services provided a unique context for data collection. Our data indicate that inmates experienced respect in two distinct ways, generalized and particularized, which initiated an identity decoupling process that allowed them to distinguish between their inmate identity and their desired future selves and to construct transitional identities that facilitated positive change. The social context of the organization provided opportunities for personal and social identities to be claimed, respected, and granted, producing social validation and enabling individuals to feel secure in their transitional identities. We find that security in personal identities produces primarily performance-related outcomes, whereas security in the company identity produces primarily well-being-related outcomes. Further, these two types of security together foster an integration of seemingly incompatible identities—”identity holism”—as employees progress toward becoming their desired selves. Our work suggests that organizations can play a generative role in improving the lives of their members through respect-based processes

Constructing project business around professional identity: business model strategizing of architectural firms

Creative professional service firms experience difficulties in establishing healthy and sustainable business models, as they must reconcile the often competing value systems upon which the models are based. They continuously negotiate between professional values and beliefs and the firm’s commercial goals, resulting in struggles between identity and strategy. Adopting a work lens, this study investigates the reciprocal tensions between identity and strategy in 17 business model design workshops with members of architectural firms. Observational data show that practitioners collaboratively construct their business models around professional values, thereby strengthening organizational identity, but constraining innovation in their business models. The research contributes to the body of literature on business model design processes by articulating how professional aspects of identity enable and constrain practitioners in shaping and being shaped by their strategic actions and decisions

Enriching the values of micro and small business research projects : two sides of a story

Copyright and all rights therein are retained by the authors. All persons copying this information are expected to adhere to the terms and conditions invoked by each author's copyright. These works may not be re-posted without the explicit permission of the copyright holdersThe research aim was to critically examine the two sides of co-creation from the small business and GCU researcher perspectives. The interest is in the value created and delivered. Previous studies have suggested the importance of identity and trust in these types of collaborative projects. The approach used a single case study to explore indepth the development of identity and trust, and the subsequent movement of the project participants to the creation of value. The results of the study revealed important action learning and knowledge management developments. A strong focus at the beginning on identifying key propositional knowledge needs, later led to more opportunities to co-create value for both parties. The understanding of the processes and importance of trust in these significant knowledge exchange projects reveals both a strength and weakness in these university-business collaborative projects. The indepth undersrtanding and interpretation of the value derived in-action and on-action speaks highly of the role of these university-business collaborative projects. Suggesting that the university has a key role to play in future economic development. KeywordsFinal Published versio

Identity, enactment and entrepreneurship engagement in a declining place

We examine entrepreneurship practice and identity work in a rural small town in New Zealand. Once prosperous, the town suffered economically and socially as old industries closed. Recently the town was rejuvenated, largely because of Linda's entrepreneurial activities. Our findings demonstrated conflict between her entrepreneurial identity and local sense of place. We theorize Linda's entrepreneurial identity in her business practice; where she experienced controversy, despite economic success. We argue that a complete understanding of identity and entrepreneurship practices requires attention to social and spatial processes, not just economic processes

Identity, enactment and entrepreneurship engagement in a declining place.

We examine entrepreneurship practice and identity work in a rural small town in New Zealand. Once prosperous, the town suffered economically and socially as old industries closed. Recently the town was rejuvenated, at least in part because of the entrepreneurial endeavours of Linda. Our findings demonstrated conflict between her entrepreneurial identity and local sense of place. We theorise Linda's entrepreneurial identity in her business practice, where she experienced controversy despite economic success. We argue that a complete understanding of identity and entrepreneurship practices requires attention to social and spatial processes, not just economic processes

Organizational Identity Implications of Cross-Sector Partnerships: A Nonprofit Perspective

Nonprofit organizations frequently cooperate with profit-oriented businesses in order to fulfil their goals and mission. Although collaborative activities such as nonprofit-business partnerships can benefit both non- and for-profit organizations, they are also a potential source of inter- and intra-organizational controversy, conflict, and even disruption when social objectives clash with business interests. Taking on the perspective of nonprofit organizations and their members, this tripartite dissertation investigates one particular risk associated with nonprofit-business partnerships: organizational identity threats (i.e., experiences that call into question members’ perceptions of their organization’s identity). Building on and connecting research on inter-organizational collaboration, nonprofit organizations, and organizational identity, this dissertation first develops a conceptual model that outlines the conditions under which nonprofit-business partnerships may arise as organizational identity threats. Second, a qualitative study based on semi-structured interviews explores nonprofit members’ sensemaking and organizational identity threat appraisal processes in the context of nonprofit-business partnerships. Third, a subsequent qualitative study investigates how nonprofit members manage potential identity-related tensions arising from these partnerships through identity work. Taken together, this dissertation provides insights into how members of nonprofit-organizations perceive, evaluate, and manage potential identity threats in cross-sector partnerships with corporate actors

Vendor Digital Identity for State Street Corporation

This project focused on understanding digital identity to improve State Street Global Services’ supplier onboarding and vendor identification process. Our interdisciplinary, combined graduate and undergraduate student team began by researching digital identity and conducting subject matter expert interviews to map out business processes. Using Python and Excel we analyzed supplier spend data to detect anomalies. Our team then reviewed the business process and analysis to make recommendations on digital identity usage. We finalized the project by creating a Tableau dashboard prototype for use by State Street for risk analysis

Corporate sustainable brand identity work and network embeddedness:Learnings from Better Place (2007–2013)

The growing attention to the climate crisis in today's business environment, increases the need for B2B firms to integrate corporate sustainable branding activities in stakeholder interactions. Motivated by a continuous push for market reforms to promote a sustainability agenda for B2B firms, this research uses an intensive single case study design to showcase how corporate sustainable brand identity work is carried out in B2B firms and how business network embeddedness affects this work. We describe how Petter Place, a company that attempted to introduce a radically new way of providing charging for electric cars, provides an opportunity to outline and discuss corporate sustainable brand identity work in B2B networks. We identify how corporate sustainable brand identity work is carried out through different sub-processes, such as building corporate sustainable brand identity and awareness, network mobilizing, and ongoing actor commitment and coalignment, and how network embeddedness facilitates and restricts these processes in different ways.</p

Academic Process Oriented to the Reputational Capital of Brazilian HEI Brands

The reputation of a university must be positive, whether it is private or public, given the competitiveness of its environment.  Reputation is an indicator of organizational success and can be monitored by the brand\u27s reputational capital, which corresponds to the harmony between the characteristics established by the managers - brand identity, and the perception defined by its stakeholders - brand image. In a complementary way, business processes are useful tools for optimizing the roles and outcome of organizations. The objective of this work was to model an academic business process, to increase the efficacy of higher education training, guided by the reputational capital of the brands of universities in Brazil. A quasi-systematic review was carried out to investigate academic business processes - identity; bibliographic review to understand reputation and competitiveness – image; and was elaborated a diagram of the academic business process model with UML resources, SIPOC approach, relating identity and image through guidelines: elaboration and evaluation of student work individual plan, student self-efficacy stimulus, individual teaching advice, positive university culture, interaction with society and co-creation of brands by students from Brazilian HEIs - reputational capital