No-size-fits-all: collaborative governance as an alternative for addressing labour issues in global supply chains

Labour issues in global supply chains have been a thorny problem for both buyer firms and their suppliers. Research initially focused mostly on the bilateral relationship between buyer firms and suppliers, looking at arm’s-length and close collaboration modes, and the associated mechanisms of coercion and cooperation. Yet continuing problems in the global supply chain suggest that neither governance type offers a comprehensive solution to the problem. This study investigates collaborative governance, an alternative governance type that is driven by buyer firms setting up a coalition with competitor firms in order to increase leverage and address the supplier and/or host country specific labour issues. Based on interviews with managers involved in the establishment and management of such coalitions and supplier firms in the garment industry, we examine the rationale behind collaborative governance and discuss its opportunities and challenges in addressing labour issues in global supply chains

Short-term versus long-term impact of managers: evidence from the football industry

Studies into the impact of top manager change on organization performance have revealed inconsistent findings. Using longitudinal data over a 12-year period on football organizations, we test for the short-term and long-term effects of manager change in comparison to the tenures of incumbent top managers. We find that long incumbent tenures are associated with performance far above the average. But when looking at change events, contrary to theoretical expectations, we find that change in the short term leads to a brief reprieve in poor performance only for performance to deteriorate in the long term as underlying weaknesses once again take hold. Our findings reveal the illusion of a short-term reprieve and the long-term consequences of this illusion. We map several implications for research and practice from our work

Why wait? Organizational learning, institutional quality and the speed of foreign market re-entry after initial entry and exit

Using a unique dataset of over 1000 foreign marketre-entries by multinational enterprises, we draw on organizational learning and institutional theory perspectives to examine the antecedents of speed of foreign market re-entry into previously exited markets. Contrary to expectations, we find that the length of experience accumulated between initial entry and exit does not lead to earlier re-entries. In turn, the depth of experience accumulated through operating via joint ventures and the nature of the experience determined by the exit process have a significant impact for early re-entrants. Host country institutional quality leads to early re-entry and, under certain circumstances, moderates the relationship between learning from past experiences and re-entry speed. Our findings reveal experience-based learning to be a complex and dynamic process, one highly dependent on the quality of the institutional setting of the firm. Theoretical and practical implications of the paper are discussed, along with directions for future research on international business strategies

A study of the association between level of slack reduction following downsizing and innovation output

Over the years scholars put forward a number of theories to explain the association between slack and innovation. This study extends this body of research by focusing on the effects of reduction in slack level following downsizing on innovation output. We developed two hypotheses to examine the total effects and varied yearly effects. We tested the hypotheses with data from a panel of UK firms that downsized between 1997 and 2003. The results show that the level of downsizing has only temporary effects on innovation output. We discuss the implications of these findings and avenues for future research

Revisiting the concept of absorptive capacity: The moderating effects of market sensing and responsiveness

This study proposes new moderators acting on well-established antecedents of absorptive capacity. We treat separately the two dimensions of potential absorptive capacity and realized absorptive capacity. We first examine the moderating effect of market sensing on the relationship between coordination capability and potential absorptive capacity. Then, we assess the moderating effect of market responsiveness on the links between organizational systems and socialization processes and realized absorptive capacity. We draw on multilevel analysis with data from 205 managers from the banking sector in Turkey to test our hypothesized relationships. Our contribution reveals interesting insights on the contingent effects of market sensing and responsiveness for the emergence of absorptive capacity. Market sensing moderates the relationship between coordination capability and potential absorptive capacity, while market responsiveness moderates the relationships between organizational systems and socialization processes and realized absorptive capacity. The findings provide important implications for theory and practice on developing potential and realized absorptive capacity

Changes in Corporate Social Responsibility Activity during a Pandemic: The Case of Covid-19

This study examines the practice of corporate social responsibility (CSR) during Covid-19. Little is known about how organizations practice CSR during acute exogenous crises. Overlooking how CSR practices change during a crisis matters because organizations are compelled into trade-offs that carry implications for their CSR initiatives. Analysis of interview data with CSR managers, from 21 Dubai-based business organizations during Covid-19, uncovers changes in the content and process of CSR during the pandemic. The results show that the practice of CSR underwent a fundamental change in focus as organizations shifted to an employee-centric model of CSR and away from an environmental one. Measures placed on organizations and society to combat the pandemic also led to a recalibration of stakeholder and issue salience, with notable effects on CSR that challenge the capability of the power-legitimacy-urgency framework to anticipate these shifts. We consider the impacts associated with the shift in the content of CSR initiatives and process of their implementation and discuss the implications of the findings for CSR theory, research, policy, and practice