Adam Lindgreen

François Maon

Stefan Markovic

Cristina Sancha

Contemporary companies are expected to behave ethically and responsibly toward their stakeholders and to provide social and environmental good. Key stakeholder groups, including employees, consumers, investors, and public authorities, increasingly demand that companies deliver products and services in responsible yet economically sound manners and act in accordance with moral obligations and financial requirements. Such mounting societal expectations and institutional pressures relate to complex concerns, including environmental and climate impact, working conditions, and human rights, both locally and oversees. In this context, as companies now appear to commit to comprehensively tackle ethical, social, environmental, and economic challenges, concerns increasingly are raised as to whether most companies in the end can indeed contribute to societal and environmental good and transform how they operate to create value responsibly, considering the success and impact of so called corporate social responsibility or sustainability policies. In recent decades, while some companies have advanced on their social and environmental responsibility journey, other companies have engaged in ethical, social, and environmental initiatives in manipulative and insincere way, or merely as a rhetorical tool to maintain legitimacy. Together with governments and business partners, these companies are largely failing to deliver for society and the environment. Subsequently, more than ever before, understanding what it means to do business responsibly and how business actors can engage constructively in ways that support the development of resilient business practices, forms, and organizations that contribute to generate positive impact for society and the environment and generate the type of economic value needed to address the key challenges of this century is central. On this background, this edited volume sheds light on different crucial themes and approaches spanning historical, conceptual, operational, critical, practical, and prospective considerations that have animated the field of business and society in the last decades, and that are instrumental or have the potential to drive constructive research discussions and business efforts. The central aim of the book is to set the research agenda for the next five to seven years, to redefine existing areas within the context of international research, and to highlight emerging research areas in need of further investigation, representing a prestige reference work providing an overview of the subject area of responsible business, primarily for academics, researchers, postgraduate students, as well as reflective practitioners.

The Routledge Companion to Responsible Business

Henk Volberda

Aybars Tuncdogan

Frans van den Bosch

Strategic Renewal is an original research anthology offering insight into a subject area which, although critical for the sustained success of organizations, has received relatively little attention as distinct from the more general phenomenon of strategic change. Firstly, by providing a summary of the literature, this research anthology helps graduate students and new researchers grasp the current state of affairs in the field. Secondly, this research anthology will help update the knowledge base of the existing researchers in the field. By bringing together various studies, the research anthology determines the core concepts of the field and elucidates the key gaps and future research areas. Through contributions building on the knowledge bases of other disciplines, this research anthology develops an interdisciplinary research agenda, giving the reader an in-depth understanding of the mediating, moderating, and antecedent variables concerning strategic renewal. Strategic Renewal aims to provide a state-of-understanding to the subject, as well as a clear picture of the cross-disciplinary landscape that informs the subject. Thus, this research anthology is essential reading for managers, consultants, and other practitioners, as well as students and scholars of business.

Core Concepts, Antecedents, and Micro Foundations

Strategic Renewal

Joelle Vanhamme

Francois Maon

Beatriz Palacios Florencio

Helen Borland

Véronique Ambrosini

Business Strategies for Sustainability brings together important research contributions that demonstrate different approaches to business strategies for sustainability. Many corporate initiatives toward what firms perceive to be sustainability are simply efficiency drives or competitive moves – falling far short of actual strategies for ecological sustainability. To suggest true ecological sustainability strategies, this new research anthology adopts an interdisciplinary, or transdisciplinary, approach to discern what business strategies might look like if they were underpinned by environmental and ecological science. The 23 chapters in this anthology reflect five main topic sections: (a) delineating sustainability challenges and visions; (b) contradiction, integration and transformation of business and sustainability logics; (c) innovating and developing strategic capabilities for sustainability; (d) assessing and valuing sustainability; and (e) toward multi-level engagement and collaboration.

Business Strategies for Sustainability

Christine Vallaster

Shumaila Yousafzai

The way organizations manage entrepreneurship has changed dramatically over the past decade. Today, organizations take account of economic issues, but they also adopt a broader perspective of their purpose including social and environmental issues (i.e. sustainability). Yet, despite its global spread, sustainable entrepreneurship remains an uncertain and poorly defined ambition with few absolutes. This book reaffirms the important need to improve comprehension and explore the subtleties of how individuals, groups, and organizations can discover, create, and seize opportunities for blended value generation, by designing and operating sustainable ventures. It examines, in an interdisciplinary fashion and across sectoral and geographical boundaries, how entrepreneurial activities can be developed to be generally consistent with sustainable development goals, as well as by whom, for what reasons, and with what implications. The Editors comprehensively review key dimensions of the sustainable entrepreneurship phenomenon to establish an essential definition and up-to-date picture of the field. The 19 chapters cover 4 main topics: Understanding the intentions and motivations for sustainable entrepreneurship Fostering and enacting sustainability through entrepreneurial action Leading and inspiring sustainable entrepreneurial action Finding the contextually grounded implications of and challenges to sustainable entrepreneurship and blended value generation This book is an important resource for entrepreneurs and policy makers as well as students in the fields of entrepreneurship, innovation, and sustainability.

Discovering, Creating and Seizing Opportunities for Blended Value Generation

Sustainable Entrepreneurship

Michael Beverland

Adriana Campelo

Laura Reynolds

Cultural Heritage is a systematic, interdisciplinary examination of cultural heritage, which provides an up-to-date view of the field by drawing on various disciplines. The book offers a thorough, structured review of extant literature on heritage in tourism and pertinent challenges for cultural heritage. This book offers new ways of looking at cultural heritage assets against a backdrop of increasing economic and environmental pressures. It comprises a number of sections that each examine cultural heritage from the perspective of ethics and values, community relations and development, cultural entrepreneurship, economic viability and conservation, methodologies, impacts of tourism research, consumption, and urban and immaterial heritage. Encompassing global research perspectives from public management, visual culture, environmental management, and cultural entrepreneurship, Cultural Heritage is a crucial text for those working or interested in the heritage field.

Cultural Heritage

Richard Gyrd-jones

Sylvia Von Wallpach

Bringing together different theoretical perspectives on brand co-creation and discussing their practical applicability and ethical implications, this Research Handbook explores emerging notions of brand construction which view brands as co-created through collaborative efforts between multiple stakeholders. Chapters contribute to clarifying the ontological and epistemological assumptions underlying brand co-creation, gaining deeper insights into the co-creation of intangible and tangible brand assets, as well as uncovering the ethical implications of brand co-creation. The impressive selection of contributors also foreshadow and critically reflect on possible future developments related to brand co-creation, and illustrate practical applications in the form of case studies. In an ever more interconnected business environment, this timely Research Handbook will be an ideal read for students studying courses related to branding, marketing, innovation and business ethics. It will also be welcomed by scholars conducting research in these fields, as well as practitioners and managers implementing co-creation strategies.

Research Handbook on Brand Co-Creation - Theory, Practice and Ethical Implications

Thomas Ritter

Carsten Lund Pedersen

Torsten Ringberg

This important book considers the ways in which small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can thrive in the age of big data. To address this central issue from multiple viewpoints, the editors introduce a collection of experiences, insights, and guidelines from a variety of expert researchers, each of whom provides a piece to solve this puzzle. Contributions address the limitations faced by SMEs in their access to data and demonstrate that the key to overcoming this issue is to be aware of these limitations, to work within them, and to use them to think creatively about how to overcome obstacles in new ways. They discuss Artificial Intelligence, revenue blueprinting, GDPR compliance and other key topics related to the relationships between SMEs and data. Offering ideas to inspire big data-driven success by SMEs making smaller investments, the book argues that there must be a place for "ordinary" data-driven journeys that are available to firms of any size. Stimulating further thought and action, Big Data in Small Business will be of great interest to academics, researchers and practitioners in areas such as strategic management, organizational and innovation studies, marketing and sales. The ideas and information in this book will help fill knowledge gaps related to important aspects of capabilities, functions, and transformations of big data that drive business growth.

Data-Driven Growth in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises

Big Data in Small Business

Rebecca Watkins

Although literature on corporate social responsibility is vast, research into the use and effectiveness of various communications through digital platforms about such corporate responsibility is scarce. This gap is surprising; communicating about corporate social responsibility initiatives is vital to organizations that increasingly highlight their corporate social responsibility initiatives to position their corporate brands for both consumers and other stakeholders. Yet these organizations still sometimes rely on traditional methods to communicate, or even decide against communicating at all, because they fear triggering stakeholders’ skepticism or cynicism. A systematic, interdisciplinary examination of corporate social responsibility communication through digital platforms therefore is necessary, to establish an essential definition and up-to-date picture of the field. This research anthology addresses the above objectives. Drawing on marketing, management, and communication disciplines, among others, this anthology examines how organizations construct, implement, and use digital platforms to communicate about their corporate social responsibility and thereby achieve their organizational goals. The 21 chapters in this anthology reflect six main topic sections: Challenges and opportunities for communicating corporate social responsibility through digital platforms. Moving toward symmetry and interactivity in digital corporate social responsibility communication. Fostering stakeholder engagement in and through digital corporate social responsibility communication. Leveraging effective digital corporate social responsibility communication. Digital activism and corporate social responsibility. Digital methodologies and corporate social responsibility.

Communicating Corporate Social Responsibility in the Digital Era

Thyra U. Thomsen

Annemette Kjærgaard

Eleri Rosier

This timely Handbook investigates the many perspectives from which to reconsider teaching and learning within business schools, during a time in which higher education is facing challenges to the way teaching might be delivered in the future. Bringing together a diverse range of expert contributors, this Handbook fills gaps in current knowledge and research, whilst expanding and exploring new fields. Topics covered include the use and value of learning technologies, leadership education and continuous professional development of research-based teachers. Crucially, the Handbook considers how faculty at all levels of seniority will be forced to challenge their own modus operandi in designing and delivering teaching. This is especially important during and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, where blended learning should be carefully assessed before it is adopted as part of any course design. Offering both practical suggestions and cutting-edge research into the field, this Handbook will be a key resource for academics, practitioners and students in business and management education who wish to consolidate their teaching and learning and further understand the broader issues surrounding it.

A Practice-Based Approach

Handbook of Teaching and Learning at Business Schools

Alain Fayolle

Saadat Saeed

Colette Henry

Women entrepreneurs are indeed a formidable force of economic growth and social change, though we still often question the "how" and "why." For the readers who seek to understand the spectrum of gender influences in the context of entrepreneurship, Understanding Women’s Entrepreneurship in a Gendered Context: Influences and Restraints widens the contextual focus of women’s entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship research by providing powerful insights into the influences and restraints within a diverse set of gendered contexts including social, political, institutional, religious, patriarchal, cultural, family and economic, in which female entrepreneurs around the world operate their businesses. From recognition of a seventh-century businesswoman in Mecca to the construction of a gendered scientific Business Model Canvas, this collection of studies will inspire readers to think differently about theory, patriarchy, trade systems, adoption or transformation and strategies to create inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystems. In doing so, the contributing authors demonstrate not only the importance of studying the contexts in which women’s entrepreneurial activities are shaped, but also how female entrepreneurs, through their endeavours, modify these contexts. This book will be of great value to scholars, students and researchers interested in women’s entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial ecosystems, gender hierarchy and the transition to gender equality. It was originally published as a special issue of Entrepreneurship & Regional Development.

Influences and Restraints

Understanding Women's Entrepreneurship in a Gendered Context

John Nicholson

Joëlle Vanhamme

C. A. Di Benedetto

This insightful book considers the challenges faced by researchers pursuing an academic career. From applying for grants to supervising PhD students, it utilises practical research and real experiences to illustrate how marketing scholars can strike a healthy working balance between teaching and research to find success in academia.

A Guide for Mid-Career Scholars

How to Fast-Track Your Academic Career

Bernhard Hirsch

Dr. Shumaila Yousofzai

Efforts to establish the measurement and control of sustainability have produced notable tools, but those instruments lack applicability in practice. Increasing the level of standardization of such tools also seems difficult to achieve, because the contexts surrounding the focal organizations differ considerably. Therefore, what we need is a systematic, interdisciplinary assessment of how to measure and control sustainability, so that we can establish an essential definition and up-to-date picture of the field. Measuring and Controlling Sustainability attempts to provide such an assessment in 17 chapters, organized into four main topic sections: (a) organizations and social value creation: Concepts, responsibilities, and barriers; (b) accounting, measurement, performance, and diffusion of social value; (c) practical and managerial insights from real-life cases; and (d) choices, incentives, guidance, and ethics. This research anthology provides a comprehensive collection of cutting-edge theories and research that will further the development and advancement of measuring and controlling sustainable efforts in theory and managerial practice.

Measuring and Controlling Sustainability

Carolyn Strong

Engaging with Stakeholders: A Relational Perspective on Responsible Business contends that meaningful and constructive stakeholder engagement efforts should be rooted in a deep relational process of shared understanding, expectations, and viewpoints, through honest, continued dialogue between stakeholders and company management. This anthology follows and reaffirms this view, which also establishes the increasing need to explore the subtleties of how companies can respectfully engage their stakeholders in ways that reflect the corporate strategy and contribute to the ongoing development of business activities and creation of value, for themselves and stakeholders, from social, environmental, and economic perspectives. Stakeholder engagement practices, however, remain highly complex and difficult to manage; their ability to generate value in an inclusive way requires critical consideration. Sound stakeholder engagement efforts also constitute a keystone for responsible business activities. Drawing on a wide range of literature and studies, this book addresses key dimensions of stakeholder engagement, through a responsible business lens, and thereby contributes to identifying the opportunities, challenges, and key organizational implications associated with their unfolding. The four main topics covered are: • Delineating the nature and multiple raisons d’être of stakeholder engagement • Dialogical and communicational foundations of stakeholder engagement • Engaging with diverse stakeholders throughout the value chain • Reaping organizational returns and relational rewards of stakeholder engagement efforts

A Relational Perspective on Responsible Business

Engaging With Stakeholders

Adam Lindgreen

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