Zombies and Originals: How Cultural Theory Informs Stakeholder Management

The question of stakeholder salience has recently resurfaced in the suggestion that the ethical foundations of corporate cultures result in stakeholder cultures that largely explain how firms allocate resources among stakeholders. The present article seeks to complement this novel approach to understanding stakeholder management by adding insights from the multilevel influences that create the corporate culture in the first place, and ultimately affect managers in their stakeholder decisions. This article draws on cultural theory to examine how the individuals who compose firms present group and grid solidarity that results in cultural biases in the corporate culture. These cultural biases—individualism, hierarchy, fatalism, and egalitarianism—are then paired with the stakeholder cultures they enable, and inferences are extracted concerning the salience managers are likely to accord to various classes of stakeholders as a result. Future research and managerial implications stemming from this new view on stakeholder management conclude this article.     

Executives’ Views of Factors Affecting Governance Change in a Not‐for‐Profit Setting

Knowing the factors that executives deem critical to governance change can improve our understanding of how such changes come about and can help us evaluate those changes. Interviews with business and finance executives at 11 colleges reveal the importance to governance change of chief executive and board member leadership and interactions, as well as executive communication style. Costs are clear constraints to action, particularly since benefits are not quantified and are difficult to describe. Efforts to discuss governance with internal stakeholders require persistence to overcome narrow, individualized concerns. Communication about governance to external stakeholders is rare and represents a missed opportunity for stakeholder feedback and the development of trust. Executives appear willing to adopt governance forms without considering the idiosyncrasies of their institutional field, limiting the working definition of governance and its potential. For corporations and not‐for‐profit enterprises these findings hold implications for the context in which leadership is exercised and the shape of governance structures. They also pose a fundamental ethical dilemma for leaders to address.     

Corporate governance and stakeholder conflict

The stakeholder management literature is dominated by the ‘shareholder value’ and ‘inclusive stakeholder’ views of the corporation. Each views the governance problem in terms of inter-functional conflicts between stakeholder groups, such as between investors and managers or managers and employees, and rests on the assumption of an idealized corporate structure characterized by the separation of ownership from management. Our review of corporate governance and stakeholder conflict shows that such functional-based characterization is too simplistic and fails to account for important intra-functional conflict. Through a comparative review that considers managerial, stakeholder and family systems of governance, we demonstrate that, while the modality of conflict varies by system, substantial intra-functional conflict is endemic to each. We integrate the findings of the agency and comparative stakeholder theories of corporate governance to offer an authority-based framework with three different governance structures that offers complementary insights into stakeholder conflicts. Thus, our study highlights the important, but often neglected, intra-stakeholder type of conflict in various organizations and provides a basis for understanding their various manifestations and consequences under the different systems of governance.     

Information security governance: pending legal responsibilities of non-executive boards

The study shows that a structural conflict of interest in non-executive boards exists due to missing corporate governance structures and a lack of awareness for legal issues with regard to information security risks. Non-executive boards receive information on strategic security threats as a part of their oversight function to fulfill investor interest in transparency. At the same time, they act as representatives of company stakeholders and have an interest to counteract to information security risks based on the stakeholder’s risk disposition. If not properly structured by corporate governance rules, these different interests may lead to regulatory aberrations on non-executive board level. The study analyses a Deutsche Telekom AG case where non-executive board members, employees, and journalists fell victim to a spying scandal subject to the German telecommunications secrecy law in 2005–2006. The analysis demonstrates how the handling of information security on non-executive board level bears governance risks as well as legal risks that are insufficiently addressed in corporate governance research. The paper contributes to avoid a reproduction of events in the future, by suggesting the principle of a segregation of duties on non-executive boards as well as providing an overview of relevant legislative requirements that clarify tasks of non-executive board members with regard to information security. The study therefore helps protecting corporations and their stakeholders from similar consequences of missing corporate security governance.     

Institutional Complementarities within Corporate Governance Systems: A Comparative Study of Bankruptcy Rules

Recent research work has put forward theconcept of national system of corporate governance to describe the complex architecture of legal rules, economic mechanisms and mentalities which constrain managerial discretion in a different way according to the country considered. The role played by the legal system in this set of mechanisms is particularly important and, as part of the legal system, the bankruptcy law performs a specific function: designed as a governance device for financially distressed firms, it also acts as a monitoring mechanism for healthy ones. The aim of this paper is to investigate the mechanisms of corporate governance in the context of bankruptcy in a comparative perspective. Relying on a broad definition of corporate governance (i.e., one which takes into account the influence of all stakeholders on managerial discretion), we first examine the insolvency codes of five countries (France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States). The stance of the law (creditor-oriented vs. debtor-oriented) is discussed in relation to the legal tradition of each country. We then study the way bankruptcy law in each country articulates with the other governance mechanisms. For that purpose, a typology of those mechanisms is used, based on the type of device each kind of stakeholder is able to activate. Results of both theoretical and empirical studies on bankruptcy are used to understand which of the different devices are used in each country. The comparative approach underlines the impact of institutional differences on organizations through the incentives sent to their stakeholders.     

Corporate governance and management practices: stakeholder involvement, quality and sustainability tools adoption

Local public services are the field in which New Public Management (NPM) and Public Governance issues are most in evidence. The local public services are characterized by the rethinking of the role played by local government in the provision of services. An evolution has taken place. From a traditional configuration in which local public services were managed by local governments they moved to a configuration where a separation has taken place between the local government role (which continues to be the guarantor of the satisfaction of public needs) and the role of local public utilities (LPUs) (responsible for delivering the services). This transformation implies both the delegation of resources and authority to lower organisational levels within the public sector and the reconfiguration of accountability chains between the state institutions and the society. In recent years, an intense debate has developed regarding the introduction of new tools and control systems. Particular attention has been paid to planning and control systems, human resources management systems, and performance management systems, leaving a few pioneers to develop their analysis on corporate governance mechanisms with regard their relationships with both the external (stakeholders) actors and the internal (management) ones. On one hand, the OECD wrote guidelines in order to ensure good corporate governance practices, focusing on relations with stakeholders. On the other hand, the dialogue between corporate governance and stakeholders has been already tackled by a number of International organizations guidelines or principles, following a debate on corporate governance that has progressively combined a stakeholder perspective with a more classic shareholder-maximizing model of governance. This article contributes to the debate on the stakeholder involvement process. By means of both a theoretical discussion and an empirical research conducted on 37 Italian LPUs, this paper attempts to analyse specific management tools which can be used to improve the quality of corporate governance in LPUs, by extending the stakeholder involvement. Some NPM’s tools, such as quality standards and sustainability tools imply an effort to offer new forms of organizational behaviour in the decision-making processes (i.e. the choice of the performance indicators and the reporting tools) and to create a dialogue between the enterprise and its stakeholders. In particular, in our study we focus on the adoption of quality standards (ISO 9000 and Customer Satisfaction) and sustainability tools (sustainability reports and ISO 14000 standard) as NPM’s tools to facilitate the stakeholder involvement practices.     

Risk-Based Approaches to Deal with Uncertainty in a Data-Poor System: Stakeholder Involvement in Hazard Identification for Marine National Parks and Marine Sanctuaries in Victoria, Australia

Management responsibilities for the system of marine national parks and sanctuaries declared in Victoria, Australia in 2002 have created imperatives for robust, scientifically defendable approaches to identifying threats to valued ecological attributes of the parks, setting management priorities, and developing monitoring systems. We are developing a protocol for ecological risk assessment in the parks that has due regard for the perception of risks by individuals, and ensures that stakeholder values are an intrinsic part of decision making. The inclusive and transparent protocol provides an opportunity for stakeholder involvement in the identification of valued attributes, as well as in the assessment of associated risks. Our approach brings together ideas about how science enters the community engagement domain in ways that promote collaboration and transparency in decision making. A series of stakeholder workshops across the state drew on the expertise of agency staff, community groups, fishers, industry representatives, academics, and knowledgeable park neighbors to identify hazards of major concern in the parks. Many hazards involved predictable, tangible threats like pollution and exotic species, but the approach also identified a number of less obvious threats related to governance issues and the knowledge-base for the parks. Importantly, the workshops with their broad range of stakeholders identified threats not previously considered by the management agency in its internal assessments, and several of these "new" threats are already the subject of action by the agency. The deliberate incorporation of local knowledge and local networks in the risk assessment process also provided opportunities for greater engagement of stakeholders with the management agency.     

Cognitive Mapping Tools: Review and Risk Management Needs

Risk managers are increasingly interested in incorporating stakeholder beliefs and other human factors into the planning process. Effective risk assessment and management requires understanding perceptions and beliefs of involved stakeholders, and how these beliefs give rise to actions that influence risk management decisions. Formal analyses of risk manager and stakeholder cognitions represent an important first step. Techniques for diagramming stakeholder mental models provide one tool for risk managers to better understand stakeholder beliefs and perceptions concerning risk, and to leverage this new understanding in developing risk management strategies. This article reviews three methodologies for assessing and diagramming stakeholder mental models—decision‐analysis‐based mental modeling, concept mapping, and semantic web analysis—and assesses them with regard to their ability to address risk manager needs.     

The financial crisis,investor activists and corporate strategy: will this mean shareholders in the boardroom?

The concept of stakeholder engagement is gaining increasing attention in the mainstream media and may feature as part of a corporation’s strategy for corporate social responsibility. Not only are boards considering how they might engage with key stakeholders, but stakeholders are also pursuing greater participation in the strategic decisions of companies in which they invest. While this is an emerging concept in companies governed by unitary boards, as in North America, the issue of stakeholder engagement in various forms is also entering debate in other countries around the world. In general, however, the idea of shareholder or stakeholder representation on the boards of most UK and Commonwealth companies is anathema. Forces now influencing the development of strategies for stakeholder engagement and the rise of active investors include changing corporate governance rules which give investors more power in the election of directors, the increasing role of pension plans and hedge fund investment groups which have produced investors who keep a close eye on company performance and value, and a sluggish or turbulent stock market as a result of the financial crisis initiated by the credit crunch in the sub-prime mortgage markets. In this paper the phenomenon of stakeholder representation is examined and results of a recent survey conducted among a large sample of New Zealand directors are presented. The findings suggest that these traditionally oriented boards are increasingly inwardly focused and are without an agenda for building and managing shareholder and stakeholder relations. Accordingly, such boards are unlikely to regard stakeholder engagement as a serious strategic issue and are thus also likely to miss significant opportunities in the changed business environment to benefit from stakeholder support.     

The Primary Importance of Corporate Social Responsibility and Ethicality in Corporate Reputation: An Empirical Study

We examine three assumptions commonly held in the corporate reputation literature: (1) reputation ratings of owners and investors are generally representative of all stakeholders; (2) stakeholders will generally provide a higher reputation rating to firms that emphasize corporate social responsibility versus firms that do not; and (3) profitability is the primary criterion of importance to all stakeholders when rating a firm's reputation. Using an exploratory in‐class exercise, our findings suggest that: (1) there are significant differences among stakeholder groups in their reputation ratings; (2) firms that emphasize corporate social responsibility are not rated more highly across all stakeholder groups; and (3) for all stakeholder groups, the ethicality criterion explained more of the variance in firms' reputation ratings than the profitability criterion.     

Institutional Predictors of and Complements to Industry Self‐regulation with Regard to Labor Practices

In recent years, there has been increasing managerial and academic attention given to a variety of mechanisms for companies to respond to stakeholder concerns about global business ethics. One area that merits further analysis is the role of industry‐level cooperation regarding issues in global business ethics such as labor practices. There are two main issues that we will address in this article: institutional pressures that predict when an industry will create a code of conduct and institutional complements for an industry‐level code of conduct to be “successful” with regard to responding to stakeholder concerns about international business operations. We offer a number of propositions—bringing together work from both the corporate social responsibility and (neo)institutional theory literatures—with regard to both predictors and complements of industry self‐regulation in reference to labor practices.     

Beyond Transparency: Information Overload and a Model for Intelligibility

The role and evaluation of the modern corporation is being challenged by multiple stakeholders, changing markets and public expectations. Unfortunately, corporate governance, regulation and accounting have played a prominent role in business failure for the past decade resulting in a growing lack of public confidence in our markets. We present a new model that contributes to improving the quality of corporate information by providing not more, but better information through increased intelligibility of overall information, benefiting both the firm and its broad array of stakeholders. It has become apparent that boards, management and regulators have been unable to cope with the rise of business failures by adding increasing layers of regulation that have often served only to exacerbate the complexity and further cloud the transparency of needed information. We have identified a growing number of forward‐thinking firms that have found alternative means to provide betterinformation and strengthen their companies. We offer a stakeholder‐centric model for improving information intelligibility based upon the extensive scope and variety of external input derived from the growing social movement organizations. With the added focus on intelligibility, these groups can help foster greater corporate responsibility, meaningful transparency, increased stakeholder benefits, and improved overall performance of the firm.     

Social accounting as stakeholder knowledge appropriation

Heeding the call for socio-political explorations of the social accounting project, we use the analytical lens of knowledge appropriation to explore power and contest in social auditing. We develop a knowledge appropriation model comprising three stages: knowledge creation, knowledge generation and outcome distribution, which we then use to analyze an exemplar case. We argue that, despite asymmetries of power and managerial prerogative, deficient stakeholder involvement in the creation and distribution stages renders social auditing ineffective for governance as either a stakeholder account or a strategic management system. We conclude that embedded stakeholder involvement in knowledge creation processes is essential for social auditing to be effective as corporate governance.     

Die Rolle des Bilanzrechts in der aktuellen Corporate Governance-Diskussion

This paper discusses the role of accounting and auditing and its regulation in the current debate over good corporate governance. Part I addresses the functional relationship of accounting and corporate governance and the extent to which the goals of accounting and auditing on one hand and of corporate governance on the other hand converge. Part II discusses the ways in which specific substantive and formal or procedural features of accounting and auditing are designed to foster the goals of good corporate governance. Finally, part III presents a number of regulatory steps taken recently in order to enhance efficiency of accounting and auditing as devices to promote good corporate governance. It becomes evident that despite strong emphasis on information and disclosure as core functions of accounting, the original and prime function of accounting is self-information and self-account, particularly with regard to corporate governance, as has been evidenced by recent attempts of regulators to exploit self-information and self-account functions of accounting in the context of risk-management and the relationship between accountant and supervisory board. From a regulator’s perspective this recent development is of particular interest since after a long period of focusing on transparency and disclosure the classical technique of material regulation is back in the center or legislative attention.     

Calling in a Debt: Government's Role in Creating the Capacity for Explicit Corporate Social Responsibility

Before the field of business and society can adequately analyze the relationship between governmental policies and corporate social responsibility (CSR), either as a reality or an ideal, it is first necessary to understand exactly how governments nurtured the development of the autonomous corporation. The roles assigned to government by the economics and management literatures—regulator, standard setter, protector, and adjudicator—ignore the crucial part played by state violence and government expenditures in the rise and sustained success of the corporate economy. An examination of the history of the American case, crucial for the development of the modern corporation as well as the “explicit” form of CSR that eventually followed it, highlights these roles: the willingness of the state to intervene with force in labor conflicts bolstered the managerial autonomy that defined the large corporation, and the way government expenditures promoted innovation and firm success. Acknowledging how corporations depended on government assistance in their development is a necessary step for both assessing the responsibilities owed stakeholders and for advancing the theoretical development of the field.     

The Bind that Ties: Socioemotional Wealth Preservation in Family Firms

A growing body of research shows that family firms are different from other organizations in significant ways. In this paper we review this literature by examining how family firms differ from nonfamily firms along five broad categories of managerial decisions. These categories encompass a set of key organizational choices concerning management processes, firm strategies, corporate governance, stakeholder relations and business venturing. We argue that socioemotional wealth or affective endowment of family owners explain many of these choices. We also examine some contingency factors (namely family stage, firm size, firm hazard, and the presence of nonfamily shareholders) that moderate the influence of socioemotional wealth preservation as a point of reference when making managerial decisions in family firms. Lastly, we explore the firm performance consequences of family ownership.     

Accounting information for managerial decision-making in shareholder management versus stakeholder management

With global challenges like climate change and, of course, the crisis of capital markets in the recent past stakeholder oriented management receives enhanced attention whereas shareholder value management is increasingly criticized for its undesirable external effects on stakeholders other than owners. Regardless of whether these criticisms are well founded or not, the question arises how accounting-related techniques for supporting managerial decision-making differ in shareholder and stakeholder value management. Accounting information can affect managerial decision-making in two ways: directly as input to decisions or indirectly by influencing the behavior of managers. This article reviews the contributions and limitations of information that prominent accounting-related techniques of shareholder management and stakeholder management provide for managerial decision-making. In a comparative perspective we find that the approaches in shareholder value management are much more advanced. In particular the two roles of information in shareholder value management are manifest in accounting-related techniques which are focused on increasing firm value. The value driver models or residual income-based performance measures may serve as examples. In comparison, accounting-related techniques to support managerial decision-making in stakeholder management are not as well advanced. So far we have approaches which concentrate on selective stakeholder groups and only partially address the multi-dimensionality of stakeholder value creation. From a conceptual perspective our findings indicate that stakeholder value creation requires a more integrated approach for answering the question whether stakeholder value is created or diminished. As a consequence, if stakeholder-orientation is taken seriously, the time has come to pay more attention to related accounting techniques.     

Factors of Employees’ Effective Voice in Corporate Goverance*

Traditionally, corporate governance has focused on the problem of crafting mechanisms to align the interests of owners and managers. The key characteristic has been to minimize the potential for managers to act in their own self-interest at the expense of shareholders. The purpose of this paper is to focus on employees as stakeholders in the governance process. We argue that creating an environment where employees have help in behaving ethically, in the course of their work, is the first step in encouraging them to voice observations of wrongdoing. Seven groups of professionals in the accounting and insurance fields were surveyed during a 10-year period and asked to indicate the extent to which 14 items were helpful in dealing with ethical challenges. Over 2700 responses were analyzed. The findings indicate that professionals think that their organizational culture and policy for voice was more helpful in dealing with ethical dilemmas than was their professional association. *Presented at the 2004 European Academy of Management Conference in St. Andrews, Scotland     

Bridging the Gap between Social Acceptance and Ethical Acceptability

New technology brings great benefits, but it can also create new and significant risks. When evaluating those risks in policymaking, there is a tendency to focus on social acceptance. By solely focusing on social acceptance, we could, however, overlook important ethical aspects of technological risk, particularly when we evaluate technologies with transnational and intergenerational risks. I argue that good governance of risky technology requires analyzing both social acceptance and ethical acceptability. Conceptually, these two notions are mostly complementary. Social acceptance studies are not capable of sufficiently capturing all the morally relevant features of risky technologies; ethical analyses do not typically include stakeholders’ opinions, and they therefore lack the relevant empirical input for a thorough ethical evaluation. Only when carried out in conjunction are these two types of analysis relevant to national and international governance of risky technology. I discuss the Rawlsian wide reflective equilibrium as a method for marrying social acceptance and ethical acceptability. Although the rationale of my argument is broadly applicable, I will examine the case of multinational nuclear waste repositories in particular. This example will show how ethical issues may be overlooked if we focus only on social acceptance, and will provide a test case for demonstrating how the wide reflective equilibrium can help to bridge the proverbial acceptance‐acceptability gap.     

Do auditors’ perceptions actually help fight against fraudulent practices? Evidence from Tunisia

The purpose of this paper is focused on investigating empirically how Tunisian Auditors perceive their status regarding fraud fighting issue. In this respect, a set of auditor-associated mental representations will be expressed in terms of their respective roles as relevant governance models (legal versus ethical ones), via the cognitive mapping technique. The findings reveal that corporate governance can be globally depicted within these particular representations, indicating the supremacy of the legal governance approach over the ethical one with regard to the Tunisian case. .