Our faculty are involved in a wide range of research projects.
Here is just a sample of some of issues being addressed through recent studies within the theme of Management and Organisation.
- Supply chain collaboration and sustainability: a profile deviation analysis
-
Today the increasing emphasis on sustainability has already led to a wide-scale adoption of sustainable practices along the supply chain, which has led many firms to collaborate with both their suppliers and customers. This has promoted partnerships and joint initiatives that aim to improve overall efficiency along the supply chain to meet organisational as well as environmental objectives. Through such improvements, firms also aim at improving their performance to not only alter customer perception, but also influence their market position as a means to improve profitability and gain competitive advantage.
The Study
Yet, research on sustainability initiatives has predominately focused on the supply side. There is only limited knowledge about the performance benefits of sustainability-related collaboration with suppliers and customers.
Research by Professor Constantin Blome, Antony Paulraj, and Kai Schuetz analysed how supply chain collaboration affects sustainability and market performance. By developing a multidimensional ‘ideal’ profile of demand and supply side sustainability collaboration the researchers investigated the relationship between the ideal performance-based profile and sustainability collaboration.Methodology
Using data collected from 259 European manufacturing firms and advanced structural equation modeling approach, the authors test a number of direct, mediation, and moderation effects.Findings
The research indicates that firm performance can benefit from sustainable production and collaborative practices. However, firms will only benefit from sustainability practices if they are leading such practices and implementing them internally, as then they are in the position to offer their knowledge, assets, and lessons learnt to partners along the supply chain. It is not enough to for a firm’s internal practices need to match those of the supply chain. Rather a firm must dedicate resources toward sustainability collaboration as well as internal sustainability practices simultaneously to reap direct benefits. For example, if suppliers adhere to reduced CO2 emissions, there will be little positive effect if the firm does not also adhere to the same standard.The research also shows that the inconsistent pursuit of external collaboration and internal practices might strongly hamper the potential benefits, thereby suggesting that supply chain sustainability practices have to be considered holistically.
Access the paper
Blome, Constantin, Paulraj, Antony and Schuetz, Kai (2014) Supply chain collaboration and sustainability: a profile deviation analysis. International Journal of Operations and Production Management, 34 (5). pp. 639-663. ISSN 0144-3577 - Liberalization, flexibility and industrial relations institutions: evidence from Italian and Greek banking
-
Since the 1980’s the banking service has come under increasing pressure to become more flexible. The transition was anything but smooth, as it clashed with the tradition of banks having internal labour markets based on job security, internal career ladders and seniority-based pay, and it resulted in different responses across Europe.
The Study
A study by Dr Andreas Kornelakis looks at the challenges faced during the transitional period and how it has affected both Italian and Greek banks in relation to discussions around levels of pay. The researchers seek to explain how institutions change, so as to contribute a better understanding of the dynamics that underpin wage bargaining by explaining divergent trajectories of change despite similar pressures.Both Italian and Greek banks faced similar pressures due to liberalization, privatization, and the penetration of flexibility, yet discussions around levels of pay followed different paths due to two different forms of decentralization:
- Italian organized decentralization: industry-wide agreements were not abolished altogether, but reformed to set minimum standards across the sector
- Unorganized: abolition of centralized bargaining.
The research looked to determine what causes different outcomes to occur, and how different actors’ interactions impact upon these outcomes.
Methodology
The data was collected via interviews as well as primary and secondary sources. Key informants were representatives from Italian and Greek banking trade unions, business associations, political parties as well as experts who had knowledge of the sector.15 semi structured interviews were conducted with open questions. To validate the information from the interviews, primary and secondary documents were used including inter alia: reports on sectoral developments from the European Industrial Relations Observatory (EIRO), the European Industrial Relations Review (EIRR), newspaper articles and official announcements of the associations.
Findings
The research indicates that different paths of change in relation to Italian and Greek banking were explained in large by two factors: employer associability and labour-state coalitions.- Italy, having strong employer associability was able to provide the best of both worlds for its members: control at the sector level, and flexibility at the firm level. Leading to organized decentralization
- Greece however had weak employer associability and so could not follow this path. Leading to disorganized decentralization
In addition, the researchers found that societal effects appeared strong in both cases with regard to industrial relations institutions. Moreover, the role of the state proved to be a crucial factor in relation to wage bargaining, even in very low union-density countries such as France. Thus the ‘political pressure’ on firms via government intervention complements the ‘market pressure’ that is exerted on firms via strikes. In this respect power relations seem to be very much at the core of the process.
The research was funded by Bodossakis Foundation.
Access the paper
Kornelakis, Andreas (2014) Liberalisation, flexibility and industrial relations institutions: evidence from Italian and Greek banking. Work, Employment and Society, 28 (1). pp. 40-57. ISSN 0950-0170 - The Teddy Effect: Does Having a Babyface Benefit Black Chief Executives?
-
The relationships between race, gender and leadership in business is a sensitive, but very important area of research in business studies. As the “Fortune 500” list itself demonstrates, the corporate world in the USA still has a long way to go to be able to show true diversity. Only 15 black executives have ever made it to the position of Chairman or chief executive officer of a Fortune 500 company, with only 7 of them currently active (Fortune).
The link between physical traits and inferences of competence in business is a long-existing area of research in social psychology. Studies by Zebrowitz & Franklin and Gorn, Jiang and Johar both focus on babyfaceness in business. Prior research indicates that white men do not benefit from features such as babyfaceness and traits such as anger are regarded as positive in white male leaders. Livingston and Pearce’s study, the first to examine the role of disarming mechanisms (babyfaceness, in this case) for black males in high positions of leadership, helps us understand whether black male CEOs require different traits to succeed.
The Study
This paper by Professor Robert Livingston, et al, explores the role of “babyfaceness” as a disarming mechanism and a potential key to success among black CEOs. Decades of research has shown that having a babyface inspires trust and radiates warmth. However, it could be regarded as a detriment especially in positions of leadership where it might be a liability (showing weakness and incompetence) among white males (see research by Zebrowitz& Montepare 2005 and Rule & Ambady 2008).The paper postulates that babyfaceness is beneficial to black leaders who might otherwise be perceived as threatening. Babyfaceness is a disarming mechanism that is regarded counterproductive for both white male leaders and women CEOs for different reasons.
In order to prove their hypothesis the researchers carried out two studies among students to establish whether there is a link between “babyfaceness” and success among black male CEOs and the same in white men CEOs, then comparing the two groups.
Methodology
The paper is based on two paid studies carried out among students, where participants had to rate standardized pictures of 40 Fortune 500 company CEOs on physical appearance (inc. babyfaceness) and personality traits. The first study involved 21 students. It also investigated the relationships between “babyfaceness” and financial compensation using data from the Standard & Poor Compustat/ExecuComp database. The second study had 106 participants and was designed to address the shortcomings of Study 1. It included a training session on “babyfaceness” and participants were informed that the people on the photos were actual employees of American corporations.Key Findings
The key findings of the paper are:- Black male CEOs rated as significantly more babyfaced than their matched white counterparts
- Black male CEOs were rated as being significantly warmer than White male CEOs, even though Blacks as a group were rated as being less warm than Whites as a group. This illustrates that there is truly something unique about the subsample of Blacks represented in CEO positions.
- Babyfaceness significantly correlated with judged salary for black male CEOs with babyfaced black men CEOs perceived as earning higher salaries than mature-faced black CEOs.
The paper concludes that the success of black male leaders is linked to facial cues of warmth, while the success of white male or female leaders is not. A possible interpretation of this result can be that “babyfaceness” attenuates feelings of anger, envy or resentment among whites who otherwise feel threatened by powerful black males. The findings suggest that black males are more constrained in their leadership style which can lead to increasing self-monitoring behavior. Further research in this area needs to ascertain a deeper understanding of the unique qualities of black male CEOs and their leadership styles.
Access the paper
Livingston, Robert W and Pearce, Nicholas A (2009) The teddy bear effect: does babyfaceness benefit Black CEOs? Psychological Science, 20 (10). pp. 1229-1236. ISSN 0956-7976 - Theorisation and translation in Information Technology institutionalization: evidence from Danish home care
-
Organizations are constantly faced with the need to innovate and often look for solutions in new ideas that circulate in their environment. This is particularly true when it comes to information technology. Still, we know little about how IT ideas and associated material objects unfold and coevolve, how IT ideas travel across a field and within individual organizations, how they transform and become legitimized over time, and how they take on different forms across organizational settings.
The Study
Research by Professor Susan Newell, Jeppe Nielsen and Lars Mathiassen, focuses on the process and discourse of IT institutionalization, aiming to distinguish between theorization of ideas about IT usage across an organizational field and translation of such ideas into practical use of IT within particular organizations. The researchers apply theorization and translation as analytical lens aiming to reveal:- How IT ideas travel across both a sector and within individual organisations
- How they transform and become legitimised over time
- How they take on different linguistic and material forms.
The researchers propose a new theoretical framework for IT institutionalization and demonstrate its utility through a study of mobile IT within Danish home care.
Methodology
The researchers employ a longitudinal study of home care in Denmark during a ten year period (1998-2008). Over that period, the vast majority of home care agencies adopted mobile IT for their care workers and nurses, and work practices changed substantially. Introducing mobile IT was part of the Danish government’s 2001 modernization program for the public sector, which aimed to increase efficiency and effectiveness in home care service delivery.The case study is divided into three phases: emergence (1998 - 2001), experimentation (2002 – 2005) and stabilization (2006 – 2008). Researchers used interviews with care workers and observations.
Key Findings
The analyses reveals how ideas about mobile IT usage traveled through a changing discourse across the home care organizational field, and how this discourse not only influenced but was also influenced by implementation efforts within individual home care agencies.The three observed home care agencies vary in size and geography, they had different histories, they drew on different management ideas, and they applied and offered different “scripts” for making sense of mobile ITs. In this way, the idea of mobile IT usage was redefined and appropriated for different purposes as ideas traveled between home care field theorizations and individual home care agencies’ translations.
The research demonstrates how heterogeneous actors theorized and jointly supported mobile IT as a ready-to-wear technology by constructing positive and politically acceptable ideas to legitimize the technology, to ensure government funding, and to facilitate swift diffusion into individual home care agencies.
Access the paper
Nielsen, Jeppe, Mathiassen, Lars and Newell, Sue (2014) Theorization and translation in information technology institutionalization: evidence from Danish home care. MIS Quarterly, 38 (1). pp. 165-186. ISSN 0276-7783