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Sustainable supply chain management practices and performance: The moderating effect of stakeholder pressure

Currently, sustainable supply chain management practices have become an important strategy for firms to improve performance and gain competitive advantage. However, there is a current debate over the performance outcomes of sustainable supply chain management practices. Additionally, the role of stakeholder pressure is frequently overlooked. Drawing on Natural Resources-Based View and Stakeholder Theory, this study aims to elucidate the ambiguous connection between sustainable supply management, sustainable process management, stakeholder pressure and performance, and investigate the mediation role of sustainable process management and the moderation effect of stakeholder pressure. Our analysis, based on data collected from 235 Chinese manufacturing firms, reveals significant insights. First, stakeholder pressure positively moderates the relationship between sustainable process management and performance, while negatively moderates the relationship between sustainable supply management and performance. Second, sustainable process management has a complete mediation effect on the relationship between sustainable supply management and performance. The conclusion not only explains the inconsistent relationship between sustainable supply chain management practice and performance, but also reveals clearly the relationship between sustainable supply management and sustainable process management. Besides, it also highlights the difference in performance outcomes of sustainable supply management and sustainable process management under stakeholder pressures, and has valuable guidance to the practice of sustainable supply chain management in Chinese manufacturing firms.

Management practices and manufacturing firm responses to a randomized energy audit

Increasing the efficiency of industrial energy use is widely considered important for mitigating climate change. We randomize assignment of an energy audit intervention aimed at improving energy efficiency and reducing energy expenditures of small- and medium-sized metal processing firms in Shandong Province, China, and examine impacts on energy outcomes and interactions with firms’ management practices. We find that the intervention reduced firms’ unit cost of electricity by 8% on average. Firms with more developed structured management practices showed higher rates of recommendation adoption. However, the post-intervention electricity unit cost reduction is larger in firms with less developed practices, primarily driven by a single recommendation that corrected managers’ inaccurate reporting of transformer usage at baseline, lowering their electricity costs. By closing management-associated gaps in awareness of energy expenditures, energy audit programmes may reduce a firm’s unit cost of energy but have an ambiguous impact on energy use and climate change.

What makes a man unmanly? The global concept of ‘unmanliness’

This paper presents the findings of a multi-national study that led to the development of a new analytical framework in masculinity research—the Global Concept of ‘Unmanliness’ (GCU). Drawing on three key theories—hegemonic masculinity, precarious manhood and masculinity threat, and emasculation—we conducted an innovative study across 15 countries (selected from an initial pool of 62) to examine cultural perceptions of ‘unmanliness.’ Participants provided open-ended responses to identify traits and behaviors considered unmanly within their cultural contexts. By analyzing common themes expressed by young men, we propose the Global Concept of ‘Unmanliness’ as a framework for understanding how societies define and enforce masculinity norms. Furthermore, comparing these findings with the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI) revealed a key distinction in how ‘unmanliness’ is characterized across different levels of gender emancipation. In countries with high GGGI rankings (e.g., Norway, Ireland, Germany), ‘unmanliness’ is more often associated with physical traits and behaviors linked to femininity (e.g., clothing, makeup). Conversely, in countries with low GGGI rankings (e.g., Pakistan, Morocco, Nigeria), it is more commonly defined by acts such as violence against women. Our study highlights how cultural and structural gender dynamics shape the boundaries of masculinity and offers a new lens for cross-cultural research on gender norms.

Emotions and individual differences shape human foraging under threat

A common behavior in natural environments is foraging for rewards. However, this is often in the presence of predators. Therefore, one of the most fundamental decisions for humans, as for other animals, is how to apportion time between reward-motivated pursuit behavior and threat-motivated checking behavior. To understand what affects how people strike this balance, we developed an ecologically inspired task and looked at both within-participant dynamics (moods) and between-participant individual differences (questionnaires about real-life behaviors) in two large internet samples (n = 374 and n = 702) in a cross-sectional design. For the within-participant dynamics, we found that people regulate task-evoked stress homeostatically by changing behavior (increasing foraging and hiding). Individual differences, even in superficially related traits (apathy–anhedonia and anxiety–compulsive checking) reliably mapped onto unique behaviors. Worse task performance, due to maladaptive checking, was linked to gender (women checked excessively) and specific anxiety-related traits: somatic anxiety (reduced self-reported checking due to worry) and compulsivity (self-reported disorganized checking). While anhedonia decreased self-reported task engagement, apathy, strikingly, improved overall task performance by reducing excessive checking. In summary, we provide a multifaceted paradigm for assessment of checking for threat in a naturalistic task that is sensitive to both moods as they change throughout the task and clinical dimensions. Thus, it could serve as an objective measurement tool for future clinical studies interested in threat, vigilance or behavior–emotion interactions in contexts requiring both reward seeking and threat avoidance.

The risk effects of corporate digitalization: exacerbate or mitigate?

This study elaborates on the risk effects of corporate digital transformation (CDT). Using the ratio of added value of digital assets to total intangible assets as a measure of CDT, this study overall reveals an inverse relationship between CDT and revenue volatility, even after employing a range of technical techniques to address potential endogeneity. Heterogeneity analysis highlights that the firms with small size, high capital intensity, and high agency costs benefit more from CDT. It also reveals that advancing information infrastructure, intellectual property protection, and digital taxation enhances the effectiveness of CDT. Mechanism analysis uncovers that CDT not only enhances financial advantages such as bolstering core business and mitigating non-business risks but also fosters non-financial advantages like improving corporate governance and ESG performance. Further inquiries into the side effects of CDT and the dynamics of revenue volatility indicate that CDT might compromise cash flow availability. Excessive digital investments exacerbate operating risks. Importantly, the reduction in operating risk associated with CDT does not sacrifice the potential for enhanced company performance; rather, it appears to augment the value of real options.

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