Aston University

     

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Aston University
Aston University
Birmingham, , B4 7ET
United Kingdom
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Demographic Information

Number of full-time MBA students (2011): 

90

Number of part-time MBA students (2011): 

25

Total duration of full-time MBA program: 

12 months

MBA faculty (Fall 2010): 

150

Females as percent of student body: 

32%
Who Are the Students? See what percentage of the 2010-2011 graduating class came to this MBA program from the private sector, the non-profit sector and government jobs
 
Private Sector (100%)
 
Non-profit (0%)
 
Government (0%)


Description of MBA Program: 

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Sustainability (and related issues) are of concern for businesses locally, nationally and internationally and its importance for the global economy is likely to increase. Aston Business School (ABS) recognizes that all students (including MBA students) must be equipped with the relevant knowledge and understanding of the current and future implications for business. As managers/leaders of the future, ABS graduates will be required to directly address, and make decisions regarding societal challenges in these areas. This is highlighted in the school Strategy (to 2012) as follows - “Our curricula must prepare students for the organisations and economies of today and particularly tomorrow and not the business of yesterday ........ Our curricula and our own processes must reflect our own commitment to social responsibility and sustainability in organisational and public life.”  (ABS Strategy, p.6) In addition, ABS ensures that the students “sense of social responsibility, commitment to contributing in their communities, safeguarding the environment and appreciation of the ethics of business and leadership is embedded in this transformation”. (ABS Strategy. P.9)  

In line with this, Aston Business School became an early signatory to the UN Global Compact Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME) and were represented at both the first and second Global Forums for PRME. Aston Business School has also hosted UN PRME events in 2009 and 2010 aimed at encouraging UK Universities to become signatories. Both events were very well attended and were conducted with a collaborative approach that encouraged the sharing of good practice in fulfilling the Principles.

In the MBA programme, Business, Ethics & Responsibility became a core module for all students seven years ago. The module is interdisciplinary in nature and has contributors from across ABS and from external organisations. The module encourages students to wrestle seriously with ethical quandaries, difficult disagreeable tradeoffs between efficiency and justice and moral contradictions encountered in everyday life. It uses experiential learning to make students aware of ethical and social dimensions of the business making process and enable students to understand the ethical components of managerial decision-making. Students submit a reflective account of their own values and comment upon whether their future decision-making and actions may be influenced by their studies. An analysis of these reflections is undertaken each year to inform the development of the module. Beyond the core module, issues of Ethics, Social Responsibility and Sustainability are also integrated into other core modules, electives and extra-curricula activities (detailed in part 1 & 2).

In Autumn 2008, a complete review all ABS programmes was undertaken with the aim of ‘providing an overview of the extent to which Ethics, Social Responsibility and Sustainability (and related topics) is currently included in the curricula at Aston Business School’ and to make recommendations aimed at creating ‘social responsibility and sustainability literate’ graduates for all its programmes.

The report led to changes in ABS undergraduate programme where Social Responsibility & Sustainability are included in the early years of the programme and as part of the industrial placement year to enable real connections with the workplace to be made. In the postgraduate programme, the recommendations aimed to ensure that all MSc courses should include core content that address Social Responsibility and Sustainability issues in the context of the specialism of the individual MSc. A new MSc in Social Responsibility & Sustainability has also been developed as an interdisciplinary course for implementation in 2011.

Within the MBA programme, the report led to issues of Sustainability being covered in more depth. This has been further strengthened with the recruitment of an ecology specialist to the teaching team. In addition, 2010 saw the introduction of the Mindful Manager module that runs through all 3 terms and focuses on the acquisition of self- development and improvement skills relevant for both the roles as a manager/leader and as an authentic individual and leader. Elective modules have also been developed to provide a Social Responsibility & Sustainability specialism for future MBA students.



How does the MBA program 'walk the talk' of social and environmental impact?: 

Aston University and Aston Business School are committed to social responsibility and sustainability and is aiming to become a leader in this field. In this regard, as early signatories to the UN Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME), we work towards not only meeting our commitments and responsibilities under the 6 Principles but also to fulfill the pledge that is included in the PRME documents i.e.  ‘We understand that our own organisational practices should serve as example of the values and attitudes we convey to our students’.

At the University level the Sustainable Aston Working Group (SAWG) provides a forum for discussing initiatives and programmes to enhance social responsibility and sustainability within the University environment, curriculum and research as well as within the wider community. The group supports the work of the Sustainability Team, which is based in the Estates department, where they work together on implementing projects and policies as well as communicating progress to staff and students. In the last year, to support Aston’s Sustainability Policy and other existing policies, SAWG developed a Waste Management policy, Biodiversity policy (both approved June 2010) and Sustainable Procurement policy (approved August 2010). The Carbon Management Plan is also under review, (new version due for publication in 2011). All policies are available to view online, through the Environment and Sustainability web pages http://www.aston.ac.uk/environment/.

Aston University and the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi have secured a £3m grant from the Research Council UK and the Indian Government, to build bio-energy power plants, which will tackle energy poverty in rural India and promote renewable energy in the United Kingdom. The three year project, combines the expertise of Aston’s School of Engineering and Applied Science, the European Bioenergy Research Institute (EBRI) based at Aston and Aston Business School.

As well as initiatives within teaching and research (covered elsewhere in our submission) we would like to highlight our commitment to social responsibility and sustainability through a number of examples of recent developments at Aston:

•    Aston’s 5th place in the UK People and Planet awards is an example of this commitment and shows significant progress from our ranking (93rd) in 2007. One of Aston's strongest categories was staff and student engagement. Activities have included a Sustainability Week on campus, Go Green Awards, and a wealth of staff and student committees including a Fairtrade group, Wildlife Group, Sustainable Working group and opportunities for staff and students to volunteer in the local community.

•    Aston recently received the Silver EcoCampus Award for successfully implementing the Silver Phase of the EcoCampus Environmental Management system. Recent initiatives on Aston’s campus include; the installation of wind turbines, grass roofs to encourage biodiversity, rainwater collection units in new halls of residences; a combined heat and power plant on campus, which is drastically reducing carbon emissions; increasing the use of electric vehicles on and off campus; student switch off campaign encouraging students to turn off electronic power in the halls of residences; additional recycling posts, for batteries, books and mobile phones to be recycled.

•    ABS has committed to a 15% reduction in carbon emissions in 2010 as part of the national 10:10 campaign (www.1010uk.org). In order to achieve this a number of initiatives have been recommended in the areas of energy and transport.

•    Aston First – Aston’s culture transformation programme – (launched in February 2010), is one of the most important initiatives ever undertaken by Aston University. As part of this initiative, the programme promotes responsibility and sustainability, fairness, equality and respect, and engagement within the University and externally in the wider community.

•    Aston University regularly has a team of students running projects through SIFE (Students in Free Enterprise) whose mission is “to bring together the top leaders of today and tomorrow to create a better, more sustainable world through the positive power of business".
 

Academic Department

Course Name: Accounting for Business
Instructor: Matt Davies, Stuart Cooper

Within this module the future developments of accounting and reporting is considered. As part of this lecture content relating to corporate social (or sustainability) reporting is covered. First, arguments as to why corporations may choose to disclose information on the social and environmental impacts of their activities is discussed. Insights from academic literature into the theoretical and empirical reasons why companies voluntarily report on their social and environmental performance are referred to here. Second, the Global Reporting Initiative’s (GRI’s) sustainability reporting guidelines are discussed. This content considers the principles that underpin the GRI’s guidelines and how these compare to more traditional accounting principles. It also provides some detail on the required content in terms of the economic, environmental and social indicators identified within the guidelines. The extent to which sustainability reporting is being currently practiced is considered through an exploration of the GRI reports list. The students are encouraged to explore these issues further and related material is made available to them.

Course Name: Business Finance
Instructor: Carmel de Nahik

Much of the current support provision for finance courses focuses on the for-profit organisation, largely located in the Western economies but many of our students come from outside that milieu and will need to contract with or become involved in governance roles in public sector bodies or NGOs. Or they may decide to start their own firm or invest in other new firms. So we explore new organisational governance forms such as partnerships and employee owned firms. We examine the link between the stakeholders, strategy and finance when looking at a not for profit investment and discuss agency theory in the context of the bankers bonus controversy. We consider definitions of ethical behaviour in different cultural contexts as we debate insider trading linked to the efficient market hypothesis and the need to manage information asymmetries between organisations and their wider stakeholders (as opposed to shareholders) to create strong “relational contracts”. We look at prospecti as purveyors of information and assess them in today’s more socially responsible context. But this module is still developing further ....

Course Name: Business, Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability
Instructor: Carole Parkes

This module takes an interdisciplinary approach to help understand, analyse and resolve ethical dilemmas in management (with contributions from external business practitioners). Main areas include; the ethics of business, CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility), Corporate Governance and Sustainability. Key objectives include to; distinguish between ethics, morals, codes of conduct and the law; understand the ethical dilemmas facing managers; explore models that supports ethical decision making and their limitations; study a series of cases focusing on contemporary issues; examine the evolution of governance and its practice; understand corporate social responsibility and philanthropy; explore the concept of sustainability in relation to business strategy.

The module assessment is in two parts. Part one is an essay aimed at demonstrating understanding of ethics and responsibility or sustainability in the context of business organisations. Students select an organisation or industry they have knowledge of and discuss key ethical or responsibility or sustainability issues in the context of the chosen organisation/industry. Part two is a reflective piece where students reflect on their own values and views about the issues raised in the module, then comment upon whether their future decision making and actions may be influenced by their studies with evidence to support their choices.

Course Name: Creative Decisions for Effective Change
Instructor: Karen Caine

We discuss importance of inclusivity when making decisions - of involving a

variety of people with a variety of points of view, and of obtaining

consensus rather than voting in order to make well supported, sustainable

decisions that lead to real changes. Participants experience this for

themselves in a group exercise.

We learn about cultural/background differences, how they affect decision

making, and the importance of listening to people. We better understand how

and why people can be different, how our brains work (or can go wrong), and

what the practical implications of this are when trying to improve our

decision making. Including a variety of points of view and personalities in a

decision making team is also one way to foster creativity - crucial in a fast

changing world.

To be useful decisions must be successfully implemented. Again, diversity

can either help this, or can hinder or prevent it, if it not properly taken into

account and if implementation is not done in an inclusive way.

Ethics are also considered. For example, understanding the kinds of decision

traps people fall into gives you the power to artificially induce situations

that will make others fall into those traps in ways that are favourable to

you - is that unethical? Or alternatively is it just a normal marketing, or

negotiation, skill - would you be neglecting your job if you did not

pursue this opportunity?

Course Name: International Marketing Management
Instructor: Heiner Evanschitzky

The course International Marketing Management is designed to develop an appreciation of the special requirements for successfully conducting international marketing activities. With respect to business ethics, the module deals with issues such as corporations’ responsibility in dealing with other nations and cultures. There will obviously be class debate on how a British/Western company has to deal with different concepts of what is ethical and what not when doing business in an international environment. Issues such as enforcing ethical standards (e.g., labour, environment) might be heavily debated in class. Essentially, it will be discussed whether any company has the right – or the obligation – to “enforce” standards on business partners or whether it has to adapt to the local environment. During the case studies, the class will be particularly encouraged to critical thinking with respect to ethical issues, corporate social responsibility, and environmental concerns in international marketing.

Course Name: Leadership Development
Instructor: Geoff Thomas, Uwe Napiersky

Aspects of Ethical leadership will be covered in a number of the lectures. For example, the lecture on leader attributes/competencies highlights the importance of integrity and ethical values. Unethical behaviour will also be covered when explaining the process of executive derailment, and mention made to a number of examples such as Enron, etc. Also, one of the key leadership development theories that will be covered is authentic leadership development. This clearly highlights the importance of ethical leadership and its development (e.g., displaying leader transparency and consistency between their values, ethical reasoning, and actions, focus on developing positive psychological states such as optimism, hope and resiliency in themselves and followers, and demonstrating integrity).

Course Name: Marketing Management
Instructor: Brigitte Nicoulaud, Graham Hooley

Critical to a marketing orientation is sustainability. Sustainability in business has to be obtained within the broader context of environmental sustainability. Therefore, the module stresses the “Environment” as a critical integral element of the external analysis of a business. Also a market orientation implies a win-win situation for both the firm and its customers. That is established through mutual respect and trust, which are part of the ethical agenda.

Course Name: Strategic Human Resource Management in a Global Context
Instructor: Pawan Budhwar

Strategic HRM in a global context focuses on people related issues in the formation and development of organisational strategy from three perspectives: multi national enterprise, comparative and cross-cultural.

Students explore the impact of environment (locally & globally) on strategic issues. Key areas of the module include; national culture and cross cultural issues, dimensions and challenges of diversity management and the impact of globalisation. Students also explore how these issues relate to the context of business negotiations, mergers and acquisitions and expatriation.

Most of the teaching on this module is strongly supported by the key research findings of the Professor leading this module who has been involved in IHRM research for the last 16 years, carrying out research projects involving over 30 countries. This complements the first hand experience the students bring from different cultures and parts of the world.

Course Name: The Mindful Manager
Instructor: Uwe Napiersky

The learning aim of the programme is the acquisition of self- development and improvement skills relevant for both the roles as a manager/leader and as an authentic individual.

It runs throughout terms 1, 2, and 3 and covers areas including critical competences for self-directed learning, self-development and a mindset open for new experience and timely adaptation. It seeks to enhance students’ ability to understand oneself via psychometric and other self-assessment tools, team working, intra- and interpersonal and soft skills development. The principle underpinning this module is that real development, personal growth and sustainable self-improvement can only take place by understanding and knowing oneself. Some of the key sessions include: Why personal and professional development matters; self leadership - Ancient Asian and Western traditions; mindfulness and other critical competencies for tomorrow’s leaders and managers and Why should anybody follow me; personal brand & individual self-awareness map; defining one’s priorities: vision, values & basic principles of ethical fitness.

Type of Offering

Green HRM and Corporate Social Responsibility
Date: June, 2010

The seminar on Green HRM & Corporate Social Responsibility was a pre conference event for HRM professionals and academics attending the International HRM Conference hosted in June 2010 by The Aston Centre for Human Resources at Aston Business School. The event was also attended by post graduate MBA students. The seminar focused on the theme of managing the ethical and environmental/sustainability agenda from a HRM (Human Resource Management) perspective. The scholars leading the event included; Susan Jackson, Professor of Human Resource Management from Rutgers University, USA. Her work focuses on understanding how HRM practices can support environmental sustainability; Carole Parkes from Aston University, who has led the CSR agenda for Aston Business School and built a global profile through engagement with businesses and universities investigating ethics, responsibility, sustainability and HRM and Helen Borland from the University of Birmingham, UK. Her research is underpinned by scientific principles of ecological sustainability, looking at evidence for change towards sustainability in human society. She also explores whether we can move towards more sustainable economic and business models and what they might look like.

Centre for Sustainability and Innovation (CSI) Seminar Series

The MBA students are invited to attend the CSI seminar series, which is an ongoing series of six – eight seminars each year. These seminars are themed around sustainability issues and recent speakers include:

23 February, 2011: S.C. Lenny Koh (University of Sheffield) “Sustainable supply chains and logistics”

24 November, 2010: Mika Kortelainen (University of Manchester) "Willingness to Pay For Carbon Labelled Products: Empirical Evidence from Scanner Data"

13 October, 2010: Simon Snowden (University of Liverpool) “Economics 101, resource depletion, and organisational instability: A view of low carbon transitionary events”

22 September, 2010: Denis Slieker (Face the Future, Rotterdam) “The real value of ecosystems”

Audencia (Nantes Business School, France) Study Visit
Type: Overseas Study Visit
Date: March, 2011

MBA students may attend a week’s study visit to Audencia (Nantes Business School, France) which focuses on global responsibility as:

- An opportunity to reinforce the company’s economic performance while contributing to the natural and social environment

- A challenge for companies that have to develop global strategies while taking into account the different national contexts

- Part of Audencia’s commitment to the Global Compact and the Principles for Responsible Management Education

Students attend the following seminars (The programme focuses on the US/France-EU aspects, as the issues and practices differ between the two continents):

- Introduction to Global Responsibility

- Responsible Finance and Governance

- Responsible Performance Management Systems

- Global Responsibility Reporting

- Diversity Management

Go Green Week
Type: Week of Environmental Activities
Date: February, 2011

MBA students are encouraged to become involved in Aston’s “Go Green Week”. Each of the days is themed and the 2011 week is scheduled as follows:

• Move on Monday (transportation)

• Turn off Tuesday (energy efficiency)

• Wildlife Wednesday (biodiversity)

• Throwaway Thursday (waste and recycling)

• Fairtrade Friday

Among the highlights for 2011 are the Vice Chancellor’s lecture: “The UK’s approach to addressing climate change: the Carbon Budgets”; Bike sale; Student switch off campaign; CHP (Combined Heat and Power) tours; Live webcam footage of kestrels nesting at Aston; RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) display; Bring and Buy sale; and Fairtrade stalls.

Business in a new climate - reputation or profit: Does there have to be a choice?
Type: ‘Business in the Community’ Breakfast Event
Date: November, 2009

Aston Business School hosted a major business breakfast to hear from prominent business leaders on how building responsible and sustainable businesses is the imperative in the new economic climate. MBA students facilitated company case studies and discussion questions. Speakers and topics included; Peter Lambert OBE, Deputy Chief Executive, Business in the Community; Trevor Bond, President, Cadbury Britain & Ireland - ('Building a Sustainable Business'), Brian Colquhoun, Regional Director, Yorkshire Bank - ('Ethics and profit – two halves of the same coin'), Carole Parkes, Aston Business School -('Ethics, Responsibility & Sustainability - The Role of Business & Management Education').

Birmingham Centre for Business Ethics - Case Study Workshop
Type: Workshop
Date: February, 2010

Workshop for MBA students with business practitioners from the Birmingham Centre for Business Ethics. The business professionals come from all areas of business and are mainly CEO's or Senior Managers who help facilitate 'real life' case studies with students on the course. The case studies are based on the experiences and ethical dilemmas of the business practitioners that the MBA students find they can relate to. The businesses the individuals come from include; Construction, Law, Banking, Retail, Utilities, Manufacturing, Finance, Consultancy, Arts as well as public sector organisations.

Hult Global Case Challenge
Type: Team Challenge
Date: March, 2011

The Hult Global Case Challenge is an annual event organised by the Hult International Business School, which plans to continue its financial commitment each year toward the implementation of solutions for a select cause. Its mission is “We commit to tackling the world's toughest social challenges through crowd-sourcing innovative ideas and solutions from the world's best and brightest business school students”. The 2011 Challenge, the 2nd annual Hult Global Case Challenge, aims to identify solutions to the global clean water crisis, in partnership with Water.org. Water.org is a U.S.-based non-profit organisation dedicated to providing safe drinking water and sanitation to people in developing countries. Co-founded by Gary White and Matt Damon, Water.org has transformed thousands of communities in Latin America, Africa, and Asia by providing access to safe water and sanitation.

The 2011 Hult Global Case Challenge will be themed around innovations in clean water supply. A group of MBA students have been selected for this challenge and will be representing ABS.

MBA Careers Team

The MBA Careers Team is an integral part of the MBA Programme and careers activities are scheduled into student’s timetables. MBA participants are encouraged to identify their interests, abilities, values and motivators through workshops, one to one counselling and a range of psychometric tools. This approach aims to ensure that students are supported in developing sustainable career plans and implementation strategies relevant to themselves as unique individuals. Students have access to a wide range of careers resources e.g. Vault Guides, links to websites, books etc that feature information and job opportunities in green energy, environmental careers, not for profit sector, charities, international organisations. We have been targeted by employers such as Vesta Wind Energy with MBA vacancies and alumni have taken up jobs in social entrepreneurship, green energy, the Red Cross and eco products. The Careers Team also sources MBA summer projects for students; these are major pieces of assessed work where students work on a live business challenge and provide free consultancy advice. In the last two years MBA students have undertaken projects with local government, Eden Organics Energy, Birmingham Children’s Hospital and with a major private sector company, Cap Gemini, who offered an HR project examining themselves as a sustainable employer.

Master of Science in Management
International Master in Management
MSc in Arts, NGOs Management
Birmingham Centre for Business Ethics (BCBE)
Business School Housing? Yes
Number of Faculty: 2
Contact Name: Carole Parkes
Contact Email: c.l.parkes@aston.ac.uk

Birmingham Centre for Business Ethics (BCBE) " Good business is good for business". Its mission is 'To promote high ethical standards in business and the professions'. Launched in 1995 the centre works to raise the level of awareness and consideration of ethical issues within the business community through a varied programme of educational, annual and special events. Sir Adrian Cadbury is its president and the Lord Mayor of Birmingham the patron. It seeks to 'inform, educate, support and counsel and promote due diligence, questioning and reflection. It aims to encourage and applaud good practice at least as much as highlighting the dubious. BCBE activities include; publications (Good Business & occasional papers); Group discussions; Public meetings; Universities workshops; Schools programmes, Corporate programmes and courses/conferences.

Centre for Sustainability and Innovation (CSI)
Business School Housing? No
Number of Faculty: 25
Contact Name: Stuart Cooper
Contact Email: s.m.cooper@aston.ac.uk

CSI was established in 2009 and is a multidisciplinary initiative that brings together researchers from all four Schools across the University to stimulate and develop research that focuses on the vital and current issues of innovation and sustainability.

ABS Social Responsibility and Sustainability (SR&S) Group
Business School Housing? Yes
Number of Faculty: 20
Contact Name: Stuart Cooper
Contact Email: s.m.cooper@aston.ac.uk

ABS is committed to implementing a strategy for Social Responsibility and Sustainability (SRS) during the period 2008-2012. (ABS Strategy, p.21). To this end Stuart Cooper and Carole Parkes have taken on the roles of co-directors of Social Responsibility and Sustainability within the School and they lead the SR&S group. The membership of this group consists of academics from across ABS that have an interest in issues of ethics, governance, social responsibility and sustainability. Currently there are 20 members.

The group meets each term and discusses developments in teaching, research and community engagement. Over the last year the group has specifically focussed upon the initiative to launch a new MSc in Social Responsibility and Sustainability in the academic year 2011/12. The SR&S group have helped shape the content of this MSc and will be responsible for delivering much of the content. The group has also enabled academics from across ABS to come together to discuss research interests and identify, where appropriate, areas for possible research collaboration. Finally, the SR&S group is one way in which contacts and initiatives within the University and wider community can be shared and developed.

A study of the relationship between exit, voice, loyalty and neglect and commitment in India
Author(s): Budhwar, P S

Drawing on exit, voice, loyalty and neglect (EVLN) literature, this study examines direct and interactive associations between organizational-level commitment and team-level commitment and the use of EVLN by managers in India. The study is based on a survey of 200 managers and supervisors from seven Indian firms. The findings on the use of voice are consistent with the past research in Western countries, but challenge the prevailing assumption about the use of voice in high power distance societies. The results also indicate that team-level commitment moderates the association between organizational-level commitment and the use of EVLN.

Journal Title: Human Relations Volume: 63 Edition: 3 Page Numbers: 349-369
Collaborating to achieve Corporate Social Responsbility and sustainability? Possibilities and problems
Author(s): Haynes, K

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the possibilities and problems for collaboration in the area of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability. The paper explores the nature and concept of collaboration and its forms, and critically evaluates the potential contribution a collaborative approach between agencies might offer to these agendas.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper explores different forms of research on collaboration, together with a UK Government report on collaboration, to evaluate how the issue is addressed in theory and practice.
Findings – Sustainable development creates extensive challenges for a wide range of agencies, including governments, non-governmental organizations, businesses and civil society. It is unlikely, however, that solutions will be found in any one quarter. Collaboration between agencies in some form would seem a logical step in supporting measures towards a more responsible and environmentally sustainable global economy.
Originality/value – The paper offers new insights into developing a research and praxis agenda for collaborative possibilities towards the advancement of CSR and sustainability.

Journal Title: Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal Volume: 1 Edition: 2 Page Numbers: 161-177
Conceptualising global strategic sustainability and corporate transformational change
Author(s): Borland, H M

The purpose of this paper is to present the concept of global strategic sustainability, represented by a conceptual framework, the spheres of strategic sustainability. The paper examines routes, solutions and a vision for corporate strategic sustainability in the macro context of the global physical environment and the planet. This builds on previous research identifying key drivers and strategies for corporate sustainability. The paper is conceptual in nature and underpinned by Gaia theory, ecosystems theory and the laws of thermodynamics. These three offer specific foci for sustainability research including holism, integration and synthesis: without which, sustainability research would be difficult to achieve. The paper identifies two major domains - corporate and consumer strategic sustainability. It examines the corporate domain in which routes are identified through responses to existing globalisation, corporate strategy and corporate culture. The paper provides insight and preliminary conceptual development towards a full theoretical model of corporate and consumer strategic sustainability. The framework will guide future conceptual and empirical investigations and broaden and deepen our understanding of how firm's can construct strategic business models that incorporate sustainability. The paper offers a conceptual framework that develops the concept of corporate strategic sustainability and provides positive, practical solutions to incorporating sustainability into business models. It also challenges the current dominant socio-economic paradigm and sets the scene for a more positive eco-paradigm that serves the present and future needs of the planet, environment, businesses and human society.

Journal Title: International Marketing Review Volume: 26 Edition: 4/5 Page Numbers: 554
CSR and the "undeserving": a role for the state, civil society and business?
Author(s): Parkes, C L; Scully, J W

Purpose: To demonstrate how the conceptual lens of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), business and civil society can be used to explore ‘less popular causes’ (in this case, a community based public sector empirical study of initiatives with offenders) and in particular respond to the question used by Walzer (1995) ‘in which society can lives be best led?’
Design/methodology/approach: A formative and summative evaluation study of a National Offender Management ‘Community Payback’ offender scheme based in the UK using a mixed method, predominantly qualitative approach that integrates theory and practice.
Findings: How the citizenship actions of front line public sector employees, working in partnership with other agencies in the community, embodies the essence of Walzer’s notion of CSR and Civil society by going beyond the call of duty to provide additional training and moral support for the community offenders.
Originality/value: Contributes towards an understanding of how CSR and Civil society debates can inform wider aspects of public policy and business through its application to areas of society that are perceived as ‘challenging’ and ‘undeserving’.

Journal Title: International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy Volume: 30 Edition: 11/12 Page Numbers: 697-708
Green operations initiatives in the automotive industry: An environmental reports analysis and benchmarking study
Author(s): Nunes, B T S; Bennett, D J

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to focus on investigating and benchmarking green operations initiatives in the automotive industry documented in the environmental reports of selected companies. The investigation roadmaps the main environmental initiatives taken by the world's three major car manufacturers and benchmarks them against each other. The categorisation of green operations initiatives that is provided in the paper can also help companies in other sectors to evaluate their green practices.
Design/methodology/approach – The first part of the paper is based on existing literature on the topic of green and sustainable operations and the “unsustainable” context of automotive production. The second part relates to the roadmap and benchmarking of green operations initiatives based on an analysis of secondary data from the automotive industry.
Findings – The findings show that the world's three major car manufacturers are pursuing various environmental initiatives involving the following green operations practices: green buildings, eco-design, green supply chains, green manufacturing, reverse logistics and innovation.
Research limitations/implications – The limitations of this paper start from its selection of the companies, which was made using production volume and country of origin as the principal criteria. There is ample evidence that other, smaller, companies are pursuing more sophisticated and original environmental initiatives. Also, there might be a gap between what companies say they do in their environmental reports and what they actually do.
Practical implications – This paper helps practitioners in the automotive industry to benchmark themselves against the major volume manufacturers in three different continents. Practitioners from other industries will also find it valuable to discover how the automotive industry is pursuing environmental initiatives beyond manufacturing, apart from the green operations practices covering broadly all the activities of operations function.
Originality/value – The originality of the paper is in its up-to-date analysis of environmental reports of automotive companies. The paper offers value for researchers and practitioners due to its contribution to the green operations literature. For instance, the inclusion of green buildings as part of green operations practices has so far been neglected by most researchers and authors in the field of green and sustainable operations
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to focus on investigating and benchmarking green operations initiatives in the automotive industry documented in the environmental reports of selected companies. The investigation roadmaps the main environmental initiatives taken by the world's three major car manufacturers and benchmarks them against each other. The categorisation of green operations initiatives that is provided in the paper can also help companies in other sectors to evaluate their green practices.
Design/methodology/approach – The first part of the paper is based on existing literature on the topic of green and sustainable operations and the “unsustainable” context of automotive production. The second part relates to the roadmap and benchmarking of green operations initiatives based on an analysis of secondary data from the automotive industry.
Findings – The findings show that the world's three major car manufacturers are pursuing various environmental initiatives involving the following green operations practices: green buildings, eco-design, green supply chains, green manufacturing, reverse logistics and innovation.
Research limitations/implications – The limitations of this paper start from its selection of the companies, which was made using production volume and country of origin as the principal criteria. There is ample evidence that other, smaller, companies are pursuing more sophisticated and original environmental initiatives. Also, there might be a gap between what companies say they do in their environmental reports and what they actually do.
Practical implications – This paper helps practitioners in the automotive industry to benchmark themselves against the major volume manufacturers in three different continents. Practitioners from other industries will also find it valuable to discover how the automotive industry is pursuing environmental initiatives beyond manufacturing, apart from the green operations practices covering broadly all the activities of operations function.
Originality/value – The originality of the paper is in its up-to-date analysis of environmental reports of automotive companies. The paper offers value for researchers and practitioners due to its contribution to the green operations literature. For instance, the inclusion of green buildings as part of green operations practices has so far been neglected by most researchers and authors in the field of green and sustainable operations.

Journal Title: Benchmarking International Journal Volume: 17 Edition: 3 Page Numbers: 396-420
Green technologies: What do we know about them?
Author(s): Bennett, D J

In many nations green technologies are receiving much attention in the fields of industry, agriculture, construction, manufacture of ecologically-friendly materials, and new services, which are all improving living standards. The world is racing for innovations and development of new products that provide high impact on sustainability, the environment, national and regional policies. This Special Issue on Green Technologies is a co-initiative of the International Association for Management of Technology (IAMOT), Journal of Manfacturing Technology Management (JMTM) and the Russian journal , INNOVATIONS. The Special Issue aims to review theoretical and empirical developments in the management of green technologies. The object of the initiative is to study green technologies 'made in Russia' and to understand their perspectives in joining in the global ecosystem.

Journal Title: Innovations Volume: 3 Edition: 125 Page Numbers: Pages 3-9
Influence of ethical beliefs, national culture and institutions on preferences for HRM in Oman
Author(s): Budhwar, P S

Purpose – The paper seeks to investigate the association between ethical beliefs, aspects of national culture and national institutions, and preferences for specific human resource management practices in the Sultanate of Oman. Design/methodology/approach – A total of 712 individuals working in six organisations (both private and public sectors) responded to a self-administered questionnaire in the Sultanate of Oman. To test the raised research questions of the proposed framework, the methodology of structural equation models was used. Findings – The results highlight significant differences in the belief systems on the basis of different demographic characteristics. The findings also confirm impact of ethical beliefs, and aspects of national culture and national institutions on preferences for human resource management (HRM) practices. Research limitations/implications – Although the goodness-of-fit indexes confirmed the validity of the proposed operational model, some indices were attained at rather flexible levels. Practical implications – Studies on managerial beliefs and values can offer important insights into the extent that work is viewed as an integral life activity. Such information can help differentiate among managerial styles in various cultures, and in predicting managerial behaviour such as ethical decision-making. Based on such understanding, the findings can be used to educate government officials and outside consultants interested in Oman. Originality/value – The study contributes to the accumulation of knowledge about under-researched developing countries such as Oman, as limited data are available on HRM, value orientations and ethical beliefs' issues in this region.

Journal Title: Personnel Review Volume: 39 Edition: 6 Page Numbers: 728-745
Stakeholders' perceptions of corporate social reporting (CSR) in Banglaesh
Author(s): Belal, A

Recent calls in the corporate social reporting (CSRep) literature have emphasized the importance of giving voice to non-managerial stakeholder groups in the social reporting process. The research, presented in this paper, employs recent work in stakeholder theory and CSRep to examine the perceptions of a diverse set of non-managerial stakeholders in the context of a developing country, Bangladesh. A series of semi-structured interviews were conducted with individuals who identify with various non-managerial stakeholder groups. Interviewees generally believed that the motivation and practice of CSRep in Bangladesh is developing in response to pressures from international markets and is producing largely cosmetic responses. Also, they expressed concerns that, given the economic, political, and social conditions in Bangladesh, premature adoption of strict CSRep standards may lead to increased corruption and other unintended consequences. Whilst some of the interviewees sharply criticized the current process of imposing social accounting codes/standards on developing countries which fail to consider the important local socio-economic context, the findings suggest that there is overwhelming support for mandatory externally verified CSRep based on the principles of peoples’ right to know, full disclosure/completeness, and relevance, which are anchored in the broader principles of transparency and stakeholder accountability.

Journal Title: Journal of Business Ethics Volume: 97 Edition: 2 Page Numbers: 311-324
The impacts of market orientation and corporate social responsibility on firm performance: Evidence from China
Author(s): Qu, R

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the joint effects of market orientation (MO) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) on firm performance.
Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected via a questionnaire survey of star-rated hotels in China and a total of 143 valid responses were received. The hypotheses were tested by employing structural equation modelling with a maximum likelihood estimation option.
Findings – It was found that although both MO and CSR could enhance performance, once the effects of CSR are accounted for, the direct effects of MO on performance diminish considerably to almost non-existent. Although this result may be due to the fact that the research is conducted in China, a country where CSR might be crucially important to performance given the country's socialist legacy, it nonetheless provides strong evidence that MO's impact on organizational performance is mediated by CSR.
Research limitations/implications – The main limitations include the use of cross-sectional data, the subjective measurement of performance and the uniqueness of the research setting (China). The findings provide an additional important insight into the processes by which a market oriented culture is transformed into superior organizational performance.
Originality/value – This paper is one of the first to examine the joint effects of MO and CSR on business performance. The empirical evidence from China adds to the existing literature on the respective importance of MO and CSR.

Journal Title: Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics Volume: 21 Edition: 4 Page Numbers: 570-582