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Understanding how to predict and manage the spread of negative brand-relevant content is of critical concern to marketers. This paper aims to contribute to this understanding by building on existing anti-branding, brand hate and word-of-mouth literature to explore the factors that lead individuals to engage in the transmission of negative brand-relevant information via social media.

A two-phase exploratory design was used. The first stage involved an analysis of negative transmission via comments left on news and brand posts. The second phase of the research involved a series of 13 depth interviews with frequent social media users about their negative brand-relevant transmission behavior to add richness and depth to the findings from the passive observation in the first phase of the research.

The first phase of the research demonstrated that negative transmission can be both brand-related (e.g. driven by-product or service failure or corporate irresponsibility) and consumer-related (e.g. driven by self or social motives). The second phase of the research clarified that negative transmission often occurs in the absence of brand hate, particularly when it can be used as a covert method of self-enhancement for the transmitter via downward social comparisons.

Negative transmission as a form of anti-branding that is more strongly self-related (as opposed to brand) is established, progressing understanding and applications of contemporary media channels. Implications, including how brand-generated controversy and consumer reinforcement can be used to manage negative transmission, are offered.

The purpose of this research was to create a brief scale to measure perceived social benefit that would be appropriate for use in future research aiming to explore the role of this variable in determining word-of-mouth (WOM) behaviour. There is evidence that perceived social risk negatively impacts the willingness to share, but the role of perceived social benefit has not yet been explored. Understanding how perceived social risk and benefit interact to determine WOM will inform social marketing campaign design.

This paper outlines two studies: Study 1 was concerned with the development of the perceived social benefit of sharing scale (PSBSS), including the construction of preliminary items and the reliability and discriminant validity of the final scale. Study 2 involved an investigation of the concurrent validity of the PSBSS in relation to the likelihood to share.

Study 1 demonstrated that the perceived social benefit associated with WOM was related to social approval, impression management and social bonding. The results of Study 2 established that scores on the PSBSS predicted self-reported likelihood to engage in both face-to-face WOM and electronic WOM.

The PSBSS can be used to examine the role of perceived social benefit, including how the interaction between perceived social risk and benefit determines where, when and with whom people will share WOM.

There are mainly two viewpoints on women’s leadership effectiveness compared with that of men – the questioning view and the admiring view, two points of view that are not in agreement. Based on that, this study aims to find the gender difference in leadership effectiveness.

This study uses carefully matched male and female presidents (223 pairs) of Chinese listed companies and male and female chief executive officers (141 pairs) of American listed companies as samples. Analysis of variance was conducted to analyze the indicator data of the leadership effectiveness.

The findings show that women’s leadership effectiveness is not significantly inferior to that of men, and that women’s leadership effectiveness compared to that of men in the Chinese cultural context is not inferior to that in the American cultural context. The findings do not support the questioning view of women’s leadership effectiveness.

This study first uses the carefully matched (female/male leaders) data of Chinese listed companies and American listed companies as samples to find which viewpoint (the questioning view and the admiring view) is supported or is not supported.

Mentoring postdocs is a shared responsibility and dynamic process that requires a mutual commitment between the faculty mentor and postdoc. The purpose of this study is to understand how minoritized science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) postdocs view and engage in mentoring exchanges with their faculty mentors. In the context of this study, minoritized postdocs include women, people of color, and individuals with international status; faculty mentors include postdocs’ Principal Investigators (PIs).

Three researchers and 31 data sources (i.e., interview transcripts) were used to construct the case. Researchers first deductively and independently coded the data sources using Molm’s (2006) social exchange framework to identify examples of direct, generalized, and productive mentoring exchanges. Researchers then used thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2006) to identify emergent themes among coded examples of direct, generalized, and productive mentoring exchanges.

Data analyses revealed three emergent themes: (1.1) postdocs valued regular meetings and communication with mentors to clarify responsibilities and role expectations, (1.2) postdocs found more value in their interactions with junior faculty PIs who were flexible and open to innovative ideas, and (1.3) postdocs appreciated conversations about short- and long-term career goals and advice with mentors.

Findings offer implications for faculty and postdocs’ approaches to mentoring relationships, and for approaches to cultivating supportive scholarly communities in STEM higher education. Recommendations include flexibility in research assignments, increased awareness of non-academic careers, and opportunities for informal interactions and intra/interdepartmental community building.

Purpose – Responsible investor (RI) engagement seeks to change corporate strategic priorities while balancing the financial imperative. This chapter uses an institutional theory framework to explore the tension between financial performance and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues in RI engagement.

Methodology – Discourse of the proponent, supporters and opponents of Australia’s first climate change shareholder resolution – a minority proposal, will be analyzed using framing analysis.

Findings – Framing indicated that the discourse emphasized the dominant financial performance logic while often omitting the ESG logic. One possible explanation is that the process of shareholder proposal nomination and the financial imperative of investment organizations effectively co-opted the engagement.

Research limitations – A case of responsible investment engagement is used to illustrate multiple logics in the investment field. Although there are significant limitations to drawing inferences from a single example, the discussion is relevant to RI support for engagement initiatives such as the UN Principles of Responsible Investment clearinghouse and Carbon Disclosure Project Carbon Action. This chapter argues that attempts to change corporate strategic actions on climate change by RI through engagement will be less effective while the financial performance logic provides relatively more legitimacy to investors.

Practical implications – Integrating the ESG logic with the financial logic is vulnerable to co-optation due to incommensurability. Operationalizing both logics requires establishing a boundary between ESG and financial logics to develop legitimacy.

Social implications – RI engagement on climate change has the potential to be an important part of the social response to the sustainability agenda.

Originality – In applying institutional theory to RI climate change activism this chapter presents original insights into the potential of engagement to effect change.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how leaders’ behaviour and subordinates’ personality can impact subordinates’ feelings of being trusted. Feeling trusted by one’s leader is associated with increased performance, organisational citizenship behaviours and job satisfaction (Baer et al., 2015; Lester and Brower, 2003).

Participants read a vignette in which a leader’s behaviour was manipulated and then rated the extent to which they felt trusted. Participants in Sample 1 consisted of 726 undergraduate students with work experience, and Sample 2 consisted of 1,196 people with work experience recruited over CrowdFlower, a crowd-sourcing website.

Results from both samples indicate that a leader delegating a task increases subordinate felt trust, for Sample 1 p<0.001, d=0.75 and for Sample 2 p<0.001, d=0.90. Further, subordinate felt trust increases when the task delegated is of high importance, for Sample 1 p<0.001, d=0.42 and for Sample 2 p<0.001, d=0.58. The likelihood of the delegated task resulting in negative outcomes and subordinate propensity to trust have negligible effects on felt trust.

Despite the organisational benefits of felt trust, it is still unclear how to elicit subordinates’ felt trust. This study is one of the first to empirically examine leader behaviour that may lead subordinates to feel trusted in the workplace. These findings support theoretical underpinnings of the relational leadership model and the risk-based model of trust.

This paper aims to explore online consumers’ perceptions of a trustworthy Web site. Specifically, it analyzes which Web site elements and features online buyers identify as online trust cues signaling e-vendor’s trustworthiness.

This study implemented a repertory grid technique to gain insight into the customers’ perceptions of Web site trustworthiness.

The most frequently identified online trust cues belong to the “Layout”, “Easy to Use” and “Sales” categories. This is in contrast with the traditional views that Web elements related to customers’ privacy and security are leading trust cues. In addition, online shoppers confirmed two trends in e-commerce: the role of social media in developing online trust to e-vendors is increasing and online shopping is associated with entertainment.

Rich data collected from 16 participants of this qualitative study present a challenge for generalizability. A caution should be taken in extending findings to the whole population of online shoppers.

This study proves that the repertory grid technique is a useful method for qualitative market research. This method helped to solicit a list of Web site elements and features that online consumers identified as online trust cues. As buyers refer to those cues when deciding to trust or not to trust an e-vendor with the private and confidential information, businesses could use these research findings in designing Web sites that signal trustworthiness to customers.

This study contributes to the research methodology as it extends the use of the repertory grid technique to the study of online trust cues and collection of data online. It is one of a few qualitative studies of online trust cues.

In many organizational settings, status hierarchies result in the conferral of privileges that are based on achievement. However, in the same settings, status may result in the bestowal of privileges that are unearned. We argue that these unearned privileges are often awarded based on ascribed characteristics, but are perceived to be achieved. We further argue that these misattributions occur because acknowledging that one has benefited from unearned advantages that are awarded in a meritocracy can be threatening to a person's self-identity. We propose that by studying unearned privileges in organizational settings, a more accurate assessment of status hierarchies may result.

The purpose of this paper is to report on the findings from the Digital Privacy Story Completion Project, which investigated Australian participants' understandings of and responses to digital privacy scenarios using a novel method and theoretical approach.

The story completion method was brought together with De Certeau's concept of tactics and more-than-human theoretical perspectives. Participants were presented with four story stems on an online platform. Each story stem introduced a fictional character confronted with a digital privacy dilemma. Participants were asked to complete the stories by typing in open text boxes, responding to the prompts “How does the character feel? What does she/he do? What happens next?”. A total of 29 participants completed the stories, resulting in a corpus of 116 narratives for a theory-driven thematic analysis.

The stories vividly demonstrate the ways in which tactics are entangled with relational connections and affective intensities. They highlight the micropolitical dimensions of human–nonhuman affordances when people are responding to third-party use of their personal information. The stories identified the tactics used and boundaries that are drawn in people's sense-making concerning how they define appropriate and inappropriate use of their data.

This paper demonstrates the value and insights of creatively attending to personal data privacy issues in ways that decentre the autonomous tactical and agential individual and instead consider the more-than-human relationality of privacy.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/OIR-05-2020-0174

Research into responsible management education has largely focused on the merits, attributes, and transformation opportunities to enhance responsible business school education aims. As such, a prominent part of the literature has occupied itself with examining if responsible management modules are inherently considered a non-crucial element of the curriculum and determining the extent to which business schools have introduced such learning content into their curriculum. However, there has been scant research into how to apply novel teaching approaches to engage students and promote responsible management education endeavours. As such, this paper seeks to address this gap through the development of a teaching framework to support educators in designing effective learning environments focused on responsible management education. We draw on constructivist learning theories and Lego Serious Play (LSP) as a learning enhancement approach to develop a pedagogical framework titled The Educator's LSP Journey. LSP is chosen due to its increasing application in learning environments to help promote critical discourse, and engage with highly complex problems, whether these are social, economic, environmental, or organisational. Therefore, this paper contributes to the responsible management education discourse by providing educators with a practical methodology to support student engagement and co-creation of knowledge by fostering exploratory learning environments and enriching the practices of active learning communities.