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An individual engages in a façade of conformity by attempting to appear to embrace their organization's values when, in truth, they do not. While numerous studies investigate the negative outcomes associated with facades of conformity, fewer studies consider its antecedents. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the association between diversity-related influences – including individuals' beliefs, other unit members' beliefs, unit gender diversity and unit racial diversity – and individuals' propensities to engage in a façade of conformity.

This paper administered an online survey to 2,122 employees nested within 151 units located at a hospital site located in the southeastern United States. Hierarchical linear modeling and relative weights analyses were used to test the study hypotheses which aimed to determine how objective diversity and perceptions associated with diversity increase or diminish facades of conformity.

In this paper individuals' and other unit members' beliefs that their organization values diversity were negatively associated with facades of conformity; however, there was a positive association between unit gender diversity and facades of conformity. There were no statistically significant associations involving unit racial diversity or interactive effects. Overall, the results indicate that it is less likely that employees will engage in façades of conformity when diversity is valued within organizations.

By further expanding understanding of the concept of façades of conformity within the humanities and social sciences literature, this study highlight the importance of allowing and encouraging employees to “be themselves.”

This study aims to investigate the effect of financial-tax reporting conformity jurisdictions on the association between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and aggressive tax avoidance.

Using a sample comprising firms domiciled in Europe for the period 2008–2016, this study uses regression analysis to test the impact of financial-tax reporting conformity jurisdictions on the association between CSR and aggressive tax avoidance.

The empirical results show that there is a positive association between CSR and tax avoidance, and firms headquartered in low financial-tax reporting conformity jurisdictions are more likely to engage in CSR to hedge against the potential negative consequences of aggressive tax-avoidance practices as compared to firms domiciled in countries with high level of financial-tax reporting conformity.

This study confirms Sikka’s (2010, 2013) view of “organised hypocrisy” act committed by firms to cover their socially irresponsible activities of aggressive tax avoidance by engaging in CSR. Results have implication for various regulatory bodies and investors in that the type of financial-tax conformity does impact the link between CSR and tax avoidance, and based on that, CSR firms may engage in CSR to overcome any negative reactions that could be caused as a result of tax avoidance.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is the first to investigate the impact of financial-tax reporting conformity jurisdictions on the association between CSR and aggressive tax avoidance. This study also contributes to the literature in that, it uses an alternative data set which offers a more objective assessment of CSR measure and covers multiple countries.

This paper aims to investigate the role of informational and relational mechanisms on equity crowdfunding investors' conformity behaviors by focusing on a relational culture of China.

The data of 108 financing projects and 7,688 investment records from a union of Chinese equity crowdfunding platforms are gathered. Lead investors' response to a campaign and follow-investors’ former links explain investors' conformity by social network analysis (SNA) and ordinary least squares (OLS) analysis.

The results show that informational and relational influences drive conformity in Chinese equity crowdfunding. Moreover, the informational influence weakens in a highly centralized structure of linked investors.

The results add new knowledge to follow-investors’ conformity behaviors in equity crowdfunding and enrich the literature on conformity theory by finding the contextual effect of information-influenced conformity and the adaption of conformity theory to cultural uniqueness. Besides, this preliminary work also suggests opportunities for future research.

The paper inspires new consideration on a strategical use of follow-investors’ conformity mentality to promote successfully financing and reminds platform managers to be alert to the interference of small groups formed based on informal relationships to the normal financing order.

This is the first study that discovers the non-informational influence and the limited influence of information on equity crowdfunding conformity through contextual concerns.

This research seeks to explore the intersection between modularity and conformity in organizational contexts. Modularity, a cornerstone of organizational design, pertains to the decomposability of tasks within an organization into subtasks with internal interdependence and external independence. Conformity, on the other hand, is the adjustment of an individual’s behavior to match that of others, often driven by a desire to adhere to social norms.

We employ agent-based modeling and simulation as a technique to model organizations as complex systems. This approach allows us to delve into the effects of modularity in organizational structures on organizational performance, with a particular emphasis on the role of conformity in this relationship. We treat conformity as exogenously given, which allows us to focus on its effects rather than its emergence.

The results demonstrate that a concentration of interdependent tasks within fewer departments can boost overall performance. Conformity decreases performance in all organizational structures except for cases when the departments work on highly similar tasks. This decline in performance can also explain why functional organizational structures are still being used in practice even though they are less modular than divisional structures — they feature lower levels of conformity and, thus, face smaller decline. Finally, we find that in highly complex settings, organizational performance can, surprisingly, be improved as complexity within departments increases.

To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to explore the modularity in organizational structures in presence of conformity. Distinctively, we adapt the NKCS model from evolutionary biology to our study, and perform an exhaustive analysis by examining all possible combinations of parameters that refer to the task allocation within organizations. We thereby contribute a unique perspective to the discourse on organizational theory and behavior.

This study provides an analysis of the possibility of companies in Indonesia to adopt integrated reporting (IR). This is undertaken by comparing the degree of conformity between current reporting disclosures with that of the IR framework.

A mixed-method approach is employed, which entailed using both quantitative and qualitative techniques to access data. For the quantitative analysis, a total of 64 companies are chosen, which represent companies with significant market capitalization included in the LQ45 index (an index for the 45 most liquid stocks) in 2016 and the non-LQ45 by publishing a sustainability report. These companies are selected on the basis of high levels of disclosure compared with other companies and serve as an appropriate benchmark for other listed companies. The level of disclosure conformity is employed using 39 principle disclosure indices and 76 content disclosure indices based on the IR framework. For the qualitative analysis, interviews were conducted with nine interviewees that are considered as experts in the field of IR. The interviews are conducted to assist in providing explanations for the findings.

The results indicate that approximately 60% of companies (mostly in the banking, finance and mining industries) have an adequate degree of conformity, reflecting their higher probability of voluntary compliance to apply the IR framework. However, the principles of conciseness and connectivity of information provide significant challenges for Indonesian firms when they will consider implementation. Further analysis using in-depth interviews with experts showed that several factors from various perspectives should be considered in shifting to IR.

This study provides empirical evidence on the current reporting landscape of Indonesian firms. Scant research is available on the possible adoption of IR in emerging markets such as Indonesia. Hence, this project raises further possible explanations for the challenges and pressures faced by Indonesian firms in an era of changing stakeholder expectations.

With the tremendous increase in the number of netizens, online consumer behavior has become an important issue nowadays. One of the important issues of online consumer behavior is e-consumer conformity. This paper aims to explore prominent factors of e-consumer conformity and its impact on consumer attitude, which helps marketers to understand this new business arena and involve this relationship to enhance their business.

For the purpose, convenience sampling was used with sample size of 510. Offline as well as online mode of survey was applied. The resultant hypotheses (based on the developed model depicting normative and informational consumer conformity effect on attitude) were examined by structured equation modeling.

The present study presents the different dimensions of e-consumer conformity and its difference in metro and non-metro cities on which marketers have to frame their strategies. The study revealed that the customer attitude is largely affected by others expectations (conformance with others expectations, NCC) rather others knowledge and expertise (ICC). Additionally, the comparison of virtual conformity behavior of metro and non-metro customers was made, and it was found that conformity behavior does not significantly differ in these two contexts.

Business saturation in metro cities, infrastructural growth and technological advancement in non-metro cities, companies are moving toward non-metro cities. Due to contextual differences existing between metro and non-metro market, it is difficult to trace the changes in the marketing policies and device the appropriate strategy accordingly for the marketers. In lieu of this, the present study presents the different dimensions of e-consumer conformity and its degree of difference in metro and non-metro cities on which marketers have to frame their strategies.

Good number of research has been conducted on consumer conformity in India; however, there is a scarcity of literature in virtual consumer conformity in India. This research is not only establishing the relationship between virtual consumer conformity and consumer attitude but also establishing the difference of virtual consumer conformity in metro and non-metro cities in India.

This investigation aims to unpack the negative connection between employees’ experience of resource-draining career compromise and their organizational citizenship behavior, by theorizing a mediating role of their depersonalization of organizational leaders and a moderating role of their conformity orientation in this connection.

The hypotheses were tested with survey data collected among employees who operate in the construction retail industry in Portugal.

A critical reason that frustrations about unwanted career adjustments translate into a reluctance to undertake work efforts that exceed formal job descriptions is that employees develop dehumanized perceptions of the people in charge of the company. This explanatory mechanism is less prominent, however, to the extent that employees’ personal orientation favors rule adherence.

For HR managers, this research identifies a key channel, indifference to organizational leaders, through which disappointments about compromised career developments escalate into rejection of voluntary work activities, which otherwise might leave a positive impression on leaders and enhance employees’ careers. It also reveals that organizations can subdue this detrimental process by leveraging a sense of conformity among their workers.

This study adds to HR management research by showing how a mismatch between employees’ current career situation and their own meaningful career goals paradoxically might direct them away from extra-role work behavior that otherwise could provide meaningfulness. This harmful dynamic, which can be explained by their propensity to treat organizational leaders as impersonal objects, can be avoided to the extent that employees draw from their conformity orientation.

This study aims to examine the impact of different levels of required book-tax conformity (BTC) on audit clients' demand for auditor-provided tax services (APTS). In addition, the authors also investigate the effects of the European Union (EU) Regulation (2014).

This study utilizes a sample of listed companies from 10 EU countries between 2010 and 2019. The final sample consists of 16,049 firm-year observations from 2,515 unique firms, and the authors use both probit and ordinary least square (OLS) regression models in this study.

The main finding of this paper is that companies listed in countries with a higher level of BTC are less likely to purchase tax services from incumbent auditors and pay fewer auditor-provided tax service fees. Results from further analyses confirm that firms substantially reduced their purchase of APTS after the EU Regulation (2014) was implemented, but these reduced purchases were found to be more pronounced for firms located in countries with low BTC.

This study advances the understanding of the determinants of APTS and the consequences of BTC. Specifically, the authors report that variation in a country-specific feature (i.e. BTC) also affects firms' decision to purchase APTS. Moreover, this paper provides some preliminary evidence of the new regulation and contributes to the literature on APTS regulation. The findings of this study have important policy implications for regulators and are also relevant for various capital market participants.