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Many argue that the design of compensation contracts for public company chief executive officers (CEOs) is often not guided by a goal of value maximization. Yet, there is limited direct empirical evidence on the negative consequences of the proposed inefficient contracting between shareholders and CEOs. Using data on CEO bonus contracts of the S&P 500 firms, we investigate potential firm performance implications of the use of qualitative criteria such as leadership and mentoring in those contracts. We maintain that unlike quantitative criteria, qualitative criteria are difficult to define and measure on an objective basis, possibly resulting in an inefficient and biased incentive structure. Twenty-five percent of the sample observations have CEO bonus contracts that include a qualitative criterion for bonus payment determination. Our results show that employee productivity, asset productivity, capital expenditures, and future abnormal stock returns are lower for firms that use a qualitative criterion in CEO bonus contracts than those that do not. Further, contrary to the argument in prior literature that earnings management decreases with the use of subjective performance indicators in incentive contracts, we find that income-increasing accruals are actually higher when the CEO bonus contract includes a qualitative criterion. We recommend that compensation committees set concrete, measurable performance goals for CEOs, providing CEOs with better guidance and helping improve their corporate decision making.

Further understanding of how stakeholder marketing explains firm performance through greater customer satisfaction, innovation, and reputation of a firm.

Grounded in stakeholder theory, the study provides a conceptualization of stakeholder orientation based on cultural values that is distinctive from stakeholder responsiveness and examines the relationship of stakeholder responsiveness to firm performance. The study determines the mediating role of marketing outcomes on the impact of stakeholder responsiveness on firm performance. Multiple regression analysis tests hypotheses using a data set consisting of qualitative data obtained from corporate documents and quantitative data from respected secondary sources.

Our findings provide support for stakeholder marketing creating a strong relationship to organizational outcomes. There exists a positive relationship between stakeholder responsiveness and firm performance through customer satisfaction, innovation, and reputation.

Our definition implies that stakeholder responsiveness is acting in the best interests of the stakeholder as a responsible business. This study shows that stakeholder marketing may not always represent socially responsible marketing. Further research could explore how and why firms may not respond ethically and responsibly to stakeholders.

We further the discussion whether stakeholder marketing equates to sustainability. Marketers can build on expertise of managing customer relationship and generating customer value to develop a stakeholder marketing approach that addresses the economic, social, and environmental concerns of multiple stakeholders.

We further the discussion whether stakeholder marketing equates to sustainability. Marketers can build on expertise of managing customer relationship and generating customer value to develop a stakeholder marketing approach that addresses the economic, social, and environmental concerns of multiple stakeholders.

Although employee race has been an actively investigated area of scientific inquiry for decades, a thorough and informed understanding of the role of race in the organizational sciences has eluded us for a number of reasons. The relationship of race and stress in organizations is a prime example of this neglect and deficiency in our knowledge base, as little work has been done in this area. We attempt to address this limitation in the literature by proposing an inductively derived, review-centric framework that attempts to articulate the multiple intermediate linkages that explain the process dynamics taking place in the relationship between employee race and health and well-being in organizations. We argue that socialization processes, social networks, information and resource access, and mentoring contribute to distance and differences between racial minorities and nonminorities concerning control, reputation, performance, and political understanding and skill, which in turn, creates barriers to success, and increased stress and strain for racial minorities. The implications of this framework along with directions for future theory and research are discussed in this chapter.

We review and summarize accounting literature that examines whistleblowing in the accounting context. We organize our review around the five determinants of whistleblowing identified by Near and Miceli (1995). The first determinant is characteristics of the whistleblower. Studies related to this determinant examine whistleblowers’ personality characteristics, moral judgment, and demographic characteristics. Studies related to the second determinant, characteristics of the report recipient, examine characteristics of the individual or individuals who receive the report and characteristics of the reporting channel. The third determinant is characteristics of the wrongdoer. Studies in this area focus on the wrongdoer’s power and credibility. Fourth, accounting studies related to characteristics of the wrongdoing examine factors that affect the dependence of the organization on the wrongdoing and evidence credibility. Studies related to the final determinant, characteristics of the organization, examine organizational perceptions of the appropriateness of whistleblowing, organizational climate, and organizational structure. For each determinant, we first summarize and analyze the findings of prior research, and then we present suggestions for future accounting research in whistleblowing.

This chapter intends to explore the emerging concept of fiscal responsibility (FR), a particularly relevant issue in Europe. There is an ongoing debate about what are companies responsible for, the reasons and the limits for this responsibility. And while the social awareness for this issue increases it is not clear whether corporate tax dealings can be articulated into the wider realm of corporate social responsibility (CSR).

The chapter begins with a brief review of today’s situation in terms of corporate taxation. The changing environment of corporate taxes (from local to global) is described. Production processes are fragmented all over the world, and in the European Union, across national borders of their member States. This complexity is compounded by the increasing dematerialisation of business processes, the higher importance of intangibles and the use of subsidiaries in low-taxed jurisdictions.

The elusive concept of FR is analysed, along with a discussion on the nature of the firm and the limits of tax regulation, particularly the boundaries between legitimate and illegitimate tax avoidance.

Having seen how FR is now emerging, the last part of the chapter analyses the common understandings of CSR today, along with two specific challenges for FR in the realm of CSR. Finally, there is a tentative proposal on how FR may articulate with different theories of CSR.

Implicit contracts are ‘invisible handshakes’ that are not legally binding but are grounded in mutual understanding between the parties of what they expect from each other. These contracts are very common both within the firm (e.g., between managers and employees) and in business relationships (e.g., between a firm and its suppliers). Typically, implicit contracts arise in relationships that are in some way open-ended. An extensive literature has showed that implicit contracts allow firms to create value by encouraging relationship-specific investment and motivating effort by stakeholders. This chapter focusses on how sustainability satisfies existing implicit contracts (including a broad social contract with society at large) and facilitates a firm in entering new implicit contracts by improving its trustworthiness. The author argues that the adoption of sustainability is directly related to industry- and firm-level variables that make implicit contracts important to a firm’s strategies, and inversely related to the strength of overriding factors that make a firm trustworthy. Based on this reasoning, the author analyses four areas in which rates of sustainability adoption can vary according to the importance of implicit contracts.

I integrate several literatures on how networks relate to firms and markets. While the logic of strong ties (based on mutual goodwill, trust, and commitment) is distinct from the style of interaction classically associated with hierarchical firms and free markets, such ties in fact depend on the legal environments constituted by firm and market. A key role is played by credible commitments to refrain from exercising rights to control others and exit relationships with them. But since such commitments to employees conflict with commitments to contractors, strong ties may be prevalent internally or externally, but not in both simultaneously.

Organizational approaches to racial inequality have provided contextual insight into a host of traditional stratification outcomes (e.g., hiring, earnings, authority). This chapter extends the organizational approach by drawing on the health-stress framework to explore how organizational context affects experiential and health-related outcomes – discrimination, social support, and psychological distress. Drawing on a sample of Black workers in the United States, we examine the relationship between workplace racial composition and psychological distress, as well as two potential mediators – racial discrimination and workplace social support. Our findings reveal that psychological distress is similar for Black workers in token (<25% Black coworkers), tilted other race (25–49.99% Black coworkers), and tilted same race (50–74.99% Black coworkers) job contexts. Workers in Black-dominated jobs (>75% Black coworkers), however, experience significantly less psychological distress than other compositional thresholds, net of individual, job, and workplace characteristics. This relationship is not explained by either racial discrimination experiences or supervisor and coworker social support. This finding suggests that researchers need to theorize and examine other protective factors stemming from coworker racial similarity.

Throughout history, the actions of human beings have been analysed based on ethics. In every aspect of human life, ethics is an essential element, and business life is no exception. Business ethics, and marketing ethics in particular, has been a subject of interest in both the academic and business world. Apart from doing what is perceived as correct, acting in a socially responsible and sustainable manner becomes compulsory, as the changes in ecological and social environment necessitate this. There have been warning signs from nature such as environmental disasters and climate change, and it is no longer possible for for firms or individuals to continue with previous behaviours. Acting as if the world’s resources are limitless has caused damage to the environment. A new way of thinking and behaving is needed. The awareness and involvement levels about sustainability and social responsibility are not the same everywhere in the world. Culture has significant impact on perception of social issues such as social responsibility and sustainability. Turkey, as a developing country with its own cultural dynamics, differs from developed Western countries which makes analysing consumer ethics, corporate social responsibility and sustainable consumption in Turkey worthwhile.

In this chapter, concepts of business ethics, marketing ethics, consumer ethics, sustainable consumption and corporate social responsibility are discussed with specific examples from Turkey.