Bridging the gap: unleashing the power of non-core departments through interdepartmental collaboration

Traditional research on firm performance has predominantly emphasized the role of key departments, often underestimating the potential contributions of non-core departments. This study redresses this oversight by investigating the impact of non-core departments on firm performance. Utilizing a comprehensive 20-year dataset from Chinese A-listed firms and employing the endogenous growth model, we scrutinize the influence of non-core departments on enterprise productivity and organizational growth. Our findings underscore that non-core departments significantly enhance firm performance. Furthermore, we observe a negative coefficient of the interaction term, implying the presence of diminishing returns to scale when amalgamating department diversity with firm knowledge. This suggests that while both department diversity and firm knowledge independently contribute positively to firm performance, their conjoined effect does not necessarily induce a proportionally amplified impact. Moreover, we found that factors such as the company's equity structure, market environment, and the age and education level of executives may moderate the impact of departmental diversity on firm performance. This study enriches the literature by spotlighting the potential of non-core departments in propelling firm success and underlines the imperative for strategies that cultivate interdepartmental collaboration. The implications of these findings propose that firms can leverage the potential of non-core departments for sustainable growth, offering a fresh perspective for future research in organizational development.

Celebrity CEOs, digital transformation and firm performance in China: the moderating role of controlling shareholders and institutional investors

Background

business leaders' social status significantly impacts companies' strategic direction and performance. Digital transformation, an important tool for companies to enhance competitiveness and resilience, plays an important role in the relationship between executive background and firm performance.

Objective

To investigate the impact of celebrity chief executive officers (CEO) on firm performance through digital transformation.

Method

Using data from companies listed on the main boards of the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges between 2017 and 2021, this study explored the relationship between celebrity CEOs, digital transformation, and firm performance.

Result

Celebrity CEOs significantly enhanced a firm's digital transformation. However, this effect weakened when controlling shareholders and institutional investors held more shares. Additionally, the study showed that celebrity CEOs can improve firm performance through digital transformation. These findings were robust across a range of sensitivity analyses.

Conclusion

This study contributes to understanding celebrity CEOs' decision-making motivations and economic impacts from a psychological perspective while also providing valuable insights for driving digital transformation within companies.

What factors affect firm performance in the hotel industry post-Covid-19 pandemic? Examining the impacts of big data analytics capability, organizational agility and innovation

The Covid-19 pandemic has had an adverse effect on the global economy, particularly the hotel industry. Industry players have turned to big data to recover and improve their business performance. This paper aims to identify the key resources to develop and build big data analytics capabilities (BDAC). Drawing upon the knowledge-based and dynamic capability views, this research also examines the interplay among BDAC, organizational agility, marketing and organizational innovations, and firm performance in the hotel industry. The partial least square structural equation modeling is used for the data analysis, while quota sampling is used for the sampling design. Based on the statistical data analysis from 115 star-rated hotels in Malaysia, BDAC positively impacts organizational agility, marketing and organizational innovations, and firm performance. Likewise, organizational agility positively impacts firm performance, marketing and organizational innovations. The empirical findings provide researchers and industry players with meaningful insights for improving firm performance in the hotel industry using big data.

Explaining Firm Performance During the COVID-19 With fsQCA: The Role of Supply Network Complexity, Inventory Turns, and Geographic Dispersion

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly affected firm performance. As a result, many studies have examined the significance of supply network complexity. Our paper uses the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) method to investigate the causal relationships among the supply network complexity, geographic dispersion, inventory turns, and firm performance. Using a sample of 263 Chinese listed firms, we find that no single factor is necessary to achieve high firm performance during COVID-19 and reveal four paths to produce high performance: operational level driven, supply base complexity driven, and customer base complexity driven with supplier distance, and supply network complexity absence. Furthermore, our findings suggest that supply-based complexity-driven and customer-based complexity-driven can improve firm performance, but not all supply network complexity dimensions can improve firm performance. Hence, firms need to choose the suitable path based on their specific situations.

The Impact of Environmental Regulation on Firm Performance: Evidence from the Pulp and Paper Industry in China

In areas with serious pollution problems, the government designates a special emission limit (SEL) for pollution control and environmental protection in China. This paper examines the effects of chemical oxygen demand (COD) SEL on firms' production activity and market performance in the pulp and paper industry in the Lake Tai area in China. Using firm-level data, we employ a difference-in-differences strategy and find that SEL has a negative impact on the production scale, profitability, and market size of the regulated firms, while showing no significant impact on firm exports. The heterogeneity tests suggest that the impact of SEL on production and market performance varies with firm ownership, firm size, and target market. The reallocation effect of production shifts extra production from exited firms to existing firms, which explains the expansion of production scale and market size for SOEs and large-sized regulated firms. Compared with the decline of production scale, the inventory alleviation effect reduces the negative impact of stricter environmental regulation on firm performance.

Does board activeness strengthen the relationship between structure of corporate ownership and firm performance?

This study empirically investigates the moderating effect of board activeness on the relationship between the structure of corporate ownership and firm performance. The objective was evaluated using the hierarchal panel regressions with data from non-financial companies of the Pakistan Stock Exchange from 2009 to 2018, operationalizing the ownership structure as state ownership, associated companies, foreign ownership, ownership concentration, institutional ownership, and family ownership, and firm performance as operating performance, financial performance, and stock market performance. The findings of the study revealed that operating, financial, and stock market performance were favorably influenced by the ownership stakes of the state, associated concerns, institutions, and foreigners. Family interests proved to be diverse for the firm performance. The isolated effect of the board consistently uplifted the firm productivity, but its interactional impact with all the ownership stakeholders postulated differential outcomes for internal and external performance. The study provides valuable insights for policymakers and investors to make optimal strategies to manage ownership interests and enhance value.

Corporate governance, capital structure, and firm performance: a panel VAR approach

This study aims to examine the interrelationships and interdependencies between corporate governance (CG), capital structure (CS), and firm performance (FP) of companies listed on the Stock Exchange of Mauritius from 2009 to 2019 along with a comparison between financial and non-financial firms. A panel vector autoregression (PVAR) approach is used in this study to determine the relationship dynamics between CG, CS and FP. The findings reveal a positive and significant bidirectional association between CS and FP, supporting the trade-off theory. The results also show that CG and FP jointly help to increase CS while CG and CS jointly boost the profitability of firms. A strong bidirectional relationship with varied signs between CG and CS is found only for financial firms. The results of the forecast error variance decomposition analysis support the selection of FP as the most endogenous variable. Robustness tests also support the findings. This study is the first to examine the dynamic and interdependent relationships using a PVAR model between CG, CS and FP that presents new contributions to the existing CG and CS literature with insights from an emerging economy.

How do information strategy and information technology governance influence firm performance?

Organizations today engage in turbulent competition to seize opportunities and cope with challenges by making strategy planning, increasing information technology (IT) investment, and other means. Based on survey data through questionnaires, this paper constructs models to explore the synergistic effects of information strategy (IS) and IT governance (ITG) on firm performance. The results show that, first, ITG and IS as explanatory variables have a significant influence on firm performance. Second, ITG has a positive effect on the relationship between IS and firm performance. This study extends existing research on IS and ITG by exploring the synergistic effects of IS and ITG on firm performance. The conclusion provides management insight and practical guidance for enterprises by actively implementing IS to improve firm performance to transform from the inherent pattern of traditional governance to the new technology governance.

Mediation Effect of Corporate Tax Burden and the Relationship between Environmental Regulation and Firm Performance

This paper took the panel data of 1052 heavily-polluting listed companies from both the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchange from 2010 to 2017 to empirically analyze the impact of environmental regulation (ERG) on firm performance (FP). The article introduces a mediating effect model to test the mediating role of corporate tax burden (ETR) within the relationship between ERG on FP. The results showed that: (1) ERG has exerted a significant enhancement effect on the performance of heavily polluted firms via the ETR reduction mechanism. (2) The mediating effect of ETR depends on the duration of ERG. A significant time lag exists before the mediating effect starts to work, and the magnitude of the mediating effect increases with the time lag from the execution of the ERG. (3) The mediating effect of ETR varies significantly with the nature of corporate property rights. It is significant for the state-owned firms, while for non-state-owned firms, there is no evidence supporting the existence of the mediating effect of ETR despite ERG still having a significant direct-impact on FP. Based on these findings, we discuss the policy suggestion to optimize the impact of environmental regulation policies in terms of incentivizing the green development of polluting firms.

Policy Intervention and Financial Sustainability in an Emerging Economy: A Structural Vector Auto Regression Analysis

The purpose of the study is to observe the impact of policy intervention on financial sustainability using the structural vector autoregression (SVAR) analysis. The population of the study is the manufacturing sector of Pakistan, which is an emerging economy. Data for 249 firms operating in the manufacturing sector are taken, collected from Datastream from 2005 to 2019, with total observations of 2,400. To conduct the analysis, R software is used for its better visualization. Results show that firm performance, corporate governance, and sectoral policies have a positive and long-term impact on financial sustainability, whereas earning management and financialization not only have a negative impact, but this impact affects the operations of the corporate for a longer period. This study would be helpful for policymakers as it gives a framework for financial sustainability based on the policies and strategies developed by the sector.

An empirical investigation of firm performance through corporate governance and information technology investment with mediating role of corporate social responsibility: Evidence from Saudi Arabia telecommunication sector

This study intended to examine the effect of information technology (IT) investment and corporate governance mechanism on the performance of the Saudi telecommunication sector with mediating role of corporate social responsibility (CSR). A survey method was used to collect data from the targeted Saudi telecom firm. Results show that corporate governance practices, i.e., internal audit, internal audit committee, and internal board size, have a significant and positive relationship with firm performance. Furthermore, IT investment positively affects the performance of Saudi telecommunication firms. Moreover, CSR mediates the relationship among internal audit, internal audit committee, internal board size, IT investment, and firm performance. This study contributes to the body of knowledge regarding IT investment, corporate governance mechanism, corporate social responsibilities, and firm performance of telecommunication firms in emerging markets. Furthermore, this study will help the top management of the telecom firms to improve corporate governance and IT investment, which will be beneficial to enhance firm performance.

The Role of Transformational Leadership on Firm Performance: Mediating Effect of Corporate Sustainability and Moderating Effect of Knowledge-Sharing

The primary purpose of the research is to investigate the mediating role of corporate sustainability in the relationship between the impacts of transformational leadership on the performance of firms. This study also aimed to investigate the moderating role of knowledge-sharing on the relationship of transformational leadership with corporate sustainability. Respondents of the study were the top management of large Chinese automobile sectors, such as Shanghai Automotive Business Corporation (Group), China FAW Group Corporation, Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd., Beijing Automotive Group Co., Ltd., and China North Industries Group Corporation. These are the companies with the biggest market share in the automobile manufacturing industry in China. The data was gathered by using a self-administrative survey questionnaire from 198 individuals operating in different automobile industries in different sectors of China. The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) through the Smart PLS 3.3.2 software. The results of this study revealed that transformational leadership has a positive and significant effect on the performance of the firm. Corporate sustainability has a significant positive mediating role in the association of transformational leadership and firm performance. Findings indicated that knowledge-sharing also has a positive moderating role in the association between transformational leadership and firm performance. The findings of this study contribute to the body of knowledge and show that leadership style has a significant effect on firm performance and that knowledge-sharing culture in firms is essential for better performance of the firm. Furthermore, firms may improve their performance by improving their sustainability and by creating knowledge-sharing culture. The findings are important, particularly in connection with a developed country like China. The findings have important insights for various stakeholders, i.e., government, regulatory bodies, practitioners, academia, industry, and researchers.

Examining the Relationship Between Product Market Competition and Chinese Firms Performance: The Mediating Impact of Capital Structure and Moderating Influence of Firm Size

This study emphasized the relationship between the Chinese companies' product market competition and organizational performance. This article explored the mediating effect of capital structure and the moderating impact of firm size in achieving better performance of Chinese companies. This study employed a sample of 2,502 Chinese firm observations and identified that market competition positively influenced firm performance. Additionally, capital structure partly mediated the relationship between product market competition and firm performance. Similarly, the present study also tested the moderating effect of firm size (both small and large) on the association between product market competition and firm performance. The results showed that moderating large businesses affects the nexus between product market competition and firm performance. Conversely, small firms' moderating role revealed a substantial adverse impact on the association between product market competition and firm performance. These findings contribute to the literature on the complex implications of market competition on business firms' performance. The results provide insightful and practical implications for future research directions.

Assessing the Empirical Linkage Among Access to Finance, Firm Quality, and Firm Performance: New Insight From Bangladeshi SMEs'

Access to finance plays a central pillar on the sustainable firm growth of developing and developed nations. This study depicts the linkage between access to external finance, firm quality, and firms’ performance as measured by labor productivity for sustainable small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs’) development by employing the ordinary least squares (OLS) regression and propensity score matching (PSM) techniques to alleviate the selection bias and endogeneity issue on Word bank enterprise survey (WBES) cross-sectional firm-level data of 3,196 Bangladeshi SMEs for 2007–2013 period. Empirical evidence linking access to external finance and labor productivity has been positive and significant. However, our finding explores a negative but significant relationship between exports and SME labor productivity. A further look into the results also exhibits no statistical significance in the interaction effect between firm quality and access to finance on labor productivity. Moreover, the study anticipates novel empirical support that, the disintegration effect of export sales between direct and indirect exports with labor productivity for credit-accessed firms, is also found statistically insignificant. Then, several policies are drawn from the results to gain international competitiveness, and to ensure more external finance channels for enhancing SMEs’ performance and sustainable firm growth.

How Do Green Innovation Strategies Contribute to Firm Performance Under Supply Chain Risk? Evidence From China's Manufacturing Sector

With environmental issues increasingly becoming prominent in today's business world, firms may need to pay extra attention to developing their environmental strategies and capabilities in response to environmental concerns and achieving sustainable growth. While a broad consensus exists on the value of green innovation, current empirical research on how different types of green innovation strategies may account for the international performance of a firm remains scant. Addressing this gap is important because determining how to better manage a firm's green innovation strategies nowadays has become increasingly important for firms hoping to achieve and maintain their sustainable performance advantages. This study aims to bridge this gap by systematically examining how various types of green innovation strategies (i.e., green product, green process, and green service innovations) can be beneficial to firms in an emerging market economy. This study also examined the important role that potential risks of supply chain play in shaping the relationships between various types of green innovation strategies and firm performance. This study proposes that the effective management of supply chain risks may be important to the successful implementation of green innovation strategies because green innovation has increasingly become a collaborative effort. This study empirically tested the hypotheses by gathering survey data from a sample of 337 firms in China's manufacturing industries. Results demonstrate that the green innovation strategies of firms are positively related to their firm performance. Additionally, the potential risks faced by the firms in efficiently and effectively managing their supply chain significantly moderate the impact of green product innovation and green process innovation strategies on their firm performance. This study not only offers useful theoretical implications for the green innovation strategy research and for better and effective supply chain risk management. It also provides important practical guidelines and managerial actions that practicing managers can implement to accelerate their green innovation strategy, assess the effect of supply chain risks, and thus improve firm performance in the post-pandemic era.

COVID-19 Shock, Financial Flexibility, and Hotels' Performance Nexus

This study investigates the nexus of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) shock, financial flexibility (FF), and firm performance (FP) in Taiwan listed hotel firms. Quantile regression (QR) methods were used to analyze the data from Taiwan Stock Exchange listed hotel firms between 2020 Q1 and 2021 Q2. The results evidence that there is an inversed U-shaped linkage between FF and FP for the hotel industry. Additionally, FF has an inverted U-shaped effect on FP for the asset-light hotel firms for all quantiles except the 50th quantile. In addition, FF also has an inverted U-shaped impact on FP for the asset-heavy hotel firms in the 10th and 90th quantiles. A significant finding in this study is that there is a concave non-linear relationship between FF and FP, consistent with the law of diminishing marginal return. That is, with an increase in FF, the FP is on the rise; when FF exceeds the inflection point level, the FP begins to decline. Thus, a firm must ensure that the FF strategy it adopts must be the most efficient and effective, i.e., it must bring the trade-off between costs and benefits. The empirical results highlight the need for the hotel industry of Taiwan to take the rolling adjustment and optimization of FF after the COVID-19 pandemic for long-term sustainability.

The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Firm Performance: An Application of the Resource-Based View to e-Commerce Firms

The application of artificial intelligence (AI) technology has evolved into an influential endeavor to improve firm performance, but little research considers the relationship among artificial intelligence capability (AIC), management (AIM), driven decision making (AIDDM), and firm performance. Based on the resource-based view (RBV) and existing findings, this paper constructs a higher-order model of AIC and suggests a research model of e-commerce firm AIC and firm performance. We collected 394 valid questionnaires and conducted data analysis using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). As a second-order variable, AIC was formed by three first-order variables: basic, proclivity, and skills. AIC indirectly affects firm performance through creativity, AIM, and AI-driven decision making. Firm creativity, AIM, and AIDDM are essential variables between AIC and firm performance. Innovation culture (IC) positive moderates the relationship between firm creativity and AIDDM as well as the relationship between AIDDM and firm performance. Environmental dynamism (ED) positive mediates the connection between AIM and AIDDM. Among the control variables, firm age negatively affects firm performance, and employee size does not. This study helps enterprises leverage AI to improve firm performance, achieve a competitive advantage, and contribute to theory and management practice.

Anti-Corruption Campaign and Firm Financial Performance: Evidence From Vietnam Firms

BACKGROUND

Corruption affects businesses in various ways. Anti-corruption, on the other hand, can improve the institutions of the country as well as business operations. Vietnam, as a socialist-oriented country with an ongoing high-profile anti-corruption campaign, provides us a unique setting to evaluate the impacts of anti-corruption on corporate performance.

OBJECTIVES

We address two questions: (1) what is the effect of anti-corruption on the performance of private-owned firms in Vietnam? and (2) how does anti-corruption influence the performance of firms with state ownership (FSOs) in Vietnam?

RESEARCH DESIGN

To investigate the impact of anti-corruption on performance of firms with different ownership settings, we use the establishment of the Central Anti-Corruption Steering Committee of Vietnam as a quasi-natural experiment for difference-in-differences analysis. We generate treatment effects of private holding and the state block ownership. To validate the findings, we construct a novel news-based anti-corruption index from Vietnamese online newspapers and use it in a robustness test to evaluate anti-corruption's impacts on firm performance.

RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS

We find a positive impact of the anti-corruption campaign on private firms' performance, supporting the social norm perspective of how corruption affects businesses. The empirical results indicate a negative impact of the campaign on FSOs' performance. The findings suggest that anti-corruption benefits private firms via improving the institutional quality of the country while improving the financial transparency of FSOs. Our study provides a method for measuring anti-corruption which is virtually unobservable and absent in the literature. The findings have implications for policymaking in contemporary Vietnam.

Product Market Competition and Firm Performance: Business Survival Through Innovation and Entrepreneurial Orientation Amid COVID-19 Financial Crisis

The product market competition has become a global challenge for business organizations in the challenging and competitive market environment in the influx of the COVID-19 outbreak. The influence of products competition on organizational performance in developed economies has gained scholars' attention, and numerous studies explored its impacts on business profitability. The existing studies designate mixed findings between the linkage of CSR practices and Chinese business firms' healthier performance in emerging economies; however, the current global crisis due to the coronavirus has made product market completion fierce, which ultimately affects business firms' performance. This study focuses on this logical global challenge, investigates the rationale, and examines product-market completion impact on firms' performance operating in the Chinese markets. The study collected data from the annual reports of Chinese business organizations with A-share listing and registered with the database of China Stock Markets and Accounting Research (CSMAR). The study employed a Generalized Method of Moment technique and investigated the connection between product market competition and Chinese firm performance. The empirical analysis of this study highlights the conclusion that market competition positively and significantly affected business firms' performance. This study specified that product market competition play a dynamic and indispensable role in achieving healthier firm performance in the Chinese markets. This study provides valuable insights on practical implications and future research directions for the scholars to draw interesting results with new study models.

Effects of Top Management Team Characteristics on Patent Strategic Change and Firm Performance

Patent strategy is increasingly recognized as a vital contributor in promoting core competitiveness of an enterprise. A top management team (TMT) has been indicated as one of the key factors driving changes in patent strategy. Based on upper echelons theory, this study examines how TMT characteristics, including, team diversity, emotional intelligence, and safety climate, influence enterprise patent strategic change and, hence, the business outcome. The data from 930 top managers in 228 enterprises showed that the changes in patent strategies are significantly influenced by the characteristics of top managers. These aforementioned internal TMT factors have diverse effects on the speed and scope of the enterprise patent strategic change, which in turn affects firm performance in a positive and negative way, respectively.

The Influence of COVID-19 on Entrepreneur's Psychological Well-Being

This research focuses on the influence of COVID-19 on entrepreneurs' psychological well-being (PWB) in China. A start-up's performance is believed to play an important moderating role. This study uses 2 years of tracking data of 303 entrepreneurs from Shandong Providence, China. Based on conservation of resources (COR) theory, this study found that COVID-19 will significantly decrease entrepreneurs' PWB. A start-up's past performance will enhance the negative influence of COVID-19 on entrepreneurs' PWB. This study contributes to the literature on entrepreneurship, COR, and PWB. The findings can also guide entrepreneurs to maintain well-being during the pandemic and post-pandemic era.

The Relationship Between CEO Duality and Business Firms' Performance: The Moderating Role of Firm Size and Corporate Social Responsibility

This study focuses on exploring the relationship between chief executive officer (CEO) duality and firm performance. We focus on how the size and corporate social responsibility (CSR) of firms moderate this relationship. In terms of size, business organizations are of two types: small and large firms. This study uses datasets of listed Chinese business firms included in the China Stock Market and Accounting Research database. It employs a generalized method of moment's technique to explore the connection between CEO duality and the performance of Chinese business firms through double mediation effects. Our empirical analysis showed that CEO duality has a significant negative relationship with firm performance. We also explored the moderating effects of firm size (small and large) and CSR practices on the relationship between CEO duality and improved performance of Chinese firms. Large firms and CSR practices showed significant and positive moderating effects on the relationship between CEO duality and firm performance. Conversely, with CEO duality, small firms showed a negative moderating influence on firm performance. This inclusive model provides valuable insights into how the dual role of the CEO of a firm affected the performance of Chinese firms through the moderating role of CSR practices and firm size for better business performance. The study offers empirical and theoretical contributions to the corporate governance literature. This research framework might help researchers in designing robust strategies to evaluate the effects on firm performance. Researchers may gain helpful insights using this methodology.

Can R&D investment reduce the impact of COVID-19 on firm performance?-Evidence from India

This study examines whether investing in R&D reduces the impact of exogenous shocks like the COVID-19 on stock market performance and accounting performance of manufacturing firms in India. For the sample of listed manufacturing firms, the paper finds that the firms engaged in R&D activities had lower negative cumulative abnormal return than those firms that did not invest in R&D in the pre-pandemic period using multiple event windows. The result suggests that R&D investments can lower value erosion for the shareholders during a severe crisis period. Further, using a difference-in-difference fixed effects model, the study finds that manufacturing firms engaged in R&D activities in the pre-pandemic period exhibited higher return on sales and growth of total income during the pandemic quarter vis-à-vis the non-R&D firms. The favorable accounting performance indicates the possibility of firm-level R&D being associated with the firm's ability to adjust its functioning during a crisis, thereby reducing the effect of the crisis. Finally, the study documents that government intervention to reduce the spread of the virus had a differential impact on firms based on their industry of operation. The findings have implications for investors, corporate managers, and policymakers in India.

Chief Executive Officers Entrepreneurial Orientation, Dynamic Capabilities, and Firm Performance: The Moderating Effect of the Manufacturing Industry

This study explores the implications of CEO entrepreneurial orientation for firm performance through corporate dynamic capabilities. It explores the moderating effects of firm industry type on the above indirect effect. Based on 188 matched sample data collected from vice chief executive officers (CEOs) of Chinese firms, this study found that CEO entrepreneurial orientation was positively related to corporate dynamic capabilities and firm performance and that corporate dynamic capabilities mediated the positive relationship between CEO entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance. Firm industry type moderated the direct effect of CEO entrepreneurial orientation on corporate dynamic capability, and the indirect effect of CEO entrepreneurial orientation on firm performance through corporate dynamic capability. Both direct and indirect effects were stronger in manufacturing enterprises. The findings enrich the CEO entrepreneurial orientation literature by extending the existing knowledge on its underlying mechanism and its impact on firm performance, as well as its boundary conditions.

How CEO Workaholism Influences Firm Performance: The Roles of Collective Organizational Engagement and TMT Power Distance

Based on upper echelons theory, the current study examines how and under what conditions CEO workaholism influences firm performance. Specifically, we propose that CEO workaholism is positively related to collective organizational engagement, which has a subsequent positive effect on firm performance. Top management team (TMT) power distance would moderate the relationship between CEO workaholism and collective organizational engagement in such a way that workaholic CEOs are more likely to stimulate collective organizational engagement when TMTs have a high level of power distance. Findings based on multi-source, multi-wave data from a sample of 122 CEOs in state-owned enterprises and their corresponding TMT members supported the hypotheses. This study is an initial attempt to empirically examine the effects of leader workaholism at the firm level, which answers the call for more research into the intersection of workaholism and leadership and carries implications for organizational management practices.

Entrepreneurial Learning, Self-Efficacy, and Firm Performance: Exploring Moderating Effect of Entrepreneurial Orientation

Although the impact entrepreneurial learning on firm performance has attracted significant attention, a comprehensive understanding by integrating entrepreneurial orientation and individual self-efficacy remain poorly understood. We fill this void by integrating the above variables into a model and examine these relations. Findings from a sample of 411 nascent entrepreneurs support that entrepreneurial learning is positively related to firm performance, and this relationship is fully mediated by entrepreneurial self-efficacy (ESE). We also found entrepreneurial orientation strengthens the positive impact of entrepreneurial learning on ESE. The findings indicate that ESE must be in place to maximize the effect of entrepreneurial learning on performance, and entrepreneurial orientation is an important contingency in shaping entrepreneurial learning's impact on nascent entrepreneur's self-efficacy.

Fiscal policy benefits and green recovery of firms: an experimental exploration of Chinese listed firms in post-Covid-19

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, fiscal policy is an important tool to facilitate green recovery of the economy. This paper uses the low-energy-intensive incentive support policy implemented by the Chinese government as a trial and explores the impact of fiscal policy on the green recovery of firms. Using Chinese listed-firm data from 2019Q1 to 2021Q1, we use the difference-in-differences method to estimate policy effects, leading to several findings. First, our fundamental results show that the government's low-energy-intensive support policy can significantly improve low-energy-intensive firm performance more than that of high-energy-consuming firms, with respect to return on assets, return on equity and Tobin’s Q. Second, regarding the mechanisms involved, our estimation results indicate that the low-energy-intensive support policy works by alleviating financial constraints to improve firm performance. Third, our empirical findings indicate that low-energy-intensive support policy can increase current ratio, liquidity and cash flow, resulting in improved firm financial resources. Finally, the fiscal support policy reduces management and financial costs, thus improving firm performance. Our findings recommend adoption of well-designed fiscal policies in regions where green economic recovery is needed.

How Do Proactive Environmental Strategies Affect Green Innovation? The Moderating Role of Environmental Regulations and Firm Performance

Global warming has gained the attention of researchers and authorities to work on the environmental glitches. Prior researchers highlighted that the industrial sector is more responsible for these environmental glitches. The industrial sector is highly participated for climate change problems. In the light of firm’s sustainable development goals, this study focuses on the proactive environmental strategies for green innovation. Furthermore, this study considers the link amid environmental regulations and green innovation, firm performance, and green innovation. Most importantly, this study applies the moderating role of environmental regulations and firm performance on the link amid proactive environmental strategies and green innovation. The outcomes with ordinary least square, fixed effect, generalized method of moments, and feasible generalized least square presents unique conclusions. This study concluded that firms with proactive environmental strategies are more valuable for green innovation practices. The environmental regulations promote green innovative practices. Similarly, firm performance also encourages the firm for green innovative practices. Importantly, these outcomes suggest that environmental regulations positively moderate the link amid proactive environmental strategies and green innovation. In addition, firm performance also plays positive role for positivity amid proactive environmental strategies and green innovation. These findings are imperative addition into the narrow literature of environmental practices at firm level in Pakistan. Moreover, this study suggests various guidelines and directions for policy makers, owners, governments, and stakeholders as promoting the environmental practices for higher profitability as well as minimizing industrial negative effects.

COVID-19 pandemic and firm performance: Cross-country evidence☆

Using financial data on firms worldwide, we assess the impact of COVID-19 on corporate performance. We show that firm performance deteriorates during the COVID-19 pandemic. The adverse effects of COVID-19 on firm performance are less pronounced in countries with better healthcare systems, more advanced financial systems, and better institutions. Finally, uncertainty avoidance strengthens the adverse effect of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Board attributes and corporate philanthropy behavior during COVID‐19: A case from China

This study examines the relationship between board attributes and corporate philanthropic behavior for combating the COVID‐19 epidemic and stock price fluctuations The results show that the philanthropic behavior has a positive effect on the stock prices; that companies with female leaders are more likely to engage in philanthropic behavior; and that the proportion of female's directors is positively correlated with philanthropic behavior. Additionally, the results show that board size is negatively correlated with philanthropic behavior.

The Moderating Role of Corporate Social Responsibility in the Association of Internal Corporate Governance and Profitability; Evidence from Pakistan

At present, climate and other environmental problems are arising because of the development of the industrial sector at a large level. The industrial sector is supposed to be a major cause of climate change problems that lead to global warming. Therefore, corporate social responsibility (CSR) with the help of corporate governance is an imperative approach to control these social problems. Consequently, in the context of the organizational and management theory, agency theory, and the stakeholder theory, this study focuses on important factors of internal corporate governance such as chief executive officer (CEO) power, the board size, independence, ownership concentration, managerial ownership, and audit quality for improving the profitability of firms. Moreover, this study considers corporate social responsibility as a controlling and moderating factor for firm performance and internal corporate governance. We employed ordinary least square (OLS) for endogeneity testing, fixed effect (FE), generalized method of moments (GMM), and feasible generalized least square (FGLS) on data of Pakistani firms for the period of 2010–2019. The results of this study demonstrate the following outcomes: firstly, all internal corporate governance factors are positively linked with firm performance; secondly, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the most valuable tool for improving profitability. Importantly, this study suggests that all internal corporate governance factors are positively linked with firm performance because of the interactive role of corporate social responsibility (CSR). This study practically contributes to the literature by suggesting the imperative role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) for internal corporate governance, which may help to reduce climate and social problems.

Environmental Orientation, Green Supply Chain Management, and Firm Performance: Empirical Evidence from Chinese Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises

This study investigates the relationship between environmental orientation and firm performance with the mediating role of green supply chain management (GSCM). This study uses a survey questionnaire to collect data from 247 CEOs from Chinese small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Structural equation modeling is used to analyze data and test hypotheses. Empirical results show that internal and external environmental orientations are positively related to the three elements of GSCM, namely, environmental selection, monitoring, and collaboration with suppliers which are also positively related to firm performance. In addition, results show that environmental selection, monitoring, and collaboration with suppliers mediates the relationship between internal and external environmental orientations and firm performance. The findings provide important implications for academic researchers and business managers in planning and implementing environmental strategies. In terms of theoretical implications, this study sheds a new light to current knowledge about the effect of environmental orientation on GSCM and firm performance of SMEs. This study also provides empirical evidence to clarify the mediating mechanism of GSCM in the link between environmental orientation and firm performance of SMEs. In terms of practical implications, this study provides knowledge for managers of SMEs to better understand the important role of environmental orientation and green supply chain management. Findings of this study provide knowledge for managers of SMEs to make their business policies better.

Labor Costs, Market Environment and Green Technological Innovation: Evidence from High-Pollution Firms

Emerging economies face the challenge of increasing labor costs but also provide an opportunity to promote environmental governance and green development. Based on the perspectives of impetus and capability, the effects of rising labor costs and market environment on green technological innovation are investigated in this study. The empirical studies used the data of high-pollution firms in China from 2009 to 2018. Results demonstrate that rising labor costs deteriorates high-pollution firm performance, while highly competitive industries are affected more than other industries. Meanwhile, the influence of rising labor costs on green technological innovation has a threshold effect which illustrates an “inversely U-shaped” variation trend with the increase of degree of market monopoly. The labor costs will make biggest impact on the green technological innovation in the moderately concentrated market environment. Basing from these results, this study provides the following suggestions for emerging economies’ green development: Take rising labor cost as an opportunity to advance technological progress to the green direction, establish a sound market competition environment, and develop green finance to reduce the financing constraints of green technological innovation.

Cultural Distance and Firm Internationalization: A Meta-Analytical Review and Theoretical Implications

This paper presents the most comprehensive review and meta-analysis of the literature on cultural distance and firm internationalization to date. We analyze the effects of cultural distance on key strategic decisions throughout the entire process of internationalization. For the preinvestment stage, we examine the decisions on where to invest (location choice), how much to invest (degree of ownership), and how to organize the foreign expansion (entry and establishment mode). For the postinvestment stage, we examine the decisions of how to integrate the foreign subsidiary into the organization (transfer of practices) as well as the performance effects of cultural distance at both the subsidiary and the firm level. We find that firms are less likely to expand to culturally distant locations but if they do, they prefer greenfield investments and integrate subsidiaries more through transfer of management practices. Cultural distance does not seem to affect how much capital firms invest and whether they enter through a joint venture or full ownership. Interestingly, cultural distance has a strong negative effect on subsidiary performance but no effect on the performance of the whole multinational company. In addition, we find that the effects of cultural distance are not sensitive to time, but they are sensitive to the cultural framework used (e.g., Hofstede vs. Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness) and the home country of the company (developed vs. emerging market). Based on our study, we feel confident to offer some theoretical insights, recommendations for improving the validity and reliability of cultural-distance research, and ideas for future research.

Shared vision promotes family firm performance

A clear picture of the influential drivers of private family firm performance has proven to be an elusive target. The unique characteristics of private family owned firms necessitate a broader, non-financial approach to reveal firm performance drivers. This research study sought to specify and evaluate the themes that distinguish successful family firms from less successful family firms. In addition, this study explored the possibility that these themes collectively form an effective organizational culture that improves longer-term firm performance. At an organizational level of analysis, research findings identified four significant variables: Shared Vision (PNS), Role Clarity (RCL), Confidence in Management (CON), and Professional Networking (OLN) that positively impacted family firm financial performance. Shared Vision exhibited the strongest positive influence among the significant factors. In addition, Family Functionality (APGAR), the functional integrity of the family itself, exhibited a significant supporting role. Taken together, the variables collectively represent an effective family business culture (EFBC) that positively impacted the long-term financial sustainability of family owned firms. The index of effective family business culture also exhibited potential as a predictive non-financial model of family firm performance.