Strategic Organization Special Issue on Impact Driven Strategy Research for Grand Challenges

 

Guest Editors:

Amanda Williams, IMD Business School, amanda.williams@imd.org

Gail Whiteman, University of Exeter Business School, g.whiteman@exeter.ac.uk

Judith Walls, University of St. Gallen, judith.walls@unisg.ch

Bill Harley, The University of Melbourne, bharley@unimelb.edu.au

SO Editor: Glen Dowell, Cornell University, gwd39@cornell.edu

Aims and scope

In this special issue, we call for impact-driven strategic organization research that leverage research methods and theory in new ways to concretely result in a measurable impact on societal grand challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, inequality, poverty, and health, among others. By measurable, we acknowledge that there are various ways of measuring impact, including both qualitative and quantitative indicators.

Topics of interest

We are particularly interested in uncommon approaches to combine strategic organization research and impact in rigorous and relevant ways such as action research, ethnography, field experiments, and cases of scientific activism. Through this special issue, we seek to advance research and methodological approaches for positively impacting grand challenges. It is important to identify and share the lessons learned from conducting such research, to identify the pitfalls of combiningresearch with impact, and to establish avenues for future impact-driven research. Articles that explicitly propose new avenues for addressing the methodological challenges of combining research with impact are particularly appealing. We are also interested in articles that draw on organization theory and empirical application in ‘real-world’ settings to suggest radically new ways for impacting the ways in which academia can contribute to the resolution of grand challenges. We encourage contributions that are focused on, but not limited to, the following themes:

• Cases of leveraging strategic organization research to impact grand challenges
• New and improved methods to measure impacts
• A range of impact-driven cases conducted in collaboration with strategic organizations on different kinds of societal, environmental, and economic impact and at different levels of scale
• Field experiments with strategic organizations that leverage uncommon theoretical insights to drive change for grand challenges
• Qualitative or quantitative studies co-designed with strategic practitioners aimed at specific impact-driven outcomes
• Autoethnographic studies that uncover the researcher’s role in driving strategic action or change based on scientific insights
• Autoethnographic or case studies that demonstrate the potential of combining teaching strategy with impact and training future managers of grand challenges
• Autoethnographic or case studies of scientific activism
• Case studies on the use of strategy research to solve real-world grand challenges
• Other innovative and unusual cases of driving impact for grand challenges with strategy research.

 

Timeline and submission instructions

All submissions should be uploaded to the Manuscript Central/ Scholar One website: http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/so between 1 November and 30 November 2022. Once you have created your account (if you do not already have one) and you are ready to submit your paper, you will need to choose this particular Special Issue from the drop-down menu that is provided for the type of submission. Contributions should follow the directions for manuscript submission described on Call for Papers on the Strategic Organization webpage: http://journals.sagepub.com/home/soq. For queries about submissions, contact SO!’s editorial office at strategic.organization@hec.ca. For questions regarding the content of this special issue, contact one of the guest editors.

Here is the link for more information:

https://journals.sagepub.com/pb-assets/cmscontent/SOQ/211026-SO-Call-for-Papers_Impact%20Issue-1635854652.pdf

 

Business & Society Special Issue Call for Papers: "Cross-Sector Partnerships and Socio-Ecological Systems Change: Navigating Tensions between Resilience and Transformation"

 

Submission Deadline: 20 November 2022 

 

Guest editors:

Domenico Dentoni, Montpellier Business School, France
Amelia Clarke, University of Waterloo, Canada
Helen Etchanchu, Montpellier Business School, France
Ralph Hamann, University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business, South Africa 

Martina Linnenluecke, Macquarie University, Australia 

Frank de Bakker, IÉSEG School of Management, France 

 

Full details: https://journals.sagepub.com/pb-assets/cmscontent/BAS/BS-SI-CfP-Partnerships-Socio-Ecological-Systems-1638221137.pdf

 

Paper Development Workshop (PDW)

 

On June 27th, 2022, the Guest Editors will host an online Special Issue PDW integrated to the 8th Cross-Sector Social Interactions (CSSI2022) conference.

To develop ideas and receive feedback on working papers in preparation for submission to this Special Issue, authors can submit either full papers (according to Business & Society author guidelines) or 'wild ideas' (that is, innovative yet not fully fledged ideas presented in the format of a max. 1,000-word extended abstract).
For consideration to this Special Issue PDW, full papers or 'wild ideas' should be submitted via email to Domenico Dentoni (d.dentoni@montpellier-bs.com) by April 30th, 2022.

 

Technological Forecasting and Social Change Special Issue on Digitization and Business Model Innovation in Retailing and Transport: Implications for economic, social, and environmental sustainability

 

Managing Guest Editor

Professor Pejvak Oghazi, Sodertorn University, Stockholm, Pejvak.oghazi@sh.se

 

Guest Editors

PD Dr. Maximilian Palmié, University of St. Gallen, maximilian.palmie@unisg.ch

Professor Mats Bergman, Sodertorn University, Mats.bergman@sh.se

Dr. Rana Mostaghel Mälardalen University, Rana.mostaghel@mdh.se

Lucas Miehé, Copenhagen Business School, lmi.si@cbs.dk

 

In order to enhance the economic, social, and environmental performance of firms and ecosystems in times of digitization as well as the economic, social, and environmental sustainability of the retail and transport sectors as a whole, this special issue calls for studies of traditional retail and transport firms, new entrants into the retail and transport sectors, and other key actors in their ecosystems. Relevant questions include, but are not limited to the following examples:

 

• Does digitization alleviate previous trade-offs and create synergies among firms’ economic, social, and environmental performance? If so, how? Does it create new trade-offs?
• How does digitization affect the interdependencies and relationships of firms in retail and transport ecosystems? What are new business models for firms in these ecosystems and what are new business models for such an ecosystem as a whole?
• What business models allow retailers to gain a competitive advantage from incentivizing manufacturers to produce more environmentally friendly products and from incentivizing customers to buy these products? What role does digitization play in such business models?
• Selling consumers more and more products that they hardly ever use can be detrimental from an environmental perspective. What business models allow online retailers to perform well economically without selling more and more products?
• Since digital retailing may favor network effects and “winner-takes-all” tendencies (Gawer, 2014): What are promising business models for players that do not dominate the market (e.g., new entrants, late followers)?
• What strategies allow firms which entertain business relationships with the dominant enterprises to operate profitably in the long run?
• Under which context conditions are business models that do not seek enormous market shares and network effects (e.g., business models driven by niche strategies) more or less viable?
• Business model archetypes, including archetypes of digitally-enabled business models, are not implemented homogenously across firms. Rather, firms need to make certain “design choices” when they implement a given business model archetype (Palmié et al., 2021). These design choices “allow firms to go beyond a ‘one size fits all’ [… business model archetype] and to adapt it” to their specific needs and clients (Palmié et al., 2021, p. 10). What are prominent design choices that firms can make to adopt specific business model archetypes in retail and transport (such as “online-retail platform” or “Mobility-as-a-Service”) to their individual situation and thereby increase their economic, social, and environmental performance?
• Some elements of digital business models in retail and transport may appeal to customers, but may neither be economically sustainable nor environmentally sustainable. An example are free returns in online shopping, which tend to entail higher costs than returns for the seller and increase the number of items that customers send back (Patel et al., 2021). Related to the above notion of “design choices” (Palmié et al., 2021), firms may be able to implement a specific element of digital business models in different ways (for the example of return management, see Hjort et al. [2019]). How do different approaches to implementing specific business model elements vary in their economic, social, and environmental implications and how do they affect the trade-offs and synergies among the three sustainability dimensions?
• What elements of retail and transport business models should not be digitized to avoid economic, social or environmental backlashes? When are business models combining physical and digital activities superior to purely digital activities in retail and transport? What are the limits to digitization? What non-digital business model innovations allow retail and transport firms to compete successfully in the era of digitization?
• How can retail and transport companies use digital technologies to collect information on social and environmental sustainability (e.g., on fair working conditions in their supply chain or on efforts to minimize their CO₂ footprint)? What adaptations to their business model allows them to make the most of such information?
• When do “managing for stakeholders” approaches (Bridoux & Stoelhorst, 2014; Harrison et al., 2010) bestow a competitive advantage upon retail and transport firms in the era of digitization?
• How does digitization affect employees in the retail and transport sectors? When and how do firms with a digital business model achieve a competitive advantage from treating their employees better than usual?
• What digitally-enabled business models improve the availability or accessibility of products and services to consumers whose access to these products or services was seriously limited in the past (e.g., people with special needs, consumers with low income)?
• How do the opportunities and challenges that digitization in retail and transport pose for social enterprises, non-profit organizations, and hybrid organizations (e.g., Saebi et al., 2019; Santos et al., 2015) differ from the opportunities and challenges that it poses to “traditional” firms? How can social enterprises, non-profit, and hybrid organizations leverage these opportunities and how can they respond to these challenges?
• What effect do smart city initiatives (Friedrich et al., 2021) have on business model innovation in retail and transport? How do digital business models in retail and transport differ across different geographical contexts? Do these business models yield different social and environmental implications in different cities, states, or countries? If so, why? What actions can local and national governments and non-governmental stakeholders take to improve the social and environmental performance of these business models?

We encourage scholars to adapt these questions and pose further questions as they see fit with the theme of this special issue. This special issue is not limited to specific research methods.

 

Important dates

The timeline of this special issue is as follows:

• Submission dates: December 1^st, 2021 — August 1^st, 2022
• Review process: On a rolling basis from December 2021 to October 2022
• Papers revisions are due December 15, 2022.
• Publication: This is a VSI; accepted papers will be published online immediately once accepted and included in the next available issue of the journal.

 

Here is the link for more information: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/technological-forecasting-and-social-change/call-for-papers/digitization-and-business-model-innovation-in-retailing-and-transport-implications-for-economic-social-and-environmental-sustainability

 

ASAC 2022 Conference, Stronger together – 3-7 June, Nova Scotia (hybrid)

In partnership with the Rowe School of Business at Dalhousie University, the Administrative Sciences Association of Canada invites you to submit a paper, work-in-progress, case, symposium or workshop proposal to the 2022 ASAC conference.

 

Submission deadline: Friday, March 4, 2022 at midnight. To submit and for submission guidelines, criteria and policies, visit ASAC.ca. Stronger Together: Building sustainable local and global partnerships for a better future Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, our lives and how we do business has ultimately changed forever. The shift to online and virtual spaces in support of public health has forced us all to find new ways of connecting and doing business. While the end of public health measures does not appear imminent, we have all come to realize a new normal, elements of which may well endure into the post-COVID world. With this global shift, along with growing social, economic, environmental and political tensions worldwide, there is a significant need to partner, collaborate, and navigate through the issues together. As business academics, we have an important role to play in facilitating meaningful partnerships built on a foundation of knowledge and truth. Partnerships can take many forms. At ASAC 2022, we invite you to join the conversation on what it means to be stronger together and how we can build sustainable partnerships locally and globally to support a better future.

Here is the link for more information:

https://asac.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/ASAC-2022-CALL-FOR-PAPERS-APPEL-A%CC%80-COMMUNICATIONS.pdf

 

1st Latin American Symposium on Sustainability – 22-24 August, Curitaba

In August/2022 PUCPR-Brazil and HAW-Germany will host in Curitiba-Brazil the 1^st Latin American Symposium on Sustainability – LASS. After COP 21, all attention is focused on proposals and solutions around sustainability in its most different aspects. How about sharing what you are doing or studying in a discussion and learning environment? So come join LASS! We hope to have a great face-to-face event with interesting people from all over the world. Be sure to visit our link: https://www.lassustainability.com/.

 

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Lucrezia Nava
University of Cambridge - Judge Business School
Barcelona
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