The Effects of Organizational Socialization and Leadership Behavior on Burnout

The relationship between organizational socialization (Training, Understanding, Coworker Support, and Future Prospects) and leadership behavior (Monitor, Producer, Consideration for Others, and Trust in Others) and burnout (Emotional Exhaustion and Personal Accomplishment) were explored and discussed in this chapter. Data were collected from 341 Chinese manufacturing workers in Southern China. Results revealed that organizational socialization was highly and negatively correlated with Emotional Exhaustion, but highly and positively with Personal Accomplishment. Monitor, Consideration, and Trust were highly and negatively correlated with Emotional Exhaustion, but all the four leadership behaviors were highly and positively correlated with Personal Accomplishment. Regression revealed Training and Monitor to be significant predictors of Emotional Exhaustion, and Understanding, Coworker Support, and Trust explained significant variance of Personal Accomplishment. Management implications are discussed, and future research is indicated.

Corporate Social Responsibility, Stakeholder Perception, and Firm Performance

In the present-day business landscape characterised by global competition, demanding customers and depleting natural resources, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become an important strategy for corporations for creating competitive advantage. CSR involves a corporation's commitment to align performance (revenue growth and profit) motives with fulfillment of social, ethical, community and environmental obligations. Researchers have found a positive correlation between stakeholder perceptions of firm's CSR performance and financial performance, assuming other factors as constant. In this chapter we study the effect of stakeholder perception of a firm's CSR on the performance of the firm, based on analysis of Wal-Mart's performance from 2001 to 2011. We found that seemingly significant negative perceptions of CSR activities of corporations result in lower performance of the firm. Once formed, changing negative perceptions of stakeholders is often difficult and the effort needed involves considerable amount of resources with questionable outcomes. This study has come to the conclusion that being a good ‘Corporate Citizen' and creating positive stakeholder perceptions is a better strategic approach for firm's continuing success.

Role of Entrepreneurship in Networked Indian Economy

Historically, all societies may have a constant supply of entrepreneurial activity, but that activity is distributed unevenly. Urban areas are favourable for innovative entrepreneurship, as a result of economies of density and the opportunities created by the city as a nucleus of a broader network. Thus, a modem entrepreneur tends to become increasingly a network operator and manager. The purpose of this chapter is to contribute to our understanding on entrepreneurship in networked economy of India; thereto the literature is summarized from the perspective of geographical seedbed conditions and network constellations. It focuses on the role played by small firms and entrepreneurship. The constraints are identified, and the areas that need action are highlighted. It is also suggested that in the age of liberalization and globalization, any attempt at creation of a competitive environment in the country would need to explicitly note the emerging global production and knowledge networks.

Sustainable Community Enterprises in Thailand

In this chapter, a method is described that has been developed working with local village communities in Thailand to create sustainable community enterprises principally based on local knowledge and resources. Characteristics of local communities in Thailand are described, before research methodology and the approach used is discussed. The importance of incorporating local intellectual capital is noted. A community enterprise learning model developed and validated using case study work carried out in the Central Region of Thailand is described. The community learning process has been evaluated and refined. The work may be more generically applicable, and can form the basis for a broader co-operation with similar groups conducting studies in other countries. The success of this work relies on personal contact, however new technologies can be employed to support and upgrade the entire activity.

Manifestation of Ethical Consumption Behaviour through Five Precepts of Buddhism

Consumption is an essential everyday process. By very nature, it is a means of expressing our moral identities and an outlet for ethical obligations. In more recent years, ethical aspects of consumption have come under greater scrutiny with the emergence of ethical consumption discourses, and are currently associated with a range of consumer behaviours and responsible business practices. To this end, religion is considered an undeniably powerful and concurrently the most successful marketing force that can shape the ethical behaviour, yet under-investigated in consumption practices despite the Corporate Socially Responsibility provoked ethical behaviour. Ethical consumption practices are regularly characterised as consumption activities that avoid harm to other people, animals or the environment where basic Buddhist teachings become more pertinent and practiced in Buddhist communities. This Chapter aims to conceptualise the importance of religious beliefs in ethical consumer behaviour and present the findings of a study that explored whether and how ethical consumerism is reflected through Five Precepts of Buddhism [i.e. (1) abstain from taking life, (2) abstain from stealing, (3) abstain from sexual misconduct, (4) abstain from false speech, and (5) abstain from intoxicants that cloud the mind]. The content of the Chapter contributes to the theory and teaching in the marketing discipline by linking how religious beliefs enhance ethical consumerism that remains largely unexplored.

Technology and Innovation

This chapter deals with the speed to market as one of the most important competitive advantages in nowadays' markets. Responsiveness requires information sharing among all members across the supply chain and thus how to facilitate channel coordination is a major problem to address. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems have been employed to deal with this issue by re-engineering the supply chain. This Chapter addresses the issue of guanxi creation that is inherently based on an individual's knowledge and social networks to the technological implementation in the Chinese firm. An ERP system, that is based on access to technological networks based on Western business culture leading to potential conflict if implemented without cultural sensitivity as China is based on social business networks. There is a need to balance these two networks if harmony and business success is to be achieved.

Strengthening Sustainability through the Lenses of Corporate Social Responsibility Concept

The term “Corporate Social Responsibility” has gained lot of momentum in the last few decades. Carroll's pyramidal model has made significant contribution to the debate by categorizing corporate social responsibility into four broad dimensions: Economic, Legal, Ethical and Philanthropic. This paper looks into different dimensions of corporate social responsibility and tries to deconstruct its primary motive. Through the scanning of literatures on the definitions of corporate social responsibility concept, this paper tries to understand the focus of such an attempt. It then takes the help of qualitative in-depth interview methodology to understand what the corporate managers in India across sectors feel about corporate social responsibility. This leads to convergence of literature review and in-depth interview findings benefiting both academic and corporate world. The findings suggest that although companies seem to accomplish such responsibility for societal purposes, the ultimate objective is an economically viable model which leads to the sustainability of a corporate organization.

Role of Technology Options for Financial Inclusion

Financial services have a ubiquitous need however the urban rich have easy and universal access with wider options, compared to the low-income group who are forced to accept informal, expensive and riskier means to fulfill their financial needs. The demand and supply of financial services for the poor is imbalanced, with supply being acutely constrained by lack of viability and sustainability of current business models. Technology and IT has a pivotal role in making financial inclusion a viable reality. Technology, including information technology can enable lowering costs by increasing automation, enhancing efficiency, enabling scaling up through uniformity, consistency and security. Multiple technology choices are available to financial service providers but few have been proven yet. This chapter is based on available front end and back end technology options for financial inclusion. Further, it describe the role of front end and back end technology options in Indian context.

Business Sustainability from the Perspective and Management of Malaysian Retrenchment Laws

The chapter is based on the analysis of the relevant statues on retrenchment in Malaysia and criterion based sampling of the Court awards to analyze the cases and to provide recommendations to practitioners. Findings from these cases analyses reveal that many of the retrenchment awards were made against the employers due to the handling of the retrenchment exercise itself which violated the relevant statutes and the established procedures. The author suggests that retrenchment should not be viewed as a reactive but a proactive exercise aligned with the organizational strategic plan. The retrenchment exercise should be seen as a last resort when other measures have been exhausted. The author hopes with many proactive measures, the number of unfair retrenchment claims made to the Industrial Relations Department will be reduced. This will eventually improve or maintain the harmonious employment relations.

Postgraduate Students' Perceived E-Learning Acceptance Model Validation Using SEM Method

E-Learning is a method of delivering knowledge using information technology and electronic media for the remote users. The advantages of E-Learning method can be fully achieved with the postgraduate studies. Because, majority of the postgraduate students are engaged in learning while they are working and also geographically dispersed due to the family and work life thus physically appearing for the lecture sessions are rather difficult to them. The Technology Acceptance Model identifies how user accept a new technology. Therefore, this chapter attempts to develop a framework to measure the postgraduate students' perceived technology acceptance by developing an extended version of the Technology Acceptance Model. Hence, the original Technology Acceptance Model is modified and 200 postgraduate students were selected from Sri Lanka to validate the model. The structural regression was accepted based on the model fitting criteria. Thus, this model can be used by the future researchers and can be tested in other contexts. Also this model can be further modified by adding more variables.