Knowledge that Transforms

The sudden passing of Alan Rugman has abruptly cut short the academic career of one of the most prominent, contemporary international business (IB) scholars. Alan was one of the 10 most cited researchers in IB and an influential advisor on international business strategy issues to both businesses and governments. During his distinguished academic career Alan has published numerous journal articles, book chapters and books that represent a tremendous reading list for aspiring IB researchers. To acknowledge Rugman's scholarly contribution, we have invited two teams of leading IB scholars to engage in a Point – Counterpoint (PCP) discussion, providing a constructive dialogue associated with Rugman's work and its implications for the IB and management research fields. In this introduction to the PCP, we first highlight Rugman's core contributions to IB studies. Subsequently, we summarize the core arguments of the Point and Counterpoint articles. Finally, we reflect on the implications of this PCP for future research in the areas of international business strategy and its connection with other research streams. One of Alan's main contributions to research on multinational enterprises (MNEs) has been his exploration of their strategies in terms of geographic scope, in addition to technological scale. More specifically, he studied the spatial dispersion of MNE supply chains, as reflected in the distribution of these firms’ assets and sales across borders. Beginning with the work of Levitt (1983), considerable research in international management and strategy has been based on the implicit assumption that the largest MNEs compete for global dominance and do so by operating on a global scale. Early research on global expansion builds on the assumption of MNEs commanding ‘non-location-bound’ firm-specific advantages (FSAs). These FSAs can be stand-alone ones such as R&D outputs and brand names, or higher-order ones, such as managerial routines and capabilities allowing recombining extant knowledge with newly accessed resources in host countries. In their critique of these over-simplified assumptions Rugman and Verbeke (1992) argued that many MNE FSAs are actually location-bound, and deployable/exploitable in a limited geographic space only. Operating successfully in host countries by being nationally responsive thus requires creating new location-bound FSAs. This line of argument was further explored in more recent papers by Alan and his research collaborators. Using detailed firm-level evidence, Rugman and Verbeke (2004) documented that even the very largest MNEs undertake significant operations in at most two of the three major economic regions of the world (North America, Europe and Asia). In other words, despite describing their own strategies as ‘global’, many MNEs are actually home-region based or bi-regional, but certainly not global in the sense of having a balanced distribution of their sales and assets across the globe. The lack of globalization appears to be even stronger for multinational service firms than for manufacturing firms, both in terms of geographic sales and asset distribution (Rugman and Verbeke, 2008). This work has emphasized the importance of the regional dimension in the context of MNEs, and it has set in motion an important debate in the IB, international entrepreneurship and strategic management fields regarding both the theoretical and empirical foundations of international management and strategy. It complements another major research tradition (also highlighted in the pages of JMS) that points to the key role of local context (Meyer et al., 2011), and the well-known integration-responsiveness (I-R) model, which emphasizes the importance of linking the local to the global. The question then arises as to whether the notion of global strategy has any theoretical or empirical content. Researchers involved in this debate have drawn on a diverse range of theoretical frameworks going beyond Dunning's ‘eclectic’ paradigm. As a result, the IB discourse has been considerably enriched by inclusion of regional studies with specific conceptual angles grounded in economics, regional studies, resource-based-view theory, resource-dependency theory, governance research and institutional theory. This debate has not only proven to be a fertile ground for the existing conceptual conversations in the MNE domain, but it has also become an important platform for further theory development in IB as a research field. In these two Point-Counterpoint papers, the authors address key theoretical and empirical foundations of the divergent views on the drivers of MNE strategic decisions, and suggest possible avenues for theory building that are important not only for IB scholars but also a wider community of management researchers. In the Point article, Verbeke and Asmussen follow Alan Rugman in emphasizing the merits of considering a regional perspective on the internationalization, organization, and management of the firm. It discusses how the concept of regional strategy emerges from – and is informed by – different conceptual perspectives, including internalization theory; theory of economic geography; resource-based thinking in strategic management; and the broader academic work on the importance of distance (in particular geographic, cultural, and institutional distance). In the intersection among these fields, Verbeke and Asmussen address a number of important questions such as: Which additional transaction costs do firms incur as soon as they cross regional boundaries and how should these costs be managed or mitigated?; What factors (internal and external to the firm) ultimately determine whether MNEs can assemble and orchestrate the necessary resources to be successful across different regions and how does this shape the cross-border rivalry among firms?; How do firms take into account transaction costs, resource characteristics and distance dimensions when searching for an optimal geographic scope and organizational structure? The article provides an overview of recent empirical evidence on these questions, illuminating the ‘non-global’ nature of international business, and discusses the managerial implications of these questions and findings. It also points to the avenues for future research that these questions and findings entail. The authors explore modern micro-foundations of management, especially aspects of ‘bounded rationality’ and ‘bounded reliability’ and the related difficulties of managing the innovation process across regions, and they suggest a number of novel extensions with regard to the theory of regional strategy, organizational structure, and management. In the Counterpoint paper, Mudambi and Puck suggest that the arguments and findings presented by the ‘regional strategy’ literature do not capture the full array of global activities of the multinational enterprise. They argue that the regional strategy literature provides a rather narrow interpretation of transaction cost theory and resource based view of the firm by overly focusing on geographical location of downstream activities, while disregarding the location of knowledge creation and other relevant upstream activities in the MNE. In addition, prior studies often associate the firm's value creation only with its internalized activities and do not capture the value created through any activities that are externalized. Using a range of theoretical arguments and illustrative case studies, Mudambi and Puck argue that it is important to holistically incorporate the workings of global value chains (GVCs) inside and outside a firm's boundaries. In terms of the ‘regional-global’ debates, the two papers relate to a number of fast-growing research streams in the IB, organizational theory and strategic management fields to highlight the relevance of regional and global phenomena for internationalization strategy. This includes the impact of the corporate governance parameters of MNEs and their effects on the balance between regional and global internationalization decisions (building on the past theoretical debate in the JMS related to governance of MNEs, Filatotchev and Wright, 2011) as well as the relevance of global scale- and scope effects to recover costs of innovation (e.g., Levitt, 1983). The papers highlight key avenues for future theoretical and empirical research that may bring together local, regional and global perspectives in novel theoretical frameworks. We see a number of important connections between the theoretical debates highlighted by the two papers and various domains in management and business research, including corporate governance, business ethics and organizational theory. The global environment in which multinational corporations (MNEs) operate dramatically increases the complexity of the governance challenges and ethical dilemmas confronting MNEs and their leaders, as well as the diversity of stakeholders whose interests must be considered. However, traditional, agency-grounded studies of corporate governance are free of spatial dimensions by largely focusing on the firm's operations in its local market. In the context of corporate governance research, Filatotchev and Wright (2011) indicate that since the firm's degree of internationalization is an important determinant of the complexity it faces, MNE strategy will depend on its ability to deal with information asymmetries and the potential agency conflicts associated with overseas ventures. Therefore, there is a need to extend our understanding of governance issues in MNEs to embrace strategy and knowledge dimensions together with contextual issues, such as location preferences explored by Verbeke and Asmussen in the Point article. Different knowledge and risk preferences of managers and shareholders may lead to differences in their strategic objectives, leading to a need for a complex governance contract to align their interests rather than governance structures that solely focus on minimizing the costs of effecting a transaction. Therefore, the complexities associated with ‘local-regional-global’ dimensions of international business strategy may have significant relevance in terms of governance theory building. Further, in their paper Mudambi and Puck argue that despite the fact that elements of the value chain may be external, many stakeholders may attribute those parts of the chain to the MNE. The MNE therefore assumes liability and risk for these externalized activities, in particular in the context of ethical leadership and corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this regard, Filatotchev and Stahl (2015) point out that MNEs face a perennial dilemma: how to balance the need for global consistency in CSR approaches and ethical standards across the organization with the need to be sensitive to the demands and expectations of a diverse set of stakeholders spread across the globe? Building on the framework of ‘transnational CSR’, the authors provide a systematic mapping of CSR approaches in MNEs, highlight the tensions between globally integrated and locally adapted CSR strategies, and discuss the constraints that they impose on MNE activities at both headquarters and subsidiary levels. By focusing on integration/coordination advantages versus localization/responsiveness advantages when analysing CSR decisions at both headquarters and subsidiary level, the authors’ analysis shows the cost-benefit trade-offs associated with the interaction of these advantages at the local, regional and global levels. This suggests that issues raised in the two papers may have important implications in terms of considering not only economic but also ethical aspects of business strategy. More specifically, various challenges associated with the global-regional dilemma identified by Verbeke and Asmussen can have not only transactional dimensions but also significant implications in terms of organizational legitimacy vis-à-vis different types of stakeholders. For example, an unexplored issue is whether social and ethical norms converge on the regional level to the extent that MNEs can build legitimacy regionally, as opposed to either globally or locally. Further, Mudambi and Puck argue that externalized relationships within GVCs are frequently much less ‘loose’ than one may expect and need to be actively managed by the MNE. While in most cases the MNE is not connected to its partner via any kind of equity-based agreement, the two are intertwined at arm's length. This creates an important area of research that does not only acknowledge that MNEs reflect a network of one headquarters and a set of semi-independent subsidiaries, but also takes into account that MNEs themselves are embedded in a broader network of inter-firm relationships, which might substantially impact the MNE's ability to create and appropriate value. Within the strategic management literature, the relational view perspective (e.g., Dyer and Singh, 1998; Madhok and Tallman, 1998) has emerged as a solid theoretical foundation to better understand why some firms are more able to generate relational rents in external networks. Applying such theoretical framing can help international business scholars to assess the ability of MNEs to realize sustained competitive advantage when engaging in GVCs. At the same time, strategic research on the phenomenon of inter-firm collaboration might substantially benefit from the insights that have emerged out of international business research. Focusing on the external network of partners, research on inter-firm collaboration tends to pay limited attention to the internal structure of firms, even when MNEs are considered. Examining how the internal structure of MNEs (e.g., geographical and cultural distance between subsidiaries, nature of subsidiary-headquarters relationship, intensity of collaboration between subsidiaries) influences their external partnerships therefore is an important avenue for future research. Existing insights from international business are a viable starting point for such novel research endeavours. In conclusion, the two papers of this PCP identify theoretical commonalities but also highlight potential tensions between the ‘regional-global’ perspectives. By integrating complementary aspects of business strategy within the context of MNEs, these papers help to develop theoretical foundations for future research on the strategy and governance of MNEs. The two papers have a high degree of relevance and implications for management practice, since both the MNEs and national governments need to have a clear understanding of the costs, benefits and potential efficiency and regulatory trade-offs associated with different types of strategies. By publishing these two papers JMS not only acknowledges Alan Rugman's significant contribution to IB research, but it also recognizes that his legacy provides an important building block for essentially inter-disciplinary theory development that combines key elements of IB research with general management studies.

The Journal of Management Studies has a long history of publishing qualitative research. In recent years, a number of other journals have sought actively to attract more qualitative papers and it would appear that the proportion of qualitative papers in leading journals has increased (Bluhm et al., 2011). Nonetheless, it is widely recognised in the field that quantitative research remains the norm, and in some sub-disciplines would appear to be becoming even more dominant, with positivist methodology and conceptions of rigour more-or-less taken for granted as the preferred approach (Harley, 2015). A dilemma facing qualitative researchers is how to publish their work in leading journals, which demand very high levels of methodological rigour, without losing what is distinctively valuable about qualitative methods. In his contribution to this Point-Counterpoint, Joep Cornelissen suggests that an increasingly popular approach has been for qualitative researchers to produce papers which seek to mimic the style of quantitative papers. He argues that this commonly takes the form of analysis in which the rich and detailed data from qualitative studies is reduced to a series of ‘factors’. Cornelissen's concern is not with the method per se, but with its implications for theory building. He argues that method and theory are inextricably linked and that by adopting this kind of approach, qualitative scholars are led toward linear cause-effect theorising of the kind usually associated with quantitative work. For Cornelissen, the danger of this trend in methods is that it undermines the ability of qualitative work to provide the kind of rich, detailed explanatory theorising which is its hallmark. In his Counterpoint piece, Patrick Wright also accepts that qualitative scholars face difficulties in publishing their work in leading management journals. Adopting a view of theory and method consistent with positivism, he argues that theoretical progress takes place as theories are developed, refined and empirically tested. A necessary part of this is measurement. If concepts cannot be measured, then their reliability and validity cannot be tested, and theory cannot be built on a rigorous empirical basis. From Wright's perspective, quantification of qualitative data might help scholars in addressing their reliability and validity challenges and subsequently increase the probability of publishing in leading management journals. He concludes by arguing that the biggest obstacle to theoretical progress is a lack of meaningful dialogue between scholars working in different methodological traditions and he proposes ways of increasing such dialogue. Taken together, these papers present two very different accounts of the obstacles to theoretical progress in management studies. The two accounts reflect fundamentally different understandings of theory, methodology and the links between theory and method. They demonstrate the profound ways that our ontological and epistemological assumptions shape our views on the right way forward for management studies and we feel sure that they will stimulate ongoing debate about developments in qualitative research. Although Cornelissen and Wright provide clearly different perspectives, they agree on the need for establishing more connections between different research communities. We hope that our journal, emphasizing an inclusive ethos and having a tradition in publishing papers from different perspectives, can play an important role in stimulating and nurturing connections across different research traditions. We are convinced that publishing a wide variety of high-quality papers, applying different approaches and perspectives, allows for a richer theoretical understanding of particular phenomena. We therefore hope that our journal can continue functioning as a meeting place for different approaches and perspectives.

At 6pm on 16 December 2014 while sat at my kitchen table and slowly marking 500+ exams I received a call from my cardiologist. As expected, the various tests I had completed all proved to be normal. However, a cardiac CT scan had surprisingly identified a rare and life-threatening anomaly. It seemed I suffered from a condition which occurs in less than one per cent of the population and could (though might not) lead to me becoming a victim of sudden cardiac death. Open heart surgery beckoned five weeks later. I was not seriously ill before my surgery; tests were sparked by a single fainting episode and a low heart rate detected via an App. Neither the cardiologist nor my 47 year-old self expected such an outcome. Open-heart surgery is serious business, recovery takes about six months to be on the right side of ‘normal’ and another six before you are ‘fully’ recovered. Thankfully, long-term prognosis is excellent and I have recently been discharged from the cardiologists’ care. What then was my experience of returning to work after a lengthy absence? Here, I provide an intimate introspective account and hope it provides food for thought for future managerial research in the health and well-being arena. It should be noted that an income protection policy meant I did not have to worry about money during my absence from work, a privilege that is not afforded to many others with long term illness. First, before a discussion of returning to work it's important to highlight what my relationship with work was like before my illness. A snapshot of the five week period before open heart surgery offers a clear indication of how work has always received top priority in my life. After the cardiologist phoned with the news of surgery, I made my kids their tea and then went back to grading exams. I finished grading and all the other horrible messy jobs involved with the exams process and let co-authors, students and other colleagues know of my impending absence. It embarrasses me to admit that one of the first things I thought about when I realised surgery was imminent was to rue the fact that my first research-only semester after five years of significant managerial positions would now no longer happen. The morning I left for hospital my husband literally dragged me away from the computer as I hit send on a reference for a part-time PhD student. One of my last acts before surgery was to see that my email out of office was working properly. I wish this was a joke, but sadly it isn't. Would anyone have complained if I had said I was not emotionally capable of marking 500+ exams? This was a question I actually did not consider. It simply never occurred to me not to grade and if it had I'm sure I would not have passed on such a significant work-load to colleagues during the busy exam marking season. Why on earth did I not spend every waking hour with my family instead? It was certainly not good for my well-being to work incredibly long hours before life-saving surgery, but I never considered other options. Why did I have such a strong work-ethic, would others in my position have had a similar response and what are the implications of this for our understanding of health and well-being in the work-place? What happens when a workaholic can no longer be or no longer wants to be a workaholic and what impact does presenteeism have on employees’ health? Three months into my recuperation, I received a detailed letter from HR which opened with ‘we're sorry to hear you've been unwell’. The body of the letter made no reference to my illness, but rather, included copious information on requirements and details about financial (dis)entitlements and how to claim them. It was overwhelming, confusing and sent me into a state of panic (not good for someone who has recently received open heart surgery). Eventually, I asked my husband to ‘bin it’ on the assumption that at some point HR would write again and I would be better able to cope with the form filling, which of course was the case. The next step in coming back to work was just shy of six months post-surgery and involved visiting a university appointed GP who was to determine my fitness to return. Reassurances from my own care providers were not acceptable, even though the appointed GP asked if my cardiologist was happy to approve my return. After a brief five minute chat, I was declared fit enough to go back to my job. It became clear that the appointed GP's role was to ensure that the university was following necessary procedures, but they were not interested in my health or well-being beyond this. The HR process meant that my HR function went through a set of procedures to ensure I was fit for work – ironically these procedures were woefully inadequate. While I told the university appointed GP I felt able to resume my job, this was far from the truth. In reality I did not feel either physically or mentally ready to return, but felt a huge obligation to do so. All of the other patients on my cardiac rehab programme had gone back to their jobs, my cardiologist had said I was physically able to return, and I felt somewhat of a fraud and also a failure by saying ‘you know what guys, I can't do this yet’. In hindsight it seems obvious that I returned to work too early, the HR protocols didn't pick up on this, and I struggled on as a consequence. My communication with HR was one that I felt dealt with my illness in the abstract. The HR bureaucracy did not allow members of HR to be interested in the vicissitudes of my life. The HR department was an impersonal bureaucratic machine that was indifferent to me as a person, not because the people in HR didn't care, but because the process did not allow for anything else. From many conversations I have had, it seems my university is far from alone in its approach. Six months after surgery I returned to academia. Having only been absent from work for no longer than a few weeks during my 25 year career and foolishly working throughout my maternity leaves this was my longest period of not working. The journey was an incredibly challenging one. My first day back was in August, I was pleased about this – there would be no students and many colleagues would be on annual leave, thus enabling me to quietly ‘settle’ back in. My vulnerability was exposed before even the opportunity to enter the building arose – I was physically unable to open the very heavy doors and needed to press the disabled button to gain entrance. The impact of this on my emotional well-being was profound. If I couldn't even open the door how on earth would I be able to teach or carry out my research activities? Physical and emotional vulnerabilities were, and still are, a central facet of my well-being. Physical symptoms following open heart surgery include poor concentration, cognition and short-term memory issues – not exactly ideal for an academic. Fatigue is a significant factor also. My first forays entailed real struggles with the mundane – forgetting my username and password allowing access to email and online storage applications such as Dropbox; forgetting the keycodes to the staff common room etc. I even forgot which junction to take exiting the motorway. I was beyond exhausted after finding solutions to simple humdrum problems and had yet to actually do any ‘real’ work. While HR processes existed to ensure I was fit to return to work there were no protocols in place to follow up on how I was getting on – in the 16 weeks since my return no-one from the HR function has been in contact to ask after me, my health or well-being. Even if the protocols had been more effective, I'm not sure they would've allowed me to capture the profound impact not being able to open the door had on me; or how, when entering my office for the first time in many months, I became distraught because the previous view of the car park now housed a partially completed five storey student residence. Tempus fugit hit me like a freight train. I felt as if I were in a bad episode of a reality TV show, left the building to digest the new residences and promptly burst into tears after realising that leaving the building meant that I now had to press the disabled entrance button twice in one day. I wonder how would one capture this experience and emotion in a return to work questionnaire? Somehow ‘on a scale of one to ten how difficult did you find the return to work’ doesn't quite capture it. The university process was insufficent for preparing me for the moment I stood at the door and felt hopeless and overwhelmed, but could any process have been more effective? How do organisations measure trauma when individuals will not know how they will cope with something until it happens? The solitary life of an academic meant I felt completely out of my depth, thrown in at the deep end, and genuinely terrified. The first five colleagues I met were unaware that I had been absent or seriously ill. Since my return, I would guess that approximately half of my colleagues, in a Business School I have worked for nearly 16 years, did not know I had undergone open heart surgery. To say I felt like a very unimportant cog in a very large machine would be somewhat of an understatement. I have asked many friends and co-workers for their take on this lack of knowledge about a serious life-event for one of their colleagues; the response has been mixed. Colleagues have recounted how they had not wanted to talk about my illness to others because it was not their story to share. Friends reminded me that academics are not the most attentive and aware individuals and others pressed home how they deliberately ‘hid’ my illness to protect me from any unneccesary work intrusions while I recuperated. In reality, a combination of these reasons, and probably others too, helps explain a lack of knowledge regarding my personal circumstances. And, of course I now wonder if the shoe had been on the other foot would I have been one of those self-obsessed academics unaware of my colleagues’ health? Why have our private lives become invisible in the workplace? Will it be a case of ‘everyone alone at work’, as discussed in Courpasson's (2016) recent essay in this series? At this juncture I must draw attention to the compassion of some work colleagues. My Dean and Head of Subject Area were incredibly supportive before, during and after surgery. I had considered taking a year's leave of absence and reducing some of my responsibilities following my immediate return was life-changing. A small number of colleagues were a life-line during my recuperation and return to work – from visits to the hospital and my home, social lunches, and for their humour; I could not have survived without their compassion. They played a crucial role along with other friends and family in my recovery. A number of other colleagues sent flowers, cards, texts and messages to get well soon – all of which really mattered, in a way I would not have expected prior to my illness. In fact, many collaborators from around the world were wonderfully supportive. These acts of compassion were informal and voluntary, my colleagues were simply being kind, caring, human beings. Without the human interaction that keeps the organisation going on so many levels, work would have been intolerable. It is the daily experiences of individuals in the work-place which should populate our theories and papers. Without these human interactions will organisations become soulless, taking on an Orwellian façade whereby employees are doomed to a life as one of Philip Larkin's Toads? Human beings are, of course, incredibly complicated – this is what makes us human – and while I found colleagues’ lack of knowledge about my health to be deeply upsetting, others could want extreme privacy about their personal life within the workplace. One contributory factor to both a lack of knowledge and support on my return to work is our ‘time poor’ culture. So many colleagues have mentioned that we should ‘do lunch’ or ‘catch up properly’ when they can ‘find the time’. Being time poor has become a badge of honour in organisations, indeed in life in general. Prior to my illness, I worked an average 58 hour week, and rarely had a weekend when I did not answer emails – I believe I was successful in a senior managerial role as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, but my family and personal life certainly suffered. I am no longer working ridiculously long hours, partly as this would be a physical impossibility and to some extent because, not surprisingly, I've re-evaluated my relationship with work. What strikes me is that, while this re-evaluation will most definitely be good for my happiness, health and well-being, it won't necessarily be good for my ‘economic’ productivity, at least in the short-term. Of course, it could contribute to not suffering in the longer term from the ‘burn-out’ so many do in the contemporary workplace. I've always had an ambivalent relationship with KPIs in education and struggle to understand their purported benefits and this has not changed. I still question the merits of the Association of Business School (ABS) journal rankings and the Research Excellence Framework (REF) (even though I haven't worked in the British system for 16 years). I still question why performative measures are economic ones, even in not-for-profit organisations such as universities. But, now I also question not only the academic merits of these measurements, but the health and well-being implications too. Not conforming to the “new norm” of only publishing 4* and/or FT45 papers (I'm still perplexed as to how universities have allowed a newspaper to determine what our research output should be) or whatever the latest fad is, has certainly impacted my promotion chances. Prior to my surgery, while I made some small unsuccessful attempts at both micro and macro levels to change this, I reluctantly accepted the status quo. Today, I have no intention of changing either what I write about or where I publish and, when I feel able, I will attempt to shout louder about the arbitrary system, but will also be asking my organisation and the university sector to consider what impact the constant need to perform at exceptionally high levels has on health and well-being. What measures will be put in place to protect colleagues, particularly those embarking on an academic career? And will these measures be effective? What then of my future? My work-life balance will, I hope, be changed forever. I am aiming for a balance which works for both my mental and physical health, my personal life and my workplace. It saddens me that it has taken open-heart surgery to realise that my work-life balance was definitely tipped in favour of work. Ultimately this means in terms of university metrics my ‘productivity’ will decrease. Does this bother me? Yes, absolutely. But not enough to work inordinate hours again. I recently listened to a colleague describe how women were not being honoured for their business achievements because they were not (yet) as successful as men. I was apoplectic at this false statement, but while I simply put my hands to my face in horror, another colleague made a reflective comment – perhaps we need to re-define success? In terms of managerial research, the broad questions which need addressing are fundamental ones. Why does so much of the research on health and well-being in organisations focus on the bottom-line? Why, in so much management research, is the underlying assumption if it's not good for business we shouldn't do it? Even in the staggering example of VW's diesel emissions scandal, the initial storylines predominately focused on how much will be wiped off VW's share price rather than how much damage the engine rigging has done to the planet or our health. As Pfeffer (2016) suggests in his essay in this series, does the bottom line always win out? Can research help organisations to transform the workplace to ensure health and well-being are important in their own right, rather than emphasize how they may contribute to the economic success of organisations? The human side of my organisation kept me during my the HR side kept me While the protocols and procedures were and the meant my illness was from colleagues, the informal to my return to health and my to perform my job. Can management research the of the human in organisations, and in the role of the human in health and well-being in the workplace? the years have focused on the of health and well-being in the workplace. However, a of academic since health and well-being research has become a it is this is from a view of the as and this is because there is a lack of research management of the academic research on work-life balance while the the of for both and the in to my own health and well-being it life-saving surgery and a months absence from work to me the to work. The of my job, by an of being always at work, and to and the badge of honour for being busy are difficult to research on colleagues return to work after a lengthy absence is as is significant research on the health implications of I the focus in future health and well-being research should be to the human to the Human well-being should take – this may or not the organisation more But it could lead to and human beings and better to work. It has now been months since I returned to work and this essay has allowed me to on I have to my in terms of not working ridiculously long hours real will, of course, when I am physically able to work long hours, but not I have said more in this than during my colleagues that to me still me I guess I've yet to do with those colleagues who said do and I still colleagues who ask me how my my concentration, cognition and short-term memory are and my is to feel like constant with I have not yet allowed my work email to be on my I still can't open the door to the building without this me but I do which to I've that the of the workplace really me out and not to with one way to do this has been to social at work – this of course means I am in of being at I it's I up every day and about my and while I am not at work I am to it and am that my new relationship with it will be a one. I to the colleagues who in my recovery. And, while this essay details my struggles with the workplace I am very happy to be

The idea that I put forward in this essay is not, in its immediate content, a happy one. The three-year old Aylan Kurdi, lying face down in the sand, on a Turkish beach; the immobile figure of a police officer beside him, like a powerless sentinel. This small body washed up on a beach. Other pictures emerged of the boy with his five-year old brother Galip [also dead], laughing and holding a teddy bear in a pink dress; another with Galip's arm around his brother. These pictures gripped the whole world in early September 2015, for several days. They were ‘extraordinarily powerful images’ (The Independent, 3 September 2015). It appeared like a revelation to each of us that millions of people were trying to escape from their camps, villages, dead places where no future could be invented any more. The image of the boy's body was an emotional shock. Why him? Why now? Surprisingly, these pictures created carnal connections, as if we knew the boys and their family because they acted like any boy: laughing, playing with teddy bears, and… with sand on a beach. But did we really care? Were we feeling true and durable pain and suffering, as if we all were his parents, brothers or friends? Or some ersatz substitute displayed on-line while we continue our studied indifference to the people around us? I think that this unfortunately mundane experience of virtual solidarity can help us to interrogate (again) the genuineness of contemporary emotions and of the gaze we have on each other's destiny: civilized indifference and voyeurism? Genuine solidarity is rare; it is hardly achieved by emotional excitement or empathic attunement, especially on-line, because we are not in others’ skin. At the time of the internet, people often remain hidden behind their screens to express feelings and opinions. They click out and forget what they have done and said with the smell of lunch. They are socially disengaged while spending and/or wasting hours watching videos, sending pictures, answering or asking pointless questions in their ‘social’ networks. Sometimes, they are actually emotionally grasped by an event occurring in a remote place where they will never go, by faces of people they will never meet. Focused on the very image of Aylan, we forgot that hundreds of thousands of children have been dying under the bombs of diverse oppressors for some years in numerous different regions of the world… We tend to physically disappear behind our screens while expressing these emotions in our curious isolation; we are contained and confined by our screens, in the secluded bedrooms or offices where we spend most of our time. The corporeality of Aylan's tragedy contrasts with our curious inclination to prefer, or at least enjoy, virtual relationships. This decorporealization of social relationships has been documented many times, for we are in a social media society where links are strange hybrids between invisible technological connections and deep physical feelings. At the same time, we live in a ‘body-driven’ society, where the peer and societal/media driven pressure to have fit and healthy bodies (you have got to look good!) is greater than ever; moreover, the importance of physical encounters, of corporeal connections remains crucial to any form of social life and media: what grips people is indeed the cadaver of the Syrian boy, the imploring face of another starving child, or the bleeding fighting bull not standing a chance in front of the colourful acclaimed toreador: these are corporeal images. But these are ‘just’ images. Whether we are that gripped by the dying beggar at the corner of our own street is another kettle of fish. Other ‘true’ people may have no true place in the current obsessional struggle to prove oneself, to improve oneself, to measure oneself. In organizations, the story of bodies is pretty much the same; nothing has really changed since Taylor: the Google factory may be more outwardly smiling, more connected, and its offices more colourful too, but it is still designed to constrain bodies to be at work all the time, by mixing up leisure and work, by tying people physically to their workplace. This nicely oppressive factory reproduces a view of the adequate worker as being physically resilient for supporting the long hours that s/he spends at work, which is the exact spitting image of the corporeal Taylorian discipline. Among other consequences, in many corporations, the ‘practice of suicide’ as a personal bodily sacrifice in response to the duress of work and management, as well as the addiction to drugs that modify the physical presence and availability of workers are seldom studied but constitute major social facts. In France, an increase of 25 per cent over the last ten years in the number of employees taking drugs before coming to work, to forget one's fears and always be ‘up to it’, hit the news before being forgotten (Le Monde, 13 April 2012). In Japan, the number of karoshi, literally translated as ‘death from overwork’, mainly from heart attacks or stroke due to stress, is increasing steadily. In China, where the phenomenon is called guolaosi, it was estimated in 2010 that 600,000 people had died this way (Japan Times, 7 January 2013). Suffering bodies at work seem to be part of the contemporary social landscape of work and we organization scholars seem to be quite indifferent to this phenomenon. Indeed, despite these harsh realities of the condition of bodies in the workplace, despite the power of images of dead bodies, organization studies have largely neglected corporeal elements, to the advantage of more subjective and identity-driven accounts of organizational life. They have preferred to focus on the subjective rather than on the physical dimensions of people's experience at work, despite recent efforts to think about the ‘socio-materiality’ of organizations. We scholars also enjoy debating for hours about the emotional power of social media in catalysing movements and political protest. However, many interesting accounts of specific forms of work and occupations contribute to highlight the salience of the corporeal dimension in the accomplishment of work, especially in the tainted and dirty jobs of the factory, as well as in settings such as call centres: contemporary organizations are developing ‘cool factories’ where the work being done is still largely characterized by dirtiness, stigma and/or lack of substantial interest, notwithstanding the above mentioned bodily consequences due to the demands of productivism. In a similar vein, collective action on the internet creates a buzz much more than strikes, blockades or street demonstrations, less crunchy and more traditional practices of protest. However, research also largely demonstrates that the tweet without the street amounts to almost nothing (Gerbaudo, 2012), and that collective protest is all the more powerful as bodies are central in the mobilization (Juris, 2008) and concrete places are occupied. Be they dying, suffering, acting, occupying, shouting and fighting, bodies are decidedly central to many aspects of social and organizational life. So why are we more stimulated by a picture than by the close-by pain of our colleagues to which we are indeed indifferent? This thought came to my mind as I was walking down a busy commercial street in a lively North-American city. Luxurious displays, attractive cafés and pictures of perfect bodies were contrasting with the dirty and unlikely bodies of many people that were either sleeping close to the entrance doors of cheap hotels, silently sitting at the corner of a street, or wandering like sleepwalkers looking for nothing, and talking to nobody but themselves. The contrast was shocking: Brandy Melville little dolls, perfectly waxed and made up in their perfectly fitting blue jeans, and homeless bodies, indifferent to their own dirtiness, stuffed with alcohol and weed. In the midst of all that, a sort of invisible social connection made of civilized indifference, I spotted a young guy in his twenties (I reckon, although he looked older) begging for food. On a sign he had written: ‘help me stay alive, I left my body behind me’. I did not dare ask what he meant. But that brutally reminded me that many workers had been doing exactly the same for decades in the name of work, and many migrants as well, in the name of a promised land: leaving their bodies behind. This is simultaneously a terrifying and mundane statement; and again, quite surprisingly (or not?), we are not that interested in the fate of bodies in organization studies, except to understand their relationship to identities and discipline or erotic dimension [surely because of the influence of Foucault]. This is very annoying: are we actually living in the cities and factories, to see these estranged people from the other side of the society, to listen to the duress of the corporeal life at work, or are we living in a disconnected world; do we have a physical proximity with these people? At times, a fair amount of pity mixes up with something darker, a mental turning away that is justified by the liberal idea of responsibility: these suffering people must have done something wrong to be like that, after all. Or it is simply our lack of time that prevents us from paying attention to the everyday tragedies occurring at work (as well as in the streets and in the sea). But it remains that, as the poet Chaim Nachman Bialik put it: ‘the sun is shining, the acacia is blooming and the slaughterer is slaughtering’ (in Geras, 1998, p. 8). Lamennais points to the gloomy future of societies in which indifference is the most widespread sentiment: ‘The age that is most ailing is not that which is violent on behalf of error, but the age which neglects, which disdains the truth. There is still power, and consequently hope, whenever violent commotions are felt: but when all motion is extinguished, when the pulse has ceased to beat, when a cold chill has reached the heart, what next is to be expected but an approaching and unavoidable dissolution’ (Lamennais, 1895, p. xv). This statement suggests that the problem of indifference is as much corporeal as social: motion and pulse are the key factors of social life. I do think that there is a close relationship between the phenomenon of civilized indifference that I evoke above, and the lack of attention given to bodies [in organization studies], whereas bodies are everywhere in the social media, be they perfect or rotting. Indifference lies at the tension between the sufferings of some people and the blank inaction of others in response. Indifference is fundamentally based on lack or absence of true membership to a group or a community: this absence makes people un-moved by the emergencies of others; we are not Syrians or beggars after all. This is why bodies come to play, because membership is not just about a disembodied collective conscience: it comes to life in members’ bodies (Eliasoph, 2005, p. 160). And it is also why social media are so successful: they allow people to live social relationships behind a veil, a screen of abstraction which separates them from the actual bodies of people they know and do not know. Aylan became ‘our child’ because of the image of his dead body. An exciting and protective image for our conscience but we nevertheless rapidly look away. That cannot be the model of our world. Take the example of a fitness room. Bodies at work, the fleshly companionship that can arise in the course of years of frequent training and suffering side by side under the bars. That simple activity generates bonds that help caring about others, simply helping them to lift a heavier bar and share their contentment! Or think about a workshop in a chemical factory: working by night, this team of seven workers controlling the always uncertain functioning of a machine and of dangerous products flowing in the conduits, trusting the colleague for her ability to fix the problem when the flow is blocked: they need to be two together in their special suits to open the tub and see how it goes… These experiences are conducive to developing carnal connections (Wacquant, 2005). I am not talking about an exalted view of interpersonal fusion in teams, but of a connection that prevents those which experience it from the civilized indifference, a connection that pushes people to not look away because they are incorporating the social structure and see any person as worth the detour. In the closed contexts where we spend most of our lives (offices, bedrooms, shops, cars… fitness rooms) what matters most is people's actions and ‘how they relate to one another in recurrent interpersonal encounters’ (Wacquant, 2005, p. 455). The homeless writing that he left his body behind explains that he is not incorporating the social structure anymore: he is left behind by the social structure, by us. He is not part of any small-scale civilizing machine in the sense of Elias, imposing rules, taboos and strict adherence to forms of control and obedience to authority. He is alone. If he got his body back, he could be with us. So we need to reinvestigate the carnal connections existing in the confined spaces where we spend our time, including workspaces. Carnal connection means feeling physically what the other is feeling; it prevents the current contract of mutual indifference (Geras, 1998) that characterizes life at work and elsewhere. In another context, Geras reminds us of a story happening during the period of the great deportation from the Warsaw ghetto in the summer of 1942: ‘Adina Szwajger, a woman who worked in the children's hospital there, recalls a scene: “They kept going past and it was a sweltering day….On the balcony of a house on Zelasna Street-there, on the other side [of the ghetto wall]-a woman in a flowered housecoat was watering plants in window boxes. She must have seen the procession below, but she carried on watering her flowers”’ (Szwajger, 1990, pp. 48–9, cited in Geras, 1998, p. 3). Carnal connections are decisive because they mean that if I cut my finger, it does hurt someone else, not only me. Is the world of work so different from that crude account of social relationships? The most dangerous enemy is not necessarily the most vicious dictator but the silence of good people (Geras, 1998, p. 20). Reinstalling effective carnal connections in organizations might help in preventing so many workers leaving their bodies behind and thereby reduce the magnitude of the social and physical calamity that is affecting the world of work. This is what Michel told me in his own terms when narrating the experience of collective dismissals in his bank in 1997: ‘we were all waiting for the names; you know the names of those who would lose their job. The HR department was in charge of making the list, for several weeks the atmosphere was just unbearable, and when I knew that I wasn't in the list, Oh My God, I remember that I felt more than a sense of relief, a real happiness and at the same time, absolute indifference to the fate of the four colleagues in our branch who had to leave the place. Simply happy to be alive in a sense. When I learned that one of them had committed suicide two weeks later, I was sad but sadness could not exceed the threshold of my personal satisfaction to keep on working’. What could organization studies do to understand why so many people do not come to the aid of others in dire need or great distress? Do we organization scholars have anything to do with this implicit contract of civilized indifference? We live a life largely concerned with private ends and the ends of very closely related others in the shadow of widespread human catastrophe. And we keep on focusing on issues such as identity, subjectivity, performativity, CSR, strategy, and so on, individualistic issues for an egoistic research agenda that does not pay any attention to that catastrophe. Is that inappropriate to the issues considered central in organization studies? Is this statement so naïve that it is of no use to tell again and again about the barbarity of current corporate practices, the lack of consideration for topics of without being of at that would be the would be a where no would be because there would be in nothing effective that can be done by most people to duress or Or because the of would be after all in a world where people would and looking away to and of and indifference, for people looking for elsewhere. can of this what they will another on may think that the between indifference to the tragedy of the or to and corporeal suffering at work is or simply may an and emotional by about the who away because she is indeed indifferent or because she cannot bear to or by about what the of and practices can The of organization scholars is simply to the pain of about these if not feeling to But it is not the most in the of this it is not a of the to to the of the social world the that s/he is working It rather to the of the there is some to most organizational to not suffering bodies and the civilized indifference that characterizes contemporary experiences of because it does not this our the of being to people before the oppressive of organizations. of organizations and work are when they do not the of a idea of be organization of human is disembodied and we about and and without often that and people at work that they can at our accounts of their experiences because they are to their The sign of the homeless boy was not to be those in writing an organization increase the between the we call and the that we from our But our cannot and be behind people's organization scholars might to a in our so in social He that society the of the physical experience of group life to the that is away with the of p. and this experience because of the presence of social media, we remain indifferent to the and that us too, like the that on our screens, be they or or society be that it does not its place in their it would p. The carnal experience of being of not looking is unlikely to on the It in the street, in the in the at the corner of the

Essays occupy a distinct position in the intellectual development of human thought. In contrast to purely theoretical arguments, which synthesize and extend existing empirical work, the essay adopts a uniquely normative epistemological position. Instead of describing the empirical world as it is, the essay offers the opportunity to critique extant reality and, instead, explore the world as it might be. While other disciplines have adopted the essay as a key element of intellectual development, management theory has not yet fully exploited the essay as a generative form of management thought. This is unfortunate, because the essay holds the promise of addressing many of the key issues raised by critics about the legitimacy of management research. As a mechanism of challenging received knowledge, encouraging academic scepticism and creatively extending existing knowledge to common social problems, the essay offers the potential for developing the field of management research in ways that respond to its critics. Writing that is concise, normative and direct has the potential to speak to audiences beyond academe. The essay, thus, offers a useful bridge between academic and practitioner knowledge (Rynes et al., 2001). It creates the space to debate the value of theory (Hambrick, 2007; Pfeffer, 2007; Suddaby, 2014). It also offers an important venue for debating the implications of, and future direction for, management education (Mintzberg, 1996). We are, therefore, pleased to introduce JMSSays in the Journal of Management Studies. JMSSays will showcase the essay as a legitimate form of management scholarship. JMSSays is a new section of the journal that will publish a wide range of essays on a variety of topics in management theory. The intent of this section is to develop the essay as an influential genre of management research and scholarship. But we are not just pleased, we are excited by this initiative. Essays should be moments of pleasure, both to write and to read. We are strongly of the view that too much management scholarship has become formulaic, sterile and just plain dull. This, amongst other things, helps explain why management research is rarely influential in practical circles (despite the facile claims that business schools cause global economic crises and are responsible for the worst that capitalism has to offer). We hope that JMSSays can provide some provocative, engaging and erudite contributions to the important debates in management, organization and business. Our aspiration is that JMSSays will be the first pages that readers turn to, and that the section will spawn a new and more engaged readership. The essay is a well-established genre of scholarship in Western society. As a form of academic discourse, the essay can be traced back even earlier to the writings of de Montaigne and Cohen (1993) who, in turn, attributed his literary style to Plutarch and Aristotle. The term ‘essay’ is derived from the French term ‘essayer’, used by Montaigne meaning to try or attempt, and the Latin term ‘exegium’, drawn from ‘exagere’ which means to weigh, winnow or sift. Over the centuries the analytic essay has emerged as a powerful vehicle for stimulating discourse in a wide variety of disciplines, from George Orwell's political essays, Bertrand Russell's essays on humanitarianism, Jay Gould's essays in evolutionary biology, to Edward Said's observations on cultural imperialism. Perhaps surprisingly, the ‘dismal science’ has been both welcoming of, and profoundly shaped by, the essay with influential contributions by Adam Smith (1795), John Maynard Keynes (1931), Milton Friedman (1953), and Friedrich Hayek (1945), among others. The essay, however, has not had much purchase in management scholarship. There are many possible explanations for this. The most likely reason, however, is the clear dominance of scientific positivism in management research and the concomitant preference for empirical accounts that underpin traditional theory building. The essay is a unique form of scholarship. As a genre, the essay offers five key characteristics that distinguish it from traditional empirical based theorizing, but which offer important advantages for advancing understanding. The most distinctive characteristic of the essay is that it grants the author the freedom to adopt a normative position. Traditional academic theorizing discourages philosophical speculation that might extend too far beyond the scope of prior empirical knowledge. As a result, management theorists have largely failed to engage in any significant discussions of the normative or ethical implications of their research. More importantly, it discourages management theorists from reflecting deeply on the implicit assumptions that drive most research agendas. As critics have observed, this lack of reflexivity has encouraged the perception that business school researchers have unwittingly become ‘servants of power’ (Breif, 2000). The essay, however, allows the author to escape from the inherent conservatism of scientific empiricism. It encourages self-reflection of the researcher and broader philosophical speculation about the limitations of existing world-views. The notion of ‘belles lettres’ encourages broader interrogation of key assumptions about the world as it is. It forces the author to make connections between the subject of inquiry and the social context within which the subject exists. If properly executed, the essay moves the reader between ideas, existing empirical understandings and new realities. The essay is a place for experimentation with new ideas and arguments. The essay is also celebrated for its ability to generate collective interaction and communication. Its aim is to start conversations and continue debates rather than to present the conclusion to a line of enquiry on the basis of empirical evidence. This makes it a particularly powerful form of engagement with wider audiences. It also makes the essay an effective generator of new ideas. We are not seeking essays that offer ‘contributions’ to the existing literature, nor that address ‘gaps’ or ‘lacunae’ in knowledge. We seek stimulating and provocative challenges to conventional thinking not marginal ‘advances’ or ‘elaborations’. Another key characteristic of the essay is that it requires the author to position her or himself in the discussion. It is uniquely personal and permits the author to use the personal pronoun ‘I’ in presenting an argument in which the author addresses an important subject from a position of personal reflection. Montaigne, often identified as the father of the essay, is also attributed with having invented the ‘I’ in literature. We have heard the essay described as being best considered as an intimate form of communication; as ‘writing to and for one's friends’. The essay creates connections between the individual and broader social institutions by encouraging the author to describe his or her personal experiences within the context of making analytic observations about broader social phenomenon. Because the essay uses personal reflection to make normative claims it serves as a powerful form of social critique. As the German social philosopher Theodore Adorno and colleagues (Adorno, Hullot-Kentor and Will, 1984) observed, the essential contribution of the essay as a form has been to construct a voice (i.e., the essayist) that is continually sceptical of all forms of reification and taken-for-granted assumptions about the nature of the world. As a result, the essay offers a novel form of truth-claim, distinct from the empiricism of science and the overt morality of art, that is uniquely positioned to challenge received wisdom about the nature of society. The contribution of the essay, thus, is humanitarian rather than theoretical, grounded in the experience of the thoughtful intellectual in society. The essay, therefore, provides the literary space to question how our theories and empirics become disconnected from, and often damaging to, social experience and practice. It offers, as Edward Said (1983) astutely observed, a unique form of ‘secular criticism’. Finally, the essay is characterized by its attention to the importance of writing. In contrast to the overly precise and often impenetrable style of traditional theory construction, the essay is valued for its elegant simplicity. The intended audience is broad, targeting the intelligent and thoughtful generalist, rather than the focused and narrowly constituted expert. Within the context of management theory, the essay should appeal to the broadest level of business academic and, indeed, extend beyond that to appeal to the curiosity of the reflective practitioner. Because of these distinctive attributes the essay is well positioned to address key issues and debates regarding the scope, legitimacy and future directions of management research. In particular, it is well placed to assist management studies address challenges regarding its wider public value and relevance (Delbridge, 2014). Its simple exposition makes the essay appealing to broader audiences, and is thus a very effective tool for succinctly translating academic research to practitioner audiences. The normative element of the essay allows the researcher to direct scientific attention to (re-)solving managerial problems rather than simply identifying them. The critical roots of the essay encourage the management scholar to challenge the managerial elitism of most contemporary research and, perhaps more importantly, question the taken-for-granted assumptions of their own research. It therefore has the potential to play important roles in what Michael Burawoy has described as the ‘public’ and the ‘critical’ spheres of social sciences research (Burawoy, 2004). This in turn can assist management studies play a part in a more impactful, public value-based and interdisciplinary social science agenda (Brewer, 2013). The purpose of this initiative is to create a series of conversations that push the boundaries of management scholarship by cultivating a space for a more intellectually provocative discourse about organizations, work, and business in their broader context of human experience. Our interest is in essays that view organizations as both outcomes of and producers of social practices. Over the past 50 years, Journal of Management Studies has developed a reputation for its eclecticism and for publishing papers which seek to challenge the conventional wisdom concerning management and organizations. JMSSays is our most recent initiative aimed at ensuring that we continue to provide opportunities for scholars to challenge conventional ways of advancing knowledge; and by doing so, advance knowledge. We have invited initial contributions from a series of leading research scholars in management whose work has included influential essays. Our hope is that these exemplary pieces will help set the tone and showcase the possible templates for future contributions, demonstrating how the essay can be effectively adopted as a form of management scholarship. Our initial essay in this issue is by Yiannis Gabriel, a skilled essayist who offers a thoughtful extension of our conversation about the role of the essay in management scholarship. The next few instalments of JMSSays will feature essays by other leading management scholars and we are now actively seeking proposals from people who would like to suggest an essay topic for consideration. Potential contributors should submit a 300 word proposal which briefly sets out the argument to be made in the essay. Proposals will initially be reviewed by the JMSSays editorial team (Rick Delbridge and Roy Suddaby) and if the evaluation is positive authors will be asked to develop a full essay. Essays will not be subject to external peer review. The JMSSays editorial team and one Consulting Editor of the Journal (Bill Harley) will review full submissions and make a decision about whether to proceed. If the decision on the submitted essay is positive, they will then work with authors to develop their essays for publication. There will be two primary criteria for selection for publication: a) is the essay interesting and, b) does it have the potential to catalyse new ways of thinking and researching a relevant management topic? Full essays should be submitted as complete word documents written in 12 point font and double-spaced. Any charts or diagrams should be embedded in the text. Authors’ names and titles can be included in the original submission. Essays should not exceed a total of 3000 words. Usually, JMSSays will start with an orientating statement (2-3 pages), before the main body of text advances the key argument (6-8 pages) and a final section (2-3 pages) explains how managerial research, practices or organizations might be understood and constructed differently. There is no abstract but the first paragraph should summarize the issue and argument. References should be used sparingly to ensure the readability of the essay. No footnotes or endnotes should be used. To reiterate, we are excited to launch JMSSays. Our aim in doing so is to provide a forum for scholarship which is not constrained by the norms of conventional academic research and theorizing. In the current environment, where there are clear institutional pressures on scholars to produce ‘safe’ and ‘formulaic’ work (‘a “good” paper is one that is accepted’), we believe that it is an important part of our mission to encourage authors to go beyond ‘standard’ papers and to challenge conventional approaches to advancing knowledge. We hope JMSSays will open up space for essayists to produce work which is innovative, interesting and even iconoclastic and which stimulates readers to question the ways that they think about, and research, management and organizational phenomena.

We investigate determinants of the competitive behaviour of satisficing, non‐profit‐maximizing pricing. Taking a behavioural approach, we argue that pricing decisions are motivated by fairness objectives as well as the desire to achieve economic objectives. We draw from the attention‐based view to build our theoretical model explaining the contextual conditions that are most likely to be associated with attention to fairness relative to attention to achieving maximum profits when setting prices. Our hypothesized predictors of satisficing pricing decisions encompass the institutional context in which the firm is embedded, the exchange context with customers and suppliers, and the context internal to the firm. Hypotheses are tested with survey data of over 3000 firms from 15 countries. We find that the decision to set prices at a satisficing level is remarkably common, and its prevalence is associated with contextual factors that are consistent with greater attention to fairness concerns.

The fundamental questions we address are whether firms with a higher initial forecasting ability are able to accurately revise the exit forecasts of their investments; and how co‐investment partners and value‐adding commitment with their investment influence the main effect. We explore these questions with novel and unique data collected via mixed research methods on venture capital firms’ forecasts of 114 portfolio companies. We find that venture capital firms that are better at making initial forecasts are less effective in revising their forecasts. In addition, while the number of co‐investment partners positively moderate this relationship, venture capital firms’ value‐adding commitment moderates it negatively. Our findings contribute to the literature on organizational forecasting as well as inter‐organizational knowledge transfer and knowledge creation. They also provide novel insights into venture capital literature and practice.

The foundational international business (IB) scholarship grappled with whether multinational enterprises (MNEs) are largely efficiency‐enhancing or market‐power inducing institutions. Contemporary scholarship, however, often associates foreign direct investment (FDI) with efficiency‐enhancing properties and thus neglects the market‐power interpretation of the MNE. Such an imbalance is problematic given that the theoretical and empirical justifications behind the field's embrace of the efficiency interpretation are not fully evident. Instead, both efficiency and market‐power effects are seemingly present in cross‐border investment activity. Based on a comprehensive sample of up to 4,361 cross‐border investments materializing between 1986 and 2010, we present theoretically‐grounded hypotheses with regard to when market‐power effects will tend to dominate efficiency effects. We find that cross‐border investments undertaken by emerging‐market MNEs in both developed and emerging markets tend to involve substantial efficiency effects and minimal market‐power effects when compared with the cross‐border investments undertaken by developed‐country MNEs in both developed and emerging markets.