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Mismanagement of Sustainability: What Business Strategy Makes the Difference? Empirical Evidence from the USA

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  • Janine Maniora

    (Technical University of Dortmund)

Abstract

This paper examines whether and to what extent the overall business strategy influences the firm’s mismanagement of sustainability. Specifically, an empirical measure for the mismanagement of sustainability is developed by exploiting the newly available materiality guidelines for US firms to define industry-specific material sustainability issues. Using this measure, this paper shows that mismanagement of sustainability can represent unethical business behavior when firms intentionally perform better on immaterial issues than on material issues by diverting stakeholders’ attention from the firm’s low overall sustainability performance. This paper assumes that the right business strategy can prevent such unethical actions. Based on Miles and Snow’s (Organizational strategy, structure and process, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1978) organizational theory, this paper distinguishes between Prospector and Defender business strategies. By employing multiple firm-level panel regressions, the findings suggest that Prospector-type firms are more likely to mismanage sustainability issues compared to Defender-type firms intentionally. The results give implications for researchers, regulators and standard setters, auditors, sustainability practitioners, and scholars.

Suggested Citation

  • Janine Maniora, 2018. "Mismanagement of Sustainability: What Business Strategy Makes the Difference? Empirical Evidence from the USA," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 152(4), pages 931-947, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jbuset:v:152:y:2018:i:4:d:10.1007_s10551-018-3819-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s10551-018-3819-0
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Business ethics; Business strategy; Corporate performance; Corporate social responsibility; Materiality; Strategic management; Sustainability;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G3 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance
    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • M1 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration
    • M2 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Economics
    • M3 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising
    • M4 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Accounting

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