Do Stakeholder Orientation and Environmental Proactivity Impact Firm Profitability?

The impact of socially responsible corporate behavior on economic performance is a major preoccupation of managers today. This article explores the links between narrowly defined constructs: stakeholder orientation, environmental proactivity and profitability, from the perspectives of stakeholder th...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Brulhart, Franck (Author) ; Gherra, Sandrine (Author) ; Quélin, Bertrand V. (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
Published: 2019
In: Journal of business ethics
Year: 2019, Volume: 158, Issue: 1, Pages: 25-46
Further subjects:B Stakeholder Orientation
B Firm profitability
B Stakeholder Theory
B Environmental proactivity
B Resource-based theory
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Description
Summary:The impact of socially responsible corporate behavior on economic performance is a major preoccupation of managers today. This article explores the links between narrowly defined constructs: stakeholder orientation, environmental proactivity and profitability, from the perspectives of stakeholder theory and resource-based theory. We collected data on the food and beverage, and household and personal products industries. Using structural equation modeling, this paper makes two contributions. We found a negative link between companies simply having a higher stakeholder orientation and profitability. Importantly, however, environmental proactivity not only had a positive impact on profitability, but also appeared to mediate the relationship between stakeholder orientation and profitability. In other words, if a company is more environmentally proactive, it will be more attentive to a broad array of stakeholders, and this will in turn contribute positively to profitability.
ISSN:1573-0697
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of business ethics
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10551-017-3732-y