Publications

May 2019 (Revised June 2019)
Background Note

Responsibilities in the Supply Chain

By: Nien-hê Hsieh

Companies are increasingly called upon to take responsibility for what occurs in their supply chains. One particular area of debate is a company’s responsibility for working conditions in supplier factories. This note provides a framework for managers to grapple with... View Details

Keywords: Supply Chain; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Working Conditions; Safety; Corporate Accountability

1999
Working Paper

Machines and Mindlessness: Social Responses to Computers

By: Clifford Nass and Youngme Moon

March 2016 (Revised April 2019)
Technical Note

ESG Metrics: Reshaping Capitalism?

By: George Serafeim

In the past twenty-five years, the world had seen an exponential growth in the number of companies reporting environmental, social and governance (ESG) data. Investor interest in ESG data also grew rapidly. A growing belief that increasing levels of social inequality... View Details

Keywords: Capitalism; Sustainability; Accountability; Corporate Social Responsibility; Responsibilities To Society; Environment; Social Impact Investment; ESG; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Measurement and Metrics; Integrated Corporate Reporting; Corporate Accountability; Accounting; Economic Systems

December 2021
Article

Employee Responses to Compensation Changes: Evidence from a Sales Firm

By: Jason Sandvik, Richard Saouma, Nathan Seegert and Christopher Stanton

What are the long-term consequences of compensation changes? Using data from an inbound sales call center, we study employee responses to a compensation change that ultimately reduced take-home pay by 7% for the average affected worker. The change caused a significant... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Wages; Compensation and Benefits; Change; Performance; Resignation and Termination; Retention; Analysis

Find at Harvard

Read Now

01 Dec 2016
News

HBS Alumni Contribute to Business and Society

HBS graduates are central players in creating jobs, guiding boards, and giving back to their communities. The survey demonstrates the extent to which that assumption is spot-on.” (courtesy Harvard... View Details

February 2009 (Revised August 2012)
Background Note

Note on Socially Responsible Investing

By: Sandra J. Sucher, Daniela Beyersdorfer and Ian McKown Cornell

This note describes Socially Responsible Investing, providing a brief history, description of different socially responsible investing approaches, and overview of selected players and institutions involved in the socially responsible investing field. It has been... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Corporate Governance; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability

October 2011
Article

Under Threat: Responses to and the Consequences of Threats to Individuals' Identities

I review and reconceptualize identity threat, defining it as an experience appraised as indicating potential harm to the value, meanings, or enactment of an identity. I also develop a theoretical model and propositions that generate insights into how individuals... View Details

Keywords: Identity; Value; Theory; Organizations; Research

Find at Harvard

April 2009 (Revised July 2009)
Module Note

Delivering Personally on Responsibility

By: Joshua D. Margolis

How can individuals equip themselves to exercise leadership in the face of moral adversity? This six-session module aims to prepare students to meet moral responsibility when it is simultaneously most essential and most difficult. Moral adversity refers to situations... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Leadership; Moral Sensibility; Leadership Development

2019
Working Paper

Southern Responses to Gold Certification: Cooperate, Compete, Reject, Revise

By: Kristin Sippl

Artisanal gold mining is a Southern subsistence livelihood posing both challenges and opportunities for sustainable development. In 2011, Fairtrade International launched a certification program to address sustainability problems in the sector. Southern activists,... View Details

Keywords: Eco-labeling; Extractive Industries; Emerging Economies; Fair Trade; Environmental Sustainability; Standards; Programs; Governance Compliance; Competition; Adaptation; Mining Industry

Read Now

Video

Introduction to HBS's Institute for the Study of Business in Global Society

Fast Answer

Companies: social responsibility

most sustainable corporations. The following websites give background information on social responsibility issues and companies: Benefit Corp Information Center: Benefit corporations have a corporate purpose View Details

Uncovering the Mitigating Psychological Response to Monitoring Technologies

Organizational psychologists have long held that monitoring workers saps them of their autonomy and thereby reduces their effectiveness. Yet technology has intensified such surveillance in recent years: Managers now track everything from clinicians’ handwashing to... View Details

2016
Working Paper

Gender Differences in Altruism: Responses to a Natural Disaster

By: Matthew Lilley and Robert Slonim

High-profile disasters can cause large spikes in philanthropy and volunteerism. By providing temporary positive shocks to the altruism of donors, these natural experiments help identify heterogeneity in the distributions of the latent altruism which motivates donors.... View Details

Keywords: Altruism; Charitable Behavior; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Gender; Behavior

SSRN

January 2019
Case

Capitalism, Entrepreneurship and Responsibility

By: Geoffrey Jones

This case contains excerpts from prominent business leaders and others expressing their views on the responsibilities, if any, of business leaders to other stakeholders in society. It begins with an excerpt from Andrew Carnegie, the nineteenth century steel magnate, in... View Details

Keywords: Capitalism; Entrepreneurship; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Leadership; Attitudes; Perspective

2020
Chapter

Luxury and Environmental Responsibility

By: Anat Keinan, Sandrine Crener and Dafna Goor

Luxury and sustainability are often perceived as incompatible and contradictory. However, as the concept of luxury and our understanding of conspicuous consumption are evolving and need to be revisited—from conspicuous to conscious consumption—the book chapter explores... View Details

Keywords: Luxury; Goods and Commodities; Trends; Environmental Sustainability; Research