Building the Responsible Enterprise - Where Vision and Values Add Value (Stanford Uni Press)
Building the Responsible Enterprise provides students and practitioners with a practical, yet academically rooted, introduction to the state-of-the-art in sustainability and corporate social responsibility.
The book consists of four parts, highlighting different aspects of corporate responsibility. Part I discusses the context in which corporate responsibility occurs. Part II looks at three critical issues: the development of vision at the individual and organizational levels, the integration of values into the responsible enterprise, and the ways that these building blocks create added value for a firm. Part III highlights the actual management practices that enable enterprises to achieve excellence, focusing on the roles that stakeholder relationships play in improving performance. The book concludes with a conversation about responsible management in the global village, examining the emerging infrastructure in which enterprise finds itself today. Throughout the text, cases exemplify key concepts and highlight companies that are guiding us into tomorrow's business environment.
"This is a timely book. Not only does it synthesize the work of many, but also it has the potential to shift the conversation about 'corporate social responsibility' from the periphery into the mainstream where 'corporate responsibility' is the future. It is an excellent resource for students and scholars."
R. Edward Freeman, University of Virginia and author of Stakeholder Theory: The State of the Art
"This book is extremely readable without sacrificing attention to relevant studies. It does a wonderful job of translating research for those who do not spend their professional lives immersed in this topic."
Ann Buchholtz, Professor of Leadership and Ethics and Research Director of the Institute for Ethical Leadership, Rutgers University and coauthor of Business and Society
"In their must-read book, Sandra Waddock and Andreas Rasche make a compelling case for value-creation through values. It confirms: infusing enterprises with a vision of sustainability is an indispensable ingredient for long-term success."
Georg Kell, Executive Director of the UN Clobal Compact
Read the First Chapter
Order via Amazon.co.uk (Paperback)
Order via Stanford University Press
The Paradoxical Foundation of Strategic Management (Springer)
This book is all about questioning 'conventional' assumptions in strategy research. I argue that strategy scholars are very skilled in obscuring paradoxes and, by doing so, sustain their traditional assumptions. The text deconstructs the theory of strategic management by using the philosophy of Jacques Derrida. Only a deconstruction of strategic management uncovers the many paradoxes that are at the heart of theorizing about 'strategy'. Despite conventional wisdom, I claim that paradoxes are very helpful in getting to know the limits of knowledge about strategic management. Thus, I explain how paradoxes can stimulate future theorizing about strategic management and why we should value them more than we currently do. Book Flyer
Presentation at European Business School, Oestrich-Winkel (October 2006)
Book Review by Robert Chia (published in Organization Studies, 2008, Vol. 29/4, pp. 631-634)
PostScript - An Exchange with Henry Mintzberg (not published with the book, but part of the original manuscript)
Buy via amazon.com
Building the Responsible Enterprise provides students and practitioners with a practical, yet academically rooted, introduction to the state-of-the-art in sustainability and corporate social responsibility.
The book consists of four parts, highlighting different aspects of corporate responsibility. Part I discusses the context in which corporate responsibility occurs. Part II looks at three critical issues: the development of vision at the individual and organizational levels, the integration of values into the responsible enterprise, and the ways that these building blocks create added value for a firm. Part III highlights the actual management practices that enable enterprises to achieve excellence, focusing on the roles that stakeholder relationships play in improving performance. The book concludes with a conversation about responsible management in the global village, examining the emerging infrastructure in which enterprise finds itself today. Throughout the text, cases exemplify key concepts and highlight companies that are guiding us into tomorrow's business environment.
"This is a timely book. Not only does it synthesize the work of many, but also it has the potential to shift the conversation about 'corporate social responsibility' from the periphery into the mainstream where 'corporate responsibility' is the future. It is an excellent resource for students and scholars."
R. Edward Freeman, University of Virginia and author of Stakeholder Theory: The State of the Art
"This book is extremely readable without sacrificing attention to relevant studies. It does a wonderful job of translating research for those who do not spend their professional lives immersed in this topic."
Ann Buchholtz, Professor of Leadership and Ethics and Research Director of the Institute for Ethical Leadership, Rutgers University and coauthor of Business and Society
"In their must-read book, Sandra Waddock and Andreas Rasche make a compelling case for value-creation through values. It confirms: infusing enterprises with a vision of sustainability is an indispensable ingredient for long-term success."
Georg Kell, Executive Director of the UN Clobal Compact
Read the First Chapter
Order via Amazon.co.uk (Paperback)
Order via Stanford University Press
The Paradoxical Foundation of Strategic Management (Springer)
This book is all about questioning 'conventional' assumptions in strategy research. I argue that strategy scholars are very skilled in obscuring paradoxes and, by doing so, sustain their traditional assumptions. The text deconstructs the theory of strategic management by using the philosophy of Jacques Derrida. Only a deconstruction of strategic management uncovers the many paradoxes that are at the heart of theorizing about 'strategy'. Despite conventional wisdom, I claim that paradoxes are very helpful in getting to know the limits of knowledge about strategic management. Thus, I explain how paradoxes can stimulate future theorizing about strategic management and why we should value them more than we currently do. Book Flyer
Presentation at European Business School, Oestrich-Winkel (October 2006)
Book Review by Robert Chia (published in Organization Studies, 2008, Vol. 29/4, pp. 631-634)
PostScript - An Exchange with Henry Mintzberg (not published with the book, but part of the original manuscript)
Buy via amazon.com
The United Nations Global Compact - Achievements, Trends and Challenges (Cambridge Uni Press)
This book is about a public-private partnership initiative of the United Nations: The United Nations Global Compact. The book reviews the first ten years of the Compact’s existence (2000-2010) by pulling together exclusively commissioned chapters from well-known scholars, practitioners, and Global Compact staff. All authors reflect on what the Global Compact has achieved, what trends it may have to respond to, and what challenges still lie ahead when considering the political environment that the initiative navigates in. For the first time, practitioners from the business world and civil society, well-known academics who have researched the Global Compact, and Global Compact staff join forces to systematically discuss the initiative. Contrary to older books on the subject, this volume contains not only up to date reflections but also debates recent changes to the structure of the Compact (e.g., the mandatory Communication on Progress policy) and thus offers a systematic as well as up to date assessment.
The books contains chapter contributions by Huguette Labelle, Oded Grajew, Paul Hohnen, Guido Palazzo and Andreas Scherer, Carolyn Woo, Malcolm McIntosh and Sandra Waddock, Dirk Ulrich Gilbert, Pat Werhane and Regina Wolfe, Guy Ryder, Greg Unruh and many more.
Order via Cambridge University Press (Paperback)
Order via Cambridge University Press (Hardback)
"This book offers a comprehensive analysis of the initiative’s governance, its engagement mechanisms and, most importantly, its impact. I commend it to a wide global audience, and to all who want to learn more about the Compact’s journey and its proven capacity to generate positive change for people and the planet."
H.E. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
“By orders of magnitude, the Global Compact is the world’s largest corporate citizenship initiative—and one of the United Nations’ true success stories. As such, it deserves a comprehensive analysis. With this book, it has got it. Encyclopedic in scope, the volume touches on all facets of the Global Compact’s ideas, ideals, innovative organizational modalities and impact. It will be an indispensable reference work, and an inspiration to global norm entrepreneurs in every field, for many years to come. It is ‘must reading’ for anyone interested in sustainable globalization, which includes most if not all of us.”
John Ruggie (Harvard University and SRSG on Business and Human Rights)
"This timely book reviews the UN Global Compact's strengths and shortcomings over its first decade and provides helpful guidance for all committed to mainstreaming responsible business practices and achieving real change through multistakeholder intiatives."
Mary Robinson (President Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, Former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights)
This project was kindly supported by EFMD and the GRLI.
This book is about a public-private partnership initiative of the United Nations: The United Nations Global Compact. The book reviews the first ten years of the Compact’s existence (2000-2010) by pulling together exclusively commissioned chapters from well-known scholars, practitioners, and Global Compact staff. All authors reflect on what the Global Compact has achieved, what trends it may have to respond to, and what challenges still lie ahead when considering the political environment that the initiative navigates in. For the first time, practitioners from the business world and civil society, well-known academics who have researched the Global Compact, and Global Compact staff join forces to systematically discuss the initiative. Contrary to older books on the subject, this volume contains not only up to date reflections but also debates recent changes to the structure of the Compact (e.g., the mandatory Communication on Progress policy) and thus offers a systematic as well as up to date assessment.
The books contains chapter contributions by Huguette Labelle, Oded Grajew, Paul Hohnen, Guido Palazzo and Andreas Scherer, Carolyn Woo, Malcolm McIntosh and Sandra Waddock, Dirk Ulrich Gilbert, Pat Werhane and Regina Wolfe, Guy Ryder, Greg Unruh and many more.
Order via Cambridge University Press (Paperback)
Order via Cambridge University Press (Hardback)
"This book offers a comprehensive analysis of the initiative’s governance, its engagement mechanisms and, most importantly, its impact. I commend it to a wide global audience, and to all who want to learn more about the Compact’s journey and its proven capacity to generate positive change for people and the planet."
H.E. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
“By orders of magnitude, the Global Compact is the world’s largest corporate citizenship initiative—and one of the United Nations’ true success stories. As such, it deserves a comprehensive analysis. With this book, it has got it. Encyclopedic in scope, the volume touches on all facets of the Global Compact’s ideas, ideals, innovative organizational modalities and impact. It will be an indispensable reference work, and an inspiration to global norm entrepreneurs in every field, for many years to come. It is ‘must reading’ for anyone interested in sustainable globalization, which includes most if not all of us.”
John Ruggie (Harvard University and SRSG on Business and Human Rights)
"This timely book reviews the UN Global Compact's strengths and shortcomings over its first decade and provides helpful guidance for all committed to mainstreaming responsible business practices and achieving real change through multistakeholder intiatives."
Mary Robinson (President Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, Former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights)
This project was kindly supported by EFMD and the GRLI.