nach oben

Journal of Business Ethics

Erschienen in:

11.10.2017 | Original Paper

Profit-Driven Corporate Social Responsibility as a Bayesian Real Option in Green Computing

verfasst von: Hemantha S. B. Herath, Tejaswini C. Herath, Paul Dunn

Erschienen in: Journal of Business Ethics | Ausgabe 2/2019

Einloggen

Aktivieren Sie unsere intelligente Suche, um passende Fachinhalte oder Patente zu finden.

search-config

KI-gestützte Suche

Aus

Abstract

The idea that socially responsible investments can be viewed in terms of real options is relatively new. We expand on this notion by demonstrating how real option theory, within a Bayesian decision-making framework, can be used by managers to help when making green technology investment decisions. The Bayesian decision framework provides a more flexible approach to investment decision making because it adjusts for new information. Responding to a call for multidisciplinary and multifaceted research in environmental sustainability, this paper integrates ethics, finance, and information technology by viewing investments in environmentally friendly technology as a profit-driven CSR real option. Our model provides managers with the analytic tool needed to make the business case for CSR initiatives providing an opportunity for firms to create economic, social, and ecological solutions that benefit all stakeholders. The practical applicability of our model is demonstrated in an illustrative case scenario based on real data.

Vorheriger Artikel Stakeholder Salience for Small Businesses: A Social Proximity Perspective

Nächster Artikel Corporate Tax: What Do Stakeholders Expect?

Sie haben noch keine Lizenz? Dann Informieren Sie sich jetzt über unsere Produkte:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

Jetzt informieren

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

Jetzt informieren

Nur mit Berechtigung zugänglich

A real option is a contract for the purchase of a physical asset, as opposed to a stock option, such as a put or a call, which trades on a stock exchange.

For simplicity, henceforth a CSR real option will be referred to as a CSR option.

Watson et al. (2010), in defining the term “green IS,” argue that while much of the practitioner literature has devoted attention to “green IT” with exclusive focus on technologies, they prefer “green IS,” which refers to an integrated and cooperating set of people, processes, software, and information technologies to support individual, organizational, or societal goals. This definition includes green IT and allows for a greater variety of possible initiatives to support sustainable business processes. Elliot (2011) argues that the term “green IT” focuses attention on technology rather than IT applications and is often associated with reducing energy use in data centers. He emphasizes that the term “environmental sustainability of IT” is also often used in a narrow sense which ignores its multifaceted nature.

The technical and cost data for the servers are obtained from a publicly available test report prepared by Principled Technologies (2012), available at http://www.principledtechnologies.com/Dell/R720_vs%20_R710_0312.pdf. We label the servers Server A and Server B to avoid favoring one model over the other. Data are scaled to accommodate the computing requirements of a small North American university. Just for estimation purposes, we use the data available from a report available at https://www.trentu.ca/eab/energy_computer.php.

http://researchcomputing.syr.edu/resources/green-data-center/. We wish to thank an anonymous reviewer for pointing out this scenario.

Aguinis, H., & Glavas, A. (2012). What we know and don’t know about corporate social responsibility: A review and research agenda. Journal of Management, 38(4), 932–968.CrossRef

Arrow, K. J., & Fisher, A. C. (1974). Environmental preservation, uncertainty, and irreversibility. In Classic papers in natural resource economics (pp. 76–84). UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

Ba, S., & Nault, B. R. (2017). Emergent themes in the interface between economics of information systems and management of technology. Production and Operations Management, 26(4), 652–666.CrossRef

Babin, R., & Nicholson, B. (2009). Corporate social and environmental responsibility in global IT outsourcing. MIS Quarterly Executive, 8(4), 123–132.

Bansal, P., & Roth, K. (2000). Why companies go green: A model of ecological responsiveness. Academy of Management Journal, 43(4), 717–736.

Bean, M. A. (2001). Probability: The science of uncertainty with applications to investments, insurance, and engineering (Vol. 6). Providence, RI: American Mathematical Society.

Berns, M., Townend, A., Khayat, Z., Balagopal, B., Reeves, M., Hopkins, M., et al. (2009). The business of sustainability, imperatives, alternatives and actions. Boston, MA: Boston Consulting Group. http://www.bcg.com/documents/file29480.pdf. Accessed December 15, 2016.

Bose, R., & Luo, X. (2011). Integrative framework for assessing firms’ potential to undertake green IT initiatives via virtualization–A theoretical perspective. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 20(1), 38–54.CrossRef

Brooks, S., Wang, X., & Sarker, S. (2012). Unpacking green IS: A review of the existing literature and directions for the future. In Green business process management (pp. 15–37). Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer.

Buchholz, R. A. (1991). Corporate responsibility and the good society: From economics to ecology. Business Horizons, 34(4), 19–31.CrossRef

Buchholz, R. A. (1993). Principles of environmental management: The greening of business. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Carbonrally.com (2010). Give your computer a rest. http://www.carbonrally.com/challenges/10-save-energy. Accessed December 2016.

Carroll, A. B. (1979). A three-dimensional conceptual model of corporate performance. Academy of Management Review, 4(4), 497–505.CrossRef

Cassimon, D., Engelen, P.-J., & Van Liedekerke, L. (2016). When do firms invest in corporate social responsibility? A real option framework. Journal of Business Ethics, 137(1), 15–29.CrossRef

Chand, M., & Fraser, S. (2006). The relationship between corporate social performance and corporate financial performance: Industry type as a boundary condition. The Business Review, 5(1), 240–245.

Chen, A. J. W., Boudreau, M.-C., & Watson, R. T. (2008). Information systems and ecological sustainability. Journal of Systems and Information Technology, 10(3), 186–201.CrossRef

Chheda, R., Shookowsky, D., Stefanovich, S., & Toscano, J. (2008). Profiling energy usage for efficient consumption. In Microsoft (Ed.), The Architecture journal: Green computing issue. https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd393312.aspx. Accessed December 15, 2016.

Copeland, T., & Antikarov, V. (2001). Real options—A practitioner’s guide. Fort Lauderdale, FL: TEXERE Publishing.

Cordano, M., & Frieze, I. H. (2000). Pollution reduction preferences of US environmental managers: Applying Ajzen’s theory of planned behavior. Academy of Management Journal, 43(4), 627–641.

Curtis, L. (2008). Environmentally sustainable infrastructure design. The Architecture Journal, 18(1), 2–8.

Dao, V., Langella, I., & Carbo, J. (2011). From green to sustainability: Information technology and an integrated sustainability framework. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 20(1), 63–79.CrossRef

Davis, K. (1973). The case for and against business assumption of social responsibilities. Academy of Management Journal, 16(2), 312–322.

DiMaggio, P., & Powell, W. W. (1983). The iron cage revisited: Collective rationality and institutional isomorphism in organizational fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147–160.

Dixit, A. K., & Pindyck, R. S. (1994). Investment under uncertainty. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Du, W., Pan, S. L., & Zuo, M. (2013). How to balance sustainability and profitability in technology organizations: An ambidextrous perspective. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, 60(2), 366–385.CrossRef

Elias, G. (2014, November 13). Carbon tax creates energy stability. Citizens’ Climate Lobby.

Elliot, S. (2011). Transdisciplinary perspectives on environmental sustainability: A resource base and framework for IT-enabled business transformation. MIS Quarterly, 35(1), 197–236.CrossRef

Epstein, M. J., & Roy, M.-J. (2003). Making the business case for sustainability. Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 9(1), 79–96.CrossRef

Francis, K., & Richardson, P. (2009). Green maturity model for virtualization. The Architecture Journal, 18(1), 9–15.

Frederick, W. C. (1998). Moving to CSR: What to pack for the trip. Business and Society, 37(1), 40–59.CrossRef

Galli, A., Armstrong, M., Dias, G., & Antonio, M. (2004). The value of information: A Bayesian real option approach. In SPE annual technical conference and exhibition, 2004: Society of petroleum engineers.

Gardiner, S. M. (2004). Ethics and global climate change. Ethics, 114(3), 555–600.CrossRef

Gholami, R., Sulaiman, A. B., Ramayah, T., & Molla, A. (2013). Senior managers’ perception on green information systems (IS) adoption and environmental performance: Results from a field survey. Information & Management, 50(7), 431–438.CrossRef

Godfrey, P. C., & Hatch, N. W. (2007). Researching corporate social responsibility: An agenda for the 21st century. Journal of Business Ethics, 70(1), 87–98.CrossRef

Gordon, L. A., Loeb, M. P., & Zhou, L. (2016). Investing in cybersecurity: Insights from the Gordon-Loeb model. Journal of Information Security, 7(02), 49.CrossRef

Grenadier, S. R., & Malenko, A. (2010). A Bayesian approach to real options: The case of distinguishing between temporary and permanent shocks. The Journal of Finance, 65(5), 1949–1986.CrossRef

Griffin, J., & Mahon, J. (1997). The corporate social performance and corporate financial performance debate: Twenty-five years of incomparable research. Business and Society, 36(1), 5–31.CrossRef

Griffy-Brown, C., & Palanisamy, B. (2009). IT solutions for SMBs in an economic downturn. Graziadio Business Review, 12(4), 1–8.

Harmon, R. R., & Auseklis, N. (2009). Sustainable IT services: Assessing the impact of green computing practices. In PICMET’09-2009 Portland international conference on management of engineering & technology, 2009 (pp. 1707–1717). IEEE.

Hayes, R. H., & Garvin, D. A. (1982). Managing as if tomorrow mattered. Harvard Business Review, 60(3), 70–79.

Hays, W. L., & Winkler, R. L. (1971). Statistics: Probability, inference and decision. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston.

Henry, C. (1974). Investment decisions under uncertainty: The “irreversibility effect”. The American Economic Review, 64(6), 1006–1012.

Herath, H., & Herath, T. (2009). Investments in information security: A real options perspective with Bayesian post-audit. Journal of Management Information Systems, 25(3), 337–375.CrossRef

Herath, H., & Park, C. (2001). Real option valuation and its relationship to Bayesian decision-making methods. The Engineering Economist, 46(1), 1–32.CrossRef

Husted, B. W. (2005). Risk management, real options, corporate social responsibility. Journal of Business Ethics, 60(2), 175–183.CrossRef

Husted, B. W., & Allen, D. B. (2007). Strategic corporate social responsibility and value creation among large firms: Lessons from the Spanish experience. Long Range Planning, 40, 594–610.CrossRef

Jamieson, D. (1992). Ethics, public policy, and global warming. Science, Technology and Human Values, 17(2), 139–153.CrossRef

Jindal, G., & Gupta, M. (2012, December). Green computing “future of computers.” International Journal of Emerging Resource Management and Technology, 14–18.

Jones, A. (2016). Ontario Chamber of Commerce urging province to delay cap-and-trade plan. Toronto: The Canadian Press.

Klassen, R. D., & McLaughlin, C. P. (1996). The impact of environmental management on firm performance. Management Science, 42(8), 1199–1214.CrossRef

Koomey, J. G., Belady, C., Patterson, M., Santos, A., & Lange, K.-D. (2009). Assessing trends over time in performance, costs, and energy use for servers. Technical Report. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Stanford University, Microsoft Corporation, and Intel Corporation.

Kurp, P. (2008). Green computing. Communications of the ACM, 51(10), 11–13.CrossRef

Luckow, P., Stanton, E. A., Fields, S., Biewald, B., Jackson, S., Fisher, J., et al. (2015). 2015 Carbon dioxide price forecast. Cambridge, MA: Synapse Energy Economics.

Luehrman, T. A. (1997). What’s it worth? A general manager’s guide to valuation. Harvard Business Review, 75(3), 132–142.

Lund, D. (Ed.). (1991). Financial and non-financial option valuation (Contributions to Economic Analysis: Stochastic Models and Option Values—Applications to Resources, Environment and Investment Problems). North-Holland.

Malhotra, A., Melville, N. P., & Watson, R. T. (2013). Spurring impactful research on information systems for environmental sustainability. MIS Quarterly, 37(4), 1265–1274.CrossRef

McCarthy, S., & Leblanc, D. (2016, October 3). Liberal government’s carbon tax plan provokes anger from provinces. The Globe and Mail.

McWilliams, A., & Siegel, D. (2001). Corporate social responsibility: A theory of the firm perspective. Academy of Management Review, 26(1), 117–127.CrossRef

Melville, N. P. (2010). Information systems innovation for environmental sustainability. MIS Quarterly, 34(1), 1–21.CrossRef

Menguc, B., & Ozanne, L. K. (2005). Challenges of the “green imperative”: A natural resource-based approach to the environmental orientation–business performance relationship. Journal of Business Research, 58(4), 430–438.CrossRef

Menon, A., & Menon, A. (1997). Enviropreneurial marketing strategy: The emergence of corporate environmentalism as market strategy. The Journal of Marketing, 61(1), 51–67.CrossRef

Molla, A., Pittayachawan, S., Corbitt, B., & Deng, H. (2009). An international comparison of Green IT diffusion. International Journal of e-Business Management, 3(2), 3–23.CrossRef

Morrow, A., & Keenan, G. (2016, May 16). Ontario to spend $7-billion on sweeping climate change plan. The Globe and Mail.

Moura-Leite, R. C., & Padgett, R. C. (2011). Historical background of corporate social responsibility. Social Responsibility Journal, 7(4), 528–539.CrossRef

Murugesan, S. (2008). Harnessing green IT: Principles and practices. IT Professional, 10(1), 24–33.CrossRef

Orlitzky, M. O., Schmidt, F. L., & Rynes, S. L. (2003). Corporate social and financial performance: A meta-analysis. Organizational Studies, 24, 403–442.CrossRef

Pohle, G., & Hittner, J. (2008). Attaining sustainable growth through corporate social responsibility. IBM Institute for Business Value (Vol. 20). https://www-935.ibm.com/services/us/gbs/bus/pdf/gbe03019-usen-02.pdf. Accessed December 15, 2016.

Porter, M. E., & Van der Linde, C. (1995). Green and competitive: Ending the stalemate. Harvard Business Review, 73(5), 120–134.

Preston, L., & Post, J. (1975). Private management and public policy: The principle of public responsibility. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Principled Technologies Test Report. (2012). Server consolidation and TCO: Dell Poweredge R720 vs. Dell Poweredge R710. http://www.principledtechnologies.com/Dell/R720_vs%20_R710_0312.pdf. Accessed December 2016.

Russo, M. V., & Fouts, P. A. (1997). A resource-based perspective on corporate environmental performance and profitability. Academy of Management Journal, 40(3), 534–559.

Sanchez, R. (1993). Strategic flexibility, firm organization, and managerial work in dynamic markets: A strategic options perspective. Advances in Strategic Management, 9(1), 251–291.

Sanders, M., Fuss, S., & Engelen, P.-J. (2013). Mobilizing private funds for carbon capture and storage: An exploratory field study in the Netherlands. International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control, 19, 595–605.CrossRef

Sarkis, J., Koo, C., & Watson, R. T. (2013). Green information systems & technologies—this generation and beyond: Introduction to the special issue. Information Systems Frontiers, 15(5), 695–704.CrossRef

Seidel, S., Bharati, P., Fridgen, G., Watson, R. T., Albizri, A., Boudreau, M.-C., et al. (2017). The sustainability imperative in information systems research. Communications of the Association for Information Systems (CAIS), 40(3), 40–52.CrossRef

Sharfman, M. P., & Fernando, C. S. (2008). Environmental risk management and the cost of capital. Strategic Management Journal, 29(6), 569–592.CrossRef

Suchman, M. C. (1995). Managing legitimacy: Strategic and institutional approaches. Academy of Management Review, 20(3), 571–610.CrossRef

Syracuse University Green Data Center. Research Computing Green Data Center website. http://researchcomputing.syr.edu/resources/green-data-center/. Accessed March 27, 2017.

Trigeorgis, L. (1996). Real options: Managerial flexibility and strategy in resource allocation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

van Marrewijk, M. (2003). Concepts and definitions of CSR and corporate sustainability. Journal of Business Ethics, 44(2), 95–105.CrossRef

vom Brocke, J., Watson, R. T., Dwyer, C., Elliot, S., & Melville, N. (2013). Green information systems: Directives for the IS discipline. Communications of the Association for Information Systems (CAIS), 33(30), 509–520.

Waddock, S. A., & Graves, S. B. (1997). The corporate social performance–financial performance link. Strategic Management Journal, 18(4), 303–319.CrossRef

Watson, R. T., Boudreau, M.-C., & Chen, A. J. (2010). Information systems and environmentally sustainable development: Energy informatics and new directions for the IS community. MIS Quarterly, 34(1), 23–38.CrossRef

Watson, R. T., Boudreau, M.-C., Chen, A. J., & Sepúlveda, H. H. (2011). Green projects: An information drives analysis of four cases. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 20(1), 55–62.CrossRef

Wood, D. J. (1991). Corporate social performance revisited. Academy of Management Review, 16(4), 691–718.CrossRef

World Commission on Environment and Development UN. (1987). Our common future. World Commission on Environment and Development. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Zarrella, E. (2008). Sustainable IT: The case for strategic leadership. KPMG IT Advisory. http://www.greenprof.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Sustainable-IT-The-case-for-strategic-leadership.pdf. Accessed December 15, 2016.

Titel: Profit-Driven Corporate Social Responsibility as a Bayesian Real Option in Green Computing
verfasst von: Hemantha S. B. Herath
Tejaswini C. Herath
Paul Dunn
Publikationsdatum: 11.10.2017
Verlag: Springer Netherlands
Erschienen in: Journal of Business Ethics / Ausgabe 2/2019
Print ISSN: 0167-4544
Elektronische ISSN: 1573-0697
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-017-3705-1

Springer Professional

Abstract

Bitte loggen Sie sich ein, um Zugang zu Ihrer Lizenz zu erhalten.

Sie haben noch keine Lizenz? Dann Informieren Sie sich jetzt über unsere Produkte:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Weitere Artikel der Ausgabe 2/2019

Managerial Efficiency, Corporate Social Performance, and Corporate Financial Performance

The Effects of Clawbacks on Auditors’ Propensity to Propose Restatements and Risk Assessments

Local Social Environment, Firm Tax Policy, and Firm Characteristics

Corporate Tax: What Do Stakeholders Expect?

Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Disclosures: An Investigation of Investors’ and Analysts’ Perceptions

Stakeholder Salience for Small Businesses: A Social Proximity Perspective