While most studies take a dyadic view when examining the environmental difference between the home country of a multinational enterprise (MNE) and a particular foreign country, they ignore that an MNE is managing a network of subsidiaries embedded in diverse environments. Additionally, neither the impacts of global environments on top executives nor the effects of top executives’ capabilities to handle institutional complexity are fully explored. Thus, using a three-essay format, this dissertation tried to fill these gaps by addressing the effects of institutional complexity and top management characteristics on top executive compensation and firm performance. Essay 1 investigated the impact of an MNE’s institutional complexity, or the diversity of national institutions facing an MNE’s network of subsidiaries, on the top management team (TMT) compensation. This essay proposed that greater political and cultural complexity leads to not only greater TMT total compensation but also to a greater portion of TMT compensation linked with long-term performance. The arguments are supported in this essay by using an unbalanced panel dataset including 296 U.S. firms with 1,340 observations. Essay 2 explored TMT social capital and its moderating role on value creation and appropriation by the chief executive officer (CEO). Using a sample with 548 U.S. firms and 2,010 observations, it found that greater TMT social capital does facilitate the effects of CEO intellectual capital and social capital on firm growth. Finally, essay 3 examined the performance implications for the fit between managerial information-processing capabilities and institutional complexity. It proposed that institutional complexity is associated with the needs of information-processing. On the other hand, smaller TMT turnover and larger TMT size reflect larger managerial information-processing capabilities. Consequently, superior performance is achieved by the match among institutional complexity, TMT turnover, and TMT size. All hypotheses in essay 3 are supported in a sample of 301 U.S. firms and 1,404 observations. To conclude, this dissertation advances and extends our knowledge on the roles of institutional environments and top executives on firm performance and top executive compensation.

Whether it is the accumulation of capital or capabilities that accounts for rapid development of Newly Industrialized Countries (NICs) has been a focus of debate. The former, which informs approaches to development often adopted by international agencies, reflects neoclassical perspectives. The later, by contrast, reflects evolutionary approaches with deliberate learning and innovation as dominant factors. The purpose of this thesis is to understand development by exploring how it is influenced by learning and innovation focusing on the factors, mechanisms and institutional conditions that foster learning and innovation in Malawi. This thesis has adopted quantitative and qualitative methods informed extensively by theoretical perspectives on the knowledge, learning, innovation and development nexus. Using primary survey and secondary data, a conceptual framework that emerged from contrasting perspectives on theories of the firm has situated a quantitative understanding of how firms in Malawi learn and innovate and the impact of institutional conditions. A qualitative approach, however, has enabled identification of underlying mechanisms that foster learning and innovation thus, providing bases for articulating how evolutionary perspectives can enhance Malawi's development prospects. The thesis finds that successful development is conditioned on understanding it as an interactive process of learning and innovation hinged on addressing systemic failure regarding acquisition and utilization of knowledge by producers, firms especially. We find that failures related to institutional conditions on market and social capabilities, governance and communication and knowledge infrastructure have created a business environment in Malawi that does not foster firm learning and innovation. Thus, firms are more inclined to exploiting existing capabilities leading to static rather than dynamic efficiency. This behaviour reflects dominance of neoclassical perspective of development by stakeholders. We find, therefore, that Malawi's development prospects are predicated on innovation in the delivery of knowledge-related services to producers thus, innovation in public goods. At firm-level, action that: promotes firms' investment in on-the-job training, engenders dialogue, fosters collaboration; and builds knowledge stock positively influences learning and innovation capability. We find that high learning firms, under entrepreneurial leadership, exemplify an evolutionary understanding of the role of knowledge in production. They deliberately foster these behavioural and cognitive factors for which they are rewarded with superior performance. At national level, we find that contrary to neoclassical perspectives, Malawi's development is conditioned on purposive action by all stakeholders, government in particular, to mitigate constraints on learning and innovation arising from idiosyncratic aspects of the business environment. This evolutionary perspective entails entrepreneurial leadership in government and adoption of a national learning and innovation system approach to development. We argue that building coalitions focused on fostering knowledge flows to firms, especially those in the manufacturing sector which we find to be the basis for structural change of the economy, is a necessary though not sufficient pre-condition for Malawi's development.

Development of companies from voucher privatization has not been yet comprehensively examined although this information is necessary to evaluation the process of voucher privatization. This thesis is aimed to map the development of the companies that have passed the second wave of voucher privatization from 1993 until 2010. The aim is to determine the ownership structure of the companies, including the determination of how many of them are still under state control. The second area focuses on the economic performance and on finding of how many companies has been closed over the past period, and the comparison of development across industries. The comparison of economic efficiency is based on the information of the ownership structure depending on the size of the share of the largest shareholder. Finally, the research focuses on the marketability of the shares and delisting, changing the form of shares to the documentary, which was used by almost half of the companies.

Purpose: In literature, there is not sufficient research of the impact of Enterprise Resource planning (ERP) usage on firm performance for small and medium sized Swedish companies. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to provide clarifications regarding this topic by investigating two research questions: What factors drive ERP usage in small- and medium- sized Swedish enterprises? Does ERP usage affect Firm Performance in small- and medium- sized Swedish enterprises?  Design/Methodology/Approach: To approach our research questions 10 hypotheses are constructed based on previous studies. Further, to gather the data required to test these hypotheses, a survey was sent to 1000 Swedish small- and medium-size enterprises which generated 100 responses. The data was later analyzed using a Partial Least Square Structural Model.  Findings: The first outcome of this study is that the main drivers of ERP usage in Swedish small- and medium-sized enterprises are Top Management Support and Effective Project Management. The second outcome is that ERP usage has a significant positive impact on Firm Performance.  Contribution/implication: The main practical contribution derived from our results is that small- and medium-size firms should focus on Top management support and Effective project management in order to increase their ERP usage, which in turn could lead to greater levels of firm performance. In the theoretical spectrum, we contribute to the literature by enhancing the importance of effective project management not previously tested in the ERP usage context and by adding question marks regarding the effect of certain variables on ERP usage.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has moved to the forefront of many firms' concerns and is defined as a firm taking into consideration the interests of society by taking responsibility for the impact of the firm's actions on all stakeholders: customers, employees, shareholders, communities at large, and the environment. This dissertation will look at several public announcements and examine not only the level of corporate social responsibility a firm has but also the effects these announcements have on not only firm value but also customers' reactions to them. The three samples examined in the paper are boycotts announcements, recall announcements, and negative social responsibility announcements. The announcements were separated into the three groups to allow me to better analyze the effects of individual announcements and distinguish between types of announcements. The first part of the study focused on market response, measured by stock reactions and shows that the three samples of event announcements produced inconsistent results. Each of the three events produced the negative short term effects expected, either for Day 0 or for the post event period (+1, +30). However, the significance varied and the control sample for both recalls and boycotts produced positive post announcement results, implying that competitors are positively affected by these announcements. With regards to the control samples, only the general announcements control sample produced negative post announcement implying market wide affects. These test also showed that recalls may be subject more often to leakage. The general findings of this test are as expected though the significance was not. The second part of the study focused on customer's reactions, measured by change in market shares, to the three announcements. I found that no significant effect existed due to any of the three types of announcements, negative CSR announcements, boycotts, and recalls. This can be interpreted as the lack of public response to the announcements studied. These results were then followed up with a regression analysis that put the market share as the dependent variable and `Sample" as one of the independent variables. The purpose was to see if the firms that were subject to an announcement affected market share significantly. With regards to the tests establishing the effects of variables on market share, it was found that the results in all three samples were similar. The Size variable was always among the most significant followed by whether the firm is in its growth stages or mature stages. The Sample variable is the most important variable in the regression and shows that the subject firms did not have the expected effect on market share. For all three samples the Sample variable was not consistently significant but was, in fact, positive. This implies that a negative announcement positively contributes to market share. The implication of these regressions is not necessarily contrary to the event study first completed since the stock market study is observing owners' responses while the market share analysis is studying the customers' response to the same announcements. The final portion of the study shows that KLD is relatively effective at ranking firms, both at the product and firm level. Effective ranking is determined as the firm's lack of need to reassess a firm after an announcement. I find that there is no significant or economic difference in the ranking provided by KLD in the years surrounding the event. However, the regression results in all samples tested did produce the negative reaction in the KLD ranking that was as expected. However, it was only significant in the boycott sample. I conclude that the market reacts minimally to poor CSR and that customer's barks' are worse than their bite.

Purpose: This thesis aims to explain the relationship between board gender diversity, measured as the proportion of women on boards and different board categories, and firm financial performance.  Methodology: This study was conducted through a quantitative method with a deductive and cross-sectional approach. It aims to explain the relationship between the independent variable board gender diversity and the dependent variable firm financial performance through the measures of return on equity, return on assets, and Tobin’s Q. Data were collected from annual reports of all firms, excluding banks, listed on the Swedish Stock Exchange on small, mid, and large-cap for 2014 and 2020. The data were analysed through t-tests, Spearman’s rho, and ordinary least squares regressions with the control variables board size, firm size, industry, and financial year.  Theoretical perspective: Several different theories were used for hypothesis formulation and for interpreting the findings, which were: critical mass, upper echelons theory, human/social capital theory, and agency theory. Findings: The findings of this study indicate that there exists a positive relationship between board gender diversity and return on assets and return on equity. The largest difference in performance seems to be between the groups that have reached at least a threshold of 30% of the underrepresented gender and those that have not. Further, boards with no women had the worst return on assets. The results are not consistent between different tests or performance measures; however, the conclusion could be drawn that board gender diversity does not affect firm financial performance negatively.

This paper investigates  the factors  which influence  top management  turnover  in the Chinese real estate industry. The three main announced  reasons for top management turnover  are occupation  mobility 、 expiration  of the term and quit. In the empirical analysis, I find that three statistically  significant reasons for turnover are firm size 、 turnover  of first shareholder  and proportion  of independent  director.  Furthermore,  I study  how  firm performance  affect  top  management  turnover.  This  paper  uses  two different  firm  performance  indexes.  One  is financial  index-ROA  (Return  on  asset). The other is stock index-EPS  (Earnings per share). Significant  negative relations are found between total chairman turnover and earnings per share and lagged earnings per share.

Manufacturing industries have adopted globalization as a strategy to improve the reach of their products/services, bringing them closer to the customer and utilizing the cost advantage in emerging economies, better availability of resources such as raw materials, and cheaper workforce. However, with globalization came a fair share of obstacles in effectively managing the operations of a complex supply chain network spread across the globe. Failure of manufacturing firms in controlling their operations has led to a generation of wastes such as underutilization of resources, inefficient by-product disposal systems, and increased emissions from poorly managed logistics networks. Research on understanding the environmental impact of ineffectively managed supply chain networks shows that industrial operations contribute up to 20% of global carbon dioxide emissions creating a serious impact on the environment.  Realizing these adverse effects, many countries across the globe have taken steps to regulate and monitor the operations and by-products produced by manufacturing firms. Multiple countries and local governments have come together to become environmentally more responsible through encouraging sustainability initiatives. They have laid more stringent regulations to pressure the manufacturing firms to transform into more sustainable and reduce their carbon footprint. Moreover, the manufacturing firms are also experiencing pressure from local governments and private NGOs. With increasing awareness of sustainability, customers have also slowly started transforming towards sustainable products and boycotting products from firms that do not comply with sustainability standards. Consequently, manufacturing firms have realized the need to become more sustainable in order to adapt to the changing regulations and customer needs. To achieve the level of sustainability in their supply chain operations, manufacturing firms have adopted innovative strategies and made changes in their policies making sustainability one of their prime goals. To achieve the desired level of sustainability, firms need to transform their current ways by incorporating a sustainability perspective into their operations. However, integrating sustainability at the operations level is not as easy as said due to existing governance gaps which are a result of ineffective control and management in global supply chain networks.  This thesis aims at identifying, understanding, and analyzing the gaps in integrating sustainability into supply chains and providing suggestions on how to fulfill these gaps. Through this research three innovative sustainability strategies which can be applied at operational, organizational, and system levels are analyzed, and conclusions are drawn on how successful implementation of these strategies would help in fulfilling the governance gaps. Further, the research also analyses the plausible effects of implementing the strategies by understanding and comparing the firm performance before and after implementation. The firm performance is measured in three categories: environmental performance, operational performance, and financial performance.

This paper investigates how family ownership affects firm performance among Swedish publicly listed firms during the Covid-19 pandemic. The period of interest is the second quarter of 2020 which is argued to be the period of the largest impact on the economy from the Covid-19 pandemic. During this period, we hypothesize that firm performance is influenced by family ownership due to agency conflicts. Our findings suggest that family firms with a present founding family member in the management outperform other firms in general. However, firm performance is not affected by family ownership during the Covid-19 period. We also consider different aspects of family ownership such as the level of stake controlled by the family, and whether the family firm uses a dual-class share system. Inconsistent with our hypotheses, our results show that a moderate stake controlled by the family is not associated with higher performance, and family firms that use the dual-class share system do not suffer in performance. Overall, our findings indicate that the Covid-19 pandemic did not impact firm performance contrary to our expectations. Lastly, this paper highlights an issue of sensitivity in the results depending on the family firm definition and the chosen measure for firm performance.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to introduce and test a portfolio view of a firm’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. Drawing from stakeholder theory and the dynamic capabilities literature, the authors introduce CSR portfolio diversity and dynamism as key portfolio characteristics that have differential impacts across short- and long-term performance contexts. Design/methodology/approach: The study draws from the Kinder, Lydenberg and Domini database to examine CSR portfolio diversity and dynamism across seven dimensions of CSR activities. The authors test the direct and indirect relationships between CSR portfolio characteristics and both short- and long-term performance outcomes to assess the opportunities and challenges associated with managing a diverse and dynamic CSR portfolio. Findings: The findings suggest that a diverse portfolio of CSR activities positively impacts long-term performance; however, CSR portfolio diversity yields negative performance outcomes in the short-term. The authors also find that CSR portfolio dynamism moderates the relationship between CSR level and firm performance, such that a dynamic portfolio of CSR positively moderates the relationship between a firm’s CSR level and long-term performance; however, it negatively moderates the relationship between CSR level and short-term performance. Originality/value: This study integrates insights from the literature that examine the independent effects of individual CSR activities and the broader perspective that assesses the aggregated summation of CSR activities in relation to firm performance. By taking a portfolio perspective, the present study provides a unique integration of these two research streams to examine the performance implications of engaging in a diverse and dynamic range of CSR activities.