Being Nice Goes Long Way: Manifesting Compassion for Others Enacts in Experiencing Positive Emotions and Workplace Happiness for the Employees

Business Perspectives and Research, Ahead of Print.
Drawing on positive activity model (Lyubomirsky & Layous, 2013), the present study aims to examine the relationship of employees’ compassion for others and the level of workplace happiness whilst investigating mediating mechanism of positive affectivity. The study further explores the role of perceived organizational support (POS) in bolstering the happiness of the employees. Using the purposive sampling technique, a sample of the Indian working population (N = 422) was selected for the study. Standardized instruments were administered to the respondents for data collection. Structural equation modeling findings revealed that the employees who showed more compassion toward others experienced a higher level of happiness at work. The results indicated that the positive emotions acted as a significant mediator in this relationship. The PROCESS macro analysis showed that the POS moderated the link between compassion and workplace happiness for the employees in a positive direction. The study highlights the importance of performing intentional positive activities for the better well-being of the employees. The implications of the study in terms of practicing positive psychology for creating thriving modern organizations are discussed.

Impact of “Distance” on Corporate Social Responsibility: Evidence from an Emerging Market

Business Perspectives and Research, Ahead of Print.
Multinational enterprises resort to several market and nonmarket strategies to overcome the liability of foreignness (LOF) faced by them in overseas markets. A lesser explored nonmarket strategy to overcome LOF and gain legitimacy in the host country is through corporate social responsibility (CSR) expenditure. This paper empirically examines the role of “distance” on the CSR practices of foreign subsidiaries in India. Further, the study explores the role of market potential of the emerging market host country as proxied by the Gross Domestic Product in moderating the relation between distance variables and CSR expenditure. Our sample consists of CSR expenditure data of 69 foreign subsidiaries in India from 17 countries over the period from 2014 until 2018. The results show that cultural and economic distances impact the CSR expenditure of foreign subsidiaries positively and significantly. This relationship is negative and significant for administrative distance and insignificant for the case of geographic distance. Furthermore, it is observed that the market potential of the host country can make the foreign subsidiaries overlook the existence of distances.

Institutional change in the social innovation process: Evidence from an emerging context

The International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Ahead of Print.
Institutional change has been identified as inherent to social innovation proposals, especially in developing contexts. However, it is still unclear how these changes occur in the social innovation process. Therefore, our study seeks to answer the following research question: How do attempts at institutional change occur in the social innovation process in an emerging context? We use the qualitative approach to investigate two Brazilian social innovation cases striving to change the institutional environment in which they operate. Our data reveals that institutional change may be necessary before the scalability stage of the social innovation process. We suggest that this finding is related to the developing context, which requires social entrepreneurs and their teams to break institutional barriers to expand their social innovation initiatives. We have also identified some mechanisms used for the attempts to institutional changes: cwompetition with government organisations, influence in formulating laws, and support for the market growth and the entry of new participants.