Wruk, D. / Scheiber, F. / Oberg, A.: Diversity of Management Labels on Organizational Self-Representations on the Internet: A Reflection of Multiple and Contradictory Logics?
Today’s organizations are confronted with a variety of expectations and demands (efficiency vs. innovation, shareholder value vs. social responsibility) imposed on them by different stakeholders within their relevant environments. How do organizations address these various demands resulting from the heterogeneous environments in their self-representations on the Internet? To answer this question, we investigate organizational self-representations of the 500 largest companies in Germany. We explore whether organizations reflect heterogeneous expectations by using management labels - such as “Shareholder Value Management”, “Lean Management”, “Diversity Management” or “Corporate Social Responsibility” - which represent concepts and norms that indicate an adequate management of the specific demands and thereby address expectations of different stakeholder groups. By assessing the variety of management labels on organizations’ websites we intend to gain a measure for the degree to which these organizations reflect various expectations originating from their environments. According to arguments from new institutional theory, we thereby propose that certain organizational characteristics (such as size and degree of internationalization) and surrounding characteristics (such as industry and strength of shareholders) are strong predictors for the variety of expectations organizations face and partly reflect within their self-presentation.
08.04.09
