Microfoundations of Partnerships Exploring the Ro

Authors: Ans Kolk Marlene Vock Willemijn van Dolen

Publish Date: 2015/06/24

Volume: 135, Issue: 1, Pages: 19-34

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Abstract

The growing body of literature on partnerships has paid most attention to their implications at the macro level for society as well as the meso level for the partnering organisations While generating many valuable insights what has remained underexposed is the micro level ie the role of managers and employees in partnerships and how their actions and interactions can have an effect on the spread and potential effectiveness of collaborative efforts This article uses a casestudy approach to empirically explore the patterns and potential boundary conditions of socalled ‘trickle effects’ of partnerships among individual actors within and outside partnering companies which have thus far only been proposed conceptually Based on interviews with employees from three different companies we found an evidence of trickledown and trickleup effects with higher and lower management as well as trickleround effects with colleagues family friends and customers The article discusses several partnership characteristics that seem to play a role and notes implications for research and practiceThe past decade has seen a wave of studies on partnerships and a concomitant set of overview articles eg Austin and Seitanidi 2012a b Selsky and Parker 2005 special issues eg in Journal of Business Ethics May 2009 and July 2010 and a research handbook Seitanidi and Crane 2013 Most attention has been paid to the macro societal implications of partnerships and to the meso level to the partnering organisations in the various stages of their collaboration from formation and implementation to outcomes While this has generated many valuable insights what has remained underexposed is the role of individuals in partnerships and how their actions and interactions can have an effect on the spread and potential effectiveness of collaborative effortsIt is here that this article seeks to contribute in line with Austin and Seitanidi 2012b who recommended further research at the micro level of partnerships to obtain more insight into the potential socalled ‘trickle effects’ of these social interactions at the individual level as proposed by Kolk et al 2010 Focusing on managers and employees within organisations they conceptually suggested partnership interactions to ‘trickle down’ from managers to employees ‘trickle up’ from employees to managers and/or ‘trickle round’ between employees the latter horizontal effects may also extend from employees to people outside the organisation for example family friends and customers Kolk et al 2010 cf Austin and Seitanidi 2012b Empirical research on these aspects has been scarce except for anecdotal evidence and preliminary studies on trickle effects from employees to consumers and interactions with partner organisations Le Ber and Branzei 2010 Vock et al 2013 This article aims to shed light on the microlevel interactions by employees of organisations involved in collaborative activities and the related trickle effectsBesides a contribution to the partnership literature our study also adds to the corporate social responsibility CSR debate With regard to the implementation of CSR programmes extant research has suggested the need for a balance between topdown and bottomup approaches Van der Voort et al 2009 and a more employeecentred perspective Nord and Fuller 2009 Similarly studies point at employees as potential advocates of CSR initiatives to external audiences Bolton et al 2011 Du et al 2010 Dawkins 2004 However current insights are mainly based on the views and best practices of CSR managers eg Bolton et al 2011 Maon et al 2009 Seitanidi and Crane 2009 Sharp and Zaidman 2010 Van der Voort et al 2009 not on actual perceptions and interactions of employees which have hardly been investigated This raises the question whether and if so when employees are willing and likely to participate in and advocate CSR initiatives which is a necessary condition to ensure their viability Our study takes this perspective and aims to extend past research on CSR which advocated employeecentred approaches by exploring how such strategies may workBuilding on the conceptual framework by Kolk et al 2010 this article unravels the patterns of trickle effects ie trickleup trickledown and trickleround as well as potential boundary conditions While previous research pointed at the managerial importance of actively engaging employees in corporate social initiatives this study provides implications for ‘how’ to do that It also contributes to the broader CSR debate by responding to recent calls for more research on individuals’ perceptions actions and interactions particularly through qualitative studies to help reveal behavioural mechanisms and thus shed light on the socalled microfoundations Aguinis and Glavas 2012Given the lack of empirical research we used a casestudy approach to explore the issues raised above Before explaining this further in relation to the methodological setup of the study the next section will first discuss the theoretical insights specifically considering the role of employees in relation to trickle effects of partnerships followed by a presentation of the findings The article concludes with a discussion of our findings and implications for research and practiceIn partnerships’ trickle effects employees seem crucial as they interact with managers colleagues as well as customers family and friends Spreading the word about partnerships from within organisations has been suggested as a critical success factor by academics Berger et al 2006 as well as by practitioners who identified a lack of effective communication and management as major obstacles for the creation of enthusiasm among a company’s internal and external constituents CE 2010 Tennyson and Harrison 2008 Some authors Burmann et al 2009 Burmann and Zeplin 2005 have more generally noted the importance of employees as facilitators and possible proponents of implementation and communication of brand and company activities also visàvis a range of external stakeholders And according to a recent global citizen survey 50  of respondents regard ‘regular employees’ as highly credible in providing information about a company a score similar to representatives of nongovernmental organisations NGOs and much higher than chief executive officers CEOs or government officials/regulators Edelman 2012From a more internal organisational perspective employees have also been mentioned as important stakeholders of companies’ responsibility efforts eg Bhattacharya et al 2008 Du et al 2010 but in most cases to highlight that CSR can help to retain current employees and attract new ones Albinger and Freeman 2000 Turban and Greening 1997 In this regard CSR is noted to increase pride in the company as well as organisational commitment job satisfaction work motivation loyalty productivity and helping behaviours and to lower absenteeism and turnover intentions eg Bhattacharya et al 2008 Brammer et al 2007 Koh and Boo 2001 Peterson 2004 However as Bolton et al 2011 p 64 observed this is seen as a “byproduct of CSR activity rather than an integral part of the process” in which the employee would be crucial to its success and considered the key internal stakeholder Van der Voort et al 2009 also noted a lack of attention for these internal “activists” in view of a dominant focus on managers

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