Business as Usual? An Exploration of the Deteriminants of Success in the Multinational Transfer of Corporate Responsibility Initiatives

We conduct an exploratory study of the determinants of success in the multinational transfer of social practices. We find that though extant literature on business practice transfer provides some relevant insight, social practice transfer differs in significant ways from "business as usual." In particular, successful social practice transfer is associated not with concrete and clearly codified initiatives, but with ambiguous and loosely bounded initiatives; not with management by business units that have mastered internal organizational dynamics, but with those that focus on understanding external stakeholder needs; not with maintaining complete control over the transfer process, but with opening it up to substantive stakeholder involvement. We discuss the implications of our findings for development of a more nuanced view of how to manage social practices within multinationals