Tension and Paradox in Women-Oriented Sustainable Hybrid Organizations: A Duality of Ethics
研究可持续时尚行业中女性导向混合组织面临的紧张与悖论,发现三种伦理双重性:商业战略与个人价值观、财务可持续与整体可持续、企业员工社会福祉与个人福祉,对组织创始人管理者影响深远。
Abstract The pursuit of social goals and ethics in business creates challenges. Sustained efforts to address poverty, environmental degradation or health/wellbeing require meaningful and transformative responses that impact across multiple levels—individual, community and the global collective. Shifting predominant paradigms to facilitate change entails a renegotiation of business strategy—between organizations, their purpose(s), individual and collective stakeholders and ultimately with society at large. Hybrid organizations such as social enterprises are positioned to affect such change. However, in balancing divergent goals such organizations encounter tensions and paradox, creating a duality of ethics. Utilizing in-depth interviews to develop a case within the sustainable fashion industry, we identify tensions and paradox within women-oriented hybrid organizations. Significantly, managing these tensions and paradox results in multiple dualities of ethics, often with a wider impact on organizational founders/managers. We find three interrelated ethical dualities: business strategy and personal values; financial sustainability and holistic sustainability; and business, employee, societal wellbeing, and personal wellbeing. This insight is noteworthy when looked at within the broader context of sustainability and highlights the importance of sustainability in women-oriented hybrid organizations.