a b s t r a c tCorporate social responsibility (CSR) literature holds that CSR can help firms gain a competitive advantage by enabling them to differentiate themselves from their competition and reduce costs. In the strategy literature, differentiation and cost reduction are recognized as two major competitive strategies that firms pursue to outcompete rival firms. Yet, how CSR is linked to a firm's choice of competitive strategy is not explicitly explored in the extant literature. The present paper fills this gap. Using data collected from 478 small firms representing multiple industries in the US, this paper finds that a firm's focus on competing through differentiation strategy is associated with its level of community engagement but not with its level of environmental engagement. Competing through a strategy of costleadership is associated with neither community nor environmental engagement. The paper concludes that, except for seeking differentiation through community engagement, the approach of small firms to CSR remains largely characterized by adhoc decisions with few ties to their competitive strategies. The paper advances the understanding of CSR in small firms and provides novel insights into how CSR is linked with competitive strategies.

Drawing upon the corporate social responsibility literature, we investigate the moderating effects of the natural environment and the stage of an organization's life cycle on the market orientation to firm innovativeness relationship. Through 229 owners or chief executive officer respondents, our results establish evidence of (1) a positive linkage between market orientation and firm innovativeness; (2) natural environmental policy positively moderating the market orientation to firm innovativeness relationship; and (3) organizational life cycle negatively moderating market orientation to innovativeness. Our findings suggest ventures characterized as being early in the organizational life cycle are more likely to have a positive environmental policy toward the natural environment leading to a competitive advantage through firm innovativeness.

Innovativeness can help companies differentiate themselves, with the ultimate goal of securing survival and improving performance. Modern theories in organizational behavior look at innovation as something that starts with individual creativity but that is also affected by the work environment. Using one broad industry sector, the US forest products industry, this study attempts to integrate into a unifying model the concepts of work climate, innovativeness, and firm performance using structural equation modeling. Results support the proposed theoretical model, with some modifications, finding a positive and significant relationship among all factors. Having innovation as a core part of a company’s strategy and fostering a climate for innovation positively affects the degree of innovativeness and performance of a company. This is especially true for secondary or value-added wood products manufacturers. A climate for innovation is characterized by high levels of autonomy and encouragement, team cohesion, openness to change and risk taking, and sufficient resources available to people. Lack of a validation sample suggests treating the model as tentative until further testing.

Abstract:The promise of increased industry competitiveness through innovation has driven interest in innovation by industry managers, policy makers and academicians. Forest sector researchers have produced a strong body of work in recent years. This article provides a review of work originating in North America during the period 2000-2013. The review includes 28 journal articles focused on the forest sector in the U.S. and Canada. Seven important themes from the literature are identified and discussed: defining innovation and innovativeness; measuring innovativeness; factors influencing innovativeness; new product development; climate/culture; innovation systems; and innovativeness and firm performance. The positive culture and climate within a company has a clear connection to improved innovativeness and firm performance. Generally, findings describing the culture of the forest sector show a conservative group that fails to sufficiently invest in innovativeness and innovation. Culture change presents a significant opportunity within the industry to strive toward the improved development of new products, processes and business systems to reap the rewards of improved performance. The implications for managers and researchers are outlined.