Entrepreneurship. Digitalisierung. Nachhaltigkeit.
BWL im Dreiklang der gesellschaftlichen Transformation

Das Streben nach „Impact“ ist und bleibt ein fester Teil der Betriebswirtschaftslehre. Welchen Beitrag kann und möchte die Betriebswirtschaftslehre als interdisziplinäres Feld zu gesellschaftlichen Transformationen leisten? Die VHB-Tagung 2024 legt einen Fokus auf die Kernthemen Entrepreneurship, Digitalisierung und Nachhaltigkeit, mit denen die BWL originäre Beiträge zu breiteren Debatten in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft anstoßen kann. Aktuelle Fragestellungen beziehen sich beispielsweise darauf, wie sich die Transformation zu einer nachhaltigen Gesellschaft auf den Unternehmenszweck („Purpose“) auswirkt und wie das Erreichen von Nachhaltigkeitszielen durch Digitalisierung als Medium und Entrepreneurship als Veränderungsmechanismus beschleunigt oder erleichtert werden kann.

Wir laden die interessierte Fachcommunity dazu ein, an der VHB-Tagung 2024 teilzunehmen und diese durch ihre Beiträge zu diesen übergeordneten Themen und darüber hinaus mitzugestalten. Beiträge können in Form von Manuskripteinreichungen für die Programme der jeweiligen VHBWissenschaftskommissionen (WKs) erfolgen oder in Form von Vorschlägen für integrative Formate („IWK“), welche den interdisziplinären, WK-übergreifenden Austausch zum übergeordneten Tagungsthema und darüber hinaus auf innovative Weise ermöglichen sollen.

Zum vollständigen Call for Contributions.
Zur Konferenz-Homepage.
Zum Einreichungsportal.
Einreichungsschluss: 8. Oktober 2023.

About the conference

We are delighted to welcome Human Resources (HR) scholars and practitioners, from throughout the world, to the 5th Human Resources International Conference (HRIC). This conference is hosted by the Department of Management at the University of Otago in Ōtepoti Dunedin, Aotearoa New Zealand, in conjunction with the HR Division of the Academy of Management.
The conference will take place from 10 to 12 January 2024 in the Otago Business School, with a series of presentations, professional development workshops and a doctorial consortium. Our theme is „Common Good HRM“.

Call for extended abstracts HRIC

The 5th HRIC offers an opportunity to advance the discussion on Human Resource Management’s (HRM) role in bringing about sustainability and common good within the workplace. Common Good is all about supporting “business leaders and employees in contributing to ecological and social progress in the world” (Aust, Matthews, and Muller-Camen, 2019), with Common Good HRM presenting a future-focused vision for HRM that supports practitioners who want to make a difference. Thus, there is a need for HRM to explore new approaches to practice.

Common good HRM emphasises how it can contribute to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by supporting organisations as they attempt to deal with the grand challenges faced by our society. The value of the Common Good approach is that it highlights the salient role HRM can play in dealing with society’s grand challenges, with all the SDGs linking to HRM policy and practice. For example, the goal of eliminating poverty (#1) is clearly linked to rewards, gender equality (#5) to diversity and inclusion, good health and wellbeing (goal #3) to health, safety, and social and psychological wellbeing, decent work and economic growth (goal #8) to recruitment, selection, rewards, training, development and performance management. Although less explicit, goals such as that of responsible consumption and production (#12) can also be addressed through training and performance management initiatives.

Therefore, the conference theme, among other things, seeks to develop our understanding about new HRM approaches which promote solutions to the grand challenges faced by society, and influence stakeholders such as employees, organisations, community, and the environment. This HRIC provides opportunities to share work-in-progress on any current related HRM issue. The conference also presents an opportunity to network with colleagues from academia, industry and government. We welcome paper, symposia, and professional development workshop submissions on a range of topics relevant to the shifting landscape of HRM, and therefore have the following tracks:

1. Common good HRM
2. Indigeneity in HRM
3. International HRM (including cross-cultural perspectives)
4. Employment Relations
5. Human Resource Development (HRD)
6. HR scholar/practitioner nexus
7. General HRM
8. Interdisciplinary/practitioner

Deadline for Submissions: 18 August 2023.
Decisions notified: by 22 September 2023.
Submission guidelines and more info on the Conference’s website.

Conference „Empirical Personnel and Organizational Research“ on 9 and 10 November 2023 at the University of Southern Denmark Sønderborg & Special Issue

With the thematic focus, this year’s annual meeting addresses the megatrends of social sustainability and new understandings of quality work for employees. Social sustainability means offering processes for creating successful places that promote well-being by understanding what people need from the places they live and work.

Social sustainability supports social and cultural life, social amenities, citizen and employee engagement opportunities, and space for people and places to evolve as belonging and identity. Social sustainability can be reached by aligning formal and informal processes; systems, structures, and relationships must allow current and future generations to create healthy and durable living. Socially sustainable communities are equitable, diverse, connected, and democratic and provide a good quality of life. The annual meeting organisers are interested in how organisations of all types can contribute to a social sustainability culture and how these cultures can be organised. Examples of problems, challenges, work practices and initiatives of interest to the conference and social sustainability paradigm are, among other things:

• The reproduction and production of social closure and exclusion in organisations: starting from cultural and social bias in recruiting, over-performance and promotion management (meritocracy, the seniority principle) to self-exclusion of particular demographic groups, workplaces have the power to divide social groups further – or potentially mend this gap.
• Private companies are increasingly interested in alternative work standards concerning technological progression: changes include agile, low-hierarchy digitalised workflows, and liberal group and project management, especially in IT and high-tech, but also in other domains.
• Organisations are increasingly encouraging issues of employee identity, belonging, (mental) health and psychological safety, cultural struggles, and empowerment: such momentum can be explored and evaluated from different perspectives. While ethical considerations (e.g., overcoming racial discrimination) matter, managing employee demands resulting from their identity and belonging and integrating resulting practices in the business and management model (e.g., rewarding employee engagement appropriately) must be equally thought through.
• The megatrends towards sustainability and new standards of good work have increased the „talk“ about such issues: Organisations have professionalised their public verbiage, installed public corporate persona and otherwise improved their image regarding corporate consciousness and engagement. Team building measures and a focus on good and friendly work milieus are ubiquitous – however, whether or not such measures benefit employees or merely the „new spirit of capitalism“ (Boltanski and Chiapello, 2007) is to be explored.

In addition, contributions that deal with other empirical personnel and organisational research topics beyond the conference topic are also welcome.

Conference dates:
Submission deadline: 30 September 2023.
Registration deadline: 15 October 2023.
Conference: 9 & 10 November 2023.
Conference’s website.
Special Issue dates:
Full paper submission deadline: 28 February 2024.
Publication planned for Issue 4/2024.
View the complete Call for Papers here.