Just like last year, Joern Hoppmann took part in the “Night of the Profs” event again this year. At “Night of the Profs”, professors from the University of Oldenburg swap their lecture desks for turntables and play music in four Oldenburg clubs. The event has a long tradition and was held for the 15th time this year. The proceeds go to a good cause, this year the Rotary Club Oldenburg and Sea Shepherd.

Joern Hoppmann has been awarded the prize for outstanding doctoral supervision by the Oldenburg University Society. The prize, which is awarded annually to one or two people, aims to recognize outstanding supervisory achievements as demanding work and above-average commitment to the promotion of young academics. The award is under the patronage of the Vice President for Academic Career Paths, Equal Opportunities and International Affairs. A jury headed by the UGO, which includes a member of the UGO Executive Board and the Vice President as well as two other university lecturers, selects the award winners. More detailed information on the prize can be found on the following page:

uol.de/ugo/preise/preis-fuer-hervorragende-promotionsbetreuung-1

At the invitation of Prof. Johannes Meuer and Prof. Franziska Lauenstein, Joern Hoppmann will give a course on “Management Theories for Sustainability” for doctoral students and postdocs at KLU Hamburg in November. During the course, participants will gain an insight into the most important 29 management theories and discuss their application in the field of sustainability research. The course also includes an introduction to theories and theory formation as well as a “fireside chat”, during which general questions about management research and academic careers are clarified. Due to the high demand, a repetition of the course is planned in the near future.

This year, three doctoral students at the Management Research Group successfully completed their doctorates. Hauke Lütkehaus successfully defended his dissertation entitled “The Impact of Policy Instruments on Incumbent Adaptation to Technological Change: The Case of Electric Mobility” in May. Katharina Gärtner followed at the end of July with a dissertation on “Platforms, Incumbents, and Institutions: Understanding the Digital and Sustainable Transformation of the Mobility Sector”. Finally, in October, Swantje Freund defended her dissertation entitled “”Green Growth, Postgrowth, Degrowth? Analyzing the Growth-Sustainability Nexus at the Organizational Level”. All three doctoral students received the top grade of “summa cum laude” for their work. Congratulations on their extremely successful completion!
 

Four researchers from the Chair of Management took part in the fall conference of the Scientific Commission for Sustainability Management (WK NAMA) of the Association of University Professors of Business Administration (VHB) at the Technical University of Munich in October. The event, which took place on October 10 and 11, 2024 in Straubing, was held this year under the motto “Management, Technology, and Entrepreneurship for Sustainability”. The event is the most important meeting place for researchers in the field of sustainability management in German-speaking countries. Last year, the conference was held in Oldenburg.

The Ministry of Science and Culture has approved a research proposal from the Chair of Management on the topic of “Sustainability-oriented transformation of companies: A systemic perspective” in the ‘PRO*Niedersachsen’ program. As part of the project, which is being funded by the state with EUR 245,000, Jörn Hoppmann and Josua Oll will investigate how various factors that hinder sustainability in companies influence each other in order to gain insights into how sustainability transformations in companies can be accelerated. The official press release of the university can be found here:

uol.de/pressemitteilungen/2024/176

Congratulations to Josua Oll, who has received the “ONE Division Best Reviewer Award”. This award honors his excellent reviews for the Organizations & the Natural Environment (ONE) Division as part of the 2024 Academy of Management (AOM) annual meeting’s paper review process. The annual meeting of the AOM is one of the most renowned and largest conferences for management research. This year, the 84^th annual meeting was themed “Innovating for the Future - Policy, Purpose, and Organizations” and took place in Chicago from August 9-13.

We are delighted that Hauke Luetkehaus joined the Management Research Group as a postdoc on June 3. His research focuses on the sustainability-oriented transformation of the automotive sector, in particular innovation in the context of electromobility and the phase-out of combustion engine technology. Dr. Luetkehaus already completed his doctoral thesis at the Chair of Management, supported by a scholarship from the German Federal Environmental Foundation.

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the winter semester 2024. The deadline for applications is July 15, 2024. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

Due to Joern Hoppmann's serving as Head of Department, the Master's module "Strategic Management" will not be offered in the winter semester 2024/2025. The module will take place again regularly in the winter semester 2025/2026.

The Chair of Management has a vacancy for a postdoc (m/f/d) in the field of transformation of the automotive industry to start as soon as possible. The detailed job advertisement can be found under the following link. Application deadline is April 25, 2024.

Job advertisement Postdoc Transformation Automotive Industry

The Management Research Group is looking to fill a 50% position for a research associate (m/f/d) as soon as possible. The detailed job advertisement can be found under the following link. Application deadline is March 18, 2024.

Job Advertisement Research Associate (m/f/d) (50%)
 

As every year, the "Renewable Energy Management" and "Introduction to Business Administration" courses were rounded off this year with exciting guest lectures from the field. Florian Hauser (Audi AG) gave a lecture on the transformation of the automotive industry and the particular challenges this poses for AUdi in the Introduction to Business Administration course. In the Renewable Energy Management event, Hilko Heddinga, alumni of the University of Oldenburg and Senior Consultant at the management consultancy plenum, gave insights into current projects in the energy sector. Many thanks to the speakers for the exciting presentations!

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2024. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2024.

Jörn Hoppmann swapped the lecture for the turntables at this year's "Night of the Profs" event and played for an hour in the Oldenburg club "Polyester". The setlist ranged from German hip hop (Beginner, Fettes Brot, Seeed, Deichkind) to English rap (Macklemore, Missy Elliot, Black Eyed Peas) and alternative (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blur, Nirvana and White Stripes). The audience sang along enthusiastically and bid Jörn Hoppmann farewell with shouts of "encore". The aim for the next few years is to achieve the title of "DJ h.c.", which is awarded after three appearances.

"Night of the Profs" has a long tradition in Oldenburg and was held for the 14th time this year. The proceeds go to a good cause, this year to the Oldenburg animal shelter and Sea Shepherd.

The fall conference of the Scientific Commission for Sustainability Management (WK NAMA) of the German Academic Association for Business Research (VHB) took place from 27 to 29 September. The most important meeting place for researchers in the field of sustainability management in German-speaking countries was held this year under the motto "Accelerating the Transition to Sustainability".

A good 80 participants accepted the invitation to Oldenburg and experienced a very varied and informative program with 4 parallel paper sessions on different topics in the field of sustainability management as well as a panel discussion on the question of how researchers can increase the impact of their research on practice. Another highlight was a presentation by Claudia Hauschild, Head of Corporate Communications & Sustainability Management at Rügenwalder Mühle, on the topic of "Transformation processes towards sustainability" as well as the conference dinner in the Baroque Hall of Oldenburg Castle, including an introduction to the history of Oldenburg. Before the conference, a workshop was held for doctoral students in the co-working space CORE, during which the young researchers received extensive feedback on their research.

The conference was organized by Joern Hoppmann and Josua Oll in collaboration with Prof. Bernd Siebenhüner, Prof. Christian Busse, Prof. Klaus Fichter and Prof. Sascha Alavi.

A new paper "Not My Business: How Individuals’ Role Identities Shape Sensegiving During Corporate Sustainability Initiatives" that is co-authored by Joern Hoppmann, Marcel Richert (University of Hamburg), and Timo Busch (University of Hamburg) has just been published by Organization & Environment.

In the paper, the authors show how individuals' perception of #sustainability and their roles jointly shape the extent to which they engage in sustainability initiatives. The literature has long shown that the degree to which individuals support organizational sustainability initiatives depends on their perception (e.g., whether they perceive sustainability to pay off or not). A core task managers have during change initiatives therefore is to change individuals' perception by making use of #sensegiving (i.e., providing individuals with information and #framing it in specific ways). In our paper, we study the sustainability initiative of a medium-sized company to show how such sensegiving can be done effectively. We find that if sensegiving efforts are successful critically depends on how individuals perceive their own role in the organization. Individuals who see their role as primarily contributing to the economic success of the organization (economic role identity) ignored and filtered out information managers provided on sustainability (e.g., as they directly deleted related emails). Individuals that perceived environmental and social issues to be part of their organizational role (hybrid role identity) were more open to sustainability-related information and thus more responsive to managerial sensegiving. Making progress on sustainability therefore requires managers to not only use sensegiving but also to change individuals' role identities (e.g., by altering role definitions and creating new roles). By showing the drivers and barriers of such role identity changes, our research holds important implications for both theory and practice. We therefore hope that our research helps facilitate the many sustainability-oriented change initiatives in companies and speed up the global sustainability transition.

For anyone interested in learning more, the paper is available open access at journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10860266231183955. A previous version of this paper has won the “ONE Best Paper Award” at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting 2017 in Atlanta.

As every year, the courses "Digital Transformation" and "Strategic Sustainability Management" ended with guest lectures by practitioners. In the course "Digital Transformation", the company Transform8 reported on its day-to-day work in consulting on the topic of digital transformation. One particular focus was on the use of digital dashboards in the area of sustainability reporting. In the lecture "Strategic Sustainability Management", Christian Blanke from the "Madaster Foundation" gave a presentation on the use of online material registers in the building sector. By registering all materials and products contained in buildings or infrastructure, Madaster allows to establish a circular economy in the construction industry and thus to strongly reduce CO2 emissions in this sector. The presentation was followed by a lively discussion on the drivers and barriers to sustainability in the construction industry

The Management Research Group is looking for two new research assistants (each up to 20 hrs./month) starting as soon as possible. First, we are looking for two assistants in the research group who will take over supporting activities in research, such as data collection and preparation of documents. Furthermore, we are looking for an assistant for the master module Renewable Energy Management. The tasks include assisting in the organization of the course, maintaining our online teaching tool, and assisting in exam correction. Furthermore, we are currently looking for 7 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachelor module "Introduction to Business Administration" as well as five tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachlor module "Business Strategies" to be held in the winter term 2020/2021.

For details on the positions, please have a look at the openings (in German). The deadline for applications is July 15, 2023.

Opening HiWi Research Group

Opening HiWi REM

Opening tutors "Introduction to Business Administration"

Opening tutors "Business Strategie”

The paper “All Tied Up? How Shareholders’ Financial and Non-Financial Interests Affect Strategic Divestitures” by Josua Oll, Swantje Freund, and Joern Hoppmann has been accepted for presentation at the 2023 AOM annual meeting and been judged as one of the best papers in the program by the Strategic Management (STR) Division. This honor entitles an abridged version of the paper to be published in the “Best Paper Proceedings” of the AOM conference. About 10% of all accepted submissions receive this honor. In their paper, the authors analyze the effect of shareholder interests on whether and how firms divest their coal business, drawing on a comparative case study of the four largest electric utility companies in Germany. The annual meeting of the AOM is one of the most renowned and largest conferences for management research. This year, the 83rd annual meeting will take place from 4-8 August, 2023, in Boston (USA). Josua Oll will attend the conference and present the paper on site.

The abridged version of the study can be downloaded here: https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/AMPROC.2023.237bp

Effective April 1, Joern Hoppmann has been appointed Vice Dean of Faculty II and Director of the Department of Business Administration, Economics, and Law. The Department comprises 20 professorships in the fields of business administration and business education, economics, law, and economic education. More information on the department is available here: uol.de/wire/department

Together with Prof. Bernd Siebenhuener, Prof. Christian Busse, Prof. Klaus Fichter and Prof. Sascha Alavi, Joern Hoppmann and Josua Oll from the Chair of Management are organizing this year's fall conference of the Scientific Commission on Sustainability Management (WK NAMA) of the Association of University Teachers of Business Administration. The conference - the most important meeting for researchers in the field of sustainability management in German-speaking countries - will take place on September 28 and 29 under the motto "Accelerating the Transition to Sustainability" at the Hoersaalzentrum of the University of Oldenburg. A PhD workshop is also planned for the day before, September 27, in the CORE co-workspace. More information about the conference and the call for papers can be found at uol.de/en/nama2023. Papers can be submitted until April 30, and registration for the conference is expected to be open from June until mid-July.

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2023. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2023. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

On December 2, 2022, Jörn Hoppmann gave a guest lecture in the course "Sustainable Innovation" at TU Berlin. Joern Hoppmann followed an invitation by Rainer Quitzow, research group leader at the Institute for Transformative Sustainability Research and research associate at the Department of Innovation Economics, Technische Universität Berlin. In the lecture on "Sustainability Innovation in Business and Management", Joern Hoppmann explained how the environmental and social sustainability of products and services can be measured. Building on this, he discussed which processes and measures are required at the operational and strategic level to promote and integrate sustainable innovations in companies.

At the invitation of Prof. Dr. Thomas Spengler (Head of the Institute of Automotive Economics and Industrial Production (AIP) and Chair of Production and Logistics) and Dr. Christian Thies (Postdoc at AIO), Jörn Hoppmann gave a lecture at the Technical University of Braunschweig on November 21. The title of the talk was "Can technology companies save the climate? Drivers and barriers of sustainability-oriented innovations". Afterwards, Prof. Hoppmann exchanged ideas with Prof. Spengler and Dr. Thies as well as staff members at the AIP about current research projects. For Prof. Hoppmann the lecture meant a return to his alma mater, as he studied at the TU Braunschweig and intensified his studies with Prof. Spengler.

A paper co-authored by Joern Hoppmann with Kerstin Lopatta, Sebastian Tideman and Thomas Tammen was presented by Sebastian Tideman at this year's Yale Sustainable Finance Symposium on 11/18/2022. The paper, titled "Capital Market Reactions to Managerial Framing of Emerging Strategic Issues," analyzes how managers can present sustainability-related issues in a way that elicits a positive capital market reaction. The Yale Sustainable Finance Symposium "features fresh thinking and cutting-edge insights on impact investing, climate risks, the transition, regulation, and other emerging issues in the world of sustainable finance - especially those of interest to the sustainable investing community." Presenters came from Stanford University, the European Central Bank, and the London School of Economics, among others. More information on the Yale Sustainable Finance Symposium is available here: cbey.yale.edu/event/2022-yisf-annual-symposium-the-parallel-pressures-of-sustainable-finance

In October, the university newspaper interviewed researchers from various disciplines at the University of Oldenburg to find out what concrete steps should be taken to successfully implement the energy transition. Among the interviewees was Joern Hoppmann, who pointed out in his contribution the role of the financial market as well as the education of skilled workers. A summary of the interview can be found at the following link: uol.de/en/news/energy-transition/mapping-wind-1

The Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School has published a policy co-authored by Joern Hoppmann. The brief is based on the article "Beyond innovation and deployment: modeling the impact of technology-push and demand-pull policies in Germany's solar policy mix," which was recently published in the journal Research Policy. The policy brief can be accessed on the following website:

www.belfercenter.org/publication/combining-technology-push-and-demand-pull-policies-create-more-and-better-energy-jobs

Joern Hoppmann was recently interviewed for an article by ZEIT ONLINE and the sustainability research platform Flip. The article asks why, on several occasions in the past, individuals (e.g. Fynn Kliemann) and companies (e.g. Got Bag) have been awarded the German Sustainability Award, even though the products or services for which the awards were given were inadequate in terms of their sustainability performance.

The article is available here: mailchi.mp/letsflip/nachhaltigkeitspreis
www.zeit.de/green/2022-09/deutscher-nachhaltigkeitspreis-everdrop-got-bag-greenwashing-kritik

In its new issue, SPIEGEL exclusively reports on the results of a supplier study by Strategy& (the strategy consultancy of PwC), which was prepared in cooperation with the Management Research Group. Among other things, the study estimates labor requirements in the supplier industry in the growth areas of charging infrastructure, software, and battery recycling in order to examine the extent to which jobs lost due to electromobility can be compensated for. Parts of this analysis are based on a master's thesis prepared by Nils Göpel and supervised by Katharina Gärtner and Jörn Hoppmann from the Chair of Management. The SPIEGEL article on the study can be found here: www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/autozulieferer-trotzen-der-krise-mit-umsatzsprung-a-6b919187-48de-44bf-b605-5b4d6036f5eb

On Wednesday, July 20, from 4:15 to 5:45 p.m., a virtual guest lecture by Alexander Langguth, Managing Partner of Übermorgen Ventures, will take place as part of the "Corporate Social Responsibility" course and in cooperation with the Oldenburg Center for Sustainability Economics and Management (CENTOS).

Übermorgen Ventures is a Zurich-based venture capital investor specializing in climate change mitigation. During the presentation, titled "Using impact investing and venture capital to solve climate change", Mr. Langguth will address what change processes need to be triggered in the economy to achieve decarbonization. Based on this, he will discuss why start-ups have a particularly important role to play in this context and how the financial sector can support innovative solutions through impact investments.

All interested persons are most welcome to join. If you are interested in attending the virtual guest lecture, please send a short email to Swantje Freund (swantje.freund@uol.de). She will then send you the access data for the video conference.

The Management Research Group is looking for two new research assistants (each up to 15 hrs./month) starting in the winter semester 2022. First, we are looking for an assistant in the research group who will take over supporting activities in research, such as data collection and preparation of documents. Furthermore, we are looking for an assistant for the master module Renewable Energy Management. Tasks include assisting in the organization of the course, maintaining our online teaching tool, and assisting in exam correction. Further details about the position can be found in the position announcement (in German). Deadline for applications is July 17, 2022.

Announcement HiWi Research Group

Announcement HiWi REM

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the winter semester 2022. The deadline for applications is July 15, 2022. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

An article authored by Joern Hoppmann in collaboration with Alejandro Nunez-Jimenez, Christof Knoeri, and Volker Hoffmann from ETH Zurich and Harvard University, respectively, has been accepted for publication in the journal Research Policy. In the article "Beyond innovation and deployment: modeling the impact of technology-push and demand-pull policies in Germany's solar policy mix" the team of authors uses an agent-based model to test how alternative scenarios for photovoltaic support would have affected technology diffusion, industry development, and international trade. The simulations show that a unilateral focus of policy support on innovation and technology diffusion can lead to the implementation of policy mixes that are suboptimal with respect to other dimensions, such as job creation. Moreover, the simulation shows that even small changes in the design of support mechanisms can have a large impact on their effectiveness, due to path-dependent interactions between policy instruments.

The paper can be accessed here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733322001093

Denise Dornieden joined the Management Research Group as an external PhD candidate in May 2022. Since 2018, she has been working as a sustainability manager in the Group Development department of EWE AG and is currently supporting the Group in its climate-neutral orientation. After studying media economics and journalism at the Jade University of Applied Sciences in Wilhelmshaven and the University Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid, she completed a master's degree in "Management Consulting" at the University of Oldenburg. Her research interest is the sustainability transformation of the real and financial economy. In the context of her PhD, she is working on inertia in a climate context as well as stranded assets.

At the end of March, the project funded by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture (MWK) "Electric, connected and sustainable? Discourses on the Future of Mobility in Times of Climate Change and Digitalization" was completed. As part of the project, a total of three public events (so-called future platforms) and 58 pre- and post-event interviews with experts were conducted. An overview of the events as well as the central results of the project can be found on the project page at uol.de/en/management/research/zukunftsplattformen.

Several papers of members of the Chair of Management have been accepted at international conferences in the field of management and sustainability. Two papers were accepted at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting, one paper was accepted at the Strategic Management Society, two papers were accepted at the Group for Research on Organizations and the Natural Environment (GRONEN) conference, and one paper was accepted at the Alliance for Research on Corporate Sustainability (ARCS). The team looks forward to presenting and discussing the papers during the events.

The website for the joint research project Digital Growth of the Management Research Group and the Business Information Systems Group is now available online and can be accessed at digital-growth.org. Further information and news about the project can be found there.

Joern Hoppmann has become a member of the "Working Group for Integrated Reporting and Sustainable Management" of the Schmalenbach Gesellschaft für Betriebswirtschaft in February 2022. The aim of the working group, which is made up of representatives from practice and academia, is to discuss relevant issues in the context of integrated sustainability reporting and sustainable management and to provide assistance to companies through its own analyses. More detailed information can be found on the website of the working group: schmalenbach.org/index.php/arbeitskreise/finanz-und-rechnungswesen-steuern/integrated-reporting-und-sustainable-management

In the context of the events "Introduction to Business Administration" and "Renewable Energy Management" Siegfried Flohr (Siemens Gamesa) and Florian Hauser (Audi AG) gave guest lectures. Mr. Flohr spoke on the topic "Project management in Onshore Wind". Florian Hauser provided exciting insights electromobility and sustainability-oriented transformation at Audi AG. After the presentations, students had the opportunity to ask questions.

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2022. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2022. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

On November 25, Oldenburg's coworking space CORE hosted the first "Sound of Science" event, which will feature regular discussions on scientific topics embedded in a musical program. In the kick-off event, which was broadcast by Oldenburg's local radio station Oldenburg Eins, Joern Hoppmann discussed the topic of "Business and Sustainability" with the CEO of the BÜFA Group. Prof. Dr. Werner Brinker, Chairman of the Oldenburg University Society, and Bianca von Husen, moderator of OEins, led through the evening.

The journal "Finance Research Letters" has published an article authored by Josua Oll in collaboration with Dirk Baur (University of Western Australia). While climate-related criticism of Bitcoin is primarily based on the network's absolute carbon emissions, the authors draw on a relative emission perspective that considers the market value of Bitcoin. The results show that adding Bitcoin to a diversified equity portfolio can both enhance the risk-return relationship of the portfolio and reduce the portfolio's aggregate carbon emissions. This finding persists under various assumptions regarding Bitcoin prices, carbon emission estimates, and carbon prices.

The article can be accessed at: www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1544612321005262

On November 8, from 1 to 3:30 p.m., the third Future Platforms will take place under the title "Mobility in Times of Climate Change and Digitalization," which is sponsored by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture (MWK) as part of the "Future Discourses" project. As part of the event, three experts will first explain their views on pressing issues in the context of mobility, sustainability and digitalization. Afterwards, there will be the opportunity for questions, exchange and discussion. We are pleased that we were able to win the following experts for the event:

• Dr. Christian Höcker (Head of Climate Neutrality Program, Deutsche Bahn): "On the way to a climate-neutral Deutsche Bahn"
• Prof. Dr. Sophia Becker (Head of the Department of Sustainable Mobility and Transdisciplinary Research Methods, TU Berlin): "Political Measures and Communicative Strategies for the Transport Turnaround"

Participation is free of charge. To register for the Future Platform, please send a short (preferably blank) email with the subject "Registration Future Platform" to Mr. Josua Oll (josua.oll@uni-oldenburg.de). In time for the event, you will then receive a link with instructions on how to participate in the video conference. In addition, we are providing an impulse paper for all those interested in the event, which summarizes the findings from the project to the present day. The number of participants is limited for technical reasons, and the "first come, first served" principle applies.

More information on the Future Platforms is available here: uol.de/en/management/research/zukunftsplattformen/3rd-future-platform-mobility-in-times-of-climate-change-and-digitalization

In the September issue of Wirtschaftswoche, an article has been published that takes a close look at the market for vertical farms. Joern Hoppmann was interviewed for the article and the insights from the interview were incorporated into the article. The article can be accessed here (in German): www.wiwo.de/my/technologie/umwelt/vertical-farms-ersetzt-die-pflanzenzucht-im-schrank-bald-den-landwirt/27550744.html.

The journal "Technological Forecasting and Social Change" has published an article authored by Jörn Hoppmann in collaboration with Geng Wu and Jillian Johnson (both formerly of ETH Zurich). In the article, the authors analyze the effect of technology-push and demand-pull policies on the innovation behavior of firms in the photovoltaic industry. Specifically, the article shows that technology-push policies lead firms to seek more knowledge that is far from their existing knowledge, while demand-pull policies on the demand side have the opposite effect. However, both types of policies lead to a narrower knowledge search by firms, with the relationship depending on the firms' existing knowledge base.

The article can be accessed at: www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S004016252100295X

The Management Research Group in the Department of Business Administration, Economics, and Law is currently looking for 7 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachelor module "Introduction to Business Administration" as well as 5 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachlor module "Business Strategies" to be held in the winter term 2020/2021.

For details on the positions, please see the position announcements (in German). The deadline for applications is July 10, 2021.

Position announcement tutors "Introduction to Business Administration"

Position announcement tutors "Business Strategies"

Julia Jaspers joined the Management Research Group as an external PhD candidate in May 2021. Since 2002, she has been working in the fields of Corporate Sustainability, Human Resources and Organizational Development, most recently as head of Sustainability Management and Corporate Foresight at Deutsche Bahn AG. She is currently involved in setting up the PeerSchool for Sustainable Development e.V., a learning network for sustainability managers from companies and academia.

Between 1996 and 2002, she studied comparative political science and Romance studies at the Universities of Münster and Paris (Sorbonne Nouvelle), supported by scholarships from the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and the German Academic Exchange Service.

Her research interests lie in the sustainability transformation of companies. In her dissertation, she examines the role of co-determination and the interplay between sustainability and corporate organization to derive implications for companies and social partners.

The second of three future platforms will take place on 4 May from 4 to 6.30 pm under the title "Mobility in Times of Digitalization", which is funded by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture (MWK) as part of the project "Discourses on the Future". At the event, three experts will first explain their views on pressing issues in the context of mobility and digitalization. Afterwards, there will be an opportunity for questions, exchange and discussion. We are pleased that we could win the following experts for the event:

• Dr. habil. Weert Canzler (Co-Head of the Digital Mobility and Social Differentiation Research Group, Social Science Research Center Berlin): "Autonomous driving: hell or heaven?"
• Maxim Nohroudi (CEO door2door and board member BITKOM): "Are we facing a Kodak/Nokia moment in the mobility industry?"
• Marion Jungbluth (Head of Team Mobility and Travel, Federation of German Consumer Organisations): "App mobility that takes everyone along".

The event will be held in German and participation is free of charge. To register for the Future Platform, please send a short (preferably empty) e-mail with the subject "Registration Future Platform" to Ms. Swantje Freund (swantje.freund@uni-oldenburg.de). In good time before the event, you will then receive a link with instructions on how to participate in the video conference. The number of participants is limited for technical reasons, the "first come, first served" principle applies.

For more information on the future platforms project, please see uol.de/en/management/research/zukunftsplattformen/2nd-future-platform-mobility-in-times-of-digitalization

On March 17, Joern Hoppmann participated in a symposium of the Oldenburg-based energy supplier EWE, dealing with the question of how companies can achieve climate neutrality. During the workshop, which was organized by the trainees of the company, Joern Hoppmann provided a brief input on corporate carbon neutrality strategies, which was followed by a stakeholder simulation. Subsequently, Joern Hoppmann shared his assessment of EWE's current strategy and engaged in a discussion of the company's strategy with the workshop participants.

EWE is Germany's fifths largest energy supplier and has set itself the goal of becoming carbon neutral in Scope 1 and 2 by 2035 and achieve a reduction of carbon emissions in its supply chain of 50 percent (upstream) and 65 percent (downstream) respectively.

In the presentation, Joern Hoppmann highlighted the drivers and barriers for a Circular Economy using the example of beverage packaging in Germany. Based on the results of a current research project, which is being conducted at the Chair of Management in cooperation with ETH Zurich, he explained why, despite ecological advantages, single-use recycled packaging is increasingly gaining ground over reusable packaging in many areas in Germany. The project is part of the dissertation project of Katharina Schweitzer, who is working on her doctorate as an external doctoral candidate at the Chair and in parallel as a scientific officer at the German Academy of Science and Engineering (acatech) in the office of the "Circular Economy Initiative Germany".

Joern Hoppmann was elected to the board of the Oldenburg Center for Sustainability Economics and Management (CENTOS) at this year's general meeting. CENTOS bundles the scientific competencies and activities in the field of environmental economics and sustainability management that have developed over the course of two decades at the University of Oldenburg and have achieved a high national and international visibility.

The Management Research Group is pleased to announce that a third-party funded project entitled "Digital Growth: Understanding the Drivers of Firm and Industry Growth in the ICT Sector" has been approved by the Ministry of Science and Culture (MWK) of Lower Saxony. The research project, which will be conducted in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Jorge Marx Gómez's research group "Business Informatics/Very Large Business Applications", will investigate the drivers and mechanisms of growth in the information and communication technology sector. The funding is part of the program "The Digital Society" of the Lower Saxony Pre-Award, which supports basic or application-oriented projects that explore the digital transformation from the perspective of the social sciences and in which social sciences and information sciences work closely together.

The "Digital Growth" project builds on the observation that while the information and communications technology (ICT) sector forms the backbone of the digital transformation and has experienced spectacular growth in recent decades, it is increasingly characterized by winner-takes-all markets and quasi-monopolies that raise barriers to entry and threaten the survival of small ICT companies. There is also the question of the extent to which technological growth drivers such as processor speed and memory density are coming up against physical limits. Against this background, the project will use qualitative case studies to investigate what drives company growth and how companies can manage to survive in winner-takes-all markets. In addition, the project will analyze patent and industry data to create a better understanding of how different technologies in the industry are interconnected and together shape industry dynamics. The new insights will be used to derive practical recommendations on how small firms can design competitive strategies in quasi-monopolistic markets and how regulators can support digital laggards and develop early warning systems to prevent monopolies from emerging.

More information on the Digital Society program can be found here: www.volkswagenstiftung.de/unsere-foerderung/unser-foerderangebot-im-ueberblick/nieders%C3%A4chsisches-vorab-die-digitale-gesellschaft

The press release from the University of Oldenburg can be accessed here: www.presse.uni-oldenburg.de/mit/2021/019.html

Hauke Lütkehaus joined the Management Research Group as a PhD candidate and scholarship holder from the „Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt“ in January 2021.

He holds a B.Sc. in Business Administration from the University of Düsseldorf and a M.A. in „Sustainability Economics and Management“ from the University of Oldenburg. During his masters, he gained research experience at the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Energy, Environment. After his graduation, he researched at the Institute for Networked Energy Systems in Oldenburg. His research interests lie in the field of sustainability transitions. In his dissertation, he examines the role of policy mixes for entrepreneurial innovation and market dissemination activities to derive implications for the improvement of existing policies as well as for the design of business strategies.

In its December issue, the university newspaper of the University of Oldenburg "Einblicke" has published an article on the career and research foci of Joern Hoppmann. The article (in German) can accessed under the following link: uol.de/fileadmin/user_upload/presse/EINBLICKE/65/management-unterwegs-im-dienst-des-klimas-joern-hoppmann.pdf

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2021. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2021. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

Josua Oll has been awarded the Dr. Walter Kapaun Study Prize 2020 for his doctoral dissertation entitled “Essays on the Advancement of Socially Responsible Investment Research: A Conceptual and Methodological Perspective”. The Dr. Walter Kapaun Study Prize is awarded with the support of the Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences, University of Hamburg, and promotes outstanding dissertations with thematic relevance to sustainability and ethics. Josua Oll’s dissertation was evaluated “summa cum laude” by Prof. Dr. Alexander Bassen (University of Hamburg), Prof. Dr. Dirk Ulrich Gilbert (University of Hamburg), and Prof. Dr. Matthias Fifka (University of Erlangen-Nuremberg) last year. Parts of his cumulative dissertation have already been published in Organizational Research Methods, Organization & Environment, and Business & Society.

For more information on the Dr. Walter Kapaun Foundation and this year’s award winners, please visit: www.kapaun-stiftung.de/index.php

A scientific article authored by Joern Hoppmann has been accepted for publication in Research Policy. Research Policy is widely considered the leading journal in the field of innovation studies.

In the article, entitled "Hand in hand to Nowhereland? How the resource dependence of research institutes influences their co-evolution with industry," Joern Hoppmann draws on a comparative case study of the world's two largest research institutes for solar photovoltaic power to study how differences in their financial resource dependence influence patterns of co-evolution. The study shows that when a research institute is heavily reliant on industry funding, it leads to close co-evolution of science and industry, thereby raising the risk of a mutual lock-in into specific technologies. A heavy reliance on public funding, on the other hand, contributes to the decoupling of science and industry evolution, which entails the risk of research having limited impact on practice. By developing a framework that shows how co-evolution between science and industry is affected by resource dependence, the study contributes to the literature on science-industry collaboration, co-evolution, and technological paradigms. Moreover, the study bears important implications for policy makers and managers of research institutes interested in spurring technological change toward sustainability.

The article can be downloaded for free until January 13, 2021, here: authors.elsevier.com/a/1c7mRB5ASFivv

The Chair of Management is looking for a new research assistant in the research project Zukunftsplattformen for 20 hours per month. The tasks include administrative activities as well as research support in the field of mobility. Further details about the position can be found in the position announcement (in German). The application deadline is October 20, 2020.

Position announcement research assistant

The first of three future platforms will take place on 3 November from 1 to 3.30 pm under the title "Mobility in Times of Climate Change", which is funded by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture (MWK) as part of the project "Discourses on the Future". At the event, which is being held online because of the Corona pandemic, three experts will first explain their views on pressing issues in the context of mobility and climate change. Afterwards, there will be an opportunity for questions, exchange and discussion. We are pleased that we could win the following experts for the event:

• Kerstin Meyer (Project Manager Vehicles and Drives, Agora Verkehrswende): "Electromobility and the Decarbonization of Transport".
• Dr. Norbert Korallus (Head of Transport Planning, City of Oldenburg): "Strategies and measures for more sustainable mobility in municipalities".
• Dr. Stephan Krinke (Head of Strategy and Programs, General Secretariat Sustainability Volkswagen AG): "The Volkswagen Decarbonization Program - The Road to CO2 Neutral Mobility".

The event will be held in German and participation is free of charge. To register for the Future Platform, please send a short (preferably empty) e-mail with the subject "Registration Future Platform" to Ms. Katharina Gärtner (katharina.gaertner@uni-oldenburg.de). In good time before the event, you will then receive a link with instructions on how to participate in the video conference. The number of participants is limited for technical reasons, the "first come, first served" principle applies.

For more information on the future platforms project, please see uol.de/en/management/research/zukunftsplattformen.

What can teachers do to make digital teaching in economics and management as interesting and instructive as possible? In order to answer this question, the Leibniz Information Center for Economics (ZBW) contacted student councils all over Germany and asked them to name lecturers who have inspired their students with good digital teaching. The lecturers were then asked about their experiences and recommendations and these were compiled in a "Best Practice" list. One of the lecturers interviewed was Joern Hoppmann, whose tips on digital teaching were included in the list. The list can be accessed at the following link: www.oekonomenstimme.org/artikel/2020/09/digitale-lehre-in-den-wirtschaftswissenschaften/

On September 15th, Joern Hoppmann gave a keynote speech in the context of the virtual OFFIS Meetup with the title "The influence of digitalization on corporate sustainability: Curse or blessing? In the lecture he highlighted the many ways in which the trend of digitalization affects sustainability in companies. The focus was on both the positive and negative effects at the operational and strategic level. A key message of the presentation was that digitization enables many operational improvements in the short term (e.g. increased information transparency and connectivity), but with corresponding negative impacts (e.g. raw material exploitation, energy consumption and electronic waste). Furthermore, the decisive influence of digitization is that it enables new products, services and business models that have the potential to fundamentally change industries. As the example of digital platforms shows, this is both an opportunity (e.g. by creating new sustainability-oriented platforms) and a major risk (e.g. by allowing platforms to abuse their market power, encouraging consumption, enabling tax avoidance or contributing to a deterioration in working conditions).

An overview of the Meetup agenda can be found here: www.offis.de/offis/aktuelles/veranstaltung/meetup-nachhaltigkeit-durch-digitalisierung-enabler-treiber-oder-widerspruch.html

Starting next semester the Chair of Management offers a new course "Renewable Energy Management" for Master students in Sustainability Econonomics and Management (SEM) and Postgraduate Programme Renewable Energy (PPRE). The module offers an introduction to the most important areas relevant to the management of renewable energy companies. To this end, the course first provides a general introduction to economic fundamentals and principles. Students then gain insights into the following topics: Energy markets, renewable energy policy and climate policy, energy and society, foundation and strategies of renewable energy companies, investment and financing and innovation management in the renewable energy sector.

Each of these topics will be explored in depth through practical exercises, including guest lectures, simulations, stakeholder discussions, case studies and investment calculations.

More information on the course can be found here: uol.de/en/management/teaching/courses/renewable-energy-management

The paper “Goal-Driven and Stimulus-Driven Attention in Sustainable Investing: An Eye-Tracking Experiment” by Josua Oll, Martin Meißner (Zeppelin University), and Alexander Bassen (University of Hamburg) has been published in the Best Papers Proceedings of the 2020 Academy of Management Meeting. About 10% of all accepted submissions receive this honor. In their paper, the authors analyze the influence of value priorities and visual salience on the relevance of sustainability information in investment decisions. Methodologically, the authors conduct a conjoint analysis in which the visual attention of the study participants is recorded via eye-tracking. Josua Oll presented the study in August at the AOM Annual Meeting, which was held virtually this year due to the Corona pandemic. Josua Oll was also selected as one of the Organizations & the Natural Environment (ONE) Division’s best reviewers.

An abbreviated version of the study can be downloaded here: https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/AMBPP.2020.211

Hendrik Thelken has been a visiting researcher at the Chair of Management since September 2020 and is a PhD student at the "Centre for Sustainable Entrepreneurship" at the University of Groningen. He is particularly interested in the cognitive aspects of behavioral patterns of sustainable entrepreneurs. His research is therefore at the interface of entrepreneurship, psychology and sustainability sciences. Due to the current situation, the collaboration will take place virtually, nonetheless we look forward to an interesting and instructive exchange.

On Wednesday, from 12.15 to 1.45 PM, Dr. Michael Peters, co-founder and managing director of Sunvigo will give a virtual guest lecture as part of this year's course on Corporate Social Responsibility.

Sunvigo (www.sunvigo.de/) is a start-up that offers private consumers the possibility to install photovoltaic power plants on their own rooftop without customers having to purchase or lease the solar panels. Instead, the customers simply pay the electricity they consume through their electricity bill. Dr. Peters will provide insights into his business idea and the process of founding a start-up company in the context of sustainability. In addition, there will be plenty of time to discuss questions from the audience. Before founding Sunvigo, Dr. Peters worked as a consultant for several years. He is an expert on questions around energy, climate, and sustainable mobility.

If you are interested in joining the lecture, please contact Swantje Freund (swantje.freund@uni-oldenburg.de), who will provide you with a link to the conference room.

The Chair of Strategic Management in the Department of Business Administration, Economics, and Law is currently looking for 7 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachelor module "Introduction to Business Administration" as well as 5 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachlor module "Business Strategies" to be held in the winter term 2020/2021. Addionally, we are looking for a reserach assistent (15 hours/monthe) for the course "Renewable Energy Management").

For details on the positions, please see the position announcements (in German). The deadline for applications is July 10, 2020.

Position announcement tutors "Introduction to Business Administration"

Position announcement tutors "Business Strategies"

Position announcement research assistent "Renewable Energy Management"

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the winter semester 2020/2021. The deadline for applications is July 15, 2020. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

As part of University of Oldenburg's graduate school 3GO, Joern Hoppmann and Josua Oll are offering a new workshop on "Publishing in Management, Economics, and Social Sciences." The four-day course is targeted at doctoral students and aims to provide participants with an understanding of how to publish in leading international journals in business administration, economics and sociology. Contents that will be covered in the course include basics of research philosophy, types of scientific publications, creating and managing a publication portfolio, selecting research question, systematically reviewing literature, data collection, writing and editing scientific articles, analyzing and selecting scientific journals, reviewing scientific articles, and communicating research results.

Since February 2020, Joern Hoppmann is member of the Editorial Review Board of "Organization & Environment". The journal aims to publish rigorous and impactful research on the management of organizations and its implications for the sustainability and flourishing of the social, natural and economic environment in which they act. With an impact factor of 8.5, "Organization & Environment" is currently one of the four most cited journals in the field of "Environmental Studies" and "Management" and is considered one of the most renowned journals in the field of sustainability management. You can find more information on "Organization & Environment" at journals.sagepub.com/home/oae.

Starting next semester the Chair of Management offers two new courses for Master students.

First, the course " Digital Transformation: Strategies and Sustainability" will be offered for the first time. It will provide insights into the diverse and rapidly developing fields of digitization in a corporate and societal context. In the first part of the course, students will get an overview of the fundamentals and practical applications of digitization. In the second part, students will develop digital business models and evaluate them with regard to sustainability criteria. Further information on the course can be found here: uol.de/management/studium-und-lehre/lehrangebot/digital-transformation-strategies-and-sustainability

In the course "Sustainable Mobility" the influence of digitization is examined alongside other developments and challenges at various levels of society. Using case studies, current solutions and problems for sustainable mobility are discussed and finally modelled with the help of a simulation game. Further information on the course can be found here: uol.de/management/studium-und-lehre/lehrangebot/sustainable-mobility

Current social megatrends such as climate change and digitization require and bring about fundamental changes in the field of mobility. However, it currently remains unclear how exactly the transport sector will develop and which measures are necessary to meet the challenges in this sector. In order to examine the social discourse on such questions in greater detail, the Chair of Management has received funding from the State of Lower Saxony for the project "Electric, connected and sustainable? Discourses on the Future of Mobility in Times of Climate Change and Digitalization". The project aims to moderate the social debate by means of scientific reflection and public participation and to contribute to a science-based opinion-forming and solution-finding process. The project will start in September and the first workshop on "Mobility and Climate Change" is scheduled for October 2020. Further information can be found in the press release of the University of Oldenburg.

A scientific article, which Joern Hoppmann co-authored with Alejandro Nuñez-Jimenez, Christof Knoeri und Volker Hoffmann (all ETH Zurich), has just been published in the journal "Environmental Research Letters".

In the article entitled "Can Designs Inspired by Control Theory Keep Deployment Policies Effective and Cost-Efficient as Technology Prices Fall? the authors examine how policies that aim to promote the deployment of renewable energy and complementary technologies (such as storage or electric vehicles) should be designed to account for falling costs for the supported technologies, to avoid over-subsidisation, but at the same time maintain a sufficient incentive level. In order to answer this question, the study uses an agent-based model, which simulates the dynamics of the feed-in tariff for photovoltaics in Germany for the years 2000 to 2016 and examines to what extent alternative forms of support could have contributed to more efficient and effective results. The analysis shows that using automatic adaptation mechanisms based on cybernetics lead to political support measures being much more effective in achieving their goal and leading to fewer costs. The study also shows that the costs of support measures largely depend on the time distribution of policy targets. Based on the results, the study derives important recommendations for the design of future support measures for technologies, such as battery technologies or electric vehicles.

The article can be accessed for free at iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ab6fbf/meta.

The Chair of Management is looking for a new research assistant (up to 15 hours per month) starting in summer semester 2020. The tasks include supporting activities in research such as data collection and preparation of documents. Further details about the position can be found in the position announcement (in German). The deadline for applications is February 15, 2020.

Position announcement research assistant

We are happy to announce that the Chair of Management has recently joined Twitter. We'll use this channel to highlight new research findings, update you on chair activities, and engage in a discussion on topics related to strategy, sustainability, and innovation. Click here to check out our profile and follow us for the most recent news.

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2020. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2020. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals.

As part of the student-organized "Public Climate School", Joern Hoppmann will be giving a talk on "Does protest work? Why firms (do not) invest in climate mitigation". Building on several years of research, the presentation will highlight the drivers and barrieres of corporate climate action and discuss how social movements affect firms' climate performance.

The presentation will take place today, Monday 25 November, at 8.15pm in lecture hall G. Everyone is cordially invited to join.

A new article entitled "Why Matter Matters: How Technology Characteristics Shape the Strategic Framing of Technologies" has been accepted for publication by the journal "Research Policy". The article is co-authored with Laura Diaz Anadon (Cambridge University, UK) and Venkatesh Narayanamurti (Harvard University, USA). Research Policy is one of the leading journals in the field of innovation studies.

In the article, the authors investigate how the executives of the two largest research institutes for photovoltaic technologies make use of framing to shape the technological development of solar technologies in their own interest. The article shows that executives use four framing dimensions and three framing tactics, and that the choice of dimensions and tactics is tightly coupled to the characteristics of the specific technologies the research institutes pursue. In doing so, beyond making important contributions to the literature, the article helps better understand the emergence of technology hypes.

The full article can be downloaded for free until December 30, 2019, here: authors.elsevier.com/a/1a20c_16wfD-HP

Katharina Schweitzer has been an external doctoral student at the Chair of Management since October 2019. She also works as scientific officer for the National Academy of Science and Engineering (acatech) in the office of the "Circular Economy Initiative Deutschland". After studying industrial engineering at the Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University and the University of South Wales, she completed her master's degree in "Sustainability Economics and Management" at the University of Oldenburg.
During her dual study for the bachelor's degree she worked in Germany and Mexico in the automotive industry. She gained practical experience in international technical project management, change management and central quality management. As part of her master's degree, she completed a research semester at the "Center for Energy and Environmental Technologies Assessment" at the Universidad Central Marta Abreu de las Villas in Cuba.
Her research interests lie in the field of sustainable and strategic transformation. Her dissertation aims at examining drivers and effects of the transformation towards a circular economy to derive implications for practitioners and policy makers.

Katharina Gärtner has been a research assistant and doctoral student at the Chair of Management since September 2019.

After studying English language and literature with a focus on linguistics and business administration at the University of Mannheim, she completed her Master's degree in "Sustainability Economics and Management" at the University of Oldenburg. As part of her bachelor's degree, she gained research experience at Swansea University and practical experience working for Volkswagen AG. Her research interests lie in the field of sustainable and strategic transformation. In her dissertation, she examines trends and change potential with regard to sustainable mobility in order to derive implications for politicians and practitioners.

A scientific article authored by Joern Hoppmann and Ben Vermeer (previously ETH Zurich, now Boston Consulting Group) has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Business Venturing, one of the leading journals in the field of entrepreneurship.

The article, entitled "The Double Impact of Institutions: Institutional Spillovers and Entrepreneurial Activity in the Solar Photovoltaic Industry", investigates whether venture capital (VC) investments (i.e., high-risk, high-return investments in entrepreneurial ventures) in the global solar photovoltaic (PV) industry are driven by foreign policy incentives. The article shows that, indeed, foreign policy incentives have driven domestic VC activity. Interestingly, however, the positive impact of foreign policies on domestic VC deals is greater if there are favorable domestic policy incentives in place and if foreign policy incentives are similar to those used domestically.

These findings have important implications for policy makers, as they suggest that domestic policies may also benefit foreign firms, but that countries cannot simply free-ride on foreign institutions, since domestic policy incentives may be required to reap the benefits of foreign policy incentives. For entrepreneurs, these findings imply that locating their business in countries with favorable policy conditions is important not only because it allows them to directly benefit from the corresponding incentives, but also because domestic policy incentives help start-ups to benefit from favorable policy conditions abroad, an effect we label "the double impact of institutions."

On Wednesday, July 10, Dr. Marcel Richert, responsible for sustainable innovations and business models at Tchibo will give a guest lecture as part of the course "Corporate Social Responsibility." During the presentation, entitled "What does it take to create change? - Lessons learned from 14 years of sustainability work," Dr. Richert will discuss the most important insights gained during 14 years of sustainability work at Tchibo. Exemplary questions, which will be treated, are: Why is dialogue-based formats more effective than command-and-control? Why are regulatory frameworks needed? Why do consumers need to be taken onboard for the journey and why are fundamental innovations needed? The presentation starts at 2.30 PM in Hörsaal 3. All interested individuals are cordially invited.

Since July 1, the Chair of Management has a new team member: Dr. Josua Oll. Dr. Oll completed his PhD at the University of Hamburg, focusing on topics at the intersection of sustainability, management, and finance. Prior to this, Dr. Oll studied Sustainability Economics and Management (MA) at the University of Kassel, Sustainable Development (MSc) at the University of Saint Andrews (Scotland), and Economics (BSc) at the University of Maastricht (Netherlands). In his research, Dr. Oll investigates the drivers and dynamics of corporate social responsibility at the individual level. To this end, he also draws on experimental methods, such as eye tracking. Welcome onboard!

The Chair of Strategic Management in the Department of Business Administration, Economics, and Law is currently looking for 8 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachelor module "Introduction to Business Administration" as well as 5 tutors (up to 30 hours/month) for the Bachlor module "Business Strategies" to be held in the winter term 2019/2020. For details on the positions, please see the position announcements (in German). The deadline for applications is August 1, 2019.

Position announcement tutors "Introduction to Business Administration"

Position announcement tutors "Business Strategies"

The Chair of Management welcomes Swantje Freund as a new research associate. Swantje Freund holds a Master in Sustainability and Economics from the University of Oldenburg and a Bachelor in Ecology from the University of Göttingen. During her PhD, Swantje will investigate the drivers and consequences of firm and market growth to derive implications for how to design sustainability-oriented corporate strategies and public policies. Welcome onboard!

Prof. Joern Hoppmann has received the the MLP "Young Talent Award" at this year's annual meeting of the German Academic Association for Business Research (VHB). The award is given to young scientists for a remarkable international publication that has been published in the previous two years. Prof. Hoppmann received the award for his habilitation thesis entitled "Organizational Strategies and Innovation toward Sustainability: A Behavioral Perspective". The thesis deals with the overaching question of how organizations (can) strategically respond to sustainability-oriented change in their social, political, and technological environment.

On April 1, Dr. Joern Hoppmann was appointed full professor and has taken on the role as head of the Chair of Management (previously Chair of Business Administration, specifically Strategic Management and Sustainability). Previously, Prof. Hoppmann served as the deputy head of the chair. Further information on his background and research interests can be found on his profile page.

We are looking to fill two positions as Research Associate (PhD Student or Postdoc) (m/f/d) (salary scale E 13 TV-L, 70%) starting as soon as possible for a period of three years, with possibility of extension.

The positions offer the opportunity to work on exciting and meaningful questions at the intersection of sustainability, strategy, and innovation (e.g., in the context of ustainability-oriented transitions of firms or strategic sustainability management) and contribute to the solution of pressing ecological and societal problems.

The detailed job ad including the application formalities can be found here:

Job Ad: 2 Research Associates (PhD Student or Postdoc) (f/m/d)

The deadline for applications is March 31, 2019. If you have questions regarding the planned research projects or the application process, please do not hesitate to contact Joern Hoppmann.

A scientific article, which Dr. Joern Hoppmann wrote in co-authorship with Dr. Jan Ossenbrink and Prof. Dr. Volker Hoffmann from ETH Zurich, has been accepted for publication in "Organization Science". Organization Science is one of the top six journals in the field of management studies.

In the article entitled "Hybrid Ambidexterity: How the Environment Shapes Incumbents’ Use of Structural and Contextual Approaches" the authors use a qualitative case study to investigate how the four largest German electricity suppliers went about addressing the two main challenges of "renewable energies" and "business models for distributed electricity generation". The article shows that the organizations chose very different approaches to address the two challenges and draws on these differences to advance the literature on organizational learning and ambidexterity. Moreover, the findings in the article can be used to derive more general implications for the transformation of firms toward sustainability.

In the category "Bachelor and Master Theses", you can now find the proposals for theses topics in the summer semester 2019. The deadline for applications is January 15, 2019. Detailed information on the application process can be found in the corresponding proposals. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to contact Dr. Joern Hoppmann.

During this year's "Teaching Day" on Novembre 29, 2018, Joern Hoppmann was awarded the "Teaching Award" for the best course at the University of Oldenburg in the academic year 2017/2018. The course for which the award was given is the module "Introduction to Business Administration." The price is awarded by the university's vice president for studies, teaching, and equal opportunities. A jury comprised of docents and students from all faculties and external members selects the awardees based on student nominations.

In its December issue, the magazine "Harvard Business Manager" (a German sister journal of the Harvard Business Review) features the paper "Boards as a Source of Inertia: Examining the Internal Challenges and Dynamics of Boards of Directors in Times of Environmental Discontinuities" by Joern Hoppmann, Florian Naegele and Bastien Girod, which is forthcoming in the Academy of Management Journal. The article summarizes the most important findings and recommendations for how to design boards of directors in times of strategic change. In addition, the article contains an interview with Ruediger Grube, former CEO of Deutsche Bahn and chair of the board of directors of the Hamburg Harbor and Logistics AG (HHLA). Building on the study results, in the interview, Ruediger Grube describes how boards of directors need to change to account for the strategic challenges organizations face in many sectors.