L Management of Intangible Assets in Contemporary Organizations

Guest Editors Introduction
Ethical Management of Intangible Assets

in Contemporary Organizations
Rossella C. Gambetti
Universit Cattolica del Sacro Cuore
T. C. Melewar
Middlesex University
Kelly D. Martin
Colorado State University
ABSTRACT: This essay explains how intangible asset management oriented

toward enhancing corporate performance increasingly embeds ethical concerns,
primarily to address stakeholder expectations. We discuss how ethical dimen-
sions in intangible asset management may be co-constructed and intertwined
in organization-stakeholder interactions to generate collaborative meaning making
according to a stakeholder-centric view of the firm. In so doing, we adopt an ethical
view that acknowledges that stakeholders beyond the firm have equal status and
agency to engage in a social construction process of intangible assets nurtured by
ongoing dialogue and reciprocal understanding between organization and stake-
holders. The essay concludes by envisioning how the dialogic process of social
construction of intangible assets involving both organization and stakeholders is best
conceived as a social contract between the two that enacts a cultural bond between
intangible assets together with ethical and societal resources that are collectively
generated, owned, and maintained.
KEY WORDS: corporate identity, corporate brand, corporate reputation, social

constructionist perspective, stakeholder-centric view of the firm, social contract
A cademics and managers widely agree that a firms ability to gain competitive
advantage and generate higher corporate and stakeholder value depends on its
capacity to build and nurture intangible assets. The assets in question are idiosyncratic
and firm specific; they include corporate identity, corporate brand, and corporate
reputation. Corporate identity constitutes the sum of all elements of organizational
life, including a firms culture, mission, vision, goals, strategies, organizational and
physical structures, and communication systems (Melewar, 2003). Pressure to
manage the corporate identity as part of the larger corporate brand continues to
increase in order to meet stakeholder demands. In this regard, the corporate brand
2017 Business Ethics Quarterly 27:3 (July 2017). ISSN 1052-150X pp. 381392
DOI: 10.1017/beq.2017.21
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382 Business Ethics Quarterly
serves as a value covenant between firm promises and stakeholder expectations

(Balmer & Gray, 2003; Balmer & Greyser, 2002). Stakeholder expectations of the
ethical management of intangible assets feature centrally in this conceptualization.
Both the firms ability to deliver valued outcomes to multiple stakeholders and its
ethical sensitivity in doing so may be best understood by evaluating the corporate
reputation, defined as a collective representation of the firms past actions (Fombrun &
Van Riel, 1997). Firms that proactively and ethically respond to stakeholders needs
will enjoy reputational benefits.
Pressing questions remain, however: How does one define the ethical man-
agement of corporate intangible assets in the contemporary business climate?
What concrete firm decisions and actions are required to enact and sustain ethical
management? Finally, how might ethical management of intangible assets affect
business-society relations generally, as well as enhance corporate credibility and
firm-stakeholder interactions specifically? These open questions represent top
concerns among global business leaders, especially in present times where a lack
of ethics in corporate behaviors can dramatically affect the business environment.
In organizations where egoistic or profit-motivated interests can overwhelm ethical
decision making, intangible capital can create severe problems, such as legal prob-
lems, employee performance and engagement problems, and credibility problems
(Carroll & Buchholtz, 2014).
Organizations quest for enhanced ethical management practices that nurture and
protect their intangible resources suggests research opportunities for business ethics
scholars. Accordingly, this special section aims to ignite academic debate as well
as inform business practitioners in the domain of ethical intangible asset manage-
ment. This special section introduction advances knowledge through understanding
of three critical and interrelated issues increasingly faced by organizations while
designing their ethical management orientation. It contributes to business ethics
research by building on a social constructionist perspective of organization and
stakeholder interactions. First, we identify specific ethical dimensions involved in
building intangible assets, such as corporate identity and corporate brand. Second,
we describe how these ethical dimensions actually are co-constructed and intertwined
in organization-stakeholder interactions to generate collaborative meaning making
using a stakeholder-centric view of the firm. Third, we explain how organizations
operationalize ethical dimensions at the behavioral level to improve internal align-
ment and synergistic integration of ethical concerns within intangible asset man-
agement practices, as well as enhance corporate market performance. In this regard,
we expect this essay and the special section articles to provide useful insights both
for scholars interested in exploring the disciplinary interconnections between the
business ethics and the marketing conceptual domains, and for corporate leaders
who daily are challenged to balance ethical and market-focused decision making.
This introductory essay is structured as follows. We first discuss how intangible
asset management is increasingly infused with stakeholders ethical concerns in
tandem with corporate performance goals. Striking an appropriate balance is critical
for the organization to gain necessary reputational approval as well as to sustain its
license to operate. We then explain how organizations progressively are abandoning
Ethical Management of Intangible Assets 383
a firm-centric logic of intangible asset management to adopt a stakeholder-centric

view of how to build and manage their intangible assets. This view acknowledges
that stakeholders beyond the firm have equal right and status to command a social
construction process of intangible assets that is nurtured by ongoing dialogue and
reciprocal understanding between organization and stakeholders. We conclude with
exploration of how this dialogic process of social construction of intangible assets
involving both organization and stakeholders may be conceptualized as a social
contract between the two creating intangible assets that are collectively generated
and managed.
Our discussion here tackles the organizational complexity of creating and imple-
menting an ethical stance on intangible asset management that benefits the orga-
nization and its stakeholders. Likewise, the two articles of the special section that
follow deep dive into strategic and operational dimensions of ethical management
of intangible assets. The article by Simes and Sebastiani (2017) extends corporate
sustainability as a key ethical dimension of corporate identity and empirically illus-
trates how organizations can effectively manage the interface between corporate
sustainability and corporate identity at strategic and instrumental levels to benefit
stakeholders and organization alike. The article by Alwi, Ali, and Nguyen (2017)
provides a conceptual and empirical understanding of how organizations can effec-
tively leverage stakeholder perceptions of having a strong ethical brand identity by
carrying out corporate branding and corporate social responsibility strategies that
are able to enhance corporate and market performance.
CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS AS LANDMARKS

OF CORPORATE PERFORMANCE
Superior performance increasingly depends on firms ability to ethically manage

corporate intangible assets (Berrone, Surroca, & Trib, 2007; Dacin & Brown, 2006;
Roberts & Dowling, 2002). Ethical management of intangible assets requires a bal-
ance between traditional performance-based objectives (i.e., profit maximization,
value creation) and broader business objectives that include maximizing stakeholder
value and meeting societal obligations. In this regard, corporate intangible assets
have become a top strategic priority for corporationsespecially for those operating
globally. The business landscape has witnessed an explosion of international rankings
and indices developed by consultancies, media companies, and research institutions.
Among the most popular are the Reputation Institutes Reputation Quotient listing
the most reputable companies, Fortunes ranking of the most admired companies,
Millward-Brown and BrandZs rankings of the most valuable global corporate
brands, the Reputation Institutes CSR Rep Track of the most socially responsible
companies, Corporate Nights most sustainable corporations, Fortunes Change the
World ranking of the most sustainable corporations, Glassdoors ranking of the best
places to work, and Universums ranking of Europes most attractive employers.
Through these platforms, companies vie for top rankings on firm value and ethical
attributions that are determined largely by assessing the corporate reputation and
corporate brand. Although these ranking schemes vary considerably, collectively
they demonstrate the significant complexity and challenges associated with quanti-
fying corporate intangible assets. Nonetheless, each ranking organization includes
strong ethical concerns spanning multiple social dimensions (e.g., environmental
sustainability, corporate social responsibility, diversity management, work-life
quality/balance, company conduct transparency, talent acquisition/management,
corporate citizenship, etc.).
Evidence shows that many global companies already are managing their corporate
brands in ways that embody ethics, fully include stakeholders, and consider impacts
and benefits upon society at large. IKEA, for instance, created a far-reaching
campaign to fight stereotypes and conventions that limit individual freedoms and
simultaneously promote gender equality. Other examples include benefit corporations
that promote ethical brands and manage those assets in a way that involves vetting
suppliers and materials providers so that every aspect of the firm embodies such values.
Firms such as these have embraced global corporate brand strategies that shift their
worldview from product-as-company, to company-as-(social)-product. Strength-
ened emphases on intangibles such as corporate name and logo that position the
entire brand portfolio toward stakeholders create a powerful corporate identity that
unifies all sub-brands. Firm use of the brand to encapsulate substantial investment
in ethical dimensions, such as corporate responsibility, business sustainability, and
care for peoples well-being ultimately can elicit brand preference and even regain
brand loyalty (Berens, Van Riel, & Van Bruggen, 2005).
As stakeholders expect more from companies, including ethical conduct, these
expectations also are playing out in firm efforts to shape the brand. Research shows
that stakeholder expectations can heighten firm ethical behavior and promote greater
social responsiveness (Fukukawa, Balmer, & Gray, 2007). Related work suggests
this enhanced emphasis on ethics happens through either stakeholder dialogue or
confrontation. Regardless, this interaction can create conditions for corporate identity
alignment with critical stakeholder and societal expectations (Abratt & Kleyn,
2012). Some have referred to ethical corporate identity building as ethicalization,
the process by which trusted stakeholder relationships and organizational citizenship
come together (Balmer, Fukukawa, & Gray, 2007; Kleyn, Abratt, Chipp, & Goldman,
2012). Ethicalization represents an important strategic imperative underpinning a
firms attempt to build a strong brand that is inclusive of its multiple stakeholders.
Although managers and business ethics scholars agree that the ethical management
of corporate intangibles is a necessary ingredient for firm success, what this implies
for corporate identity and corporate brand remains unclear. So too, the antecedents
and outcomes of such ethical management have yet to be defined. As such, ethical
management of intangible assets constitutes a significant research gap in need of
future work.
SHIFTING PERSPECTIVES ON CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS:

FIRM-CENTRIC TO STAKEHOLDER-CENTRIC
Traditional normative approaches to corporate intangible assets cast them as gener-

ated and managed by senior management (Balmer, 2001). For instance, corporate
brands are likened to a conscious senior management decision to convey organiza-

tional identity attributes in the form of a well-defined branding proposition (Balmer,
2001). Corporate brands are depicted as the unique corporate identity promise the
firm makes to its stakeholders, which are managed and controlled by key organi-
zational actors and conveyed via persuasive communication messages. This view
assumes linear communication modes comprised of one-way channels from the
organization to its stakeholders (Balmer & Soenen, 1999; Van Riel & Balmer, 1997;
Van Riel & Fombrun, 2007). Communication is then conceived as a conduit (Reddy,
1979) that bridges the self-defining intentions of the organization that constitute
its identity and the overall set of cognitive and emotional representations held by
stakeholders that shape corporate image and reputation (Christensen & Cornelissen,
2011; Cornelissen, Christensen, & Kinuthia, 2012).
However, as Cornelissen and colleagues (2012: 1098) argue, such a view pre-
supposes meaning construction as an unproblematic process of message exchange,
whereby any outcome of meaning-making is predetermined. This perspective
overlooks any formative effect of language on cognitive processes and on meaning
construction in social and organizational settings. It also disregards agency and
interpretative work by stakeholders to whom company messages are addressed
(Christensen & Askegaard, 2001; Cornelissen et al., 2012: 1098). Depicting
communication as a constitutive force by which actors exert agency in framing
and ascribing meanings to organizations, Cornelissen and colleagues (2012: 1099)
offer a social constructionist approach to communication and corporate intangible
asset management. They contend that corporate identity and corporate brand are
emerging in, and shaped by, communication flows between organizations and stake-
holders. This view suggests that corporate identity and corporate brands are resources
that constantly are (re)produced and socially constituted in company-stakeholder
interactions. Unlike the conduit model often ascribed to communicated messages,
which is largely a meaning disclosure and transfer function of corporate identity,
the constitutive view of communication highlights relational connections between
organizations and stakeholders guiding how they produce meaning (Cornelissen
et al., 2012: 1099).
Consistent with the rise of social constructionist approaches to corporate intangi-
bles, which acknowledge their role as vehicles of meaning that emerge from social
interaction (Melewar, Gotsi, & Andriopoulos, 2012: 602) between the firm and
its stakeholder environment, we argue that the management of corporate intangible
assets occurs in a context of empowered, socially engaged, and culturally adept stake-
holders who possess substantial influence in shaping the brand. These stakeholders
bring a range of societal and economic expectations to the proverbial table, some
of which may be aligned with and some of which may conflict with the actions of
the firm (Handelman, 2006). Stakeholders increasingly claim moral legitimacy as
justification to influence firm actions that affect their personal, professional, and
community spheres. Handelman (2006: 107) in this regard contends that as firms
increasingly emphasize the value of strong corporate branding, intangible assets
may assume the role of cultural entities whose inherent meanings morph across
different social stakeholder groups. As such, corporate intangible asset construction
and maintenance no longer reside under the sole strategic control of the firm, but
rather, are guided by corporate leaders in partnership with stakeholders to shape the
cultural evolution of the brands. Along these lines, brands are transformed in the
social spaces in which organizations and stakeholders coexist and thereby jointly
shape the meanings underlying corporate identity and corporate brand (Handelman,
2006: 110). Hence, intangible asset management has become a process of symbolic
facilitation, involving efforts and activities that contribute to the ongoing dialogue
between the firm and its stakeholders (Handelman, 2006) and that encourage stake-
holders to create value (Grnroos, 2011).
Social constructionist approaches also adopt an ethical perspective on corporate
intangible assets, casting them as the interconnected result of top management
vision, organizational culture, and stakeholder perceptions/values toward the firm
(Hatch & Schultz, 2003; Melewar et al., 2012). Firm constructions emerge through
relational communications with stakeholders (Christensen & Cornelissen, 2011) so
that any collective sensemaking about the firms intangible assets are situational and
arise in organization-stakeholder discourses resonating with the values stakeholders
bring into play in their interactions (Cornelissen et al., 2012). Hence, intangible
assets can be ethically conceived and managed as the dynamic output of ongo-
ing negotiation and co-creation processes (Hatch & Schultz, 2010; Thompson,
Rindfleisch, & Arsel, 2006) between the firm and its stakeholders. So too, these assets
are sustained and nurtured by the inherent relational nature of corporate intangibles.
The ethical view of corporate intangibles highlights the brand promise as embedded
in firm-stakeholder dialogue. It follows that this view more fully characterizes con-
temporary firm brand management than do past perspectives of the firm as unilateral
communicator (Christensen & Cornelissen, 2011). We advocate firm approaches
to intangible asset management that are steeped in multilateral communication and
ongoing collaborative sensemaking between the firm and its stakeholders.
The social constructionist, ethical perspective on corporate intangible assets
openly contrasts with normative approaches that are deterministic and firm biased
(Pitt, Watston, Berthon, Wynn, & Zinkhan, 2006). These latter perspectives on
intangible asset management neglect the formative contribution of firm-stakeholder
social interactions (Biraghi & Gambetti, 2013; Melewar et al., 2012). Likewise, the
ethical perspective is rooted in a shift from a firm-centric to a stakeholder-centric
approach to intangible assets. We suggest that such an approach extends traditional
good citizenship behaviors (Logsdon & Wood, 2002; Matten & Crane, 2005; Moon,
Crane, & Matten, 2005; Post, 2002; Wood & Logsdon, 2008) and better integrates
the firm with society as a whole. The social constructionist, ethical perspective on
intangible asset management ascribes a central role to stakeholders and their claims
in shaping corporate goals. It also envisions intangible assets as collective resources
that contribute to a sustainable future for people and organizations alike. Although
powerful and visionary, this view holds a utopian afflatus that can create problems
for both strategy formulation and daily business decisions that extend beyond
multilateral communication flows. In this way, the perspective raises unanswered
questions that future academic research should address for ethical intangible assets
management to benefit both stakeholders and the organization. For instance, how
is shared meaning produced, negotiated, and socially constructed by organizations

and stakeholders? How are organization and stakeholder interactions symbolically
facilitated? How does co-creation occur and how can the process be optimized for
maximum benefit to organizations and stakeholders?
CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS AS A SOCIAL CONTRACT

BETWEEN THE FIRM AND ITS STAKEHOLDERS
The perceptual shift from corporate intangible assets as firm-generated and firm-
owned resources to collectively created and collectively managed resources more
intentionally connects a firm and its stakeholders. Along these lines, corporate
intangible assets epitomize a bilateral social contract by which organizations and
stakeholders reciprocally commit to align goals and values time after time throughout
all their interactions touch points and modes (Biraghi, Gambetti, & Schultz, 2017).
The social contract is executed at the intersection of firm-stakeholder encounters
that emerge organically from societal issuesnot just those that are relevant to the
firm. This view suggests that an ethical management of intangible assets may
allow firms to fully integrate with their external environment and to better respond
to stakeholders demands.
So too, the notion of service-dominant logic (Vargo & Lusch, 2004, 2008) recently
challenged the notion that consumers are passive users of firm value, refuting the idea
that they are but destroyers of value but rather including them in the value creation
process so that they are always involved. This process empowers consumers to act
as resource integrators (Lusch & Vargo, 2006), leveraging their competencies and
abilities to undertake actions that, directly or indirectly, increase or diminish the value
organizations offer to the market (Cova & Dalli, 2009). Consumer empowerment
is the extent to which a firm provides its customers avenues to connect with it and
to actively shape its operations, as well as to collaborate with each other by sharing
information, praise, criticism, recommendations, and ideas (Ramani & Kumar,
2008). Empowerment allows consumers to combine their resources and skills to
support, challenge, or even threaten organizations. By appropriating, transforming,
and negotiating meanings and values, empowered consumers create opportunities
to imbue the market with their own cultural identity (Biraghi, Gambetti, & Quigley,
forthcoming). In doing so they raise societal issues that call for an immediate
response by organizations that provides a credible, ethical, and responsible solution
to their demands.
The social contract view of intangible assets emphasizes co-construction platforms
that enable the firm and all its stakeholders (not just consumer stakeholders) to
jointly design future goals and collectively redefine a priority agenda (Biraghi &
Gambetti, 2013; Biraghi et al., 2017). Co-construction relies on peer-to-peer
conversation and participation. In the current context, co-construction relies on
firm-to-stakeholder dialogue. Effective firm-stakeholder dialogue forms a value
covenant that fosters shared understanding and moral commitment (Pies, Hielscher &
Beckmann, 2009). The social contract perspective views corporate intangibles
as ethical assets that are built and strengthened over time as societal resources.
These resources are societal in that they are jointly shaped, negotiated, and re-shaped
by the firm and its stakeholders (Biraghi et al., 2017), who take on a role as societal
constituents (Handelman, 2006).
Expanding on Handelman (2006), the social contract perspective holds that cor-
porate intangible assets and their related cultural meanings reside in constituents
social sphere, further contradicting the idea that corporate identity and corporate
brand are controlled solely by the organization. As Handelman (2006: 110) contends,
societal constituents use intangible assets as symbolic clues or cultural artifacts
to make sense of their own world. In so doing, they operate as active co-creators of
corporate intangibles, taking up individual or collective actions to shape their own
social space. Organizations and stakeholders evoke the social contract by constantly
engaging in co-constructed and co-fostered meaning-making dynamics that both
confer and actualize an ethical stance on corporate intangible asset management.
Adopting an ethical view of intangible assets challenges current research at
both conceptual and empirical levels. At a conceptual level, research is needed to
grasp the true essence and meaning of managing intangible assets as ethical and
societal resources in perpetual two-way interactions with stakeholders. For instance,
research is needed to understand exactly how intangible assets are framed as stake-
holder cultural artifacts and sensemaking devices to inform their own world view.
Additionally, how can organizations nurture this cultural process so that intangible
assets are infused with positive values and meanings unique to the firm and that
differentiate it in both the market and in the broader society? Finally, how should
firm-stakeholder interactions be formally structured and rhetorically fashioned,
as well as continuously maintained, to encourage collaborative meaning making?
At an empirical level, research is required to understand how intangible assets
designed as ethical and societal resources shape corporate goals, values, decisions,
and behaviors. For instance, research is needed to understand how the cultural process
of collaborative sensemaking for ethical intangible assets can be properly measured.
Measurement is critical to identify both enabling or constraining factors, and to
capture both organizational and stakeholders outcomes (short-term and long-term
outcomes). These open questions are at the heart of the debate that this special
section aims to spark in the hope for future scholarly contributions. The two
articles comprising the special section vividly depict the ethical view of intangible
asset management. Their collective contribution provides scholars and managers
insight into the meanings, characteristics, and potential effects of ethical principles
as foundation for building and managing corporate intangible assets as ethical and
societal resources.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SPECIAL SECTION AND KEY TAKEAWAYS
As described above, corporate identity, corporate brand, and corporate reputation are
among the key intangible ethical assets of an organization. The article in this issue by
Simes and Sebastiani (2017), The Nature of the Relationship between Corporate
Identity and Corporate Sustainability: Evidence from the Retail Industry, probes
corporate identity as its focal construct. An important contribution is its nuanced
exploration of corporate identity interwoven with corporate sustainability. Using a

qualitative research methodology, Simes and Sebastiani explore whether and how
corporate sustainability (a potentially critical dimension of ethical corporate identity
management) is used at both a strategic and operational level in the retail industry.
In so doing, the authors identify important links between corporate identity and
corporate sustainability. For sustainability to emerge as a guiding principle in the
organizational business model, firm strategy that supports sustainability must infuse
all behaviors. The study advances corporate identity as the potential platform that
sustains these corporate sustainability orientations. To realize such a vision, sys-
tematic alignment between corporate sustainability and corporate identity must be
nurtured throughout an organizations life via shared identity strategically focused on
sustainability together with ongoing employee engagement. The article contributes to
this special section by explaining how the ethical management of corporate identity
may infuse organizational life with a sustainability ethos increasingly required in
contemporary organizations.
The article by Alwi, Ali, and Nguyen (2017), The Importance of Ethics in
Branding: Mediating Effects of Ethical Branding on Corporate Reputation and
Brand Loyalty, describes how ethical branding has been conceptualized and prac-
ticed in the industrial electronic office equipment sector. The authors investigate
the antecedents and consequences of ethical branding on corporate performance.
Their research findings provide an integrated consumer response model and offer
empirical evidence of the impact of ethical branding, demonstrated as a mediating
mechanism, on corporate brand equity variables (corporate reputation and brand
loyalty). While defining the ethical brand at a corporate level via a firms moral
responsibility to its multiple stakeholders, Alwi et al. offer a new way to ethically
manage a corporate brand that relies on projecting and differentiating CSR elements.
These elements include traditional marketing variables of products, services, and
perceived price. This research contributes to the special section in that it investigates
empirically how and under what circumstances ethical management practices can
enhance intangibles such as corporate reputation, as well as marketing outcomes
such as brand loyalty. The article also addresses an important question posed in the
present essay: how typical marketing levers such as products, services, and price
can be designed and managed as ethical signals to stakeholders. It considers how
these levers reinforce CSR efforts and support corporate brand philosophy in ways
that enhance the perceived ethical positioning of the firm toward consumers and
stakeholders in general.
Although the contributions offered by the two articles suggest important insights
into ethical management of intangible assets, both studies build on a company
perspective that ascribes agency predominantly to the organization. In this regard,
and consistent with our musings here, future research is needed to explore the
interface between the organization and its stakeholders to grasp exactly how their
interactions generate collaborative sensemaking, thereby transforming intangible
assets into cultural resources of individual and collective value. Adoption of a social
constructionist perspective on corporate intangible assets is conducive to managing
them as ethical and societal resources. This perspective also implies collaborative
efforts by scholars and managers to adapt reference frameworks and mental

models to tackle the complexities of the current digital-mediated socio-cultural
environment where organizations and stakeholders have equal agency. Focused
research and managerial attention would enhance understanding of the relational
territory that provides the interface between organization and stakeholders where
value co-creation occurs. Such research should explore interaction trajectories as
well as the rhetorical and discursive strategies involved in the social construction
process of collaborative meaning making. A balance of interests, values, and goals
between ethical organizations and ethical stakeholders likely will hinge on such
foundational research. The two articles in this special section begin to travel this
complex path, and we hope future research and scholarly dialogue will continue
to pave the way.
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L Management of Intangible Assets in Contemporary Organizations

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L Management of Intangible Assets in Contemporary Organizations

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Guest Editors Introduction

Ethical Management of Intangible Assets

ABSTRACT: This essay explains how intangible asset management oriented

KEY WORDS: corporate identity, corporate brand, corporate reputation, social

serves as a value covenant between firm promises and stakeholder expectations

a firm-centric logic of intangible asset management to adopt a stakeholder-centric

CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS AS LANDMARKS

Superior performance increasingly depends on firms ability to ethically manage

SHIFTING PERSPECTIVES ON CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS:

Traditional normative approaches to corporate intangible assets cast them as gener-

brands are likened to a conscious senior management decision to convey organiza-

is shared meaning produced, negotiated, and socially constructed by organizations

CORPORATE INTANGIBLE ASSETS AS A SOCIAL CONTRACT

INTRODUCTION TO THE SPECIAL SECTION AND KEY TAKEAWAYS

exploration of corporate identity interwoven with corporate sustainability. Using a

efforts by scholars and managers to adapt reference frameworks and mental

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