Tag Archives: social value

[12]. The Legal Environment of Side Project Ownership and IT Innovation: Evidence from the Alcatel v. Brown Case

Xi Wu, Charlotte Ren, and Min-Seok Pang. 2025. Accepted by MIS Quarterly.  https://doi.org/10.25300/MISQ/2025/18022

Abstract. Engaging in side projects outside of regular employment has become a growing trend among knowledge workers, particularly information technology (IT) professionals. Side projects offer valuable opportunities for employees to learn new skills and foster creativity. However, the legal ownership of side projects remains uncertain, raising questions about how this affects employee innovation at their primary jobs, which we refer to as “employee innovation at work.” In this study, we leverage an exogenous change in the legal arrangement of side project ownership—the Alcatel v. Brown case—to investigate how firms’ enhanced control over side projects influences employees’ innovation performance at work. We find that in states where firms gained greater contractual authority to claim ownership of employees’ side projects, the number of IT patents owned by firms decreased. However, paradoxically, the quality of these patents, as measured by the number of forward citations, improved following the legal change. Further analyses of the underlying mechanisms suggest that these contrasting findings likely stem from shifts in both employee innovation behaviors and firms’ innovation strategies post-Alcatel v. Brown. Our findings contribute to the information systems literature by highlighting the nuanced effects of side project ownership on IT innovation.

Note: An earlier version of this manuscript, titled “That’s mine! Employee side projects, intellectual property ownership, and firm innovation,” was selected for the International Conference on Information Systems Proceedings (2019).

[11]. Time Banking, Aging, and the Future of Care

Charlotte Ren, Chao Guo, and John J. DiIulio. October 6, 2025. Nonprofit Quarterly.

Abstract. As our population ages, How can we build systems of care that truly reflect our interdependence? Not solely through markets, government programs, or families, but also through the everyday relationships that hold communities together. In this article, we explore time banking as a community-based approach to strengthening social connections and rethinking how we care for one another. Time banking values everyone’s time equally and builds networks of mutual support, reminding us that giving and receiving care are part of the same shared cycle. This article is written for scholars, practitioners, and community leaders interested in more collaborative, community-driven approaches to supporting care.

Note: This is an editor-reviewed journal article. Available at https://nonprofitquarterly.org/time-banking-aging-and-the-future-of-care/.

[8]. Responding to Diffused Stakeholders on Social Media: Connective Power and Firm Reactions to CSR-Related Twitter Messages

Gregory Saxton, Charlotte Ren, and Chao Guo. Journal of Business Ethics, 2021, 172: 229-252. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-020-04472-x 

Abstract. Social media offers a platform for diffused stakeholders to interact with firms—alternatively praising, questioning, and chastising businesses for their CSR performance and seeking to engage in two-way dialogue. In 2014, 163,402 public messages were sent to Fortune 200 firms’ CSR-focused Twitter accounts, each of which was either shared, replied to, “liked,” or ignored by the targeted firm. This paper examines firm reactions to these messages, building a model of firm response to stakeholders that combines the notions of CSR communication and stakeholder salience. Our findings show that firm response to a stakeholder on social media is positively and most significantly associated with what we refer to as the stakeholder’s connective power but negatively associated with the firm’s own connective power. To a lesser extent, firm response is positively associated with the stakeholder’s normative power but negatively associated with the firm’s own normative power. Firm response is also shown to be positively associated with stakeholder urgency in terms of both the originality of a stakeholder message and the expression of positive sentiment.

Note: Click here for the paper: Saxton.Ren.Guo_2021 JBE.