Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: 1/1/26

Thursday, January 29, 2026

Strategic CSR - China

The article in the url below conveys the extent to which China is expanding its electricity generation capacity:

"China is undertaking an energy-building boom unlike anything the world has ever seen, as Beijing seeks to ensure supply for power-hungry facilities that are key to dominating emerging industries of the future."

The scale is staggering. In the last year alone, China has added more capacity than India's electrical grid:

"The nation added 543 gigawatts of new capacity across all technologies last year, according to data from the National Energy Administration on Wednesday. That's 12% more than all the power plants combined in India as of the end of 2024."

And, in the last 4 years, China has added more electrical power than the U.S. is able to generate:

"The generation China has added since the end of 2021 is also larger than the entire US system."

It is doing this across a wide-range of fuels and technologies (fossil and renewable), and it is doing it year-over-year.

Take care

David

David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation (6e)

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler6e

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

China's Four-Year Energy Spree Has Eclipsed Entire U.S. Power Grid

By Dan Murtaugh

January 27, 2026

Bloomberg

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-01-28/china-s-four-year-energy-spree-has-eclipsed-entire-us-power-grid

Tuesday, January 27, 2026

Strategic CSR - Good intentions + bad outcomes

Appreciating the prevalence of the unintended consequences of good intentions is central to the counterintuitive nature of strategic CSR. Along these lines, the article in the url below made me laugh and rings true, in the very human sense that we often can't get out of our own way. Specifically, the article deals with promotions in companies:

"Many congratulations on your promotion. It's probably downhill from here. This deflating prognosis is not true of every job, person or organisation. But too often, a promotion is a precursor to problems."

Specifically, the article cited academic research that was designed to test the Peter principle:

"… developed by Laurence J. Peter, a 'hierarchologist'—that people are promoted to the level at which they are no longer competent."

In other words, people are promoted based on past performance (not future potential), and stop being promoted once they reach a level in a job they can no longer do very well. Taken to the extreme, this means that most people who are 'stuck' in a position at work are probably there because they are no longer performing at a high level, which might explain why so many organizations are dysfunctional:

"The [research] examined data on sales transactions and job moves across a panel of more than 50,000 workers at 214 America firms between 2005 and 2011. It showed that being a good salesperson increased the probability of being promoted into a management position, but was a negative predictor of managerial quality. In other words, the performance of a sales hotshot's new subordinates tended to go backwards."

These results reminded me a little of academia, and mirror prior research using a simulation to theorize the same principle:

"An organization where promotion depends on competence in a previous role and where the new job requires different skills will indeed end up elevating people to a position they do badly. Random promotions would be a better system, the researchers concluded."

The article concludes that, where a promotion requires skills different to the dominant skills in a person's current role, then performance should not be used to assess whether the promotion is awarded.

Take care

David

David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation (6e)

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler6e

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

The problem with promotions

By Bartleby

January 10, 2026

The Economist

Late Edition – Final

https://www.economist.com/business/2026/01/08/the-problem-with-promotions

Thursday, January 22, 2026

Strategic CSR - Greenhushing

Welcome back to the Strategic CSR Newsletter!

The first newsletter of the Spring semester is below.

As always, your comments and ideas are welcome.

The other day, I was discussing with a friend the shift in public pronouncements by corporations about their equity and inclusion policies, and whether this reflected a similar shift in behavior (actions in addition to words). My sense is that many organizations are continuing as before (i.e., they are not fundamentally altering their mission and behavior), but are doing so surreptitiously. Perhaps a corollary is what is happening in the sustainability space, as explained in the article in the url below:

"Greenhushing is everywhere. While a rollback in green ambition has received a lot of attention in recent months, many speakers said companies were still pursuing their targets, just without talking about them in public. Peter Bakker, president of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, said that 91% of companies WBCSD surveyed globally said they are investing the same or more than they were last year in decarbonization. Similarly, Sherry Madera, CEO of the environmental disclosure nonprofit CDP, said its data shows that the majority of companies are either maintaining or increasing their climate ambition. But, she said those conversations are happening behind a closed door. "I don't think companies have the appetite to talk about this as much."

Of course, this reaction might evolve — stages of resistance and then submission, perhaps. In other words, perhaps organizations start out changing their words and labels, but continue their behavior. Then, as the pressure to change continues and new norms (and stakeholder expectations) emerge, behavior eventually follows.

To distort Warren Buffet's well-known quote about bankruptcy — change happens slowly, and then suddenly.

Take care

David

David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation (6e)

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler6e

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

Corporations Are Bringing Climate Talk to a Whisper

By Coco Liu

March 4, 2025

Bloomberg