Pillar 3
Corporate Sustainability Strategy
SGFIN’s third pillar focuses on guiding firms toward sustainability strategies that are both economically viable and socially responsible. It develops decision frameworks, assesses supply chain impacts, and builds tools to enhance transparency in corporate and SME sustainability performance, while also analysing consumer behaviour and financial market responses to help firms align with evolving standards and drive meaningful change.
SGFIN research on corporate sustainability strategy delves into how firms embed sustainability considerations into strategy, governance and financial decision-making. It spans environmental and climate-related investments, organisational and managerial incentives, and the strategic implications of sustainability commitments, providing evidence on how corporate actions shape performance, risk management and long-term value creation in a changing economic and regulatory landscape.
Occupational Ethics & Values
Santana, J. J., & Kim, S. (2025). From values to codes: A computational text analysis of the codification of occupational ethics. Organization Studies, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/01708406251317255
The institutionalization of occupations tends to assume homogenization of occupational values. This study addresses the question of how members of an occupation with dissenting preferences reach consensus on a code of ethics. We build on prior theorization of occupational institutionalization and institutional discourse to theorize ethical codification as a dynamic discursive process of internal dissent and consensus culminating in a professional code of ethics. We use email data from the IEEE-ACM Software Engineering Ethics and Professional Practice Committee tasked with producing the 1997 Software Engineering Code of Ethics to show how ethical codification follows a process of initial competition followed by semantic convergence. This study demonstrates how natural language processing and semantic network analysis can contribute to discourse analyses of institutional processes.
A Guide to Sustainable Events: Singapore MICE Carbon Calculator
Yannis Yuan | Johannine Enerio | Weina Zhang
This whitepaper aims to present a web-based carbon calculation toolkit tailored to Singapore’s MICE sector, detailing its methodology and local data enhancements to help organizers estimate and assess the carbon footprint of their events.
Preferences in Venture Financing
Gefen, O., Reeb, D. & Sulaeman, J. (2023) Startups’ demand for accounting expertise: evidence from a randomized field experiment. Review of Accounting Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11142-023-09775-8
This paper examines whether startup companies prefer investors with accounting expertise. To test this, we conducted an experiment with over 13,000 startup companies in the US, sending them emails pretending to be interested investors, some with accounting certifications (CPA) and some without any special credentials. As a result, we found that the startups were more likely to respond to the emails from the investors with CPA certifications. This preference held even when the investors pretended to be different types of investors, such as angel investors or venture capitalists. This shows that startups value accounting expertise in their investors significantly. In a follow-up experiment, we found that startups preferred CPA-certified investors over those with a general business degree (MBA), reinforcing the importance of accounting expertise to them.
High-Speed Rail & Corporate Investments
Lin, Y., Qin, Y., Sulaeman, J., Yan, J., & Zhang, J. (2023). Expanding footprints: The impact of passenger transportation on corporate locations. Review of Finance, 2023, 27, 1119–1154. https://doi.org/10.1093/rof/rfac049
Transportation plays a vital role in shaping where businesses thrive and grow. This study explores how making travel more convenient can help businesses expand into new areas and enhance communication between investors and companies. We focus on the effects of improving passenger travel in China through the High-Speed Rail (HSR) system. Using over 1 million firm-to-firm investment observations over the 12-year period, we find that when two cities are directly connected by HSR, the number of investments between them increases significantly by 8%, and the amount of investment grows by 45%. These results hold even when we account for differences between city pairs and local factors that might influence HSR route choices. Our results suggest that improved monitoring and access to information are essential drivers of the HSR’s effects.
Carbon Credits: Catalyzing Green Finance
Sulaeman, J., & Zhang, W. (2023). Carbon credits: Catalyzing green finance. Bank of Singapore (BOS) and Ernst & Young Global Limited (EY). https://www.bankofsingapore.com/managed-resources/pdf/BOS-EY-ESG%20report%20on%20Carbon%20Credits_2023.pdf
Haze Pollution & Utilities Consumption
Agarwal, S., Sing, T. F., & Yang, Y. (2020). The impact of transboundary haze pollution on household utilities consumption. Energy Economics, 85(104591), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eneco.2019.104591
This paper investigates how air pollution impacts household water and electricity consumption in Singapore, using transboundary haze pollution from Indonesian forest fires as an external factor. Our findings reveal that heightened levels of haze pollutants in the air result in significant increases in water and electricity usage. This happens because, during severe haze periods, households tend to stay indoors, curtail outdoor activities to minimize health risks, and intensify efforts to mitigate these risks when necessary. Our analysis of social media data, particularly Twitter tweets, indicates that higher water and electricity consumption is associated with more negative emotions and perceptions of air pollution. The effects on utility consumption are also linked to the duration of air pollution, with short-term effects returning to normal quickly. However, longer periods of air pollution lead to sustained higher utility consumption for up to two months, reflecting increased spending on water and electricity due to air pollution events.
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The research on water and electricity consumption focuses on Singapore policies and households, and examines how environmental risks and relevant public policy, specifically price announcements and subsidies on water and electricity consumption, impact conservation efforts by households. Emphasizing the importance of calibrated information provision, particularly for vulnerable socio-economic groups, the research guides the public and policymakers toward more effective behaviours and strategies for balancing environmental conservation with societal and economic well-being.
Our commitment to a holistic understanding of sustainable consumption extends to the real estate market. The research examining the consequences of environmental punishments on housing prices sheds light on the delicate balance between regulatory measures, public awareness, and property values. These insights contribute to shaping sustainable urban development strategies that consider the nuanced relationships between regulatory interventions and societal responses in the climate change era.
In our latest endeavour, SGFIN is developing the Consumer Carbon Scorecard, with the aim of empowering individual consumers to consume more sustainably with insights into the carbon emissions linked to their consumption of goods and services. By estimating each individual consumer’s carbon footprint and establishing a benchmarking system for their carbon usage relative to their peers, the research aims to enhance carbon literacy among end consumers, raise public awareness on climate actions, and promote sustainable lifestyle choices, thereby advancing long-term sustainability.
Greenpac Singapore: Doing Good in a Sustainable Way
25 October 2021, IVEY Case No. 9B21N008
Greenpac (Singapore) Private Limited (Greenpac) was a green packaging solution provider, aimed to become a world-class knowledge-based company that offered innovative and environmentally friendly packaging solutions. Greenpac was also a champion of corporate social responsibility (CSR), advocating for environmental sustainability and social issues. The case will allow students to: 1) analyze the environmental and social impact of a leading small and medium enterprise (SME) in Singapore; 2) apply three published sustainability frameworks to evaluate the impact of CSR in an SME; 3) using survey results, analyze the challenges SMEs face when conducting CSR initiatives; and 4) provide a sustainable strategy for an SME for effective CSR initiatives with better employee engagement.
SingTel: Philanthropic or Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility?
18 June 2019, IVEY Case Publishing No. 9B19M053
In 2014, the vice-president of Group Corporate Social Responsibility at Singtel, a Singapore-based provider of telecommunications products and services, was scrutinizing his proposal for the company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) transformation. He wanted to reposition Singtel’s CSR approach to create greater social impact while demonstrating greater benefit to the company beyond promoting its branding and reputation. Students will be able to acquire skills in formulating a comprehensive and strategic CSR framework that aligns well with both the external market trends and the fundamental values of the organization. These change management skills will prepare students for the diverse challenges of a dynamic work environment that is more demanding in value creation of CSR activities.