SCRANTON — A study co-authored by two University of Scranton operations and information management professors won an Outstanding Paper award from an international publisher.
The study by Rose Sebastianelli, Ph.D., of Clarks Summit, and Nabil Tamimi, Ph.D., of Clarks Green, entitled “Improving the quality of environmental management: impact on shareholder value,” which examines whether corporate environmental performance positively affects stock market value, was selected as an Outstanding Paper in the 2016 Emerald Literati Awards for Excellence.
Distributed by Emerald Group Publishing, which has a portfolio of nearly 300 journals, the awards are now in their 23rd year and were “established to celebrate and reward the outstanding contributions of authors to scholarly research.” Award winners are selected by each journal’s editorial board.
Sebastianelli and Tamimi’s study was published in the International Journal of Quality and Reliability Management in 2015.
Tamimi serves as chair of the University’s Operations and Information Management Department. Sebastianelli holds the Alperin Endowed Chair in Business Administration. They have collaborated on a number of studies that include research in the areas of quality and e-commerce, as well as in the effective design and delivery of online MBA courses.
Among several key findings, the professors’ paper showed that creating a portfolio of stocks from companies that attained an environmental practices, management and performance certification called ISO 14000 “is a strategy that ‘pays off’ for investors” – ultimately supporting the idea that it “pays to be green.” Their examination lent “support to the argument that improved environmental performance is valued by the market … and may provide long-term value for shareholders.” Their study filled a gap in the literature that focused on short-term market reactions to negative environmental incidents but neglected assessing the long-term market impact of improved environmental performance.
