Original title: Signaling in the digital era: how digitalization influences financial and social reputation across contexts
Digitalization means a company adopting digital technologies and practices. The study asks how people interpret that change: as a sign affecting financial reputationHow stakeholders judge a company’s standing in financial matters., social reputationHow stakeholders judge a company’s standing in society., or both. It finds that digitalization is linked to stronger results on both kinds of reputation, but the balance changes across types of firms. For example, state-owned firms see a stronger link with social reputation and a weaker one with financial reputation.
Imagine a school announcing that it has changed how it runs its classes. Some families care most about exam results, while others care most about how the school treats students. The same change can impress one group more than another, depending on what each group expects. In this paper, a company’s digitalization is the change, and its different kinds of reputation are how those groups judge it.
A company’s digitalization can shape how different stakeholders judge it, not just how financially capable it seems. The findings suggest that public opinion and financial reputation may respond differently depending on whether a firm is state-owned, highly polluting, or high-tech.
The abstract reports results for Chinese A-share listed firms from 2013 to 2024 and for three organizational contexts: state ownership, high-polluting industries, and high-tech industries. It does not describe the measures used, establish whether the relationships are causal, or show whether the findings apply to firms in other settings.
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Signaling in the digital era: how digitalization influences financial and social reputation across contexts — Yuying Tang, Zikang Liao, Wai‐Yan Wong — Cogent Business & Management — doi:10.1080/23311975.2026.2725484
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper.