Javier Martínez-del-Río, Ana Perez-Luño and Ana Maria Bojica
Taking a resource-based view, the authors analyse the effect of high-performance work practices (HPWPs) on the performance of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) under…
Abstract
Purpose
Taking a resource-based view, the authors analyse the effect of high-performance work practices (HPWPs) on the performance of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) under conditions of environmental hostility, and consider how this relationship is influenced by managers' embeddedness in social networks. The authors argue that high perceived levels of environmental hostility strengthen the strategic value of HPWPs in SMEs, whereas high levels of manager embeddedness in social networks weaken this contingent relationship.
Design/methodology/approach
These hypotheses were tested in a sample of 249 SMEs, from two Spanish industries related to food production, using linear regression with two- and three-way interaction effects.
Findings
The study results show that the implementation of HPWPs benefits SMEs' performance in hostile environments. However, the dark side of managers' social capital could undermine any such benefit, especially if there is a high degree of network closure. In hostile contexts, such closure appears to limit managers' willingness to depart from the common practice of reducing investment in human resources.
Practical implications
Contrary to predominant beliefs that managers facing economic adversity should reduce costs by cutting investment in personnel development, this study indicates that supporting HPWPs enhances a firm's objective financial performance.
Originality/value
This study advances our understanding of the specific conditions under which HPWPs sustain SME performance. It also introduces the dark side of managers' social capital into considerations of this relationship. The study findings provide new insights that are counterintuitive to business practice.
Details
Keywords
Ana Pérez-Luño, Ana Maria Bojica and Shanthi Golapakrishnan
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role of a specific mechanism for cross-functional integration (CFI) in the relationship between product innovation and firm…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role of a specific mechanism for cross-functional integration (CFI) in the relationship between product innovation and firm performance. It takes a contingency perspective, accounting for how these relationships vary depending on the degree of organizational knowledge complexity.
Design/methodology/approach
Hypotheses are tested via regression analysis with interaction effects in a sample of 105 wineries from Spain, using both objective and subjective firm performance data.
Findings
The results obtained confirm the existence of significant triple interaction effect of CFI, knowledge complexity and product innovation on firm performance. CFI has a negative moderating effect on the relationship between product innovation and performance and this effect varies according to the degree of organizational knowledge complexity.
Research limitations/implications
This paper looks at variables that have been hitherto studied at the project or product level, at the firm level, in an attempt to untangle the relationship between innovation, CFI, knowledge complexity and firm performance. Study’s main limitations lie in the use of a cross-functional design and its focus on a single industry.
Practical implications
Firms dealing with complex organizational knowledge could use this CFI mechanism in the development of new products when their size and resources do not allow the creation of more formal temporal structures, such as cross-functional teams. However, unless the winery has to deal with a high degree of knowledge complexity, involving the oenologist in several functional areas for the purpose of coordination, may detract resources from product innovation effort and lead to a poorer performance.
Originality/value
This study showcases a mechanism of CFI not explored in previous research, but used in practice at many firms, i.e. the cross-pollination of ideas across different functional areas through the participation of the responsible for the product development, and tests its role in the relationship between product innovation and different types of firm performance.
Details
Keywords
Maria Pilar Jerez Gomez, Ana Bojica, Javier Martínez-del-Río and Reem Karaja
This study aims to shed light on how internships' features drive employability outcomes and answers the question of how internships that maximize the employability of interns can…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to shed light on how internships' features drive employability outcomes and answers the question of how internships that maximize the employability of interns can be designed. The study assumes that the duration of an internship, degree of formalization and the use of internship-specific motivational practices by companies are likely to influence interns' perceptions of employability.
Design/methodology/approach
A study among interns investigated the relationship between different internship features and interns' employability. Data on the duration of the internship, motivational practices specific to internships and the formalization of the internship process were collected from a large sample of 13,565 interns in 27 European countries from 15 to 35 years old.
Findings
The findings suggest that internship duration has a curvilinear effect on employability with increasing effects on employability at the beginning of the internship, followed by a decrease over time. In addition, the use of practices specifically designed to motivate interns also favors the interns' employability. Finally, formalization of the internship placement moderates the effect of motivational practices on employability.
Originality/value
By identifying key features of the internship experience – duration, formalization and motivational practices – the authors contribute to the theory related to the development of career resources and employability in young adults and show that these features significantly shape young adults' employability perceptions.
Details
Keywords
Carlos A. Albacete‐Sáez, Maria Mar Fuentes‐Fuentes and Ana María Bojica
The purpose of this paper is to clarify whether there are differences in the implementation of quality management (QM) and the results achieved, based on the position of the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to clarify whether there are differences in the implementation of quality management (QM) and the results achieved, based on the position of the person responsible for QM and his/her strategic priorities.
Design/methodology/approach
Data from 256 firms that have implemented QM are collected. A multigroup analysis with LISREL is employed to contrast the hypotheses using a sample of general managers on the one hand and of quality managers on the other.
Findings
This study shows that QM is stronger implemented when it is headed by the general manager than by the quality manager. The authors also find that in both samples of general managers and quality managers, only one of the three strategic priorities analyzed, cost orientation, shows a positive effect on financial results. When the influence of QM on financial results is considered, the relationship is significant just in the case of the sample of quality directors.
Research limitations/implications
The limitations of the analysis performed suggest lines of research that can substantially enrich the analysis of the role of management in the implementation of QM systems. A first step would be to expand the study sample, since the subsample for general managers was not very large. Gathering more recent data could contribute to strengthening the results obtained and to identifying additional explanatory variables. For example, information on functional experience or training could clarify the strategic focus adopted by managers.
Practical implications
This study highlights that the general manager's commitment to quality confers greater credibility in the rest of the organization. Although the general managers impose greater implementation of QM, they do not perceive that this influences the financial results achieved directly. The incorporation of strategic priorities in this study also shows that the perception of differentiation in marketing in firms that have implemented QM is similar both for quality managers and for general managers. However, the former (quality managers) also show that differentiation in innovation has a positive effect on QM.
Originality/value
Literature has shown an indisputable consensus on the relevance of leadership and the commitment of top management to the success of QM, but few studies provide more in‐depth specific knowledge of the characteristics and actions developed by the person who leads the commitment to quality. This study tackles the role of the manager responsible for QM in the firm, based on his or her functional position, whether general manager or quality manager. It contributes by investigating how a manager's strategic priorities condition the level of QM implementation, as well as the financial performance achieved.
Details
Keywords
Tianyu Hou, Julie Juan Li and Jun Lin
Knowledge search is considered a broad concept and semi-intentional behavior. The path and boundary conditions through which search strategies affect intra-organizational…
Abstract
Purpose
Knowledge search is considered a broad concept and semi-intentional behavior. The path and boundary conditions through which search strategies affect intra-organizational knowledge creation remain elusive. Drawing on recombinant search theory and knowledge-based view, the authors seek to identify knowledge complexity as an important intermediate variable between knowledge search and innovation performance, such as research and development (R&D) output and R&D output quality. A second goal of this study is to examine the moderating roles of government support and technological turbulence.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors employed a longitudinal panel of 609 global pharmaceutical firms and obtained the firms' patent records from 1980 to 2015 for the analysis. The authors used generalized estimating equations (GEE) to evaluate the models and tested the consistency via panel fixed-effects estimations.
Findings
The authors' findings show that organizational routine-guided search has a negative effect on knowledge complexity, while routine-changing search exerts a positive impact on knowledge complexity. Governmental support and technological turbulence moderate these relationships. Notably, knowledge complexity has an inverted U-shaped relationship with innovation performance.
Research limitations/implications
The authors' research context, the pharmaceutical industry, may constrain the generalizability of our findings. In addition, potential types of routine-guided and routine-changing search behaviors were not considered.
Practical implications
Despite these limitations, this study offers important implications. First, knowledge complexity transmits the effects of knowledge search on innovation performance. Practitioners should balance routine-guided and routine-changing search processes to build and manage complex knowledge. Second, a moderate level of knowledge complexity is the key to good R&D output and R&D output quality.
Originality/value
The study identifies knowledge complexity as one important intermediate variable between knowledge search behaviors and intra-organizational knowledge creation.
Details
Keywords
Cristina Dai Prá Martens, Fabrício Martins Lacerda, Ana Claudia Belfort and Henrique Mello Rodrigues de Freitas
Research on entrepreneurial orientation (EO) has attracted researchers’ attention for over 30 years. The purpose of this paper is to comprehensively analyze the body of literature…
Abstract
Purpose
Research on entrepreneurial orientation (EO) has attracted researchers’ attention for over 30 years. The purpose of this paper is to comprehensively analyze the body of literature resulting from 30 years of research in EO, and to answer the following questions: what are the major themes that have emerged? What areas are missing? What degree of convergence do we see in the field of EO, and what concepts/topics has the field converged around?
Design/methodology/approach
A bibliometric study with a sample of 405 articles published from January 1987 to July 2014 was developed. Techniques of bibliometric, lexical, and content analysis were used. The analysis involved: the evolution of published articles; the main authors, their nationalities, and institutional affiliations; citation and co-citations analysis; the journals that have published the most articles; and the most frequently-searched topics. Opting for bibliometric techniques permit an analysis of a larger number of articles and a greater variety of articles than other methodologies such as meta-analyses and systematic review studies. Accordingly, a more comprehensive look at the field of EO can be taken.
Findings
Two distinct but complementary classifications are proposed to characterize the body of the literature resulting from 30 years of research in EO. The first one demonstrates that the field presents a convergence of the themes in four axis which together comprise studies on EO: performance, strategy, entrepreneurial attitude, and management. The second one presents the frequency of occurrence of the themes in the field: high-frequency themes or classical themes, frequently in the literature; moderate-frequency themes or emerging issues have not been sufficiently explored; low-frequency themes or potential opportunities related to understudied issues and contexts less frequently surveyed. A future research agenda is proposed for emerging themes and specific contexts.
Practical implications
The identification of key themes in the field of EO contributes to assess the research evolution in order to recognize emerging themes and contexts, and the research gaps. With this, it is possible to lead new studies to cover a lack of research and advance knowledge in the field. The themes most studied also show the contribution for EO to organizational practice, especially in relation to the impact on the performance, the stimulus to the development of innovations, and the effects on organizational growth. Additionally, the identification of the authors most cited, most productive on the theme and the identification of the core journals for publishing of the area is recommended as a general reference for researchers interested in the topic of EO.
Social implications
Although EO literature has been widely developed in Anglo regions (especially in the USA and UK) and Germanic Europe (especially Spain), there are others lacking these studies, especially Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, and Middle East, with rare articles published internationally. The results can guide the advancement of research in these different contexts and realities where even issues more widely treated in the literature have been unexplored. The lack of studies in certain contexts can lead to new studies for inserting new insights into EO, such as potential differences between developed regions and in development. For regions where the studies on EO are more developed, the results of this paper contribute to signaling issues and contexts little explored that may be the focus of attention.
Originality/value
The generation of literature indicators of EO through bibliometric fills a research gap on the theme, providing a more comprehensive view of the field and of the current status of the research on EO. Identifying the most frequent topics in EO literature, and little-explored themes and contexts makes it possible to propose an agenda for future research and knowledge generation on EO. Thus, it is suggested the development of studies focus on emerging themes like growth, learning, knowledge, resources, and capabilities; also in specific contexts with potential for aggregating new knowledges in the EO field such as family firms, non-profit organizations, social contexts, the public sector, university, spin-off, firms in emerging and developing economies.
Details
Keywords
The aim of this systematic literature review (SLR) is to map out the current state of the research on collaboration in the context of social entrepreneurship organisations (SEOs)…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this systematic literature review (SLR) is to map out the current state of the research on collaboration in the context of social entrepreneurship organisations (SEOs), synthesise this line of research and advance a research agenda.
Design/methodology/approach
A SLR of 40 scientific articles found in the Scopus and Web of Science databases built the foundation for an analysis of the state-of-the-art of the research addressing the interplay of SEOs and collaboration. This area of research has been very recent since the selected articles have been published since 2005 and more than half of which have appeared since 2017.
Findings
The findings suggest that collaboration is increasingly perceived as a crucial entrepreneurial activity and process for SEOs. The results indicate that collaboration is a vibrant and rapidly growing line of research which spans different fields of study, contexts, varied theoretical perspectives and multiple units of analysis. Furthermore, a total of five key research themes are identified pertaining to collaboration in the context of SEOs, such as motivations and strategies of collaboration, its antecedents, the interplay of institutional logics and tensions arising in collaboration, the impact of collaboration on the mission of SEOs and collaborative processes and practices.
Originality/value
To lend structure to this fragmented field of inquiry, this study systematically reviews and synthesises research on collaboration in the context of SEOs. In doing so, the study reveals that this line of research is under-researched, offering a significant scope for further scrutiny.
Details
Keywords
Ana Pérez-Luño, Rocio Aguilar-Caro and Maria F. Muñoz-Doyague
Given the general consensus that creativity is a crucial driving force for innovation and progress, understanding how to promote it would benefit individuals, companies, society…
Abstract
Purpose
Given the general consensus that creativity is a crucial driving force for innovation and progress, understanding how to promote it would benefit individuals, companies, society and academia. Therefore, this paper aims to analyze the independent and contingent impact of individuals’ personality traits, team-member exchange (TMX) and gender on stimulating creativity.
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses a survey-sample of 639 university students (51.96% women) between the ages of 17 and 50. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) demonstrated reliability and validity of its measures. To test hypotheses, using structural equation modeling, hierarchical regression analyses were performed.
Findings
Results show that four of the five personality traits (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience) and TMX positively influence creativity. There are no significant differences between men’s and women’s creativity. High TMX reinforces the influence of extraversion on creativity, while low TMX harms this relationship. High extravert women are more creative than high extravert men, while low extravert men are more creative than low extravert women. Low emotionally stable women are more creative than low emotionally stable men, while high emotionally stable men are more creative than high emotionally stable women. There are differences in how women and men take advantage of their openness to experience when TMX is considered. That is, while women take advantage of openness to experience for any value of TMX, men only increase their creativity as openness to experience increases for low values of TMX.
Research limitations/implications
Like all studies, ours has some limitations that provide opportunities for future research. First, care should be taken when generalizing these findings to other contexts. We use data from Spanish individuals, specifically university students. While they are suitable for testing our hypotheses, future studies should establish whether the general tendencies that we observe hold true for other kinds of people from Spain and other countries. Even more, this paper’s perspective might be biased by the authors’ country of origin (south Europe) in terms of gender. According to Hofstede (2001) south European and South American countries are more masculine than other cultures (Mensa and Grow, 2022). Therefore, analyzing these questions in different cultures (countries and settings) would facilitate the generalization of the results. Second, the data we use is mainly cross-sectional so strict causality cannot be inferred. The theory we use assumes specific causal directions, but alternative causal relationships cannot be ruled out. Finally, ideally, we should have controlled for additional variables that might influence the relationships in our model.
Practical implications
This paper has practical implications, as it demonstrates that neither gender is more creative than the other. It goes a step further, explaining how men and women can leverage their personality traits to be more creative. Moreover, since TMX could reinforce the impact of personality traits on creativity, this paper could help managers better organize teams and companies that want to be more innovative by taking into account the personality traits of their employees and how to get the best out of women and men.
Social implications
Traditionally, women have considered creativity to be a man’s thing. The results of this work favor society, demonstrating that women are just as creative as men and that through personality traits and TMX, both men and women can be more creative. These results help to reduce the gender gap and may favor women’s place in today’s society.
Originality/value
This work offers academic and practical implications. The main contributions to the creativity and gender literatures are the following: (1) Women are as creative as men. (2) High extravert and low emotionally stable women are more creative than men. (3) High open to experience women with high TMX are more creative than men at any level of TMX. For practitioners, the understanding of what personality traits have higher impact on creativity depending on the levels of TMX for women and men could help companies and politicians in hiring the most suitable people, especially for those positions where creativity is needed. This would increase the quality of their human capital, allowing them to get the most out of their human resources, from the very beginning of the employment relationship.
Details
Keywords
Ana M. Ortega, M. Teresa García and M. Valle Santos
The literature provides contradictory findings on planning contradictory findings on planning as a success factor in projects which entail high innovation. Nevertheless, new…
Abstract
Purpose
The literature provides contradictory findings on planning contradictory findings on planning as a success factor in projects which entail high innovation. Nevertheless, new product development (NPD) research has mainly adopted the causation lens, in which planning plays an important role. By embracing the logic of effectuation, the purpose of this paper is to secure a wider perspective concerning how the various NPD options develop, taking into account the role played by uncertainty.
Design/methodology/approach
By adopting an inductive approach, the authors attempt to advance existing knowledge on the topic. The qualitative methodology (documentary analysis, content analysis and alternate templates) is adopted for the analysis of four NPD projects in the food industry in Spain.
Findings
Results reflect the relevance of the two perspectives considered when explaining the NPD process, with the presence of hybrid behaviour in all the projects and effectuation emerging as the dominant logic in the project linked to a greater degree of innovation and uncertainty.
Research limitations/implications
Projects involving varying degrees of innovation would seem to require different NPD approaches. This paper provides an initial approach to the subject, and it analyses a small number of firms. It is necessary to better understand to what extent the two logics are present in different types of projects.
Practical implications
By incorporating the logic of effectuation, firms might consider using NPD as a means of engaging in projects that entail a higher degree of innovation, since it offers ways of dealing with the uncertainty linked to such projects.
Originality/value
The paper contributes to the still early efforts to apply the perspective of effectuation to the area of NPD, by linking the logics of effectuation and causation to the various NPD processes taking account of their varying degrees of innovation and uncertainty (exploitation, exploration and leverage options).
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of market orientation (MO) on organizational performance (OP) through organizational commitment (OC) in the intensely…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of market orientation (MO) on organizational performance (OP) through organizational commitment (OC) in the intensely competitive environment of high‐tech industrial clusters. The relationships among MO, OC, and OP are also examined.
Design/methodology/approach
Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the questionnaires completed by employees of 91 high‐tech enterprises (n=335) located in the four science parks in northern, central, and southern Taiwan.
Findings
The results indicate that MO and OC have positive and direct effects on OP. The effect of MO on OP is significantly increased by enhanced OC.
Practical implications
This study provides corporate managers with valuable knowledge, which can enhance OC and OP. That is, successful organizations must combine the strengths and motivations of internal employees and respond to external changes and demands promptly to demonstrate the organization's value.
Social implications
Regardless how the industrial environment becomes increasingly complex and diverse, OC of employees is still crucial. Only long‐term retention of human capital can sustain operations and enhance OP.
Originality/value
The most valuable contribution of this study is the understanding of OC as a mediator of MO and OP. This indicates that the only factors that guarantee OP are the talents who are willing to commit to the organization. Faced with increasingly severe challenges in the future, the results of this study contribute to existing literature by demonstrating that MO can sustain competitive advantages.