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This study aims to build upon resource orchestration theory to theorize and empirically test a model that demonstrates how knowledge assets and innovation ambidexterity trigger a synergy in favor of firm performance.

Drawing on a survey of 158 Iranian knowledge-intensive companies, this study uses the partial least squares based on structural equation modeling to test the research hypotheses.

The results show that two elements of knowledge assets, namely, structural and relational capital, indirectly affect firm performance through the full mediation of innovation ambidexterity. The findings indicate that human capital has no relationship with both innovation ambidexterity and firm performance.

This study offers fresh insights into the issue of how organizations can create value from an effective orchestration of various strategic resources and capabilities, including knowledge assets and innovation ambidexterity.

This study applies resource orchestration theory to concurrently the areas of knowledge resources and organizational ambidexterity to show how innovation ambidexterity plays a role in translating three various knowledge assets into performance.

The pivotal role of knowledge management (KM) and its extensive implications have been debated in the academic literature with insufficient focus on its link to particular organizational control mechanisms such as performance measurement systems (PMS). To bridge this gap and building on resource orchestration theory, this paper aims to investigate the relationships between KM factors, PMS and corporate performance.

Based on a survey data set of 92 listed companies in Iran, the framework and hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) based on partial least squares (PLS).

The SEM-PLS results indicate that knowledge assets are significantly associated with both PMS and corporate performance while knowledge process capabilities (KPC) are not significantly associated with PMS and corporate performance. This study also shows that PMS mediates the relationship between knowledge assets and corporate performance.

The results suggest that the use of appropriate management control systems plays an effective role in synchronizing, aligning and orchestrating a company’s various knowledge resources, which, in turn, can lead to superior overall performance.

Building on a unique synthesis of resource orchestration theory and the knowledge-based view of the firm, the results of this study provide the first empirical evidence on how PMS intervenes in the relationship between knowledge resources (knowledge assets and KPC) and corporate performance.

Drawing largely upon resource orchestration theory, this study aims to contribute to the intellectual capital (IC) literature by testing a model where intrapreneurship mobilizes resources to trigger firm performance. More specifically, this study investigates how intrapreneurship mediates the relationship between IC and financial performance.

Data was collected using a structured questionnaire administered to a target sample of publicly-listed Iranian companies across a variety of sectors. Archival data supplemented the survey findings to capture financial performance. A structural equation modelling (SEM) approach, using LISREL, was used to assess the measurement and structural models.

The results supported the hypothesized associations among IC, intrapreneurship, and financial performance. Furthermore, the findings provided some evidence that IC is indirectly related to financial performance through the mediating role of intrapreneurship.

The focus on Iranian publicly listed companies limits the generalizability of results.

Managers need to align the company's strategic resources with other competencies such as intrapreneurial initiatives. The synthesis of knowledge resources and intrapreneurship can help organization to better organize, synchronize and support – i.e. “orchestrate” – their human and structural capital, improving the firm's social and innovation capital and eventually enhancing overall performance.

To our knowledge, this is the first study ever to explore the mediating role of intrapreneurship in the relationship between IC and financial performance from the resource orchestration lens.

This study aims to explore the extent to which companies rely on sustainability management control systems (SMCS) to translate corporate social responsibility (CSR) into superior performance building upon the premise of the natural resource orchestration perspective.

Data were collected based on a survey data set from 118 Chief Financial Officers of publicly listed companies in Iran. The theoretical model was tested using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM, SmartPLS 3.0) as a method that enjoys minimum demands concerning normality assumptions and sample size.

The findings support the full mediation effect of SMCS on the relationship between CSR and organizational performance. This implies that CSR affects performance only through the mediating role of SMCS.

The central premise in the proposed theoretical framework is that the utilization of proper management control mechanisms (i.e. SMCS) can help the organization to better synchronize, measure and manage – i.e. “orchestrate” – the social, environmental and economic impacts, and this, in turn, leads to improved organizational performance.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of its kind, building on a unique synthesis of the agency cost perspective and resource orchestration theory, to introduce the “natural resource orchestration” approach for examining the intervening role of SMCS between CSR and organizational performance.

This study aims to investigate the role of social capital in Iranian agricultural students' acquisition of generic skills. For this purpose, the effect of various social capital dimensions on students' generic skills development was examined.

A survey was conducted among 190 third- and fourth-year undergraduate students in one of the colleges of agriculture and natural resources in Iran. The partial least square method was used to examine the relationships among various social capital dimensions (i.e. social values, social trust, social networks, social cohesion, social participation, social communications and information sharing) with students' generic skills.

The findings showed that social networks and social participation are effective factors in the generic skills development of students. A model designed for the development of students' generic skills based on their social capital level predicted up to 33% of generic skills' variances. Furthermore, the multi-group analysis showed that males and females vary on how various social capital dimensions affect their generic skills. In this respect, the social participation dimension had a significantly greater impact on female students' generic skills, whereas the generic skills of male students were influenced more by the social cohesion dimension.

Developing generic skills through social capital can be considered as an effective strategy in countries that do not have formal programs for developing students' generic skills. Additionally, higher education policymakers should present a more supportive approach for developing generic skills of female students through social participation in the campuses.

So far, no study has examined the relationships among various social capital dimensions and students' generic skills in Iran. The picture is even more unclear when it comes to the differences between male and female students. The results of this study confirmed the importance of social networks and social participation in the universities to support students and to improve their generic skills and, consequently, their employability competencies. Furthermore, it could be inferred that male and female students have similarities and also differences in terms of the effect of social capital on developing generic skills that can provide a path for future studies.

This paper reports on a quasi-experimental research performed in the field of reading comprehension and translation quality. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the comparative effect of explicit vs implicit reading comprehension skills on translation quality of Iranian translation students at BA level.

The design of this research was quasi-experimental in nature. This design was preferred in this study, as it was impossible to assign random sampling to the subjects and apply a true experimental design. The research in hand was also a comparative group design research in a sense that it was supposed to compare two reading comprehension methods (explicit vs implicit) with different treatments.

In light of this research, some conclusions can be drawn. It can be concluded that there is a positive and direct relationship between reading comprehension and translation, as the first step of translation is to understand the content of the source text (Reid, 1993).

The reading comprehension ability of translation students should be enhanced in their undergraduate classes so that they can better understand the source text and produce a more fluent translation. In order to teach reading comprehension skills, both implicit and explicit techniques can be applied; however, it is better if the subjects receive explicit instruction, as this technique may have more positive results.

Various researchers have explored explicit and implicit instructions on such areas as reading, speaking and listening (see, e.g. Jalilifar and Alipour, 2007; Vahid Dastjerdi and Shirzad, 2010; Negahi and Nouri, 2014; Khanbeiki and Abdolmanafi-Rokni, 2015; Khoii et al., 2015; Mostafavi and Vahdany 2016; Rahimi and Riasati, 2017). Although the results of these studies have shown the positive impacts of both explicit and implicit teaching, explicit has more positive impacts. However, the review of the literature shows that explicit and implicit reading comprehension skills have not been investigated in relation to teaching translation and their possible impacts on translation quality.