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This study examines the relationship between subsidiary autonomy and the MNE subsidiary initiative collaboration (i.e. entrepreneurial initiative resource support, the subsidiary seeks and receives from the MNE). It proposes some underlying mechanisms as external embeddedness, and MNE organizational structures to explain the relationship between subsidiary autonomy and the MNE subsidiary initiative collaboration. The study draws on paradox theory arguing how at both the subsidiary and the parent MNE levels certain paradoxes are handled.

Survey data are collected in a time-lagged fashion from 429 foreign subsidiaries in New Zealand. Data are analyzed using structural equation modeling.

Results show that the relationship between subsidiary autonomy and the receipt of MNE resource support for initiatives is positive, and this is more likely the case where the subsidiary is managed under simple structures (i.e. subsidiary reports to corporate headquarters, regional headquarters or mandated units) rather than complex structures (i.e. a matrix or a network). Furthermore, an increase in subsidiary autonomy positively influences MNE initiative resource-seeking, and this is more likely the case where the subsidiary is less embedded externally.

The study is one of the first of studies that has applied paradox theory to MNE–subsidiary relationships regarding autonomy and MNE collaboration on initiatives. The study extends research on MNE–subsidiary collaboration on subsidiary initiatives as existing research is limited on this domain. The study contributes by showing how external embeddedness, and the complexity of organizational structures determine the relationship between subsidiary autonomy and MNE subsidiary initiative collaboration.

Corporate entrepreneurship (CE) has attracted considerable attention worldwide, and the challenges of managing employees’ entrepreneurial behaviours are increasingly recognised. However, the paucity of research on managers’ entrepreneurial behaviour in the United Arab Emirates multinational corporate environment creates a salient gap in the current understanding of how national and organisational cultures that not always align frame the critical problems of CE. This study aims to fill this research gap by examining multinationals’ CE antecedents drawing on an institutional perspective in Dubai.

The author conducts 54 in-depth interviews with middle managers in multinational enterprises. This study adopts a multiple case study research design to reveal whether an emergent discovery is exclusive to a particular case or is consistently replicated by multiple cases. The author has used abductive reasoning to systematically integrate analytical framework deduction with raw data induction.

This study’s findings indicate that CE in Dubai is ineffective and fragmented. Arguably, the cultural background of employees creates different circumstances and determinants of entrepreneurial behaviour. Hence, CE may not achieve epitome competencies without identifying multicultural nuances in an organisational context.

Existing research has placed relatively little emphasis on the role of individual national culture in multinational enterprises. This study’s results offer potentially valuable implications for theory, practice and future research addressing other emerging countries. This model presents a distinct CE architecture with compelling evidence for national culture (at the macro level), organisational culture, Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument and emergent factors (at the meso level) and individual middle managers' real-life experience (at the micro level).

This chapter reports on findings from a wider research project undertaken in Portugal. It focuses on the views of school principals with respect to (new) policy on the school curriculum. School principals have to balance conflicting goals and to manage tensions of implementation, particularly in a context of intense school reform. As policy gatekeepers and interpreters, school leaders have a pivotal role to play in how policies are framed, managed, and discussed in the context of their schools. Data presented in this text are drawn from a wider 3-year study. Findings point to the existence of contradictory elements in the principals' accounts. In general, they are critical of the new curriculum policy and question the adequacy of the conditions currently existing in schools to put it into operation. Overall, the regulatory and centralized orientation stands in sharp contrast to the very essence of the policies that call for local, contextualized, and innovative solutions. Such findings need to be analyzed within a centralized and bureaucratic education system in which a logic of control and standardized management of education still dominates.

The purpose of this study is to synthesize the literature on the topic of strategic renewal by identifying the key dimensions of extant research and the connections between fragmented research domains.

This study applies systematic literature review to identify the level of consistency and generalizability of research findings across existing studies in a comprehensive manner.

This study identifies six main themes of strategic renewal in the extant literature: (1) antecedents, (2) initiation, (3) logic, (4) structure, (5) process and (6) outcomes of strategic renewal.

By integrating the current streams of research, the review offers a conceptual model of strategic renewal that maps the current state of the research and provide insights into key themes for the future research.

This study, identifies connections between fragmented research domain and offers a conceptual framework of strategic renewal.

This study investigates the integration of information technology (IT) competencies with organizational inclusion initiatives and its impact on firm performance. It examines the role of organizational inclusion in promoting knowledge management capability (KMC) and the moderating effect of approach and avoidance motivation on the relationship between KMC and operational performance.

The study is grounded in the resource orchestration theory (ROT), which conceptualizes the integration of IT competencies and organizational inclusion. It employs hierarchical regression analysis on data collected from 204 firms and 374 managerial respondents to test the proposed hypotheses.

The results indicate that IT competencies enhance the relationship between organizational inclusion and KMC. Additionally, the relationship between KMC and operational performance is weaker when employees exhibit higher levels of avoidance motivation.

This study offers theoretical and managerial insights for integrating IT competencies into organizational inclusion initiatives, providing guidance for organizations seeking to enhance their performance, with a specific focus on the relevance of China as the research context.

This study enriches the scholarly discourse by examining the underexplored integration of IT competencies with organizational inclusion, notably in the context of China. It illuminates the moderating role of motivation in the KMC-operational performance relationship, benefiting both academia and practitioners. Furthermore, this work extends the literature by demonstrating how combining organizational inclusion and IT competencies can enhance workplace KMC, connecting it to internal knowledge resources. Theoretical implications extend beyond organizational inclusion and IT to show the broader application potential of ROT in management and information systems.

The global environments that surround contemporary business activities are uncertain, fast-changing, and frequently exposed to abrupt unexpected events with the potential to inflict extreme impacts where the ability to respond and adapt the organization effectively becomes a primary strategic concern. However, various firms that operate across diverse industry contexts approach this adaptive challenge in distinct ways that lead to quite diverse outcomes with many negative performers and some high performers with positive risk features. The heterogeneous approaches appear to consistently form extreme left-tailed performance distributions with inverse risk-return features but we are not really able to explain why and how these regularly observed phenomena come about. Hence, we want to study these organizational artifacts by collecting an extensive updated dataset to test the proposed relationships, explore alternative explanations, and learn from the extreme exemplars often referred to as outliers. There are extensive literatures in (strategic) management and finance that have dealt with the distribution of firm returns from slightly different angles but with some emerging commonalities that can inspire further analyses of the performance data. As a precursor for this, we discuss the odds of effective strategic adaptation in complex dynamic environments and introduce resilience as a proper outcome when simple solutions are scarce, and consider conditions that may facilitate these aims. The premises for the ensuing analyses are laid out and the main contents of the following chapters are presented.

If building and nurturing a learning organization is not a random chance, the question of where organizations should start is patent. Because learning culture is one of the core components of learning organizations, it is wondered how individuals and organizations contribute to this phenomenon. Under an interactional perspective, the authors explore the cross-dynamics between learning resources, structure and support (organizational level), and self-directed learning (individual level).

The authors conducted qualitative and exploratory research in Spring 2021 in France. They used semi-structured interviews with HRMs and a Delphi panel as the main instruments. This dual approach brings a reflexive and complementary dialogue to the research question.

The results show that non-learning organizations took advantage of the Covid-19 period. They created a learning biotope and fostered learning dynamics. Although this biotope acted as a learning marketplace and lacked guidance, individuals interacted with this learning biotope. They took learning initiatives and developed their self-directed learning. This understanding argues for constant interaction and co-influence between organizations and individuals to build and nurture a learning culture.

There is little discussion on how individuals and organizations contribute to building and nurturing a learning culture from an interactional perspective. Furthermore, literature on learning organizations considers self-directedness as a whole, considering self-directed learning as a characteristic and a process sharpens thinking. On methodological concerns, the authors used a dual qualitative approach with interviews and Delphi for the first time in research on learning organizations.

The aim of this paper is to theoretically explore the concept of leadership in a Total Quality Management (TQM) context by developing a new theoretical framework of understanding Total Quality Leadership (TQL) as well as by opening the dialogue in researching further key elements of TQL.

The approach that the paper adopts is conceptual. Based on exploration of the wider management and leadership literature of empirical and theoretical studies, this paper develops a framework of TQL.

The suggested TQL framework is composed by three main pillars, namely the proactive, adaptive and the relational. The former consists of elements like anticipation of current business environment complexities and filtering of information that enhances practice decision making. The second pillar refers to adaptation, autonomy and feedback while the last one emphasises on the importance of aspects like social interactions, engagement and empathy. The paper explains why the specific pillars with the additional elements are critical for TQM success.

Given the tremendous challenges that organisations face due to increased complexity and demanding competition of the business environments globally, the role of leadership as the major “soft” aspect of TQM approach, seems to be vital more than ever. But the type of TQL appropriate to enhance total quality success nowadays, is still (and should be) under continuous exploration. This conceptual study attempts to provide new theoretical insights of TQL as well as to open the dialogue around the main elements consisting of TQL and how the future research agenda is formulated.

Since 2008’s financial crisis, attention toward supply chain finance (SCF) has increased. However, most research investigates SCF considering single supply chain (SC) stages or buyer–supplier dyads and focuses on a single SCF solution. It is important to see how different solutions are adopted at different SC stages, by actors with different financing needs. This study aims to analyze SCF at different SC stages, to understand why different solutions are implemented at different SC stages and the contingency factors (regulation, SC stage, product category and size) influencing their adoption.

The paper is based on multiple exploratory case studies in the Italian agri-food industry, considering firms distributed at different SC stages and adopting multiple SCF solutions. The paper exploits a contingent approach (Sousa and Voss, 2008) to analyze how contingent factors influence SCF adoption at different SC stages.

Findings explain how and why different SC stages (producer, cooperative, processor and retailer) implement different SCF solutions (reverse factoring, dynamic discounting, inventory finance and Minibond), describing contingency variables’ impact on their adoption.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the research is original in its description of SCF at different SC stages, considering different SC actors’ drivers and barriers, and questioning the importance of a coordinated approach in SCF adoption along an entire SC. Moreover, the paper adopts a contingent approach, contributing to SCF research, seldomly based on theoretical lenses.