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The purpose of this paper is to identify the key issues faced by today's supply chain professionals when managing reverse logistics (RL) processes and compare these issues with the topics examined in extant research. By making such a comparison, the paper identifies areas of practical relevance that are being adequately addressed in the literature, as well as areas that may need further attention.

The paper employed a Delphi method in order to uncover the most salient RL issues faced in industry, as viewed by practitioners. The paper then completed a systematic analysis of the RL literature in order to examine the degree to which topics addressed in the extant literature correspond with the framework proposed by Carter and Ellram (1998). Finally, the paper compared and contrasted the findings of the content analysis and Delphi study, which highlights areas for future investigation that may help to better align research with practice.

In the Delphi study, the paper uncovered and ranked seven key issues for RL managers. These are: customer support, top-management support, communication, costs, formalization, timing of operations, and environmental issues. When compared to Carter and Ellram's (1998) framework, three of the seven factors coincide with factors described in the framework and two factors indirectly relate to the framework. The two factors not specifically represented are costs and formalization.

The findings provide practitioners with an understanding of what factors are most important to consider when managing RL programs. The discussion of the comparison between the Delphi results and extant literature provides guidance as to how to address the RL issues uncovered in this study.

This research effort suggests directions for future research that will better align academic topics with current managerial issues. Although the paper offers many suggestions for future research, the paper proposes that investigating ways to increase formalization of RL programs and establish RL as a profit center within organizations may be the areas in greatest need for additional scholarly research.

The purpose of this article is to extend effectuation theory at the front end by building cognitive foundations for the effectual design process.

We adopt an integrative conceptual approach drawing on design cognition theory to explain entrepreneurial cognition.

We find a significant gap in the entrepreneurial cognition literature with respect to effectuation processes. We thus integrate the Situated Function–Behavior–Structure framework from design theory to elaborate on the cognitive processes of effectuation, specifically with regard to the opportunity development process. This framework describes the cognitive subprocesses by which entrepreneurs means and ends are cyclically (re)formulated over time until a viable “opportunity” emerges, and the venture is formalized, or else, the entrepreneur abandons the venture and exits.”

Unravelling this entrepreneurial design process may facilitate more appropriate and effective design work by entrepreneurs, leading to more successful product designs. It also should facilitate the development of better design techniques and instruction.

This research contributes to new cognitive foundations for effectuation theory and entrepreneurial process research. It better explains how means are transformed into valuable goods over time through an iterative reconsideration of means-ends frameworks. This theoretical elaboration will expectedly facilitate additional research into the iterative cognitive processes of design and enable more formulaic design thinking.

The purpose of this paper is to present a retrospective of the career life of Michael Driver, from the time of his Princeton graduate studies and early faculty years at Purdue University through the over three decades he spent at USC.

The history and development of his theoretical and research interests are presented, as well as the many contributions he made to both management consulting and the education of MBA students. His 1970s role in the founding and development of the Careers Division of the Academy of Management and his contributions to career research are highlighted and illuminate one of the critical periods in the renewal of the field. His orientation towards complexity and integration stand out as characteristics that positively impact theory building and research.

Michael Driver's career life was one of depth, scope, growth, and continuity. As a humanist, he would want us to not only continue our pursuits to better understand the complexities of human behavior, but to integrate them into something more meaningful.

This retrospective provides insight into the history and development of Mike Driver's theoretical and research interests and underscores his many contributions. The essay also highlights the history of career studies during the renewal period of the 1970s and 1980s. Hopefully, Mike Driver's legacy will inspire younger scholars to extend the field and carry it forward.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between women entrepreneurs’ firm performance and two dimensions (enrichment and interference) of the business-family interface (BFI) in the moderating context of the level of economic development in two emerging countries – Morocco and Turkey. The enrichment perspective was operationalized as family instrumental (financial) and affective (moral) support, while interference was operationalized as gender-related personal problems.

The study drew upon the work-family interface (WFI) theory from the family embeddedness perspective in the context of institutional economics. In Morocco, a purposive sample of 116 women entrepreneurs completed a self-administered questionnaire using field collection, mail, and phone surveying methods. In Turkey, 147 women entrepreneurs completed the questionnaire online and through personal contacts in business organizations.

The findings indicated a positive relationship of family financial support with business performance of female entrepreneurs in Morocco, a less economically advanced country. However, family moral support is related to better firm performance in Turkey, a more advanced economy. Gender-related personal problems of women entrepreneurs appear to hamper their business performance in Turkey; while in Morocco, the performance of women entrepreneurs seems to improve in the face of such impediments.

The results provide initial evidence that female entrepreneurs benefit from the linkages of family-to-business enrichment in different ways, depending on the country’s level of economic development. In less economically developed countries, women entrepreneurs benefit more from instrumental rather than affective components of the enrichment dimension of the BFI. Conversely, in more economically advanced countries, female entrepreneurs benefit more from affective rather than the instrumental elements of this dimension. Likewise, the components of the interference dimension of the BFI affect female entrepreneurs differently depending on the economic development of the countries. Women in the less-developed country of Morocco are less impeded by their personal problems compared to their counterparts in Turkey, a more developed economy. Actually, Moroccan women entrepreneurs improved their business performance when facing obstacles, most likely due to their increased inner strength and resilience acquired when battling adversarial institutional conditions.

The present study makes three unique contributions to the entrepreneurship literature. First, the study links the two BFI dimensions (enrichment and interference) to firm performance with an exclusive focus on female business owners. Second, within the construct of enrichment, the study employs both family instrumental and emotional support. Third, the study shows that the country’s level of economic development moderates the relationships between the BFI dimensions and firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether job rotation strategies and joint reward systems are equally effective in encouraging cross-functional collaboration (CFC) under all organizational contexts, ranging from young and small firms to mature and large ones.

To ensure a wide applicability of findings in this study, the research model and hypotheses were tested with a sample of 232 Canadian firms active in a variety of industrial sectors. A survey instrument that comprised all the questionnaire items corresponding to the examined constructs is the foundation of the data used in this contribution.

This study shows that job rotation and joint rewards are strong and positive drivers of interdepartmental collaboration, which subsequently enhance firm performance. However, this illustration must be considered in the context of the firm shaped by its size and age because these two variables strongly and negatively moderate the relationships between CFC and its two antecedents.

The study was limited to Canadian firms only. The manufacturing sector was not differentiated into subsectors, such as technology. Future studies could compare subsectors of manufacturing to see if there is any correlation between types of industries, age, and size.

Not all firms will be able to take advantage of the widely accepted values of job rotation and joint reward systems in generating CFC. Firms, to an extent, appear to be confronted with the liability of aging but not with the liability of smallness.

Female entrepreneurs play an increasingly recognised role in countries' overall well-being by contributing to job creation, wealth, family income and innovation. This study identifies combinations of family support that enhance business performance most effectively.

This study employs a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), drawing on 184 technology business owners to identify the family support configurations most conducive to high business performance.

The results suggest that high levels of emotional and instrumental support are necessary for female technology entrepreneurs to achieve a high firm performance (FP) level when instrumental support at home (ISH) is lacking. As a comparison, male technology entrepreneurs can still achieve a high level of FP when emotional and instrumental support for the business (ISB) is low.

This research contributes to the body of knowledge on women's entrepreneurship in emerging economies, technology entrepreneurs in South Africa and family and business support systems. The authors add to the emerging literature on the potential downsides of family embeddedness by tying theory to the findings on how family embeddedness-related obligations arise when individuals depend on their family's financial support and how this reliance impedes the formation of entrepreneurial intentions.

Using the family business succession, resourcebased view of firms, familiness, and organizational clan literatures, this article develops a model based on the ability of the family business to use familiness, a specific bundle of attributes deriving from a family’s culture, as a competitive advantage for the family firm. In particular, this resource-based framework of family business shows how familiness can distinguish between family firms that succeed beyond the second generation and those that do not. Implications for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to explore distinctive yet simple strategies for sustainability in academic libraries focussing on structured communication templates for stakeholders, pre-planned daily programming, and regularized, self-sustaining staff development.

Case study of unique strategies implemented at Nanyang Technological University Libraries.

Each of the three strategies has been successfully launched though they are at various stages of maturity. The first two strategies (structured communication templates and daily programming) have been implemented quite recently, whereas the staff development programme has been running for some time. Findings indicate that sustainability in all of these cases is directly linked to good planning which either minimizes daily, weekly or monthly work, and/or helps to clarify goals and focus action.

These strategies are feasible, transferable, malleable, and impactful such that other academic libraries with varying staffing structures can adopt and adjust them to their local needs.

Implementing simple sustainable services and strategies can have real impact and can provide alternatives to large-scale projects that may be too resource intensive for many to undertake on a regular basis.