Search results

This article describes an informal process of new product innovation that took place outside of the established structures in a large Swedish telecom company; how a number of individuals brought a product idea from invention to innovation by creating and enabling an informal competence network within the company. The purpose of the article is to bring out a number of insights into how “networked innovation” might be accomplished and supported, by elaborating this case and pointing to some of its management implications.

This paper seeks to discuss the challenges faced when trying to integrate entrepreneurship education in the training system, with a particular focus on vocational training.

The data were collected through in‐depth interviews, document reviews and focus group discussions. The respondents were drawn from VETA headquarters – training director, centre managers, entrepreneurship instructors in the centre, and a section of final year students who were purposively selected. Other stakeholders in vocational training in Tanzania were also consulted.

The findings were organized around key themes of the research as per the set objectives. The emerging views showed some of the following issues as the major challenges facing the authority in its effort to integrate entrepreneurship training in the programme: time too limited to cover the core subjects; Form iv leavers and standard vii trainees have different understanding levels; financial/budgetary constraint; few instructors with relevant skills; lack of role models of successful former trainees who are practising entrepreneurs; course too theoretical, lacking the component of field studies; and the course too boring compared with other mainstream courses.

The sample size was too small to be wholly reliable for generalizing the findings to a similar problem. However, the insights gained are a crucial basis for further research and give some variables to be investigated on their significance in shaping entrepreneurship training, especially in a developing country like Tanzania.

The research provides knowledge that was lacking as far as entrepreneurship training and vocational training are involved. Other studies, especially in Tanzania, focused on the quality of technical training and the infrastructural resources rather than business‐related skills.

Viewing undeclared work as low‐paid, exploitative, organised employment conducted under sweatshop conditions, public policy has widely treated this illegitimate sphere as a hindrance to development and actively pursued its deterrence using stringent regulations and punitive measures to change the cost‐benefit ratio for those considering participation in such endeavour. In this paper, however, the intention is to evaluate critically this portrait of the nature of undeclared work and resultant public policy approach.

To evaluate this representation of undeclared work and consequent public policy approach, empirical evidence is reported from 861 face‐to‐face interviews in English localities.

The finding is that the majority of undeclared work is undertaken on a self‐employed basis by people who have identified an opportunity to provide a good or service and are taking a calculated risk in order to fulfil others needs.

Future research will need to further investigate this relationship between self‐employment and the undeclared sector.

Identifying that the undeclared sphere is predominantly composed of self‐employed endeavour, a call is made for greater emphasis in public policy on developing initiatives to legitimise this illegitimate self‐employment, rather than simply deterring such work.

By re‐reading the nature of undeclared work as primarily composed of self‐employed activity, it highlights the need for public policy to stop treating undeclared work purely as something to be deterred and for more emphasis to be put on developing enabling initiatives to help such workers formalise their business ventures.

In the last 30 years or so we have seen a proliferation of research projects on immigrants and non‐white minorities in the labour market (labour market segmentation) and as entrepreneurs (ethnic entrepreneurialism). Each of these literatures helps us understand the nature of immigrant and minority participation in the labour market, but each only offers a partial view. In this paper, I bring these topics together in an empirical investigation of the relationship between ethnic labour market segmentation and ethnic entrepreneurialism in Canada, using 1996 census data. I show that there is a close correspondence between the niches where immigrants and minorities find work, and those where they become entrepreneurs. Immigrants who are drawn to niches that offer few opportunities for self‐employment have low rates of entrepreneurship and, conversely, those who are over‐represented in niches with considerable scope for self‐employment are inclined to establish their own businesses. This shows that the propensity for self‐employment is, to an important degree, determined in the regular labour market. Therefore, entrepreneurship should not be seen as an intrinsically cultural phenomenon (i.e. that certain groups are “naturally” entrepreneurial), but instead as arising out of the opportunity structure associated with wage and salary labour.

This paper fills a gap in the research undertaken into the influence of organisational structure on entrepreneurial orientation and expansion performance. The expansion decision‐making process of an international hotel group was investigated. In‐depth interviews, observations and document analysis were used as the data collection techniques. Findings suggest that the concern about protecting and developing internationally recognised brands profitably caused the organisation to be remarkably centralised. A centralised decision‐making structure, however, not only slowed down the decision‐making process and limited international expansion, but also resulted in frustration and de‐motivation among the market‐based organisational members who were responsible for international expansion. The paper therefore concludes that organisations whose growth performance is highly dependent on having market‐based organisational members in diverse host country environments need to structure differently and bring about a new way of thinking to the management.