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This study aims to explore the patterns and transformational dynamics of the executive–interpreter network in the innovation processes of small- and medium-sized enterprises in hospitality.

Grounded in social network theory and adopting a case-based approach, this study features a multi-case design focusing on three Chinese boutique hotels. Data were collected through Web page and document reviews, participant observations and semistructured interviews.

Results capture how executive–interpreter network dynamics contribute to innovation in small- and medium-sized hotels. Key factors in social networks (e.g. size, scope and strength) shift throughout innovation. This study presents a design-driven approach as a means of innovation. Findings also delineate the network development conditions under which innovation dynamically occurs in boutique hotels.

Practical implications center on how network dynamics help small- and medium-sized hotels innovate more effectively. These insights can assist hotel operators and prospective market entrants in improving their hotels’ performance and competitiveness.

This study blends social network theory with a design-driven approach to explore innovation mechanisms in small- and medium-sized hotels. It offers empirical evidence for practitioners regarding design-driven innovation. Findings enrich the body of knowledge on both design-driven innovation theory and hospitality innovation.

This study investigates whether corporate executives, who are university alumni, influence each other's firm corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance.

Drawing on social network theory, the authors hypothesise that a firm's CSR performance is positively associated with its peer firms' average CSR performance when the executives of the firm and its peer firms are university alumni. The study employs data from 1,685 listed firms and 4,906 executives who graduated from 585 different universities in China and runs multivariate regressions.

The results reveal a sizeable university peer influence on CSR performance. Such influence is even stronger for executives who graduated from elite universities (e.g. 985 or 211 universities), and universities or programmes that provide more opportunities for alumni reunions or networking (e.g. MBAs/EMBAs). Executives who are more influential in making firm decisions (e.g. CEOs/CFOs), as well as firms that are more likely to mimic the behaviour of others, also show higher degrees of university peer influence.

The results highlight the role of education in ethical decision-making.

This study documents evidence on a new determinant of firm CSR performance. The study sheds light on the impact of non-institutionalised personal ties, for example, university alumni networks, on CSR performance.

The use of women's networks is emerging as one method of advancing women's careers within organizations. However, the value of these networks has been questioned. The purpose of this study is to examine how potential differences in the perceptions of network members and the firm's executive leadership about the purposes and anticipated outcomes of a women's network may impact women's career advancement.

The authors interviewed 21 members of an intra‐firm women's network and six members of the executive leadership team of a global organization. To examine the qualitative data, they used a process of thematic analysis to discover prevalent themes in the transcribed interviews.

Both members of the women's network and the executive leadership team placed responsibility for women's career advancement upon the individual; the firm's male‐dominated culture and organizational constraints were not emphasized. While members of the women's network recognized how the network could be used to contribute to the firm's strategic goals, the executive leadership team did not recognize the network's possible effect on the firm's bottom line.

Examines how potential differences in the perceptions of network members and the firm's executive leadership about the purposes and anticipated outcomes of a women's network may impact women's career advancement.

This study aims to elucidate the role of social ties in facilitating the career progress of senior officers within public companies in an emerging market.

The authors followed the career track of 2,151 senior officers serving on management and supervisory boards of Polish public companies. The authors used multivariate econometric modeling to investigate the factors shaping their career progress.

The authors document an increasing impact of officers’ social networks on the likelihood of assuming multiple consecutive senior positions. It takes progressively less time for incumbent senior officers to find a subsequent/concomitant board position with a network of social ties from prior workplaces facilitating career progress and prior experience being negatively associated with multiple positions. Officers’ social ties at the senior level are also shown to be positively associated with total compensation and with the likelihood of cross-industry career transition in both executive and supervisory roles.

Social network appears to play a more salient role in accelerating careers of supervisory board members even though executives also benefit therefrom. Finally, the network of social ties with former or incumbent supervisory board members exercises a more pronounced positive impact on career progress than ties with former or incumbent executives.

This study aims to discover how the patterns and effects of managerial ties differ among state‐owned, domestic private, and foreign firms.

Data were collected through in‐depth interviews with 15 top executives of economy hotel chains headquartered in five cities in China. The typical qualitative data analysis procedures, such as voice‐recording, transcribing, coding, and pattern‐matching, were strictly followed.

Results indicate that managers in firms of different ownership types use different network tie combinations and differ in the extent to which they can benefit from managerial ties. For example, entrepreneurs in state‐owned enterprises thought strong ties were more important than weak ties and political ties were more important than business ties, while those in domestic private firms and firms founded by Chinese using foreign funding benefited more from business ties.

The study contributes to both entrepreneurship and social network theories by summarizing different patterns of managerial ties and exploring the rationales for the variance. It also provides evidence for understanding the important roles played by executives' network ties in the entrepreneurial processes. Entrepreneurs in the Chinese hospitality industry may use the findings to direct organization resources to more productive managerial ties and manage their network ties efficiently in the dynamic environment of a transitional economy.

The research described in this article seeks to address the question of the extent to which a role‐based perspective can provide insight into the distributed and networked form of leadership.

A model provides insight into the distributed and networked form of leadership, and the roles that executives can adopt in formal, informal or temporary groups within the organisation's overall senior management team. The methodology adopted is qualitative, focusing on inquiry‐based learning which enabled the authors to gather data on those aspects of the social structure within which they were embedded that related specifically to the leadership roles available to executives and the networks they formed.

Generically applicable links between leadership roles are identified that provides structure to the task accomplishment networks within groups executives form when discharging their leadership responsibilities. Characterising leadership in terms of role, and the task networks that executives form, is found to facilitate improvement in the speed with which groups gain productive contributions from their members.

A case study of three demographically similar multinational engineering companies engaged in the design, development and manufacture of rotating turbo‐machinery provides the platform for the research. The concepts advanced will require validating in other organisations of different demographic profiles.

The concepts advanced, and implications discussed, provide an insight into the distributed and networked form of leadership. The practical steps individual executives can take to contribute to the speed with which groups gain productive contributions from their members are highlighted.

This article attempts to assist executives within a senior management team to better adapt and coordinate their behaviour with other executives. In so doing, it is suggested that executives contribute more positively to the development of groups and the speed with which the groups of which they are a part gain productive contributions from their members.

The purpose of this paper is to describe how learning in collaborative approaches – in this paper labeled “collaborative approaches to management learning” (CAML) – can support the learning situation of small firm owner‐managers. Drawing on a socio‐cognitive learning framework, the context of the small firm and its consequences for management learning are framed and discussed. Drawing on four episodes of management learning in CAML, it is suggested that CAML establishes a new context in which old truths can be questioned and new insights can be created. In CAML the owner‐managers are offered a position on the periphery of practice of the other managers and other network visitors, where trust among the network participants provides the foundation for admitting and openly facing lack of knowledge on different issues, something that is prohibited within their enterprises, due to the lack of peers and expected omniscience of the owner‐manager.

At the level of a cognitive schema, a business model is a mental map of a firm’s value-creating, value-delivering, and value-capturing activities and the linkages between them. An important question in the study of business models as cognitive schemas is whether and how schemas differ across industry actors and whether the differences are connected to the variation observed in actual business models in the industry. This chapter examines, in particular, the ways in which business model schemas of industry insiders differ from those of industry outsiders. Using data from interviews with chief executive officers (CEOs) of 30 legal-tech firms, we graphically construct and analyze the CEOs’ schemas of important causal interdependencies between their firms’ activities. The analysis shows systematic differences between insiders and outsider CEOs’ schemas. We theorize that these differences underlie insider and outsider CEOs’ distinct approaches to opportunity recognition, expertise perception, and value framing, and have consequences for actual business model evolution in the industry.

Public policy which controls and seeks to correct employment discrimination is now in its fourth decade in the USA. Organizations have made strides in complying with such policies through their hiring practices and in employee development and training programmes. While laws such as the Civil Rights Act and programmes such as EEO and AA have high aims and lofty claims, in practice they miss the mark in organizations. Research indicates that the nature of the work relationship is constrained by both network and hierarchical forms of organization. Suggests that policy is predicated only on the latter and that innovation may lie in the former. Finds that understanding and managing the networks in organizations may be used to augment existing programmes in achieving non‐discriminatory or “fair” employment practices.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of Shariah board members and managerial networking on zakat observance among executives of Islamic financial firms (IFFs) in Bahrain and Malaysia.

The methodology is based on surveys administered to 106 respondents and personal interviews conducted with individuals holding management positions in IFFs.

The paper finds that: networking among IFF executives in Bahrain positively influences their observance and perception of zakat in their firms; and higher representation of Shariah on the board of directors increases executives’ favorable perception and observance of zakat in Malaysia. Differences in findings may be explained by Bahrain’s global Shariah institutions where networking offers opportunities for socialization of zakat ethics. In Malaysia, on the other hand, Shariah directorship sets the pace and direction of zakat ethics.

The seminal work of DiMaggio and Powell (1991) on neo-institutional theory has drawn attention to executives’ agency in creating cognitive frameworks that help promote the development of firm standards and norms. However, application of the theory to Islamic finance is largely absent. This paper contributes to an empirical understanding of the theory by highlighting sources of IFFs’ social agency in the development of zakat norm and its observance, namely, managerial networking and Shariah directors as change agents.