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This study investigates the extent to which a firm’s centrality and autonomy in its supply network are associated with the intensity and complexity of its competitive actions.

Utilizing social network analysis and dynamic panel data models, this study analyzes a comprehensive panel dataset with 10,802 firm-year observations across various industries between 2011 and 2018 to test the hypotheses.

Our findings show that a firm’s level of centrality in its supply network has an inverted U-shaped relationship with both competitive intensity and competitive complexity. In addition, the turning points of these two inverted U-shaped relationships differ in that firms with a lower level of centrality tend to compete aggressively by launching more actions within fewer categories, while firms with a higher level of centrality tend to compete aggressively by launching fewer actions that cover a larger range of categories. Finally, we find that a firm’s structural autonomy has a positive relationship with competitive complexity.

This study bridges the gap between the supply chain management literature and strategic management literature and investigates how supply networks shape competitive aggressiveness. In particular, this research investigates how a firm’s structural position in its supply network affects its competitive actions, an important intermediate mechanism for competitive advantage that has been overlooked in the supply chain management literature.

This study aims to investigate the role of ethnic networking ties in immigrant entrepreneurship literature, shedding light on insights that have been overlooked in existing literature.

A systematic literature review was conducted using a sample of 127 articles sourced from the Web of Science database. This review used a combination of bibliometric and content analysis.

The findings revealed the underproduction in this research field. The authors identified the dual characteristics and different types of ethnic ties, presented across various stages of immigrant business, the aspects often overlooked in current research. Drawing from these results, the authors proposed a conceptual model introducing four interconnected dimensions – local context, personal level, ethnic enclave and business development stages – that collectively shape the examination of ethnic ties and suggest avenues for further research to understand their role in the immigrant entrepreneurial ecosystem.

This study offers three notable contributions to existing literature. Firstly, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that systematically reviews the current research status of ethnic ties in immigrant entrepreneurship. Secondly, it uncovered the dynamic nature of ethnic ties and their roles across various immigrant business stages. Thirdly, it introduces a conceptual model that serves as a framework for future investigations, addressing the under-explored multidimensional nature of ethnic ties, thereby presenting several practical, social and theoretical implications.

This study aims to examine the impact of the regulatory focus of the top management team (TMT) members on the technological diversification of firms in high-technology industries based on the upper echelons theory and regulatory focus theory and explore the moderating effect of environmental uncertainty.

This paper uses data on the Chinese Growth Enterprises Market Board (GEM)-listed companies from 2012 to 2016. The authors collected data on TMT regulatory focus from firms’ annual reports by Python programming. A fixed-effects model was used to test our hypotheses.

Results indicate that TMTs with a high promotion focus are associated with greater technological diversification, while TMTs with a high prevention focus are linked to lower technological diversification. Moreover, environmental uncertainty amplifies the positive relationship between promotion-focused TMTs and technological diversification, while it diminishes the negative relationship between prevention-focused TMTs and technological diversification.

This study is limited to high-technology firms listed on the Chinese GEM, which may restrict the generalizability of the findings. Future research could validate these results in different countries and industries to enhance their robustness. Additionally, this study focuses on the impact of TMT regulatory focus on technological diversification; future studies could explore its influence on other strategic decisions, such as digital transformation or innovation strategies.

The results suggest that firms should carefully consider the regulatory focus of their TMT when making strategic decisions regarding technological diversification. Boards of directors should ensure that the TMT’s regulatory focus aligns with the firm’s strategic objectives, particularly in high-technology industries. Moreover, firms should adapt their strategies to the level of environmental uncertainty to better navigate the risks and opportunities presented by a dynamic market environment.

Supportive evidence allows authors to discuss how our findings contribute to the upper echelons theory, as well as the emerging stream of firm technological diversification, which provided valuable psychological insights into the factors influencing TMT strategic decision-making. Meanwhile, this paper integrates the factors of the industry macro-environment to explore the changes in the TMT regulatory focus on firm technological diversification under different contexts.

Drawing on the upper echelons theory, this study focuses on how top management team (TMT) heterogeneity affects breakthrough innovations and examines how strategic decision-making logic (including causation and effectuation) moderates the relationship between TMT heterogeneity and breakthrough innovation.

By conducting an empirical test of 227 sample firms in China, the authors applied linear hierarchical regression analysis to test the hypotheses on the TMT heterogeneityinnovation relationship and the moderating roles of causation and effectuation.

The empirical tests show that TMT heterogeneity positively affects breakthrough innovation, and both causation and effectuation positively moderate the positive relationship between TMT heterogeneity and breakthrough innovation. In addition, effectuation has a stronger moderating effect on the positive correlation between TMT heterogeneity and breakthrough innovation than causation.

This study extends the upper echelons theory to explain how the characteristics of TMTs affect firm innovation. Specifically, the authors explore the TMT heterogeneity–breakthrough innovation relationship from the perspectives of information processing and core competence and reveal the boundary condition of strategic decision-making logic in the correlation between TMT heterogeneity and breakthrough innovation. In this vein, the authors contribute to the literature by untangling the internal mechanisms between TMT heterogeneity and breakthrough innovation and extending the discussion on effectuation theory from the entrepreneurship domain to the innovation field. Furthermore, the research findings can provide helpful implications for TMTs to manage breakthrough innovation effectively.

This paper responds to several calls for a cross-national comparative study of immigrant entrepreneurship throughout the longstanding discourse of this phenomenon. This study aims to comparatively analyze the nature of immigrant enclave entrepreneurship among one immigrant community across three different jurisdictional contexts (UK, Denmark and Norway) based on comparative ethnographic methods of inquiry.

The data was collected in person from April 2022 to June 2023 by the researchers to identify the similarities and differences of migrant entrepreneurial activities in three immigrant enclaves (Manchester, Oslo and Copenhagen). Comparative ethnographic narrative analysis methods and template analysis approaches were combined to analyze interviews, observations and secondary published data.

This study examines spatiality, sectoral occupation and market orientation for comparative analysis. Through detailed analysis, it uncovers the spatiality and nuances in market demands and sectoral similarities across diverse regulatory environments. Notably, it identifies traditional migrant sectoral occupations shared across regions and its relevance to immigrant enclaves.

This scholarly contribution explores immigrant entrepreneurship in various national contexts, emphasising their engagement in neglected and low-value sectors within immigrant enclaves. The study addresses the influence of the host economy’s conditions on immigrant entrepreneurs, impacting their strategic orientation and the extent of their “embeddedness”. It responds to the theoretical gap in immigrant entrepreneurship literature by conducting a cross-national investigation across countries, extending the comparative dimension to Norway and Denmark. The research employs a unique design focusing on a specific immigrant group and emphasizes spatial contexts, sectoral proliferation and market orientation within immigrant enclaves, offering insights into the mixed embeddedness perspective and the broader environmental forces shaping migrant entrepreneurial activities in the UK and Scandinavia.

Drawing from resource orchestration theory, this research proposed an integrative model that leverages insights into counter resource constraints and uncertainty in start-up business model innovation (BMI). It investigated the influences of entrepreneurial networks and effectuation on BMI through bricolage in uncertain environments.

The research surveyed 481 start-ups in China. LISREL 8.80 and SPSS 22.0 were employed to test the validity and reliability of key variables, respectively. Additionally, hypotheses were examined through multiple linear regression.

First, entrepreneurial networks and effectuation were positively related to BMI, and combining these two factors improved BMI for start-ups. Second, bricolage contributed to BMI and played mediating roles in translating entrepreneurial networks and effectuation into BMI. Third, environmental uncertainty weakened the linkage between bricolage and BMI.

Future research should replicate the results in other countries because only start-ups in China were investigated in the study, and it is necessary to extend this research by gathering longitudinal data. This research emphasized the mediating effects of bricolage and the moderating influence of environmental uncertainty, and new potential mediating and moderating factors should be explored between resources and BMI.

There are three significant theoretical contributions. First, the findings enrich the literature on the complex antecedents of BMI by combining the impacts of entrepreneurial networks and effectuation. Second, an overarching framework is proposed explaining how bricolage (resource management) links entrepreneurial networks and effectuation and BMI. Third, it demonstrates the significance of environmental uncertainty in the bricolage–BMI linkage, deepening the understanding of the bricolage boundary condition.

Digital transformation misalignment refers to disparities in digital transformation levels between suppliers and buyers across the production and operation process. It has negatively affected supply chain stability. However, the existing research concerning the economic consequences has not been adequately addressed. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate whether such digital transformation misalignment increases supplier financial risk and to identify the factors influencing this relationship.

This paper examines binary combinations of suppliers and buyers listed on China’s A-share market between 2011 and 2021. This group constitutes a sample to empirically test the influence of digital transformation misalignment on the supplier’s financial risk, as well as the moderating effect of the geographical and organizational distances.

The paper’s findings demonstrate that digital transformation misalignment has indeed a significant increase in the supplier’s financial risk. Moreover, the impact is more intense when the geographical or organizational distance between the supplier and the buyer is relatively large.

The existing literature rarely explores the potential risks arising from digital transformation misalignment between supply chain partners. Therefore, this paper fills a notable gap as it is the first to study the impact of digital transformation misalignment on the supplier’s financial risk and the specific applied mechanisms. The contribution significantly improves the field of corporate digital transformation, particularly, within the context of supply chain management.

The purpose of this study is to explore how the risk of management motives for fraud can be assessed in external audits.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 26 experienced external auditors to explore their perspectives on the methods they employ to assess the risk of management motives for fraud.

The study identifies six methods external auditors can use to assess management motives for fraud. It emphasises that assessing management motives requires auditors to go beyond understanding these motives and necessitates a sceptical and analytical mindset. Auditors need to identify the accounts most vulnerable to management manipulations, observe management attitudes and assess the credibility of management assertions. The auditors in this study highlight specific accounts frequently manipulated by management. Still, manual year-end journal entries are the most vulnerable to management manipulations as they are subject to fewer controls. They recommend increasing the sample size to 100% and assigning more experienced staff, particularly, those with qualifications in fraud examination or anti-fraud training, to audit these vulnerable accounts thoroughly. They also provided examples of how auditors can identify management motives for fraud, observe management attitudes and assess the credibility of management assertions.

Audit standards (e.g. ISA 240, SAS99) lack explicit guidance on assessing management motives for fraud, but auditors are required to consider it in fraud risk assessment. This study proposes guidance recommendations to improve auditors' ability to assess this risk, which could be integrated into professional audit standards and training materials to improve auditors' professional scepticism, ability to challenge management and skills in fraud risk assessment.

Assessing the risk of management motives for fraud in external audits has received limited attention in the literature. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to address this knowledge gap.

This study aims to investigate the effects of moral hazard on quality and satisfaction of public–private–partnership (PPP) construction projects in Ghana.

After undertaking a literature review, questionnaires were used to elicit responses from respondents. Population consisted of quantity surveyors, project managers, procurement officers, consultants, public agency officers involved in PPP projects, private partners and contractors. A total of 211 questionnaires were received from 250 distributed. Purposive and snowballing sampling techniques were adopted. Analytical tools were Cronbach’s alpha for testing reliability, regression, mean score ranking and relative importance index.

Reduced mutual trust and respect, poor clarity of project objectives; consequence on decision-making; less effective construction process; and increased construction risks were the significant effects of moral hazard on satisfaction of PPP construction projects. Value-based effects; manufacturer-based effects; product-based effects; user-based effects; and transcendent-based effects were the significant effects of moral hazard on quality of PPP construction projects.

Construction stakeholders involved in delivering PPP projects ought to take note of the findings and recommendations arising. Further studies should explore the effects on other project performance indicators apart from satisfaction and quality.

This paper extends knowledge in the area of exploring the effects of moral hazard on PPP project satisfaction and quality. The findings are beneficial to both academia and industry practitioners.

The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between subsidiary manager’s demographic characteristics and performance, while incorporating the subsidiary context. We draw upon upper echelon theories and International Business theories to understand this relationship.

Using a dataset based on listed Multinational subsidiaries in India we use linear regression to establish the relationship between subsidiary external performance (host market performance), subsidiary internal performance and subsidiary manager’s demographic characteristics.

With our data set we find a positive relationship between percentage of host country nationals (HCN) in the Top Management Team (TMT) and subsidiary host market performance and that subsidiary age moderates this relationship. We also find an inverted U-shaped relationship between parent country nationals (PCN) tenure and subsidiary performance.

One of the limitations is that our study views the strategy process through the Upper Echelons (UE) theory lens, as a clearly specified planning process that associates strategy with intentionality. The opportunity that emanates at lower levels can turn an intended strategy into something different than what was started.

The findings in this paper can be the basis for decision making on the constitution of leadership teams.

There is a dearth of empirical evidence and studies on TMTs in the subsidiary, particularly from the non-North American context. Using a unique data set of listed multinational subsidiaries in India, the paper explores the impact of TMT demographics such as tenure of the TMT and age of the subsidiary operations on the performance of the subsidiary.