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1 – 10 of over 5000The purpose of this paper is to examine how Chinese immigrant businesses in Australia were able to shift from low return start-up businesses and move to more competitive business…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine how Chinese immigrant businesses in Australia were able to shift from low return start-up businesses and move to more competitive business models targeting mainstream clientele. The research aims to identify the factors enabling a break-out strategy for these entrepreneurs and whether a horizontal or vertical break-out was achieved.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative research method with in-depth interviews is employed. Interviews were conducted with 55 Chinese immigrant business owners in Sydney and Canberra.
Findings
The analysis found that a break-out strategy depended on a range of business activities, including innovation, marketing, networking and personnel strategies. Importantly, the current research found that these resources have varying degrees of importance in the different stages of the transition to the new business model. Accumulating sufficient financial capital was a fundamental enabler for a break-out strategy, followed by the capacity to learn and benefit from the experience of social networks.
Research limitations/implications
The current research highlights the importance of financial capital and capacity to benefit from social networks as fundamental factors in enabling a break-out strategy. The benefit of the qualitative approach in obtaining rich data needs to be offset by potential limitations on generalisability. Future research could incorporate comparison between different size businesses as well as analysing factors underpinning a failure to successfully implement a break-out.
Practical implications
The findings indicate that business support groups and policymakers could review access to financial capital for entrepreneurs seeking break-outs, consider improving opportunities for developing capacity to utilise heterogeneous social networks, and consider pathways for improving skills acquisition amongst immigrant entrepreneurs.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the research literature on break-out strategies used by immigrant entrepreneurs by analysing, in detail, the transition steps undertaken by ethnic Chinese entrepreneurs in the shift to more competitive business models.
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Jane Farmer, Tracy De Cotta, Katharine McKinnon, Jo Barraket, Sarah-Anne Munoz, Heather Douglas and Michael J. Roy
This paper aims to explore the well-being impacts of social enterprise, beyond a social enterprise per se, in everyday community life.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the well-being impacts of social enterprise, beyond a social enterprise per se, in everyday community life.
Design/methodology/approach
An exploratory case study was used. The study’s underpinning theory is from relational geography, including Spaces of Wellbeing Theory and therapeutic assemblage. These theories underpin data collection methods. Nine social enterprise participants were engaged in mental mapping and walking interviews. Four other informants with “boundary-spanning” roles involving knowledge of the social enterprise and the community were interviewed. Data were managed using NVivo, and analysed thematically.
Findings
Well-being realised from “being inside” a social enterprise organisation was further developed for participants, in the community, through positive interactions with people, material objects, stories and performances of well-being that occurred in everyday community life. Boundary spanning community members had roles in referring participants to social enterprise, mediating between participants and structures of community life and normalising social enterprise in the community. They also gained benefit from social enterprise involvement.
Originality/value
This paper uses relational geography and aligned methods to reveal the intricate connections between social enterprise and well-being realisation in community life. There is potential to pursue this research on a larger scale to provide needed evidence about how well-being is realised in social enterprises and then extends into communities.
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Carmen Daniela Maier, Finn Frandsen and Winni Johansen
The aim of this paper is to study the development of a smoldering crisis over time. The focus is on a nationwide news media and online news communication related to a smoldering…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to study the development of a smoldering crisis over time. The focus is on a nationwide news media and online news communication related to a smoldering crisis running in the Danish healthcare system since 2016: the problematic implementation of a large-scale electronic health record (EHR), technology entitled Sundhedsplatformen (SP), in the hospitals of the capital region of Denmark.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on insights from crisis communication theories and in particular rhetorical arena theory (RAT), traces of SP smoldering crisis and patterns of discursive strategies are identified and explained from a longitudinal perspective to explain the communicative complexity that characterizes this smoldering crisis. To build an understanding of how this smoldering crisis is perceived, followed and kept alive, an analysis of (de)legitimation discursive strategies employed strategically by various actors and voices in news articles is conducted in relation to four communicative themes: issue identification, warnings, blame attribution and potential solutions.
Findings
It has been found that a legitimacy deficit emerges communicatively through specific (de)legitimation strategies during this smoldering crisis. New insights into RAT (Frandsen and Johansen, 2017) are also provided.
Practical implications
This study is not only of theoretical relevance, but it is also of practical relevance for public relation professionals who aim to identify characteristics of starting smoldering crises as well as to find strategic responses to the ongoing challenges and the developing over time of smoldering crises.
Originality/value
New insights into RAT (Frandsen and Johansen, 2017) are provided.
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Peter C. Earle and David M. Waugh
This chapter examines institutional investors’ considerations while investing or otherwise engaging in the cryptocurrency sector, whether exclusively in bitcoin or the broader…
Abstract
This chapter examines institutional investors’ considerations while investing or otherwise engaging in the cryptocurrency sector, whether exclusively in bitcoin or the broader universe of crypto or decentralized finance assets. Given the rapid change in legal and regulatory oversight and cryptocurrency and blockchain innovation, offering inviolable advice about due diligence and compliance during commercial engagement is exceedingly difficult. However, general guidelines and rules of thumb are available.
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Kerry Fairbrother and James Warn
Applied research indicates strong connections between dimensions of the work place, stress and job satisfaction. Yet, there is an absence of theory to provide conceptual…
Abstract
Applied research indicates strong connections between dimensions of the work place, stress and job satisfaction. Yet, there is an absence of theory to provide conceptual understanding of these relationships. In 1999, Sparks and Cooper advocated using job‐specific models of stress as a way of developing a better understanding of the relationships. The current study adopted this recommendation and investigated a specific job context, specifically, naval officer trainees undergoing their sea training. The results indicate that a general model of stress is unhelpful in identifying the predictors of stress and job satisfaction in specific job contexts. Instead, the authors recommend identifying salient workplace dimensions rather than a broad‐brush approach when seeking workplace associations with stress.
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Elizabeth Barber and James Warn
To demonstrate two distinct leadership requirements for project managers and establish a theoretical basis for distinguishing between these two types of leadership.
Abstract
Purpose
To demonstrate two distinct leadership requirements for project managers and establish a theoretical basis for distinguishing between these two types of leadership.
Design/methodology/approach
A framework linking transactional and transformational leadership qualities with project management attributes is developed.
Findings
Explains how reactive decisions relating to monitoring of schedules and budgeting data of projects has received the greatest attention in the literature but this is only one aspect of project control. Project leadership that is proactive in controlling projects is more effective.
Research limitations/implications
The implications of our findings are substantive. Project managers who focus on proactive leadership behaviour will be more successful in completing projects on time, on budget and to the specified standard as well as achieving the strategic purpose of the project.
Practical implications
Project managers need to pay more attention to the progress of their projects and forestall any problems rather than just being reactive problem solvers.
Originality/value
The paper provides a framework for establishing the linkage between proactive decisions that impact on the direction that the project is progressing and reactive decisions that solve the existing problems of project management. It is a different focus to the traditional project management leadership knowledge base.
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This chapter explores the “Constitutional Revolution” of the 1930s, as it played out beyond the walls of the U.S. Supreme Court. It argues that a radically revised historical…
Abstract
This chapter explores the “Constitutional Revolution” of the 1930s, as it played out beyond the walls of the U.S. Supreme Court. It argues that a radically revised historical memory of the Constitution accompanied the ascent New Deal liberalism. Prior core values associated with the Constitution's history, such as federalism and the sanctity of private property, were dramatically downgraded, while the civil liberties embodied in the Bill of Rights dramatically rose. By so redefining their historical memory of the Constitution, Americans could enjoy the active government that most desired while still celebrating the constitutional traditions of individual freedom and limited government.
Joseph A. Maciariello and Karen E. Linkletter
The political philosophy of American federalism was a critical influence on the work of Peter Drucker. Drucker drew on federalist ideas to devise ways to distribute and check…
Abstract
Purpose
The political philosophy of American federalism was a critical influence on the work of Peter Drucker. Drucker drew on federalist ideas to devise ways to distribute and check power within organizations, curbing the darker side of human nature. In this article, the authors aim to discuss the history of federalism, and to demonstrate how Drucker used that philosophy to shape his own management theories. The article also seeks to provide suggestions for applying federalist principles to today's organizations.
Design/methodology/approach
Drucker's own writings, as well as historical primary sources, are analyzed to illustrate the influence of federalism. The authors use specific examples from Drucker's own work, including his study of General Motors and his concept of management by objectives, to illustrate how federalism informed Drucker's vision for a functioning society of institutions.
Findings
Although Drucker has been criticized as a utopian, he, like the federalists and their philosophical forefathers, grappled with the role and nature of virtue in society, the balance between individual liberty and the greater good, and the need for checks and balances on power. As evidenced by Drucker's work, federalism offers a potential solution to today's organizations for managing complex networks and alliances, as well as creating an effective top‐management team.
Research limitations/implications
Future research into the applicability of federalism to contemporary organizations is suggested.
Originality/value
This paper provides an in‐depth analysis of the impact of federalist principles on Drucker's work, and offers specific suggestions for applying federalism to managing organizations today. It provides an important connection between the discipline of management and the liberal arts.
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