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The entrepreneurial process is a result of an interaction between an individual entrepreneur and the surrounding entrepreneurial ecosystem. The purpose of this paper is to determine whether US metropolitan areas with disproportionately high shares of entrepreneurs are systematically linked to particular attributes of the entrepreneurial support system?

In this paper, non-farm proprietorship (NFP) employment data from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis is used as a dependent variable proxy for entrepreneurship. NFP data are widely used in the entrepreneurship literature. Data on all independent variables were obtained from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey and the Bureau of Labor Statistics by metropolitan area and subject to a stepwise linear regression analysis.

The relative share of NFP employment by metropolitan area exhibited a strong positive relationship with percentage of employment in finance, insurance and real estate, median age, percentage of Hispanic population and median home value. It is argued that the combination of significant predictors captures both out-of-necessity self-employment (e.g. low-skilled Hispanic and aging populations) and a self-employment of opportunity (e.g. access to capital).

Public policies focused on nurturing entrepreneurial ecosystems must account for these divergent explanatory frameworks when attempting to encourage NFP employment.

The paper has an explicit spatial context that tends to be overlooked in the traditional entrepreneurship literature. The focus on out-of-necessity versus opportunity-based entrepreneurship, and how it is shaped by some key predictors at the metropolitan scale, is a relatively new angle.

Over the last two decades, Under Armour (UA) has emerged from being the “underdog” in the sports apparel and footwear industry to being a leader in the industry, with a fierce attention to performance and great skill at picking up-and-coming athletes who emerge as superstars. This case underscores its administrative heritage, competitive strategy, and growth potential as a global player in a highly competitive industry. It addresses the tension between being a performance brand while launching lines for women vs technology applications and conflicts between its growth strategy and macro-economic forces. It highlights areas in which it has succeeded against macro-economic forces and where it has not.

The research relies primarily on secondary sources and countless studies of UA and its major competitors. Primary research is based on databases, videos of UA’s Chief Executive Officer, Kevin Plank, and articles from Bloomberg to The Baltimore Sun (UA’s headquarters) on the history, growth and future of UA. It also includes observations and site visits to one of its signature brand house stores as well as intensive research and directed studies with students in the USA and China.

The case can be applied to undergraduate, graduate or executive business classes in: business policy and strategy; general management; (sports) marketing; leadership or organisational behaviour classes.

In the context of the question of how entrepreneurship education can contribute to entrepreneurial competency development, this paper aims to outline the deliberate practice (DP) method and showcase how it can be applied in entrepreneurship education. To this end, this paper presents a learning innovation in which DP improves entrepreneurial competencies.

The paper describes an entrepreneurship training in which participants, over a seven-week period, learn about DP and use this approach to develop an aspect of an entrepreneurial competency of their choosing.

Evaluations show that participants find both short- and long-term gains in their competency development, and value having learnt a competency development method as well.

The presented format is designed in accordance with the DP principles as originally described in the literature on expert performance, and shows that DP can be applied in the context of entrepreneurial competency development at lower levels of proficiency. Entrepreneurship educators interested in competency development can consider to adopt (aspects of) the described approach.

The format applies DP principles as described in the literature on expert performance. The value lies in the short- and long term effects of the training.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

Professional wrestling is a multi‐million pound industry. Loyal fans watch events and buy merchandising. However, even the participants admit that the results are pre‐arranged, with writers producing the stories and the characters for those involved. In other words, the whole phenomena is manufactured. The spectators are aware of this, and still continue to offer their support. This study looks at the ways in which the industry seeks to entertain these fans and offer them the product that will maintain their interest and their attention and ensure that they will continue to pay regularly so as to maintain the industry’s profitability.

Securicor has a ‘turnover’ of £20,000 million a year—handling the money and wage packets of other firms. But in fact the group has diversified its activities a lot from pure cash‐carrying. Under the guidance of lawyer Keith Erskine, as Ken Gooding found out its management style has taken the most interesting of paths, with an absolute ceiling on profits. Pictures by Martin Slavin.

This paper has two purposes. First, I offer a reading of interpretive biography (Denzin, 1989a) as an alternative method for understanding how individual lives are rendered meaningful in postmodern communication processes. Second, given the importance of many rock performers as cultural heroes, I present an interpretive biography of Pete Townshend, chief songwriter and most visible member of the classic rock band the Who. This method of inquiry is grounded in the more general tradition of interpretive interactionism (Denzin, 1989b, 1990a) and has its roots in C. Wright Mills's (1959) concept of the sociological imagination. Its guiding question is this: How is the postmodern self (or stated more accurately, selves) created within and sustained by the mass media? I argue that as postmodern cultural symbols, Townshend and the band (however ambiguously) mirror a collective search for identity on the part of audiences and society-at-large.

This paper aims to investigate how digital capabilities associated with building information modelling (BIM) can integrate a wide range of information to improve built asset management (BAM) decision-making during the in-use phase of hospital buildings.

A comprehensive document analysis and a participatory case study was undertaken with a regional NHS hospital to review the type of information that can be used to better inform BAM decision-making to develop a conceptual framework to improve information use during the health-care BAM process, test how the conceptual framework can be applied within a BAM division of a health-care organisation and develop a cloud-based BIM application.

BIM has the potential to facilitate better informed BAM decision-making by integrating a wide range of information related to the physical condition of built assets, resources available for BAM and the built asset’s contribution to health-care provision within an organisation. However, interdepartmental information sharing requires a significant level of time and cost investment and changes to information gathering and storing practices within the whole organisation.

This research demonstrated that the implementation of BIM during the in-use phase of hospital buildings is different to that in the design and construction phases. At the in-use phase, BIM needs to integrate and communicate information within and between the estates, facilities division and other departments of the organisation. This poses a significant change management task for the organisation’s information management systems. Thus, a strategically driven top-down organisational approach is needed to implement BIM for the in-use phase of hospital buildings.