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This research aims to investigate how manufacturing flexibility can address the challenges of an ever-changing and unpredictable business environment in Bangladesh’s labor-intensive ready-made garment (RMG) industry, which is underserved and situated in a developing country.

Using Partial Least Square Structural Equation Modeling, this study empirically evaluated the relationships between manufacturing flexibility, environmental uncertainty and firm performance. The analysis utilized 320 survey responses from potential RMG experts, representing 95 organizations.

The study achieved a decision-making model for implementing manufacturing flexibility in the RMG industry of Bangladesh with acceptable model fit criterion. The research pinpointed that workforce flexibility plays the maximum mediating among different types of manufacturing in coping with demand and supply uncertainty in the RMG sector.

The study made valuable contributions to theoretical and practical knowledge in the context of manufacturing flexibility in Bangladesh’s RMG and other underserved labor-intensive sectors in developing economies. It suggests that managers should shift from defensive and risky business strategies to more aggressive and proactive approaches by utilizing workforce flexibility resources adaptively to enhance manufacturing capabilities and align with dynamic market demand. Additionally, the study offers recommendations for future research to build upon its findings.

This study is unique in its approach because it presents a decision model for implementing manufacturing flexibility in a labor-intensive industry in a developing economy, specifically the RMG industry in Bangladesh, whereas previous research has primarily focused on high-tech industries in developed economies.

The study aims to provide a critical review of the extent to which digital technologies are likely to replace human labour, the exponential rise in the amount of work to be done and how far distinctively human skills are future-proofed and therefore likely to be in short supply. It reviews the evidence for a permanent switch to home and remote working enabled by emerging technologies. It assesses the business, digital and labour strategies of work organisations and the promise and challenges from a dominant trend towards a digitally enabled flexible labour model.

A critical review of 1020 plus case studies and the extant literature was carried out.

The relationship between emerging technologies and work is widely misunderstood, and there are major qualifiers to the idea of an overwhelming tsunami of technology drastically reducing headcounts globally. Distinctive human skills remain valuable, the amount of work to be done is increasing exponentially and automation is becoming more a coping than a labour replacement mechanism. Moves to a hybrid digitalised flexible labour model are promising but not if short-term, and if the challenges they represent are not managed well.

The main limitation is that we are making projections into the future, though we are drawing on a lot of different sources and evidence and past data projected into the future.

The problem is not labour displacement but large skills shortages that will slow down the speed of technology adoption. Skills development is vital, as is the taking of long-term perspectives towards the management of hybrid, flexible working based on human-machine interactions.

Organisations need to revitalise their training and development and labour management models. Governments and intermediary institutions need to manage transition states if the skills required to gain economic growth are to be available, and to ensure that large labour pools do not get bypassed from not having requisite skills.

The study offers a more subtle and complex perspective on the emerging evidence about the future of technology and work.

Critiques of international business (IB) have long pointed to the weaknesses in the understanding of context. This has ignited debate on the understanding of institutions and how they “matter” for IB. Yet how institutions matter ultimately depends on how IB applies institutional theory. It is argued that institutional-based research is dominated by a narrow set of approaches, largely overlooking institutional perspectives that account for institutional diversity. This paper aims to forward the argument that IB research should lend greater attention to comparing the topography of institutional configurations by bringing political economy “back in” to the IB domain.

Using principal components analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis, the authors provide IB with a taxonomy of capitalist institutional diversity which defines the landscape of political economies.

The authors show institutional diversity is characterised by a range of capitalist clusters and configuration arrangements, identifying four clusters with distinct modes of capitalism as well as specifying intra-cluster differences to propose nine varieties of capitalism. This paper allows IB scholars to lend closer attention to the institutional context within which firms operate. If the configurations of institutions “matter” for IB scholarship, then clearly, a quantitative blueprint to assess institutional diversity remains central to the momentum of such “institutional turn.”

This paper provides a comprehensive survey of institutional theory, serving as a valuable resource for the application of context within international business. Further, our taxonomy allows international business scholars to utilise a robust framework to examine the diverse institutional context within which firms operate, whilst extending to support the analysis of broader socioeconomic outcomes. This taxonomy therefore allows international business scholars to utilise a robust framework to examine the institutional context within which firms operate.

Flexible staffing arrangements have become a permanent feature of employment in many industrial societies. This article examines how employers perceive the consequences of using flexible staffing arrangements. It presents and assesses theoretically informed hypotheses on organisational situations in which negative consequences are more likely to be perceived.

This study uses data (n = 761) from a bespoke employers survey, fielded in the Netherlands in 2019. Structural equation modelling (SEM) is used to measure and explain employers' perception of downsides to flexible staffing arrangements.

Employers report distinct downsides to the use of flexible staffing arrangements in terms of performance, management and employee well-being. Model estimates show that employers using flexible staffing arrangements to acquire specific expertise or to follow other organisations in their sector perceive more downsides.

Empirical research on employers' perception of the disadvantageous consequences of using flexible staffing arrangements is scarce. This article highlights that this practice can discourage investments in human capital and lead to a sense of insecurity among young workers. It draws attention to the relevance of distinguishing between strategic motives when trying to understand organisational behaviour regarding non-standard forms of employment.

To empirically study the determinant factors of adopting work–life balance measures at the firm level.

After reviewing the main theories that explain work–life balance practices, IBEX-35 Spanish companies during 2015–2019 are studied to see whether the firm sector, the presence of female employees, qualified personnel, a company agreement and an equality plan determine these types of practices.

The results indicate a negative relationship between the firm activity sector and adopting work–life balance practices. Industrial companies offer fewer work–life balance measures than service companies. A company agreement implies more extensive adoption of work-life practices. Older companies are characterized by greater adoption of work-life practices, in contrast to their level of profitability that is associated negatively with these practices.

Since it is difficult for industrial companies to change their idiosyncrasies, it is necessary to incorporate other measures that promote work–life balance, such as timetable flexibility. Companies and policymakers should promote the advantages of a company agreement to contribute to the implementation of work–life balance practices.

The empirical evidence is scarce, especially in Spain and at the company level, given that most previous studies have focused on workers and the Anglo-Saxon sphere. Given the growing interest in this topic in the business world, the authors intend to contribute to this scarce literature by incorporating variables considered in previous studies, as well as other more innovative ones (agreement, equality plan) in a single model through a longitudinal study.

Estudiar empíricamente los factores determinantes de la adopción de medidas de conciliación a nivel de empresa.

Tras revisar las teorías que explican la adopción de prácticas de conciliación, se estudia para las empresas españolas del IBEX-35 durante el periodo 2015–2019, si el sector de actividad, la presencia de mujeres y de personal cualificado, así como la existencia de un convenio de empresa y de un plan de igualdad, determinan este tipo de prácticas.

Los resultados sugieren una relación negativa entre el tipo de sector al que pertenece la empresa y el índice de conciliación. Las compañías industriales poseen un menor índice de conciliación que las de servicios. La existencia de un convenio de empresa permite un mayor índice de conciliación. El índice de conciliación tiene mayor nivel de implantación en las empresas con mayor antigüedad si bien un mayor nivel de rentabilidad está asociado de modo negativo con las prácticas de conciliación.

En las empresas industriales es necesaria la incorporación de otras medidas que fomenten la conciliación, como, por ejemplo, la flexibilidad de entrada y salida. Animar a las empresas y policymarkers a incidir en las ventajas de un convenio de empresa puede contribuir al fomento de la implantación de medidas de conciliación.

La evidencia empírica es escasa para el caso español, y a nivel de empresa, dado que la mayoría de estudios previos han analizado al trabajador como objeto de estudio y pertenecen al ámbito anglosajón. Considerando el creciente interés de este tema en el mundo empresarial, se pretende contribuir a esta escasa literatura en España, incorporando tanto variables consideradas en estudios previos como otras más novedosas (convenio, plan de igualdad) a través de un estudio longitudinal.

As media texts, advertisements use representation practices to construct ideological meanings. This study traced the representation of the worker in advertisements with the help of content and thematic analysis. The study aimed to reveal the representation of the worker in the advertisements and to make the representations of the worker built through advertisements visible. The study was limited to ads that received an Effie Award in Turkey in 2020 and 2021. In the 2020 Effie Awards, 73 awards were given in 41 categories and in the 2021 Effie Awards, 68 awards were given in 42 categories. Content analysis was applied to 24 advertisements in 2020 and 31 advertisements in 2021. The quantitative data helped to determine the themes in the thematic analysis. Thematic analysis was carried out by regarding the worker as the (in)visible, the (un)voiced, and the bypassed. This study, which reveals that the worker is represented in advertisements through being invisible, unvoiced, and bypassed, claims that the labor of the worker in the production process is ignored through representation practices. In this context, it can be said that the worker is erased and omitted in TV ads on a symbolic level.

The purpose of this paper is to consider three factors, namely, intra-week demand fluctuations, interrelationship between the number of robots and order scheduling and conflicting objectives (i.e. cost minimization and customer satisfaction maximization), to optimize the robot logistics system.

The number of robots and the sequence of delivery orders are first optimized using the heuristic algorithm NSGACoDEM, which is designed using genetic algorithm and composite difference evolution. The superiority of this method is then confirmed by a case study of a four-star grade hotel in South Korea and several comparative experiments.

Two performance metrics reveal the superior performance of the proposed approach compared to other baseline approaches. Results of comparative experiments found that the consideration of three influencing factors in the operation design of a robot logistic system can effectively balance cost and customer satisfaction over the course of a week in hotel operation and optimize robot scheduling flexibility.

The results of this study reveal that numerous factors (e.g. intra-week demand fluctuations) can optimize the performance efficiency of robots. The proposed algorithm can be used by hotels to overcome the influence of intra-week demand fluctuations on robot scheduling flexibility effectively and thereby enhance work efficiency.

The design of a novel algorithm in this study entails enhancing the current robot logistics system. This algorithm can successfully manage cost and customer satisfaction during off-seasons and peak seasons in the hotel industry while offering diversified schemes to various types of hotels.

This study examines the relationship between multi-layer supply chain flexibility (MSCF) and Supply chain resilience (SCR). Further, it looks at the moderating effect of environmental dynamism (ED) and supply chain risks (SCRI) on the relationship between MSCF and SCR.

Executives from the pharmaceutical, agri-food, electronics, automobile and textile industries were invited to complete a self-administered questionnaire. We received feedback from a total of 302 participants. Prior to conducting the primary analysis, we addressed the potential for nonresponse bias and verified the assumptions of homoscedasticity and normal distribution of the data. The reliability and validity of the constructs were established through confirmatory factor analysis. Structural equation modelling is employed for the purpose of conducting hypothesis testing.

The results demonstrate a notable influence of MSCF on SCR, particularly in settings characterized by high levels of ED and SCRI. The study highlights the importance of flexibility in multiple aspects of the supply chain to build resilience against a range of disruptions and uncertainties.

The study presents the fundamental role of Multi-Layer Flexibility in building up SCR. The results of this study reinforce the existing literature and offers empirical evidence for how ED, SCRI moderates the influence between MSCF to SCR. These results offer valuable information to both supply chain specialists and researchers for building comprehensive strategy to bring resilience in supply chains.

Advancements in responsive manufacturing have been supporting companies over the last few decades. However, manufacturers now operate in a context of continuous uncertainty. This research paper explores a mechanism where companies can “elastically” provision and deprovision their production capacity, to enable them in coping with repeated disruptions. Such a mechanism is facilitated by the imitability and substitutability of production resources.

An inductive study was conducted using Gioia methodology for this theory generation research. Respondents from 20 UK manufacturing companies across multiple industrial sectors reflected on their experience during COVID-19. Resource-based view and resource dependence theory were employed to analyse the manufacturers' use of internal and external production resources.

The study identifies elastic responses at four operational levels: production-line, factory, company and supply chain. Elastic responses that imposed variable-costs were particularly well-suited for coping with unforeseen disruptions. Further, the imitability and substitutability of manufacturers helped others produce alternate goods during the crisis.

While uniqueness of production capability helps manufacturers sustain competitive advantage against competitors during stable operations, imitability and substitutability are beneficial during a crisis. Successful manufacturing companies need to combine these two approaches to respond effectively to repeated disruptions in a context of ongoing uncertainties. The theoretical contribution is in characterising responsive manufacturing in terms of resource heterogeneity and resource homogeneity, with elastic resourcing as the underlying mechanism.

This study aims to investigate the impact of working from home and its duration on job satisfaction.

The analysis was conducted on a representative panel data set from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey - Higher School of Economics (RLMS-HSE) for 2016–2021 using endogenous regression models. The impact of working from home on job satisfaction before and during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, and separately for men and women, was analysed.

Working from home was found to positively affect job satisfaction in the Russian labour market. From 2016 to 2021, men and women who worked from home were more satisfied with their jobs than their counterparts who did not work from home. The positive impact of working from home on job satisfaction was observed before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, remote workers (RWR) putting in more than eight hours per day reported lower job satisfaction.

Working from home can be considered as a measure to combat unemployment, increase employment and improve the utilisation (distribution) of human resources. Further research is required to analyse the impact of health issues and the need to care for young children or infirm persons on job satisfaction in remote work. A more detailed analysis is required of the factors that affect the job satisfaction of women who work remotely.

To ensure that labour productivity increases and not decreases, employers are advised to develop more detailed working arrangements and labour management for RWRs. Especially for such assigned workers, task control regulations must be developed. To increase the motivation of individuals to work remotely, overtime should be paid at a higher rate.

Unclear working time regulations lead to overwork, irregular working hours and burnout. For RWRs, this leads to lower job satisfaction and a consequent drop in productivity.

The empirical investigation is based on a representative panel of Russian data with six waves. Wide ranges of job characteristics were incorporated as determinants. The problem of causality was investigated. For models with an endogenous regressor, instrumental variables were tested and selected.