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The purpose of this paper is to introduce the employment relations context in South Eastern Europe from a variety of capitalism perspectives. Particular attention is accorded to the uneven nature of change at both the levels of institutions and practice. This is followed by a review of the individual papers that make up this special issue.

This paper is primarily a theoretical one, providing a review of the papers that make up this special issue and giving an overview of the foundation being provided.

While the term “transitional” has often been deployed to describe employment relations across the region, the process has been an extremely protracted one. There is little doubt that the nature and form of employment relations in the countries encompassed in this review is still coalescing, with further ruptures likely as a result of the 2009 depression. At the same time, the papers in this special issue point to long‐standing continuities with employment.

While the papers that make up this special issue may present the most recent research in the region, they also point to future areas for research. First, there is particularly little research that has been undertaken on peripheral areas of a generally peripheral region. Not only do we know very little about, say, Albanian employment relations, but we know little about employment relations in peripheral areas of large countries such as Turkey. Second, the 2009 depression is likely to accelerate trends to downsizing and insecure work, in the short term at least. Finally, there is a growing consensus that a sustainable economic recovery from the current crisis will depend, at least in part, on new social compromises both globally and regionally.

Employment relations in the region are undergoing an extended transition. In the short term, the most likely trend will be towards a further weakening of the bargaining position of employees, and towards more insecure working. However, a sustained recovery is likely to see a reversal of this, with employers being more likely to be forced to contemplate new social compromises.

This study applies the comparative capitalism literature to the South Eastern European region context. It also introduces some of the most recent applied research in the region.

The paper seeks to determine what tomorrow's employees (i.e. graduates) are seeking from SMEs in terms of organizational satisfaction and value characteristics.

A survey of 55 university students who identified SMEs as their best opportunity for their career goals is shown. The survey utilized tested measures of organizational satisfaction and values.

The paper finds that Generations X and Y are seeking equivalent values and satisfaction outcomes from SMEs. It is seeking very caring, environmentally concerned, and sensitive SMEs. Tangible and intangible benefits, empowerment and respect, workplace involvement, concern for employee welfare and supportive management are critical.

The paper shows that when researching one can differentiate between what graduates are looking for from their SMEs as opposed to organizations in general. Future research could analyze SME versus MNC or other organizational forms.

The paper implies that in the recruiting process SMEs need to focus on various outcomes that graduates seek in order to attract and retain the best potential employees. There appears to be little need to tailor the workplace for Generations X versus Y.

A series of outcome variables has been specifically identified for graduates who want to work in SMEs.

The purpose of this paper is to study particular structural and organisational factors affecting the formality of human resource management (HRM) practices in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in South-Eastern European (SEE) post-communist countries, in particular Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in order to understand the antecedents of formalization in such settings.

Adopting a quantitative approach, this study analyses data gathered through a survey of 168 managers of SMEs from throughout the region.

The results show that HRM in SMEs in the SEE region can be understood through a threefold framework which includes: degree of internationalisation of SMEs, sector of SMEs and organisational size of SMEs. These three factors positively affect the level of HRM formalisation in SEE SMEs. These findings are further attributed to the particular political and economic context of the post-communist SEE region.

Although specific criteria were set for SME selection, the authors do not suggest that the study reflects a representative picture of the SEE region because the authors used a purposive sampling methodology.

This paper provides useful insights into the factors which influence HRM in SMEs in a particular context. The findings can help business owners and managers understand how HRM can be applied in smaller organisations, particularly in post-communist SEE business contexts.

HRM in SMEs in this region has hardly been studied at all despite their importance. Therefore, this exploratory research seeks to expand knowledge relating to the application of HRM in SMEs in SEE countries which have their business environments dominated by different dynamics in comparison to Western European ones.

The focus of this paper is on developing an understanding, and benchmarking, human resource management (HRM) issues in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in South‐Eastern Europe. The importance of SME's in helping transition‐based economies develop is critical, but at the same time the research indicates that the movement toward westernized business systems has a dramatic impact on the human resources within such businesses. Toward addressing this linkage, critical HRM issues related to work outcomes, measures of satisfaction, and managerial support were studied with a sample of nearly 300 employees from 21 SMEs in a country in South‐Eastern Europe (the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia). The data suggest that SMEs are not currently giving their employees what they want from their job (e.g. career development, participation in decision making) and that women are treated differently than men creating an imbalance within the workforce. From these data recommendations are drawn for SMEs on how to move forward as transition unfolds.

Discusses the use of the act frequency approach methodology to develop and validate a measure of organizational support of revolutionary change. A total of nine unique behaviors, describing three constructs, were viewed by employees as supportive of revolutionary change; and 12 unique behaviors, describing two constructs, were perceived as being non‐supportive of revolutionary change. The measures developed were found to have high internal reliability. The measures were also found to be highly correlated with relevant individual and organizational outcome measures. These results provide empirical support for the idea that how an organization supports revolutionary change can have an impact on both the organization and its employees and that contextual variable may not influence perceptions.

The purpose of this paper is to review the effect of a cluster approach on SMEs' competitiveness. The primary objective is to examine the use of a cluster approach among SMEs as a tool for meeting their challenges related to globalisation and trade liberalisation, as well as investigating its contributing factor in the process of increasing their competitiveness.

The methodology used for this paper is a literature review of published materials. The literature analysis was performed based on research objectivity, coverage and authority.

There is strong evidence to suggest that a cluster policy brings additional positive effect to existing SME policy in industrialised economies, but such effects have not been extensively researched in developing (transition) countries, particularly from the point of view of the SMEs, which are the main actors in the cluster development process, in relation to whether their performance has been improved as a result of cluster effects.

The findings from this research will assist business managers in making more informed decisions regarding the adoption of a cluster approach and entering into cluster‐based relations, as well as assisting policy makers in designing more efficient cluster policies. The academic value will be added in the context of expanding knowledge in relation to the impact of clusters on economic development in transition countries and as such contribute in filling gaps within the existing body of knowledge.

This paper seeks to explore the Greek National Business System (NBS) in terms of management practices, organizational culture and public administration. Moreover, the need for modernization is analyzed with focus on total quality management (TQM) as the major issue on this agenda.

This study utilizes a critical literature review approach to draw together and conceptualize the modernization agenda of the Greek NBS.

This paper supports the idea that there is a need to put promising management practices into the context of the Greek national business system and to study not only the market situation, the industrial relations history and the HR practices used, but also how these practices are understood and used by managers and employees who work in different employment sectors.

The findings of this study may have a broader impact as Greece attempts to redefine itself as a hub for South‐East Europe.

Since most academic studies concerning the application of promising management strategies like TQM have been conducted in Anglo‐Saxon countries, there is a need to remove the blinkers and explore these management initiatives in the context of other than Anglo‐Saxon NBSs.

The purpose of this paper is to explore and theorize the process of managerial feedback in relation to change in small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

This research embraces a qualitative methodology in the context of manufacturing SMEs. Drawing on 30 in-depth interviews, and observations conducted with various managers in six SMEs operating in three countries, it is argued that managers benefit more by using daily, ongoing, feedback as a trigger of change in their organizations.

The findings suggest that there is an overall view that managers appear to be reluctant to change existing processes using formalized feedback mechanisms, which runs counter-intuitive to the literature. In contrast, informal methods of feedback work better in enhancing organizational change. Moreover, another two features of feedback enhance this process, namely, benefits oriented and confidence oriented. As such, this study contributes to existing knowledge and practice by proposing a three-fold form of feedback through which managers expand their perspectives of feedback from feeding-back to feeding-forward thereby enhancing the opportunities of triggering change.

Feedback should merely be considered as a dynamic and socially constructed managerial practice. A practice where actors not only exchange information and share knowledge, but also act, react and interact with each other as they constantly rethinking the change process. The proposed aspect of feedback emphasizes knowledge therapeutically and in combination with the dialogical discourse (practical illustration) that increases the odds for capturing change as a natural, rather than exceptional.

Practitioners, as such, may wish to consider the terminology used when it comes to studying change and its implementation in a crisis context. Using deformalized managerial feedback mechanisms to tackle a formal phenomenon like “change” could help avoid employees perceiving a negative connotation, causing resistance or confusion and feeling threatened. Therefore, the authors suggest that practitioners, during development initiatives on modernizing or altering organizational processes, consider replacing the term “change” as a formal concept.

It is an investigation from an exploratory perspective in studying and understanding the causes, factors and modalities that trigger managerial feedback toward organizational change in manufacturing SMEs.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how reverse resource exchanges and resource dependencies are managed in the service supply chain (SSC) of returnable transport packaging (RTP).

A single case study was conducted in the context of automotive logistics focusing on the RTP SSC. Data were collected through 16 interviews, primarily with managers of a logistics service provider (LSP) and document analysis of contractual agreements with key customers of the packaging service.

Resource dependencies among actors in the SSC result from the importance of the RTP for the customer’s production processes, the competition among users for RTP and the negative implications of the temporary unavailability of RTP for customers and the LSP (in terms of service performance). Amongst other things, the LSP is dependent on its customers and third-party users (e.g. the customer’s suppliers) for the timely return of package resources. The role of inter-firm integration and collaboration, formal contracts as well as customers’ power and influence over third-party RTP users are stressed as key mechanisms for managing LSP’s resource dependencies.

A resource dependence theory (RDT) lens is used to analyse how reverse resource exchanges and associated resource dependencies in SSCs are managed, thus complementing the existing SSC literature emphasising the bi-directionality of resource flows. The study also extends the recent SSC literature stressing the role of contracting by empirically demonstrating how formal contracts can be mobilised to explicate resource dependencies and to specify, and regulate, reverse exchanges in the SSC.

The research suggests that logistics providers can effectively manage their resource dependencies and regulate reverse exchanges in the SSC by deploying contractual governance mechanisms and leveraging their customers’ influence over third-party RTP users.

The study is novel in its application of RDT, which enhances our understanding of the management of reverse exchanges and resource dependencies in SSCs.

This paper aims to identify and analyze the barriers to the implementation of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization’s programxk for export consortia in the Iranian handmade carpet industry.

To accomplish its objectives, the study relied on a mixed (qualitative and quantitative) research method. Primarily, unstructured interviews were conducted to identify the effective barriers. Then, the validity of the barriers identified was evaluated through content validity ratio analysis. Finally, the interrelationships between the barriers were determined using the rough decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory technique (DEMATEL).

Results revealed that “a lack of leadership,” “a traditional business environment” and “a lack of awareness of consortium benefits” were the most significant causal barriers. Meanwhile, the most important effect barriers were “a lack of long-term vision,” “a lack of business ethics” and “a lack of motivation.”

The findings and results could help the stakeholders of the handmade carpet industry in Iran to improve existing export consortium programs, increasing the country’s share in the global markets in this industry.

This investigation seeks to fill an existing gap in the literature on export consortium formation in the handmade carpet industry by providing a network of barriers for the first time.