Search results

Studies of unicorns and gazelles can offer detailed information about the process of enterprise development but are unrepresentative as examples of entrepreneurial success. In presenting a novel method for outlier analysis, this article combines insights from case studies of unusual organizations with explanatory frameworks that management scholars have applied to broader samples of firms, irrespective of their survival.

The authors illustrate the approach to outlier analysis using a prominent case from economic history: the House of Rothschild, founded during the 18th century, which became the most famous investment bank in Europe. Following the iterative refinement of mechanisms using comparison data on Jewish enclave firms, this analysis sheds light on the sources of dissimilarity in outcomes between Rothschild and the comparison group.

The study results suggest that the House of Rothschild's longevity can be explained via the mechanisms of risk sequencing, intergenerational transfers and spatial brokerage. The authors show that these mechanisms are not idiosyncratic to one enterprise but instead generalize to other family firms.

Outlier analysis encourages a rapprochement between case study and large-N research. The high failure rate of new organizations means that those yielding a large amount of information to researchers tend to be exceptional. By obtaining data on a comparison group of startups founded by similar entrepreneurs, analysts can probe the mechanisms of success identified for unicorns or gazelles.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify and extend knowledge concerning the relationship between legitimacy and organizational success within the framework of institutional theory.

While previous research has found links between legitimacy and organizational success, the authors test this assumption by case analysis, on a sample of thirteen Spanish Mutual Guarantee Societies. Data were collected from survey questionnaire and Annual Financial Reports.

Results of the empirical examination confirm that, within this population, organizations with greater legitimacy obtain better organizational results as well as improved access to resources. The findings also show that not all dimensions of legitimacy contribute equally to organizational success.

For managers, the authors have included a recommendation that legitimacy is an important element of an organization's success that must be strategically managed and be considered as a required goal in the organization's strategic planning process. Managers should analyze legitimacy, in their own activity sector, to identify the most useful types of legitimacy. In the specific case of Spanish MGSs, the most beneficial strategic actions are those geared towards obtaining pragmatic legitimacy.

The analysis provides a new approach to measure legitimacy. It also provides empirical advances to the organizational legitimacy process, showing its usefulness as a key factor for organizational success.

Drawing on institutional logics theory, this paper aims to examine the determinants of entrepreneurs’ planning behavior in the first years of 212 Spanish new firms. Additionally, this study identifies four different planning profiles: systematic planner, early planner, late planner and non-planner.

This study’s data structure is a (yearly) pooled cross-sectional time series. This paper investigates the determinants of planning behaviors among entrepreneurs, as well as the impact of that activity on new firm performance (i.e. employment growth).

The results confirm the relevance of institutional forces in explaining the involvement of founders of new firms upon planning activities. Institutional factors, in the form of public external support seem to explain early- and systematic-planner behavior while the influence of entrepreneurial family background does so with late-planner behavior.

The authors focus their attention on two key moments of a new venture’ life: the first year of operation and once the firm has overcome the four-year hurdle that is often used to distinguish new from established businesses. Four different patterns emerge: systematic planner (those who consistently plan over time), early planner (those who engage in planning activities in the early moments of the firm’s life but not later), late planner (those who do not plan at the beginning but end up conducting planning activities a few years later) and non-planner (those who never get involved in planning activities). This new division is an interesting additional feature of this study.

Utilizando la teoría de lógica institucional, el presente artículo analiza los factores determinantes del comportamiento planificador de los emprendedores durante los primeros años de operaciones, por lo que se refiere a sus negocios. A tal efecto, identificamos cuatro perfiles planificadores: sistemático, temprano, demorado y no-planificador.

A partir de una muestra de 201 emprendedores españoles se examinan los determinantes del comportamiento planificador y el efecto subsecuente en el desempeño de las empresas.

Los resultados de este artículo ponen de relieve la importancia de las fuerzas institucionales, a la hora de explicar la involucración de éstos en cuanto a la planificación de actividades se refiere. Por un lado, factores institucionales en forma de apoyo público, tienden a explicar el comportamiento del planificador temprano y sistemático, mientras que la influencia del contexto familiar definiría el modo de actuar del planificador-demorado. Asimismo, en este artículo se analiza el impacto de los diferentes perfiles planificadores en el desempeño del crecimiento de empleo de las empresas.

El presente artículo intenta examinar de manera inédita el comportamiento planificador de los emprendedores usando la teoría de lógica institucional. Además, los resultados sugieren que planificar aporta un efecto positivo en el desempeño de las iniciativas emprendedoras.

Tendo por base teórica as lógicas institucionais, este estudo analisa as estratégias de planeamento de empreendedores e seus determinantes nos primeiros anos de atividade. Adicionalmente, identificamos quatro perfis diferentes dependo do tipo de planeamento feito pelo empreendedor: planeador sistemático, planeador antecipado, planeador demorado, e não-planeador.

Com base numa amostra de 201 empreendedores Espanhóis, examinamos os determinantes de comportamentos de planeamento dos empreendedores e os seus impactos no desempenho das empresas.

Os resultados confirmam a relevância de forças institucionais na explicação do envolvimento de fundadores de novas empresas em atividades de planeamento. Fatores institucionais, sob a forma de apoio externo público, parecem explicar comportamentos de planeamento antecipado e sistemático, enquanto que a influência do contexto familiar do empreendedor tende a explicar planeamentos mais demorados. O estudo também analisa o impacto destes perfis de planeamento no desempenho das novas empresas (i.e., crescimento do emprego).

O presente artigo tenciona examinar de uma forma inédita o comportamento de planeamento dos empreendedores com base na teoria da lógica institucional. Adicionalmente, os resultados sugerem que planear tem um efeito positivo no desempenho das iniciativas empreendedoras.

The purpose of this paper is to create a better understanding of how entrepreneurial education research has evolved with regard to pedagogy over the past decades.

The authors employed systematic review methodology to enable an in-depth analysis of the literature in a process that was both replicable and transparent. Guided by the research purpose, the systematic review of 395 articles published between January 1980 and December 2018 was influenced by a configurative approach aimed at interpreting and understanding the phenomenon under study.

The analysis suggests that the scholarly discourse on pedagogy in entrepreneurial education research has developed over time from teacher-guided instructional models to more constructivist perspectives. A shift in the literature was also observed, where scholarly discussions moved from addressing the issue of teachability to a greater emphasis on learnability. Contemporary discussions centre on the theoretical and philosophical foundations of experience-based teaching and learning.

The study illustrates how entrepreneurial education has evolved into a distinct research theme, characterized by a practice-oriented research agenda that emphasizes the need to connect teaching to “real-world” environments. The practice-oriented agenda has led to continued societal interest in promoting entrepreneurial education, while at the same time creating low academic legitimacy.

Entrepreneurial ecosystems offer an approach to analyse the evolution and resilience of a region by placing the emphasis on the interactions that occur between entrepreneurs and the supporting regional resources. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the transformation of a region with high-growth firms to identify the coordinating structures that evolve in response to entrepreneurial recycling of resources.

This study uses network analysis to explore the scaling capability network of leaders in Dublin’s high-growth IT firms over a 15-year period.

After a gestation period of 10 years, leaders displayed prior experience from an initial entrant. Towards the end of the study period, numerous well-connected internet firms arose providing a structure resilient to exogenous and endogenous shocks.

The findings suggest that the region’s structure changed from a satellite platform to a “hub and spoke” type district, and is showing signs of becoming a Marshallian type district, although the analysis is limited to regional knowledge capital through leadership mobility and does not consider the financial, social or institutional capital described in the entrepreneurial ecosystems literature.

Policy that aims to create regional resilience but minimise the scope of intervention needed can encourage the introduction of an anchor firm to a region and can complement this initiative with regional capability accumulation through labour policies that encourage resource recycling and minimise human capital leakage.

This contributes to an understanding of how entrepreneurial ecosystems evolve and the structure of the supporting resources that lead to increased regional resilience.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of team member diversity and internal social capital on project performance within the context of business plan competitions (BPCs).

The paper uses survey data on 95 nascent entrepreneurial teams enrolled in an open‐to‐the‐public BPCs. It assumes that higher levels of functional diversity as well as higher levels of internal social capital enhance the performance of nascent entrepreneurial teams in the crafting of their business plans (BPs).

Under this particular context, where the needs for information processing and decision‐making requirements are so high, teams having higher levels of functional diversity attained better performance. Inversely, teams with higher levels of internal social capital did not show a significant advantage in the development of the BP.

Limitations are associated with the exclusion of external social capital measures and not considering demographic faultlines, which might have some impact on the results. Besides, this paper has the limitation of basing its analysis upon teams within a BP contest. Theoretical implications stress that under contexts maximizing the difference between potential upside gains and downside losses, team diversity is expected to play a larger role for BP effectiveness and success than team members' internal social capital.

Recognizing team prevalence and the impact of social dynamics amongst team members within entrepreneurial settings.

The paper contributes with the impact of social dynamic processes on nascent entrepreneurial teams.

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) face twin pressures of maintaining a globally integrated brand while remaining responsive to local demands. Previous research has shown that misunderstandings may surface from the way subsidiary employees read corporate messages, particularly if institutional and social distances between corporate headquarters (HQs) and subsidiaries are wide. Employer branding is sometimes used to help resolve such tensions if HQs are sensitive to signals from their subsidiaries in the policy development process. Thus, this paper addresses the question: to what extent does institutional proximity facilitates the creation and maintenance of socially legitimate employer brands in MNE subsidiaries.

The paper uses an interpretive approach in analysing two cases of multinational subsidiaries operating in Pakistan but with divergent HQ institutional distances (Northern Europe and Middle East). A qualitative approach to data collection was taken and ten semi-structured interviews with senior and middle managers and two focus groups of six lower level employees in each case organization were conducted.

The findings suggest that institutional proximity played a secondary role in establishing a legitimate employer brand whereas a receptive and responsive signalling process was of greater importance. The authenticity of the employer brand was stronger in the organization that was more receptive to the incoming signals from local employees compared to the firm that was rather institutionally closer due to shared customs and culture.

Findings point to the significance of the character and intensity of the employment relationship at a micro level as the honesty and credibility of organizational messages and interpreted and re-interpreted at a localized level, thereby bearing serious implications for both global and local managers.

These findings contribute to the IHRM literature on the integration-responsiveness problem, to the debate over institutional proximity, and to the influence of religion on people management.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between organizational performance and the pattern of strategic decisions formalized in the planning of a Brazilian heavy construction company between 2006 and 2014. In this period, the company experienced a recurrent pattern of maintaining strategic decisions, despite the systematic decrease in performance and investments in the formal strategic planning (SP) and monitoring of results. The research focus is on strategic inertia and the influence of social determinants on the relationship between performance and the strategic actions negotiated in formal planning.

This is a single-case study. The exploratory-descriptive research comprises data collection on performance and strategic decisions from the period between 2006 and 2014. The analysis was guided through documentary material and data collected from 16 interviews conducted with members of the middle to top management concerning performance, goals, and strategic initiatives. The interviewees’ statements were used to apprehend the interpreted dimension of SP expressed in the meanings attributed to this process. The analysis adopts a sociological base, and strategic inertia is the underlying phenomenon that guides this analysis.

The results show the interactive effect caused by political, cognitive, discursive, and ceremonial mechanisms obstruct the company’s strategic decisions. This case study illustrates that the conditions for the phenomenon of path dependence were created, reinforcing the strategic inertia observed in the maintenance of a reproduced pattern of strategic initiatives and goals, even though the performance was recurrently unsatisfactory. In this case, strategic inertia showed a complex relationship between the interpreted performance and strategic actions negotiated in formal planning, conditioned by mechanisms of trajectory reinforcement that interfered with the conditions for strategic change.

Strategic inertia demonstrates a complex relationship between the interpreted performance and strategic actions negotiated in formal planning, conditioned by mechanisms of trajectory reinforcement that interfere with the conditions for strategic change. Future research on social mechanisms from the perspective of strategy-as-practice could be developed to capture the tacit components, language, power games, and other relevant categories in the social interaction of strategy development at the organizational level. In addition, future research could focus on investigating the extent to which path dependence is contingent, assuming that it is a temporary and, therefore, reversible process.

This work contributes to the view of SP from the social perspective and shows that the relationship between performance and strategy has biases that can compromise performance. The work highlights implications for maintaining strategic initiative patterns, which shape a path whose function is less associated with its effects on performance and more associated with the commitment to instrumental results, due to the social nature of organizations.

This work deals with social mechanisms that influence strategic decisions. Since organizational performance depends on strategic decisions, the social nature of strategic inertia has causal implications to economic and social impact of organizations.

This work argues in favor of the influence of self-reinforcing mechanisms of path dependence in the relationship between performance and strategic decisions. The results extended the predominantly structural approach of path dependence by considering interpretive aspects related to the political, discursive, cognitive, and ceremonial dimensions of strategic inertia.

The travel and tourism industry (TTI) could benefit the most from artificial intelligence (AI), which could reshape this industry. This study aims to explore the characteristics of tourism AI start-ups, the AI technological domains financed by Venture Capitalists (VCs), and the phases of the supply chain where the AI domains are in high demand.

This study developed a database of the European AI start-ups operating in the TTI from the Crunchbase database (2005–2020). The authors used start-ups as the unit of analysis as they often foster radical change. The authors complemented quantitative and qualitative methods.

AI start-ups have been mainly created by male Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics graduates between 2015 and 2017. The number of founders and previous study experience in non-start-up companies was positively related to securing a higher amount of funding. European AI start-ups are concentrated in the capital town of major tourism destinations (France, UK and Spain). The AI technological domains that received more funding from VCs were Learning, Communication and Services (i.e. big data, machine learning and natural language processing), indicating a strong interest in AI solutions enabling marketing automation, segmentation and customisation. Furthermore, VC-backed AI solutions focus on the pre-trip and post-trip.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study focussing on digital entrepreneurship, specifically VC-backed AI start-ups operating in the TTI. The authors apply, for the first time, a mixed-method approach in the study of tourism entrepreneurship.

The purpose of this paper is to advance in research on consumer psychology of hospitality, since it investigates how online search behavior of users (particularly, information search and choice) is influenced by the opinions of other people in a new context characterized by the generalized use of Web 2.0 applications.

Empirical research was carried out in the hotel sector in Iberian Peninsula, where two Web 2.0 applications are especially relevant for users: the review Web sites and the hotel interactive Web sites. A qualitative method (in-depth interviews with hotel managers) and a quantitative technique (personal surveys to a sample of 830 users) were used to conduct this research.

The results indicates that the perceived influence on behavior of the user-generated content on these Web 2.0 applications is determined, in both cases, by the value of the information, the credibility of the sources and the degree of similarity between the user and the creators of content.

Firms should have an active presence in the review Web sites and the hotel interactive Web sites, and use these platforms for market research and communication. Firms should engage users to post content, support their credibility and facilitate the evaluation of the content generators’ similarity.

This paper is the first study in the hospitality literature that develops and empirically tests an integrative model explaining the perceived influence on behavior of user-generated content on Web 2.0 applications.