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Purpose – The paper aims to highlight the potential of paradigm interplay for providing greater insight into entrepreneurship research, in this case definitions of the entrepreneur. Design/methodology/approach – Literature from entrepreneurship, organisation studies and strategy highlights the potential of multiple paradigm research. We demonstrate how to conduct such a study through paradigm interplay by applying four contrasting research perspectives to four case studies of habitual entrepreneurs. Findings – The practical challenges of conducting multiple paradigm research are illustrated. A number of consistent themes across all four paradigms provide some insight into the reasons why it is difficult to agree on a single definition of the entrepreneur. Insights into the value and operationalisation of multiple paradigm research in the field of entrepreneurship are provided. Research limitations/implications – An exhaustive review of definitions of the entrepreneur is not provided. This is a study into how multiple paradigm research can be used to enrich understanding. Advice for the conduct of studies employing paradigm interplay is presented. Practical implications – The same individuals or firms can be included or excluded depending on the definition employed. This can lead to confusion particularly in establishing eligibility and applicability of specific policy measures. Full awareness of underlying assumptions is required. Originality/value – Paradigm interplay is a new approach for entrepreneurship research

The purpose of this paper is to address four questions: what are the drawbacks of an over reliance on the objectivist tradition in culture in international business (CIB) scholarship? Is a shift from mono-paradigmatic to multi-paradigmatic cultural research justified? What explains scholars’ hesitation in engaging in multi-paradigmatic studies? What arguments can we offer to convince them otherwise?

Informed by the critical perspective, this paper encourages a shift from mono-paradigmatic to multi-paradigmatic cultural studies. Guided by an emancipatory interest, and treating the field of culture studies as a complex system, this paper offers an integrative complexity (IC) based argument in favor of multi-paradigmatic studies. It argues that multi-paradigmatic studies allow scholars to employ higher IC than mono-paradigmatic studies, resulting in more innovative research outputs.

While mono-paradigmatic studies can achieve either predictability of output or in-depth understanding of cultural phenomena, multi-paradigmatic studies are capable of attaining both. The authors illustrate this through the example of a recent multi-paradigmatic study.

This paper does not offer insights for operationalizing multi-paradigmatic research, nor does it address factors other than IC that may impede scholars from engaging in such studies.

Shifting from mono-paradigmatic to multi-paradigmatic studies will enable scholars to address questions hitherto left unaddressed in CIB literature, facilitate a better understanding of new organizational forms, and redress the power disequilibrium between different paradigmatic schools. Implications are also offered for the training of cultural researchers in business schools.

This paper is the first of its kind to relate IC to merits of multi-paradigmatic cultural studies.

The chapter aims to enhance our understanding of “opportunity” in the context of social entrepreneurship through a paradigm interplay juxtaposing a functionalist thematic analysis and interpretivist sensemaking. This paradigmatic contrasting identifies differences and connections in the tensions of: linearity and simplicity/dynamism and complexity; forward/backward, generalizability/situated relationality, and value-laden/value-neutral. These contrasts deepen our understanding of “opportunity” so that the theoretical and practical implications can be seen.

Traditional approaches in qualitative research have adopted one research paradigm linked to an established typology. This paper addresses the unconventional application of two research paradigms in one study. A critical realist approach was used to augment a constructivist analysis of data in a research project seeking to explore the meaning that managers in small to medium enterprises (SMEs) attach to hazard identification, the construction of a hazard profile reflective of the business and its use in assisting to manage hazards within the SME's safety management system framework. Critical realism offered a complementary but essential framework to explore causal mechanisms that led to a deeper understanding of the findings by searching for the processes and causality that lay beneath the social and organizational phenomena observed.

This paper compares the two research paradigms in order to seek junctures and apply them to a research project. Analytical tools applied to each research paradigm within the project are presented, followed by a new multiparadigm conceptual model that integrates critical realism and constructivism, providing an original contribution of knowledge to this field of qualitative research.

The adoption of a multiparadigm model enabled not only the interpretation of social phenomena but also the determination of its causality, enabling a more insightful answering of the research question and leading to a deeper insight into the phenomenology that was studied. This research approach widens the boundaries of qualitative inquiry within organizational research by promoting strategies that challenge more traditionally anchored research typologies, and consequently contributes to better research outcomes.

This study was conducted across four organizations. Similar research is encouraged across a greater number of case studies to validate the process of using a constructivist and critical realist paradigm to gain a more insightful understanding of events and their causality.

The comparison of two research paradigms and consequent provision of a conceptual model (Figure 3) provides potential for the development of further multiparadigm models for research projects within the field of organizational management.

This paper has the potential to promote engagement and collaboration between research scholars seeking to explore the use of multiple research paradigms.

Such an approach has not previously been widely discussed or adopted to examine qualitative data, and advances theory in qualitative research. The application of two research paradigms using such an approach can be applied to businesses in a number of different contexts to gain a more insightful understanding of research participant perspectives, observable events arising from those perspectives and their associated causality.

Wonders whether companies actually have employees best interests at heart across physical, mental and spiritual spheres. Posits that most organizations ignore their workforce – not even, in many cases, describing workers as assets! Describes many studies to back up this claim in theis work based on the 2002 Employment Research Unit Annual Conference, in Cardiff, Wales.

Evaluation of training is observed more in theory than in practice. The literature contains a great deal of confusion over terminology, with differing approaches to training and development resulting in differing approaches to evaluation and protagonists of alternative schools claiming mutual incompatibility. Reviews the training evaluation literature to clarify concepts and options and argues for a mixed approach. Reports a case study of applying a mixture of evaluation methods drawn different paradigms. Finally, suggests that, while competence‐based approaches offer some advantages in evaluation, they will not resolve the issues addressed.

We propose that management scholars can improve their research by triangulating alternative philosophies of science to gain a richer and more holistic understanding of complex managerial problems. We illustrate the proposition by triangulating with three scientific philosophies – positivism, postmodernism, and critical realism – to design a study in response to a debate in the sociology of professions. After summarizing and applying positivism, postmodernism, and critical realism to reveal their differing research approaches, we discuss how to deal with the convergent and divergent information often produced by triangulating philosophies of science. Although common views of triangulation emphasize reliability by focusing on convergent information from different methods, we emphasize validity by discussing how divergent information from different methods reveal important aspects and values of a complex phenomenon that often go unrecognized without triangulation.