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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.

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.

The purpose of this paper is to advance the methodological self‐understanding of the emerging field of organizational space and architecture by employing concepts and frameworks from multi‐paradigm and mixed methods research.

The paper presents a methodological re‐reading of a recent research process that analyzed the spatial and architectural dynamics in a Finnish university organization.

While the analysis of architectural meanings is often grounded in researcher‐participants auto‐ethnographic experiences, triangulating personal insights with other methods is important for the validity and richness of the subsequent description of spatial dynamics and its outcomes. Especially, the incorporation of architectural visions and representations into the analysis is argued to enhance our understanding of the emergence of particular social‐material collectives.

Although there is a steady stream of empirical studies on the meanings of organizational space and architecture, rigorous accounts of the methodological challenges of spatial analyses have so far been scarce. This paper aims to partially fill this gap.

The purpose of this paper is to present a critical review of the contributions of multiple theories to accounting and organizational research, which is often referred to as “theoretical triangulation” or “theoretical pluralism”, with a particular focus on the manner in which chosen research methods have informed these efforts at theoretical triangulation.

The authors conduct an analysis of how to employ theoretical triangulations and methodological pluralism in accounting and organizational research. To this end, they use prior empirical evidence for illustrative purposes.

The authors argue that using theories with epistemological tensions that are captured by appropriate research methods enable one to explore different, sometimes even contradictory, layers of meanings of realities pertaining to management accounting information and processes in organizations and society.

The paper contributes to the thinking about the interaction between theory development and research methods chosen by demonstrating how and under what circumstances multiple theories could be meaningfully integrated and executed to provide deeper understandings of accounting and organizational phenomena.

The authors have systematically reviewed 534 corporate social responsibility communication (CSRC) papers, updating the current debate about the ontological and epistemological paradigms that characterize the field, and providing evidence of the interactions between these paradigms and the related methodological choices. The purpose of this paper is to provide theoretical and methodological implications for future research in the CSRC research domain.

The authors used the Scopus database to search for titles, abstracts and related keywords with two queries sets relating to corporate social responsibility (e.g. corporate ethical, corporate environmental, social responsibility, corporate accountability) and CSRC (e.g. reporting, disclosure, dialogue, sensemaking). The authors identified 534 empirical papers (2000–2016), which the authors coded manually to identify the research methods and research designs (Creswell, 2013). The authors then developed an ad hoc dictionary whose keywords relate to the three primary CSRC approaches (instrumental, normative and constitutive). Using the software Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count, the authors undertook an automated content analysis in order to measure these approaches’ relative popularity and compare the methods employed in empirical research.

The authors found that the instrumental approach, which belongs to the functionalist paradigm, dominates the CSRC literature with its relative weight being constant over time. The normative approach also belongs to the functionalist paradigm, but plays a minor yet enduring role. The constitutive approach belongs to the interpretive paradigm and grew slightly over time, but still remains largely beyond the instrumental approach. In the instrumental approach, many papers report on descriptive empirical analyses. In the constitutive approach, theory-method relationships are in line with the various paradigmatic traits, while the normative approach presents critical issues. Regarding methodology, according to the findings, the literature review underlines three major limitations that characterize the existing empirical evidence and provides avenues for future research. While multi-paradigmatic research is promoted in the CRSC literature (Crane and Glozer, 2016; Morsing, 2017; Schoeneborn and Trittin, 2013), the authors found no empirical evidence.

This is the first paper to systematically review empirical research in the CSRC field and is also the first to address the relationship between research paradigms, theoretical approaches, and methods. Further, the authors suggest a novel way to develop systematic reviews (i.e. via quantitative, automated content analysis), which can now also be applied in other literature streams and in other contexts.

The purpose of this study is to examine the use of tools and techniques of strategy and strategic analysis within small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) as a part of the strategy formation process.

This study uses a qualitative, multiple-case-based investigation with semi-structured interviews and secondary data sources to create a context-rich insight to the area examined.

The findings indicate a strong orientation towards operational tools deployment aligned with financial management and resources and process planning, monitoring and control. Strategic perspectives of the respondents indicate an implicit, rather than explicit deployment of strategy tools and unstructured deployment, but general awareness of the resulting component issues. Clearer strategic approaches and strong implementation appear to positively influence success, when measured by growth.

This study is limited to nine organisations within a UK geographic region, and therefore, larger-scale investigation would be beneficial to extend and confirm the findings in differing contexts.

With resource scarcity potentially stymying the opportunity for owner-managers to develop more structured approaches to strategic analysis and development, consideration should be given to how owner-managers can further develop their strategic thinking to support enhanced strategic outcomes for their organisations. Furthermore, strategy educationalists may wish to reflect upon the manner in which they prepare delegates for strategic roles, where the SME context may differ radically from corporate experience.

The methodology for this study differs substantially from previous investigations within the field, which has had relatively few contributions, as it uses in-depth, context-rich qualitative techniques to investigate the micro-processes at play. The conclusions capture new insights and indications and identify areas for further investigation, hence adding to the understanding of a complex and heterogeneous field.