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This paper aims to investigate the application of the Italian Banking Association (ABI) industry-specific reporting standard in microfinance institutions by determining whether or not a banking sector reporting standard can enhance non-financial reporting (NFR) quality and volume to meet stakeholders’ information needs in the specific setting investigated.

This paper develops an analysis of available ABI documents from 2006 to 2013 to conduct a content analysis of the quality and volume of the NFR of 98 Italian cooperative banks (CBs) during the 2008–2009 ABI implementation year. These data are analysed using two regression models to investigate the quality and volume of NFR disclosures.

The findings suggest that for CBs in the Italian banking sector, the information provided in the non-financial reports in adherence to the ABI sector reporting standard is relevant in terms of both volume and quality. However, when investigating specific categories of disclosure such as the community, the relevance of the ABI reporting standard is fairly low. The authors question the “one-size-fits-all” approach favouring a more sector-tailored approach to ensure that the NFR covers key sectoral concerns.

The high heterogeneity in the sector could negatively affect the capability of sector-specific standards to truly foster reliable, complete and extensive NFR. Therefore, NFR standard-setters, such as the International Sustainability Standards Board, should consider these heterogeneities.

Reporting standardisation should be multi-voiced and include different – even contrasting – perspectives to promote expert and non-expert engagements.

This paper focuses on hybrid organisations and shows how the theoretical approach of dialogic accountability can improve the quality of sector-specific reporting standards.

Going beyond the usual approach of measuring port performance – focusing on the efficiency of port operations – this paper aims to look into shipping lines and other port users’ perceptions on port performance.

The paper develops a framework measuring the perceptions of port users (i.e. shipping companies, shippers, etc.) on port performance. A typology of elements that shape port users’ perceptions has been developed with an eye on capturing the peculiarities of different port markets. Based on this typology, a tool to assess users’ perspectives, and subsequently evaluate, any given port has been developed. The tool provides port authorities the flexibility they need for customized approaches. The developed evaluation mechanism has been tested on a group of European seaports, and the results are presented by this study.

The framework and its pilot application unveil the key parameters that port users take into consideration when evaluating the effectiveness component of port performance. Moreover, the importance and evaluation ratings of specific performance parameters allow for a GAP analysis of the collected data.

The paper advances scholarly and practical discussion on how of port users’ perceptions can be a valuable tool for port performance measurement.

The proposed tool can be a valuable add-on for port authorities to evaluate their performance from the port users’ point of view and take the necessary actions to improve it. Also, the tool can be used for the evaluation of a new process, infrastructure. The evaluation of port users’ perception of port performance can and must be part of a European ports observatory, as it is a set of indicators that clearly reflects the satisfaction of port users by engaging their view on port performance issues, instead of relying almost exclusively on port-generated data.

The paper develops a framework for measuring port user’s perception on port performance, which is flexible and can be applied in any port.

The current study makes two main contributions: one theoretical and one methodological. First, it investigated the theoretical prepositions of career sustainability perspective, which appears particularly suitable for examining project managers' careers' dynamics and patterns, featured by explicit and recursive interactions between individual, temporal and contextual factors. Second, the study aimed to adopt a qualitative approach to this topic as to allow a deeper understanding of individual narratives about careers, highlighting underexplored issues and peculiarities that future research could further examine through quantitative methodologies.

Project managers' careers are still an under-researched topic, especially through qualitative methods. The study applied career sustainability theory to the realm of project management, moreover, adopting a socio-constructivist perspective. Participants were 50 Italian project managers who were involved through a narrative in-depth interview that focused on career and career success. Their answers were analyzed through thematic analysis of contents and diatextual analysis.

Results showed that project managers' career could be a prototypical example of sustainable career, basically described in terms of four basic constitutive dimensions as follows: time frame, social space, agency and meaning. Implications for both future theoretical expansion of career sustainability theory and project managers' career management interventions were also discussed.

The originality of the paper could be found in the effort to adopt a socio-constructivist perspective to investigate the topic of career sustainability taking the exemplary case of project managers' career.

This study aims to describe and evaluate various visual and creative tools for supporting the in-depth biographical interview aimed at analyzing educational communities and their stakeholders.

Researching educational spaces today requires new ways of understanding, analyzing and studying. The complex characteristics, functions and realities demand research that responds to educational singularities. It is a matter of deeply understanding the educational phenomenon's peculiarities. For these purposes, instruments and research paradigms are needed to extract data and reach information saturation regarding the data obtained from the proposed objects of study. With this in mind, the following paper suggests reflecting on data collection tools that can complement the interview and biographical-narrative research approach. The authors highlight the use of photo-elucidation, the biogram-based timeline, the organigram and the flight of the geese, all of which are instruments endowed with a visual character that allows a deeper understanding of the object studied.

The main contribution of this paper is to unpack the uses and applications of four visual tools that support the interview technique. First, photo-elucidation is presented as a sensory strategy to stimulate the narrative during the dialogical exchange of the interview. Next, the timeline is described as a visual concretization of the traditional biogram widely used in educational research. Next, the authors unravel the uses of the organizational chart in educational research, which, due to its nature and utility, provides a glimpse of the organizational functioning of an institution and is particularly suitable for research in institutional frameworks. Finally, the tool known as the flight of the geese is presented. This tool is recommended for use in educational leadership and teamwork studies due to its simplicity and high representativeness of the hierarchy of roles and functions.

Researching educational spaces today requires new ways of understanding, analyzing and studying. The complex characteristics, functions, and realities demand research that responds to educational singularities. It is a matter of deeply understanding the educational phenomenon's peculiarities. For these purposes, instruments and research paradigms are needed to extract data and reach information saturation regarding the data obtained from the proposed objects of study. With this in mind, the following paper invites us to reflect on data collection tools that can complement the interview and biographical-narrative research approach. The authors highlight the use of photo-elucidation, the biogram-based timeline, the organigram, and the flight of the geese, all of which are instruments endowed with a visual character that allows a deeper understanding of the object studied.

This paper explores the relationship between earnings management and firms' value through the moderating effect of the missing elements – corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure and state ownership in Russian companies. The main argument of the paper is that CSR disclosure can be used as a mitigating mechanism to weaken the negative relationship between earnings manipulation and market value. Additionally test whether state ownership is an important moderating factor in this relationship are conducted as state has always played an important role in the emerging Russian market.

The hypotheses are tested on panel data for 223 publicly listed Russian firms for the period 2012–2018. A number of robustness tests are used to check the obtained results for consistency. Following previous research GMM method is employed to address endogeneity concerns.

Supported by stakeholder theory, it is observed that firms that disclosed more CSR information experience a weaker negative relationship between earnings management and market value because investors and other stakeholders positively evaluate a positive CSR image. This negative effect of earnings management on market value is even weaker for state-owned companies as market participants appreciate involvement of state-owned companies in CSR activities and place greater expectations on these firms to be responsible without clear understanding whether these actions are “window dressing” for this type of companies or not.

The study results provide new insights into the relation between earnings management, firm's value, CSR disclosure and state ownership in emerging-market firms. The paper highlight the importance of considering country-specific factors, such as state ownership, while analysing the market reaction on CSR disclosure and earnings management since the institutional peculiarities may help to explain differences in the obtained results.

Logistics service performance measurement (PM) is a fundamental activity pertaining to the achievement of logistics goals and the improvement of services. The choice of logistics PM criteria depends on stakeholder goals and expectations, including logistics service providers, customers and government and regulatory institutions. PM is especially challenging in areas where high values are at stake, several actors are involved and uncertainty about cause-and-effect relations is high. This paper aims to examine the measurement of performance in offshore oil and gas logistics, which has unique characteristics such as a supply chain (SC) exposed to a harsh environment, the presence of several independent carriers and a highly specialised and costly set of vessels involved in long-distance transport legs.

The study is designed as a multiple case study of two Norwegian shipping companies and two international oil and gas companies. Data were collected from several parts of the offshore service SC in several Arctic oil and gas fields.

This paper sheds light on the performance of the SC and presents key performance indicators for logistics operations. It concludes that the measurement of SC performance must be context-specific and emphasis needs to be placed on the degree of uncertainty and inter-dependency related to the SC in question.

The study suggests a list of context-specific key performance indicators for offshore logistics with a special emphasis on the peculiarities of a harsh operational environment.

This paper aims to explore if firms located in industrial districts (IDs) have different adoption paths concerning Industry 4.0 technologies and get different results with respect to other similar firms located outside IDs.

The study is based on a quantitative analysis related to an original data set of 206 Italian manufacturing firms specializing in made in Italy industries and adopting Industry 4.0 technologies. A case study of a district firm is also presented to explain the rationale of investment strategies and results obtained.

The analysis shows that there are differences between district and non-district firms when Industry 4.0 technology investments are concerned (higher investment rate in big data/cloud and augmented reality for district firms than non-district ones). In contrast to a breakthrough view of the fourth industrial revolution, the study suggests that 4.0 technologies emphasize the peculiarities and competitiveness factors typical of the district model in terms of customization and flexibility. There are differences in the motivations of adoption (product diversification for district firms vs productivity enhancement for non-district firms) and in the results achieved.

The paper is one of the first attempts to empirically explore the technological innovation paths related to Industry 4.0 within IDs, therefore, contributing to the debate on the possible evolution of the district model

This article is based on a systematic and comprehensive review of the literature on two-sided platforms, the business structure based on the concept of matchmaking groups of customers (e.g. Uber or Airbnb). The research aims to identify gaps in the existing literature while providing a structured summary of the existing knowledge in the field. Finally, we propose a conceptual framework enabling platform thinking, the ability to see hybrid multi-sided platforms as a useful resource-orchestration structure to unveil innovation opportunities.

This study adopts a bibliometric approach, combing co-citation and text mining analyses of 196 papers, also implementing a longitudinal analysis that highlights the evolution of the field since its inception till today.

The novel aspect of the paper consists in taking a purely managerial stance of a very peculiar kind of platform, merging existing knowledge in comprehensive frameworks while providing potential avenues for research.

From an academic perspective, this research highlights the double nature of two-sided platforms: as an operational choice or as a way to exploit (digital) assets and reach the economic sustainability. A research agenda is proposed, based on three pillars: a side-based standpoint, a business model perspective and an evolutionary stance to see how these businesses may evolve.

The research identifies different literature streams that may help practitioners in identifying how two-sided platforms may help them in fostering innovation.

The identification of two-sided platforms as a different way to create value (transaction platforms) or to capture value (non-transaction platform), enhancing the debate on this innovative business model. A research agenda to bring the field forward is proposed.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the differences between Hungarian family-owned businesses (FOBs) and non-family-owned businesses (NFOBs) concerning the elements of SME competitiveness and financial performance.

The research covers the Hungarian data set of the Global Competitiveness Project (GCP, www.sme-gcp.org) of 738 (data collection between 2018 and 2020) non-listed SMEs, of which 328 were FOBs. The study uses the comprehensive, multidimensional competitiveness measurement of the GCP built on the resource-based view (RBV) and the configuration theory. Financial performance was captured with two composite indicators: short-term and long-term financial performance (LTFP). The comparative analysis between FOBs and NFOBs was conducted using binary logistic regression.

The results show that FOBs are more prone to focusing on local niche markets with higher longevity and LTFP than NFOBs. However, FOBs have lower innovation intensity and less organised administrative procedures. The most contradicting finding is that the FOBs’ higher LTFP is accompanied by significantly lower competitiveness than in the case of NFOBs.

This study goes beyond other GCP studies by including composite financial performance measures among the variables examined. The combination of performance-causing (resources and capabilities) and performance-representing (financial performance) variables provides a better understanding of the non-listed SMEs in terms of family ownership. The results help academia to enrich the RBV-competitiveness, the non-listed SME management and finance literature, and policymakers to design business development and support schemes. They also show future entrepreneurs the impact of family ownership on entrepreneurial success.

In times of converging and diversifying audiovisual (AV) industries, digitising health sector and the increasing phenomenon of cross-sectoral innovation, the question arises about the state of affairs between the health and AV sectors. The chapter aims to explore what the main modes of cross-sectoral cooperation between the health and AV sectors are and what supports and hinders the emergence of a related cross-innovation system. The chapter introduces two case studies carried out in Estonia and the wider Aarhus region (Midtjylland) in Denmark. At each site representatives of the main stakeholders of both sectors were interviewed – policy makers, entrepreneurs, educators and professionals. The results demonstrate the crucial role of path-dependencies – in terms of both hindering and enabling cross-sectoral dialogues – and also the importance of effective coordination in supporting cross-innovation.