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The purpose of this paper is to position the business apprenticeship model (a work-based learning model where student managers alternate between academic and workplace learning) at a political, institutional and student level in order to explain how it fits within the French business education landscape and how it is considered as a viable business model in management education.

Business apprenticeship is analysed through the prism of Osterwalder and Pigneur’s (2010) Business Model Canvas to evaluate the nine dimensions of the business model: customer segments, value proposition, customer channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, key activities, key partners and cost structure.

Two major advantages of the model are identified, namely, the potential for widening participation and affordability and three concerns are outlined: the corporate vision of the apprentice, the recent governmental reforms on funding this model, and the potential synergies between theory and practice.

This paper is useful for all those who wish to develop an apprenticeship track within their business schools and for employers who are considering the development of apprenticeship partnerships with business schools.

This paper provides insight into business apprenticeship as a work-based learning model.

The paper analyzes four cases of IAS adoption (Aérospatiale in 1989; Usinor in 1991; Coflexip in 1993; and Péchiney in 1995) to better understand the instructional logics behind the use of alternative or additional standards by French companies in the early 1990s.

The study employs multiple case studies to explain how and why the heterogeneity of adoption (IAS versus US GAAP) is a response to institutional complexity.

This research shows that French companies adopted IAS as long as they were not required to use US GAAP by their financial backers. The results highlight how the companies combine logics to respond to the complexification of the field. The authors outline how endorsement of logics by outside carriers (auditors, financial analysts, stock exchange commissions) and framing of logics by managers evolve in time and space within this complexification process.

This study contributes to the institutional complexity literature in that it focuses on distinct organizational responses to multiple institutional logics. More precisely, the choice of standards in primary consolidated accounts are viewed as an organizational response to compatible and conflicting demands from several levels: home countries, transnational areas and host countries with the aim of raising funds in the US.

This research makes a distinct link between institutional complexity and international accounting standards and US GAAP.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the ways engineering doctoral students draw on prior experiences to inform their doctoral research. This study includes the experiences of “returners” – those who have worked as practitioners for five or more years before entering a PhD program – who have distinct experiences from “direct-pathway students,” which may inform how they engage in doctoral research. This study also explores the traits that distinguish varying levels of sophistication in the ways PhD students think about the research process and how prior experience may contribute.

This study draws on interview data from 52 returning and direct-pathway engineering doctoral students. A thematic analysis of this interview data highlights the primary ways participants’ prior professional, academic and life experiences inform their doctoral research. In addition, the authors conducted an iterative analysis process to sort participants’ responses about their management of a hypothetical research scenario into emergent categories of research thinking sophistication to understand what characterizes varying levels of sophistication in research thinking and explore how experience may contribute.

Participants identified past experiences as shaping their research, related to how they identify a research problem, considering what needs to and can be done to address the problem, identifying an appropriate research approach, managing unexpected challenges, responding to critical feedback, determining their comfort taking risks and using intuition to lead a project.

Outcomes of this research can inform how graduate education supports students throughout their degree by identifying key experiences that may contribute to students’ research approaches.

This chapter shares the experiences of two graduate students as they navigated higher education during the pandemic. Engaging in graduate study during the pandemic shaped their socialisation experiences, challenged their understanding of themselves as scholars and impacted their relationships with mentors. This chapter shares personal reflections of their experiences and explores their sense of professional identity and aspirations for the future.

In this column, I'd like to deviate from the normal focus on the mechanics of network tools and instead take some time to step back and reflect on the culture of network navigation.

As mastering the two-minute entrepreneurial pitch is a key skill required of entrepreneurs and all those who have to sell an idea in a business context, the purpose of this paper is to analyse successful entrepreneurial pitches in order to provide practical pitch-related advice to entrepreneurs and to business school instructors developing pedagogical materials.

As mastering the two-minute entrepreneurial pitch is a key skill required of entrepreneurs and all those who have to sell an idea in a business context, this paper aims to analyse successful entrepreneurial pitches in order to provide practical pitch-related advice to entrepreneurs and to business school instructors developing pedagogical materials.

A ten-stage discourse framework was shown to underlie most pitches and typical linguistic exponents and rhetorical devices were identified. While there was a strong correlation between linguistic exponents and particular organisational stages, it was not possible to map the rhetorical strategies or tropes onto the organisational stages. The rhetorical framework provides a macro-structure to help entrepreneurs manipulate key content, whereas the linguistic framework highlights the salient grammatical, organisational, syntactic and lexical features of a successful pitch.

The sample of entrepreneurial pitches analysed is too small to be totally representative of the entrepreneurial pitch in general. However, this in-depth multi-dimensional analysis provides initial research into the canonical features of the entrepreneurial pitch.

This study provides an actionable, best practice, discoursal template for the entrepreneurial pitch together with the typical linguistic exponents and rhetorical features. The findings should sensitise entrepreneurs and instructors to salient macro- and micro-features of the entrepreneurial pitch.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that has been carried out that takes a multi-dimensional analysis approach (both rhetorical and linguistic/discourse analysis) to deconstruct the entrepreneurial pitch.

This paper aims to describe a proverb game where the themes of work and money introduce participants to world perspectives on handling social transactions and establishing “fair play” between people.

Students are involved in a “serious game” where they work in international groups to piece together parts of a linguistic puzzle drawing on the language competencies of the group. They exchange viewpoints about “fair play”. This experiential learning opportunity introduces an ethics and cross-cultural framework into the curriculum.

The game has been used to “break the ice” at the start of international business programs and allow exchange students greater opportunity to become involved in problem solving activities.

In three versions, the authors have tested over three academic years, the proverb game has allowed the participants to reach the objectives: become involved with international classmates, co-produce cultural knowledge with peers (an alternative to a teacher-driven seminar on culture), develop awareness of cultural self, study world values through proverbs, and examine the importance of rule-based behavior and fair play.

To the authors' knowledge, there are no “language” games suitable for the international business classroom whose purpose is actually ethical.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the papers included in this special issue and discuss the theme – shifts in Nordic welfare governance.

The paper discusses the major themes and sets out the structure of the special issue.

The picture emerging is mixed and there is evidence for strong decentralisation where policy instruments allow for considerable local room to manoeuvre. Organisational arrangements for governance are also highly localised, but (over time) oscillate between decentralisation and centralisation. As for the consequences for universalism, the contributions point to three contrasting scenarios. The first, relatively optimistic assessment suggests that while decentralisation challenges territorial equality, in some Nordic countries there seems to be inbuilt self‐correcting mechanisms pulling in the opposite direction. The second scenario is more critical and here it is argued that shifts in welfare governance, such as decentralisation and the introduction of elements of self and market governance, challenge universalism; universalism has become highly contingent on local circumstances and the practice of welfare delivery mixes different types of justice. The final scenario is rather pessimistic about the prospects of universalism and suggests that the shifts in welfare governance challenge universalism on all counts and lead to a wide range of new inequalities among citizens. This echoes the analysis of non‐Nordic countries in Europe where the scope for universalism remains limited.

The contribution of this special issue is twofold. First, using elderly care as a case study, the special issue analyses the complexity of welfare governance by looking at changes in both the vertical and the horizontal dimensions of governing. Second, focusing on Nordic countries, it assesses the substantive implications of shifts in welfare governance, notably in terms of universalism.

The purpose of this paper is to encourage initiatives to train large cohorts of undergraduate students for creativity understanding. The authors describe a case study of a creativity exercise developed within a corporate setting that accommodates a large cohort and discuss the results of empirical research on this teaching experience at a French Business School. The authors reflect on the transferability of this exercise by other educators to similar educational contexts and the usefulness of training future managers to a structured creativity methodology to be exploited in the workplace.

A case study explains the features of the exercise. Hard data on students’ perceptions and motivation/satisfaction prior to and after the creativity exercise was collected through an internet self-completed survey instrument. In total, 245 pairs of survey responses from first-year students were analysed using prototypical analysis, paired samples t-test and content analysis.

The exercise proved an effective tool to help large cohorts of undergraduates to better understand that creativity is a managerial competence that can be trained. The authors particularly underlined the need for fluidity in the organisation of the exercise; use of a clear creativity process and methodology; the necessity to involve an external creativity consultant; and the importance of the chosen topic being non art related. In the workplace, this understanding of creativity methodologies will enable future managers to support, promote and manage creativity endeavours.

This paper encourages initiatives and provides insights into the difficulties of training large cohorts of undergraduate students for understanding the concept of creativity.

As participation in higher education widens with concomitant increases in the number and diversity of commencing students, so does the need for programs that will support their transition and retention. In response to this need, a growing awareness of the value of mentorship in Australian universities has resulted in the introduction of peer mentoring programs for students in many institutions. Mentorship, however, can take many different forms. This chapter reports on a model of academic (faculty) mentorship for commencing science students belonging to a range of defined disadvantaged groups. The program was initially funded by an internal grant, with voluntary participation by eligible students. At the end of the first semester, participants overwhelmingly endorsed the program as having enhanced their transition experience and improved their prospects for academic progress and retention. Despite reduced funding, the program was retained over two subsequent years with slight modifications based on student feedback, together with consideration of its most effective elements. The success of this academic mentorship program demonstrates the potential value of such approaches in the university retention and success of disadvantaged students.