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This paper aims to show the importance of people management as a key indicator of business excellence based on four research projects, conducted on the samples of Polish (in the years 2004‐2005 and 2006‐2007) and Danish companies (in 1999 and 2005).

EFQM Excellence Model indicators were used as the evaluation criteria for the studies. The data were next estimated as a structural equation model by partial least squares using SmartPLS software. That estimation was conducted on the model of the Danish Business Excellence Index methodology. Presented data make it possible to compare developing Polish and developed Danish companies in their initiatives aiming at business excellence.

The results indicate significant negligence in the management of human resources as one of the initiatives towards business excellence of Polish enterprises before Poland's accession to the European Union (EU). At the same time, the results from the years 2006‐2007 confirm that, after several years of the functioning of the Polish economy in the structures of the EU, the role of the human factor as a key indicator of business activity results has increased, leading to a drop in the distance dividing Polish and Danish enterprises.

The paper is a continuation of previous work by the authors, which made it possible to compare developing Polish and developed Danish companies, before Poland joined the EU in 2004. The paper builds on the research and conclusions contained in the previous work of the authors, adding new data coming from Poland, collected in 2006‐2007.

The fast-developing processes of globalization, with increased political and economic interdependence, along with competition; regionalization dynamics revealing more localized ambitions and either constraining or advancing intentions and policies; and Europeanization as a particular dynamic related to the EU role as a global actor, applied to the Polish post-communist transition, constitute our vectors of analysis. This essay aims to address the simultaneously interconnected and heterogeneous responses of Polish post-communist course of change to global and regional processes, including European integration. In this line of research, we search for answers to how the linkages among globalization, regionalization, and Europeanization work in the case of Polish post-communist transition. This will be pursued through an analysis of the democratization course, mainly regarding political, institutional and social aspects, and economic integration. Despite elements of complementarity and resistance in the working relationships among the three concepts, which are highly debatable, we find they have substantial implications on Polish policy-making. These implications include adjustment and bargaining between demands and concessions, resulting in gains and losses, though despite the negative effects associated and acknowledged, the fact of Poland pursuing the course of integration in the EU reveals an equation of cost–benefit, in favor of the EU.

The purpose of this study was to advance the understanding of the effect of extraversion on an expatriate's level of contexting (adopting a higher or lower level of context) while abroad. Particularly, this study focused on Polish expatriates in the US and American expatriates in Poland.

The participants were 30 American expatriates living in Poland and 41 Polish expatriates living in the USA.

The results from the regression analysis suggest that extraversion has a different effect on contexting among Polish expatriates than American expatriates, the higher the level of extraversion, the more context dependent the American expatriates were. Moreover, Polish and American expatriates differ in terms of contexting related to the universalism and the particularism dimensions of the seven cultural dimensions from Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars.

This advanced understanding led the researchers to give practical implications on the training of expatriates for their abroad assignments.

In the last decades, migration of domestic workers and, in particular, care workers has grown into a significant part of movement from the global South to the global North. This phenomenon is referred to as the “new international division in social reproductive work” – outsourcing domestic chores to (mostly) migrants enables families in the global North to escape from the tensions arising from balancing productive and social reproductive work. This paper seeks to address these issues.

Considering two empirical examples of stereotypically male and female migrant domestic work – Polish handymen and elderly care workers – this paper puts the phenomenon in the context of the broader feminist debate on care work, global care chains and social policies.

It attempts to analyze how the employment of Polish handymen or elderly care workers in Germany results from and recreates social inequalities based on gender, class and ethnicity/citizenship.

For this purpose, it looks at both “ends” of this specific European “care chain” – the employing families in Germany as well as the migrant's families in Poland.

In recent years, authorities in Poland have recognised the need for greater internationalisation of business. As with many other socialist countries, the development of internationalisation has been under the control and guidance of the state authorities. The authors attempt to identify whether any long‐term internationalisation policy has been implemented and whether or not Polish companies follow the customary internationalisation path. They have found that despite attempts to implement economic reform, there is both a lack of integration and the omission of key elements. These failings have hindered development and export strategy has not been successful to date. The discussion takes place on both a macro and microeconomic level, examining the various types of enterprise carrying out foreign trade. The conclusion is that macroeconomic and micro‐economic conditions create formidable barriers to the internationalisation of Polish enterprises.

Focuses on the marketing strategies used by Polish marketing firms and their role as change agents after the fall of communism and the transition to a market economy. A survey of 93 marketing consulting firms in four large Polish cities was conducted in 1996‐1997. The results suggest that this sector is thriving, and the two most important success factors are on‐time delivery and high service delivery.

The purpose of this paper is to test what kind of value co-creation-related organizational capabilities may be applied in the specific context of the post-communist business-to-customer service industry in Poland and how these capabilities translate into service innovation success.

The research model with control variables was hypothesized in regard to the customer co-creation and specific institutional setting in post-communist Poland. The model was tested using survey data from Polish companies in the service sector. The variable indicators for customer co-creation capability were developed through a series of in-depth interviews with managers.

First, a service company’s organizational processes that leverage customer communication and enable this communication to be transformed as input into service innovations are distinct components that build complex customer co-creation dynamic capability. Second, customer co-creation capability by service firms positively and strongly influences firms’ innovation success, whereas this link is stronger in the cases of larger service companies.

This paper introduces the concept of “customer co-creation capability” and evaluates its implications in the specific context of Poland, a Central European market that transformed from a closed communist economy to an open, market-driven economy. A rich but dramatically changing history and culture present a unique opportunity to observe the changes in customer behavior, evaluated from the organizational point of view. For example, it presents how these unique customer features may be used by services companies to leverage their innovations.

Explores the impact of marketisation and enterprise restructuring processes on a Polish case study organisation. “Polskie” illustrates that certain western HRM practices are informing the process of restructuring organisations. These new approaches signal managers’ intentions to change attitudes to work and reassert control over the production process. The assessment, development and utilisation of human resources is an integral part of the overall management of the post‐communist enterprise. The field of personnel management is set to assume a key position. A key research question is whether women, as existing practitioners, have been able to augment their position in this growing area of expertise. Discusses whether the process of political and economic reform in Poland has provided an opportunity to improve the employment status of women and identifies reasons for being optimistic, but also highlights several areas for concern.

As the democratic world debates and in some cases replaces physical voting with postal ballots and on-line voting, it is important to refrain from advocating a generic approach to the issue and in particular to distinguish between consolidated and unconsolidated democracies.

The paper argues that unconsolidated democracies are not fit for the introduction of non-physical (postal ballot and on-line) voting methods, which rather than broadening the scope of democracy may in actual fact be derailing it. The key reason for this distinction is the lack of political consensus for constitutional rules, the weakness of the rule of law and persistence of parochial and subject-based political cultures in many countries of the region, including Poland.

Replacing physical voting with postal ballot, attempted during Presidential elections in the summer 2020 in Poland, eventually failed and was replaced with conventional physical vote. However, the Polish case demonstrates that in the system with weak checks and balances, postal ballot could be used to consolidate illiberalism not democracy.

The paper demonstrates that further research on defining consolidated and unconsolidated democracy is needed. In particular there is a need to factor in the research on political culture into the definitions of democratic consolidation.

EU membership for Poland and some other Central European states – such as Hungary – failed to prompt the process of democratic consolidation. In fact the opposite happened as the impact of EU conditionality lost relevance. It is important that any change of electoral law in Poland and other rule of law violators in the region is viewed with great care and scrutiny.

The paper’s conceptual approach rests on the definition of consolidated democracy as put forward by Przeworski (1991) and developed by Linz and Stepan (1996). According to these definitions, Poland is not yet a consolidated democracy and as argued in the paper, it has actually experienced an expansion of illiberalism in recent years. The paper also posits that the concept of “consolidated democracy” should be augmented to include the existence of civic political culture as a necessary condition for the maintenance of a healthy democracy.

To explain the sources of jobless growth in Poland, the country undergoing economic system transition and integration with the European Union (EU).

The research used the Harrod‐Domar model together with an interpretation proposed by Barro and Sala‐i‐Martin to determine the growth threshold level of jobless growth in Poland. The technical, econometric calculation does not dominate the paper, which is destined for both academic and non‐academic readers studying the phenomenon of jobless growth.

The paper provides a review of literature and theories of jobless growth. The calculations show that Poland has a high threshold of jobless growth. The Polish GDP needs to grow at least 4 per cent to add new jobs.

To evaluate the overall long run impact of labor productivity on the job market one needs to include the growth of non‐manufacturing jobs in the service sectors which accommodate the needs of more affluent worker/consumers. This long‐term analysis is outside the scope of the paper.

The authors calculated an important variable for the Polish economy, i.e. the threshold growth rate of jobless growth, which indicates a minimum rate of growth, needed to create a net demand for labor. This research is likely to be quoted by the economists studying sources of unemployment in Poland and as well as in any high growth economies.

It is the only research known to the authors attempting to explain high level of unemployment in transition economies using recognized economic theories. The paper contributes to a better understanding of the phenomenon of jobless growth in market economies in general.