Search results

The purpose of this paper is to address the role of accelerators as authentic learning-based entrepreneurial training programs. Accelerators facilitate the development and assessment of entrepreneurial competencies in nascent entrepreneurs through the process of creating a start-up venture.

Survey data from applicants and participants of four start-accelerators are used to explore the linkages between accelerators and the elements of authentic learning. Authentic learning processes are then mapped onto the start-up processes that occur within the accelerators.

Accelerators take in nascent entrepreneurs and work to create start-ups. This activity develops the participants’ entrepreneurial competencies and facilitates authentic self-reflection.

This study explores how accelerators can be useful as authentic learning platforms for the development of entrepreneurial competencies. Limitations include perceptual measures and the inability to conduct paired sampling.

Entrepreneurship training is studied through the lens of authentic learning activities that occur within an accelerator. Participants develop and assess their mastery of and interest in entrepreneurship through tasks, exposure to experts and mentors, peer learning, and assessments such as pitching to investors at Demo Day.

This paper reports on the authentic learning processes and its usefulness in competency development and self-appraisal by accelerators participants. The opportunity for competency development and self-appraisal by nascent entrepreneurs before escalating their commitment to a start-up may be an accelerator’s raison d’être.

Empowerment is recognised as being a key to achieving organisational agility. Typically associated with a particular leadership style, implications of empowerment for management have remained vague in the literature. Thus, this study aims at unpacking the facets and mechanisms of empowerment in the context of organisational units (OUs).

First, the authors review the extant literature and discuss the crucial concepts in the context empowerment. Then, the authors analyse qualitative data from interviews conducted in four research and development (R&D) departments in the industrial manufacturing industry.

This study finds that the empowerment of business entities is crucial when operating in turbulent conditions. However, empowerment must be accompanied by a clear focus when aiming at higher agile performance. Moreover, different autonomy types and their interplay with critical factors of middle management empowerment could be identified. The research results also reveal important details about the effects of autonomy on motivation and performance and the role of OUs' dependencies.

The model proposed in this paper can help senior and middle managers better manage the empowerment of OUs required to enhance middle management agility and, in turn, increase overall organisational adaptability.

Beyond regarding empowerment as a leadership style, this paper takes a middle management perspective and unfolds the facets of empowerment in the context of OUs. Adding to the theory of self-organisation, a model is proposed to capture the key factors to determine and manage the autonomy of OUs. These insights are essential to managing autonomy successfully at the middle management level.

This paper takes a holistic and process-based view on agility from a Middle Management (MM) perspective. Its purpose is to identify subjective factors of agility emerging from people's interpretations and perceptions and to integrate them into the process of agile strategy-making.

To provide a theoretical foundation, literature was reviewed in the area of agile diversity and strategy-making. A qualitative study based on interviews was conducted to uncover the hidden subjective factors from the personal experiences and perceptions of the participants.

The study has revealed that individual opinions in terms of agility can originate from three sources: individual understandings, contextual drivers and personal beliefs.

The research contributes to dynamic capability theory by providing a better understanding of agile diversity at the MM level. The findings can help mid-level executives to cope with the complexities and ambiguities in managing agility by aligning the different understandings and people's perceptions. This is crucial, as missing alignment of team members can lead to poor dynamic capabilities of business entities and thus threatens overall organisational agility.

A model was developed to align the subjective factors of agility during the process of agile strategy-making at the MM level. The framework allows a flexible adaptation to the individual demands of organisational units, as well as concentrated measures for effective agile management. It contributes to organisational agility and business success by scaling the dynamic capabilities of MM.

Networking is an important managerial skill and small businesses and businesses that are operated in informal settings, such as those of the festival entrepreneur, need to concentrate on building strong relationships with the role players in their networks in order to survive, thrive and to enhance their competitiveness. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the current level of networking skills and to determine the perceptions of entrepreneurs of their current networking relationships. The tourism industry, which is regarded as a people's industry, needs high levels of networking skills to meet customer needs and expectations. Networking can therefore be seen as a key success factor. The Grahamstown National Arts festival is South Africa's oldest arts festival and was chosen, first because of the economic impact it has and, second, tourism and entrepreneurship are considered as key developmental issues in South Africa.

A quantitative study (structured questionnaire) was used to achieve the goal of the study and 137 festival entrepreneurs participated. A factor analysis was conducted with an Oblimin rotation to determine the factors that correlate most strongly with each other.

The main findings indicated that becoming a festival entrepreneur is a career choice and, second, that relationships and trust are important aspects of networking behaviour.

It is very important to investigate entrepreneurial behaviour in terms of networking practices at festivals. This research might help festival organisers to better understand and support the entrepreneurs conducting their business at these festivals and the organisers can offer services to support these networking efforts by offering courses, networking opportunities and engagement on higher levels of festival management. This research might also assist in the development of tourism curriculums which focus on event tourism.

The purpose and the goal of this paper were to investigate South African businesses and determine their utilisation of new technologies and business structures. The role and development of e‐commerce and networks in South African businesses can determine their competitive role in a global market.

The paper shows that South Africa's position in the networked economy was researched through an empirical survey and the use of a convenience sample that incorporated 707 online businesses listed in an online directory in South Africa. Manufacturing businesses, retail and wholesale businesses, as well as business rendering services online, were targeted.

The paper finds that business networks have necessitated new business structures and 78.4 percent of the respondents are currently using these modern business structures to adapt to the demands of the networked economy. These include the matrix structure (42.9 percent), the networked business structure (25 percent) and the extended business structure (10.7 percent). E‐commerce provides many advantages, the response received on the reasons for e‐commerce utilisation includes enhanced profit (86 percent), entering strategic markets (64 percent) and building international association (61 percent).

The value of this paper is that the focus should be on finding new opportunities and the most important recommendations include: South African business people should be informed about the importance of shared knowledge, intellectual capital and establishing strategic alliances that are facilitated through the use of networks. Proactive management and added value in business processes should be implemented and can enhance the competitive advantage amongst South African businesses.

The idea of “creating something from nothing” resonates strongly with the creation process associated with artists. The Levi-Strauss and Baker and Nelson discussions also refer to entrepreneurial bricolage as something that entails a “make do with what is at hand”. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how artists utilise bricolage to create projects and develop their skills. Little is known of their perceptions of entrepreneurial behaviour and bricolage, and how they construct these bricolage networks. The tension between sharing, creating and to maintain a personal brand is negotiated by leveraging these bricolage relationships.

In-depth interviews with artists that actively make a living from their involvement in the creative industries were conducted. This provided insight into their perceptions on networking and bricolage. Since networking is such an individual and interchangeable process the interviews allowed the author to unravel these complexities of the relationships.

The findings produced two themes. The first, demonstrated the entrepreneurial behaviour of these artists and their unique contributions. The second theme involved the bricolage relationships formed to overcome resource constraints. The collaborative nature highlighted the co-creation relationships that are strategically formed to provide long-term opportunities and sustained working relationships.

This study contributes to literature on bricolage, management, creative industries and entrepreneurship in non-traditional settings.

This study contributes to theory on bricolage and entrepreneurial behaviour in small enterprises and creative industries. Artists can benefit from the knowledge to build strategic networks to secure future work.

Educators can use this information to prepare aspiring artists to create more independent and/or interdependent entrepreneurial projects.

This work encourages further cross-disciplinary research on the arts, entrepreneurship, networking and small business studies.

Despite the significance, university student start-ups and student entrepreneurship ecosystems (SEEs) have been subject to little research. This study aims to apply a qualitative emergent enquiry approach to explore best practice SEEs in Australia, complimented by narratives from leading scholars in higher education institutions with the aim of delineating the integrative components of SEEs.

Adopting the entrepreneurial ecosystem framework and aligned to the social cognitive theory, this paper explores the components and dynamics of SEEs, contributing to an understanding of how such components can better support the growth, sustainability and success of student start-ups. The authors extend entrepreneurship research on social construction using narrative research.

The findings provide guidelines for researchers, entrepreneurship scholars and educators, entrepreneurship students, policymakers and practitioners to enhance the impact and success of university student start-ups by adopting a student ecosystem approach.

The narratives represent a limited number of universities with an opportunity for further research to empirically measure the impact and outcomes of SEEs. The research is exploratory, inherently conceptual and emergent, providing an opportunity for validation of narrative frameworks in future studies.

The findings may assist university managers to be more aware of their own subconscious preferences to student entrepreneurship and start-up initiatives, which may be useful in refining their impact and offerings regarding a quest toward the entrepreneurial university.

From social perspectives, the alignment of the components of SEE has the ability to enhance and shift the entrepreneurial mindset of entrepreneurship students, notwithstanding enhancement of intentionality and self-efficacy.

This is the first study of SEEs in Australia, highlighting the importance of the integration of entrepreneurship education programs, entrepreneurship education ecosystems, the entrepreneurial university and specific start-up initiatives such as university accelerators. Furthermore, students may enhance their entrepreneurial mindset by actively engaging in such ecosystems.