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1 – 10 of 138
Article
Publication date: 2 February 2023

Min Zuo, Jiangnan Qiu and Jingxian Wang

Online collaboration in today's world is a topic of genuine interest to Internet researchers. The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of group knowledge heterogeneity…

Abstract

Purpose

Online collaboration in today's world is a topic of genuine interest to Internet researchers. The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of group knowledge heterogeneity (GKH) in open collaboration performance using the mediating mechanisms of group cognition (GC) and interaction to understand the determinants of the success of online open collaboration platforms.

Design/methodology/approach

Study findings are based on partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM), the formal mediation test and moderating effect analysis from Wikipedia's 160 online open collaborative groups.

Findings

For online knowledge heterogeneous groups, open collaboration performance is mediated by both GC and collaborative interaction (COL). The mediating role of GC is weak, while the mediating role of COL is strengthened when knowledge complexity (KC) is higher. By dividing group interaction into COL and communicative interaction (COM), the authors also observed that COL is effective for online open collaboration, whereas COM is limited.

Originality/value

These findings suggest that for more heterogeneous large groups, group interaction would explain more variance in performance than GC, offering an in-depth understanding of the relationship between group heterogeneity and open collaboration performance, answering what determines the success of online open collaboration platforms as well as explaining the inconsistency in prior findings. In addition, this study expands the application of Interactive Team Cognition (ITC) theory to the online open collaboration context.

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 21 March 2024

Aziz Wakibi, Joseph Ntayi, Isaac Nkote, Sulait Tumwine, Isa Nsereko and Muhammad Ngoma

The purpose of this study is to explore the interplay among self-organization, networks and sustainable innovations within microfinance institutions (MFIs) and to examine the…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to explore the interplay among self-organization, networks and sustainable innovations within microfinance institutions (MFIs) and to examine the extent to which organizational resilience plays a significant role in shaping these dynamics as a mediator.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper adopted a cross-sectional research design combined with analytical and descriptive approach to collect the data. Smart partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to construct the measurement model and structural equation model to test the mediating effect under this study.

Findings

The results revealed that organizational resilience is a significant mediator in the relationship between self-organization, networks and sustainable innovations among microfinance institutions in Uganda.

Research limitations/implications

The data for this study were collected only from microfinance institutions in Uganda. Future studies may collect data from other formal financial institutions like commercial banks and credit institutions to test the mediating effect of organizational resilience. More still, the study adopted only a single approach of using a questionnaire. However, future research through interviews may be desirable. Likewise this study was cross-sectional in nature. Therefore, a longitudinal study may be useful in future while investigating the mediating role of organizational resilience traversing over a long time frame.

Practical implications

A possible implication is that microfinance institutions which desire to have sustainable innovative solutions for their business operations in disruptive circumstances may need to scrutinize their capacity to be resilient and self-organize.

Social implications

Microfinance institutions play a great role to the underserved clients. Thus, for each to re-organize to be able to provide services that meet users’ needs, without physical products so as to ensure long-term financial and social welfare combined with the ability to bounce back and adapt in times of economic downturn to avoid mission adrift.

Originality/value

While most studies have been carried out on organizational resilience, this paper takes center stage and is the first to test the mediating role of organizational resilience in the relationship between self-organization, networks and sustainable innovations, especially in microfinance institutions in Uganda. This paper generates strong evidence and contributes to the powerful influence of organizational resilience in enhancing the level of sustainable innovations based on self-organization and networks.

Details

IIMBG Journal of Sustainable Business and Innovation, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2976-8500

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 30 April 2024

Luke Pittaway, Paul Benedict, Krystal Geyer and Tatiana Somià

This chapter provides an overview of entrepreneurship clubs. It charts the development of these organisations, as a form of extracurricular activity. It introduces different forms…

Abstract

This chapter provides an overview of entrepreneurship clubs. It charts the development of these organisations, as a form of extracurricular activity. It introduces different forms of entrepreneurship clubs, such as Junior Achievement (JA) and Enactus, and explains how they grew from 1919 to the present. It also illustrates the differences between self-organised clubs, organised programs using clubs as a learning method, structured societies and nationally organised cooperative societies. The second part introduces research on student clubs in entrepreneurship education. It explores the benefits of clubs. It shows that clubs assist student learning, enable the acquisition of practical skills and improve college attendance, employment opportunities and career attainment. We argue that entrepreneurship clubs have improved student learning outcomes in entrepreneurship and simulated entrepreneurial learning, while impacting student self-efficacy and intentionality as well as improving employability and social learning. The final part of the chapter provides advice and tips for educators advising student-run entrepreneurship clubs. Ultimately, the chapter explains how student clubs have developed, why they are important for student learning and how advisors can support them.

Details

Extracurricular Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Activity: A Global and Holistic Perspective
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80382-372-0

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 March 2024

Marya Tabassum, Muhammad Mustafa Raziq and Naukhez Sarwar

Agile project teams are self-managing and self-organizing teams, and these two characteristics are pivotal attributes of emergent leadership. Emergent leadership is thus common in…

Abstract

Purpose

Agile project teams are self-managing and self-organizing teams, and these two characteristics are pivotal attributes of emergent leadership. Emergent leadership is thus common in agile teams – however, how these (informal) emergent leaders can be identified in teams remains far from understood. The purpose of this research is to uncover techniques that enable top management to identify emergent agile leaders.

Methodology/design

We approached six agile teams from four organizations. We employ social network analysis (SNA) and aggregation approaches to identify emergent agile leaders.

Design/methodology/approach

We approached six agile teams from four organizations. We employ SNA and aggregation approaches to identify emergent agile leaders.

Findings

Seven emergent leaders are identified using the SNA and aggregation approaches. The same leaders are also identified using the KeyPlayer algorithms. One emergent leader is identified from each of the five teams, for a total of five emergent leaders from the five teams. However, two emergent leaders are identified for the remaining sixth team.

Originality/value

Emergent leadership is a relatively new phenomenon where leaders emerge from within teams without having a formal leadership assigned role. A challenge remains as to how such leaders can be identified without any formal leadership status. We contribute by showing how network analysis and aggregation approaches are suitable for the identification of emergent leadership talent within teams. In addition, we help advance leadership research by describing the network behaviors of emergent leaders and offering a way forward to identify more than one emergent leader in a team. We also show some limitations of the approaches used and offer some useful insights.

Details

Benchmarking: An International Journal, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1463-5771

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 16 August 2023

Jialiang Xie, Shanli Zhang, Honghui Wang and Mingzhi Chen

With the rapid development of Internet technology, cybersecurity threats such as security loopholes, data leaks, network fraud, and ransomware have become increasingly prominent…

Abstract

Purpose

With the rapid development of Internet technology, cybersecurity threats such as security loopholes, data leaks, network fraud, and ransomware have become increasingly prominent, and organized and purposeful cyberattacks have increased, posing more challenges to cybersecurity protection. Therefore, reliable network risk assessment methods and effective network security protection schemes are urgently needed.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on the dynamic behavior patterns of attackers and defenders, a Bayesian network attack graph is constructed, and a multitarget risk dynamic assessment model is proposed based on network availability, network utilization impact and vulnerability attack possibility. Then, the self-organizing multiobjective evolutionary algorithm based on grey wolf optimization is proposed. And the authors use this algorithm to solve the multiobjective risk assessment model, and a variety of different attack strategies are obtained.

Findings

The experimental results demonstrate that the method yields 29 distinct attack strategies, and then attacker's preferences can be obtained according to these attack strategies. Furthermore, the method efficiently addresses the security assessment problem involving multiple decision variables, thereby providing constructive guidance for the construction of security network, security reinforcement and active defense.

Originality/value

A method for network risk assessment methods is given. And this study proposed a multiobjective risk dynamic assessment model based on network availability, network utilization impact and the possibility of vulnerability attacks. The example demonstrates the effectiveness of the method in addressing network security risks.

Details

International Journal of Intelligent Computing and Cybernetics, vol. 17 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1756-378X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 May 2023

Roberto Falanga

This article poses the question on whether and how youth participation in environmental sustainability makes a difference within participatory budgets (PBs). This is a question…

Abstract

Purpose

This article poses the question on whether and how youth participation in environmental sustainability makes a difference within participatory budgets (PBs). This is a question worth asking because PBs have pursued, from the very beginning, goals of social sustainability through the inclusion of social groups that struggle to make their voices heard, as in the case of the youth. As young people show an increasing capacity to self-organise around environmental issues, a knowledge gap emerges as to the contribution that youth can give to environmental sustainability within PBs.

Design/methodology/approach

The 2021 edition of the Lisbon PB (2021PB) has been analysed through desk research – document analysis using the city council's website as the main source of information, and fieldwork – an organisation of one two-day workshop with 20 young students through a partnership between the local authority and the Institute of Social Sciences at the University of Lisbon. Methods were applied to retrieve findings on youth participation in environmental sustainability in the 2021PB.

Findings

The youth show a relative increase of participation in the 2021PB and emerge as a key target group in funded proposals. Convergence with student proposals suggest shared awareness on the role of youth in the pursuit of social sustainability. The success of health-related proposals confirms ownership of (young) citizens over the concept of environmental sustainability, which further relies on the various scopes of funded proposals at both city and neighbourhood levels. In the workshop, students did not stick to specific themes and struggled to connect present criticalities and future imaginaries.

Research limitations/implications

Focus on one case study necessarily limits the generalisation of findings. Nevertheless, the 2021PB illuminates pathways of research on youth participation in environmental sustainability through participatory budgeting that are worth clearing in the future, such as the role of digital participation, dynamics induced by extreme events as the COVID-19 pandemic and PBs' capacity to intercept environmental activism.

Practical implications

Decision-makers and practitioners can take advantage of findings to acknowledge the potential of youth participation in PBs to reframe the take of environmental sustainability.

Social implications

The article provides new inputs for future developments in the operationalisation of social and environmental sustainability through participatory budgeting.

Originality/value

This article examines original data retrieved from the 2021PB. Data analysis is backed by the literature review of key democratic challenges in social and environmental sustainability within participatory budgeting.

Details

Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management, vol. 36 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1096-3367

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 11 April 2024

Lucrezia Sgambaro, Davide Chiaroni, Emanuele Lettieri and Francesco Paolone

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the most recurrent variables characterizing the collaborative relationships of industrial symbiosis (IS) (hereinafter also referred to…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the most recurrent variables characterizing the collaborative relationships of industrial symbiosis (IS) (hereinafter also referred to as “anatomic” variables) established in the attempt to adopt circular economy (CE) by collecting evidence from a rich empirical set of implementation cases in Italy.

Design/methodology/approach

The current literature on IS was reviewed, and a content analysis was performed to identify and define the “anatomic” variables affecting its adoption in the circular economy. We followed a multiple-case study methodology investigating 50 cases of IS in Italy and performed a content analysis of the “anatomic” variables characterizing each case.

Findings

This research proposes the “anatomic” variables (i.e. industrial sectors involved, public actors involvement, governmental support, facilitator involvement and geographical proximity) explaining the cases of IS in the circular economy. Each “anatomic” variable is discussed at length based on the empirical evidence collected, with a particular reference to the impact on the different development strategies (i.e. “bottom-up” and “top-down”) in the cases observed.

Originality/value

Current literature on IS focuses on a sub-set of variables characterizing collaboration in IS. This research builds on extant literature to define a new framework of five purposeful “anatomic” variables defining IS in the circular economy. Moreover, we also collect and discuss a broad variety of empirical evidence in what is a still under-investigated context (i.e. Italy).

Details

Management Decision, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0025-1747

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 April 2024

İrem Taştan and Zeynep Ozdamar Ertekin

This study aims to explore how a postmodern tribe enacts and re-interprets ideologies as a part of consumers’ collective experience, to enhance our understanding of consumer…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to explore how a postmodern tribe enacts and re-interprets ideologies as a part of consumers’ collective experience, to enhance our understanding of consumer communities in conjunction with ideological capacities.

Design/methodology/approach

The community of “presenteers” is conceptualized as a self-organized tribe with heterogeneous components that generate capacities to act. Netnographic observation was conducted on 18 presenteer accounts and lasted around six months. Real-time data were collected by taking screenshots of the posts and stories that these users created and publicly shared. Data were analysed by adopting assemblage theory, combining inductive and deductive approaches. Firstly, a qualitative visual-textual content analysis of the tribe’s defining components was conducted. Then, the process continued with the thematic analysis of the ideological underpinnings of the tribe’s enactments.

Findings

Findings shed light on the ways in which consumer communities interpret the entanglement of religious, political, and cultural ideologies in shaping their experiences. In the case of the presenteers tribe, findings reflect a novel ideological interplay between neo-Ottomanism, post-feminism and consumerism.

Research limitations/implications

The study offers a deep dive into a unique tribe that is being organized around the consumer-created practice of “presenteering” and investigates consumer communalization in alignment with the ideological turn in culture-oriented interpretative research on consumers, consumption, and markets. This exploration helps to bridge the research on the communalization of consumers with the recent discussions of ideology in the postmodern market.

Originality/value

The study offers a deep dive into a unique tribe that is being organized around the consumer-created practice of “presenteering” and investigates consumer communalization in alignment with the ideological turn in culture-oriented interpretative research on consumers, consumption, and markets. This exploration helps to bridge the research on the communalization of consumers with the recent discussions of ideology in the postmodern market.

Details

Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1352-2752

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 11 April 2023

Shekhar Rathor, Weidong Xia and Dinesh Batra

Agile principles have been widely used in software development team practice since the creation of the Agile Manifesto. Studies have examined variables related to agile principles…

Abstract

Purpose

Agile principles have been widely used in software development team practice since the creation of the Agile Manifesto. Studies have examined variables related to agile principles without systematically considering the relationships among key team, agile methodology, and process variables underlying the agile principles and how these variables jointly influence the achievement of software development agility. In this study, the authors tested a team/methodology–process–agility model that links team variables (team autonomy and team competence) and methodological variable (iterative development) to process variables (communication and collaborative decision-making), which are in turn linked to software development agility (ability to sense, respond and learn).

Design/methodology/approach

Survey data from one hundred and sixty software development professionals were analyzed using structural equation modeling methods.

Findings

The results support the team/methodology–process–agility model. Process variables (communication and collaborative decision-making) mediated the effects of team (autonomy and competence) and methodological (iterative development) variables on software development agility. In addition, team, methodology and process variables had different effects on the three dimensions of software development agility.

Originality/value

The results contribute to the literature on organizational IT management by establishing a team/methodology–process–agility model that can serve as a basis for developing a core theoretical foundation underlying agile principles and practices. The results also have practical implications for organizations in understanding and managing holistically the different roles that agile methodological, team and process factors play in achieving software development agility.

Details

Information Technology & People, vol. 37 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0959-3845

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 April 2024

Xuerui Shi and Gabriel Hoh Teck Ling

Due to the influence of complex and intersecting factors, self-governed public open spaces (POSs) (managed by local communities) are subject to collective action dilemmas such as…

Abstract

Purpose

Due to the influence of complex and intersecting factors, self-governed public open spaces (POSs) (managed by local communities) are subject to collective action dilemmas such as tragedy of the commons (overexploitation), free-riding, underinvestment and mismanagement. This review paper adopts a multi-dimensional and multi-tier social-ecological system (SES) framework proposed by McGinnis and Ostrom, drawing on collective action theory to explore the key institutional-social-ecological factors that impact POS self-governance.

Design/methodology/approach

In this paper, Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) was utilized to systematically screen and review the relevant literature for the period from 2000 to 2023 in three databases: Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar. A total of 57 papers were chosen for in-depth analysis.

Findings

The literature review identified and categorized several variables associated with the self-organizing system of POS; consequently, an SES-based POS management framework was developed for the first time, consisting of 114 institutional-social-ecological sub-variables from different dimensions and three levels. Compared to ecological factors, among others, governance organizations, property-rights systems, socioeconomic attributes and actors' knowledge of SES have been commonly and primarily studied.

Research limitations/implications

There is still room for the refinement of the conceptual SES-based POS collective action framework over the time (by adding in new factors), and indefinitely empirical research validating those identified factors is also worth to be undertaken, particularly testing how SES factors and interaction variables affect the POS quality (collective action).

Originality/value

The findings of this study can provide local policy insights and POS management strategies based on the identification of specific SES factors for relevant managers. Moreover, this research makes significant theoretical contributions to the integration of the SES framework and collective action theory with POS governance studies.

Details

Open House International, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0168-2601

Keywords

1 – 10 of 138