Search results

The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate firms’ motives to patent in general, and more specifically how some of these motives depend upon firms’ technology strategies and especially their level of open innovation.

The paper is based on a questionnaire survey sent to chief technology officers (or equivalent) of the largest R&D spenders among Swedish large firms (e.g. ABB, AstraZeneca, Ericsson, and Volvo) and among Swedish small and medium-sized enterprises. Principal component analysis and multiple linear regressions were used to check the impact from open innovation upon the importance of 21 different motives to patent, with a specific focus on protection and bargaining related motives.

The most important motive to patent is to protect product technologies, but protecting freedom to operate is almost as important, followed by a number of other motives. Increasing importance of open innovation in firms is related to stronger bargaining motives to patent, and even stronger protection motives. In fact, when comparing with closed innovation, the results show that open innovation is more strongly positively related with all different motives to patent except for one (to attract customers). This indicates that firms find it more important to patent when engaged in open innovation than when engaged in closed innovation.

The paper reports results from the first study that links patenting motives to technology strategies. It contributes to an emerging stream of empirical studies investigating the role of patents in external technology strategies and open innovation, showing that the motives to patent are strengthened within open innovation settings.

Within intellectual disability care organizations (IDCOs), it is vital that professionals share and apply knowledge to improve the quality of care for their service users. Given that chief executive officers (CEOs) play a pivotal role in enabling these processes, this paper aims to investigate both the underlying motives and strategies behind CEOs’ organizational knowledge leadership and their contribution to improving these knowledge processes.

In this exploratory qualitative study, 11 CEOs from IDCOs in the Netherlands who are actively involved in knowledge management within their organizations were interviewed. An inductive thematic analysis was conducted.

CEOs’ motives for stimulating knowledge processes among professionals in IDCOs arise from the internal (e.g. the CEOs themselves) and external (e.g. policy) contexts. This study also identified four strategies adopted by CEOs to stimulate sharing and application of knowledge: providing organizational conditions for effective knowledge processes; focused attention on talent development; acknowledgment and deployment of knowledge holders; and knowledge-driven participation in collaborative partnerships. These strategies are used in combination and have been shown to reinforce one another.

An overview of strategies for stimulating knowledge processes is now available.

The results display the leadership of CEOs in knowledge strategies. Insights into their perceptions and values are provided while elaborating on their motives to take this role.

This chapter describes the role of service employees’ motives for emotion regulation in interactions with customers. To date, there has been little research and theoretical work on motives for emotion regulation in service work. The reason for this may lie in the fact that there is an implicit general assumption that employees regulate their emotions in customer interactions because of display rules given by the organization. We argue that service employees have more motives for emotion regulation than adhering to display rules. We propose that three fundamental motive categories which are relevant for general emotion regulation are also relevant in the service work context. Moreover, we argue that the different motive categories are important antecedents for the further emotion regulation process. We propose that depending on the motive category different emotion regulation strategies are used as well as moderating effects of the motives with an impact on the consequences of emotion regulation such as well-being. The chapter concludes by pointing to practical implications.

This study examines gestures, themes, message copy points and imagery, and strategy motives reflected in corporate advertising appearing in the China Times and United Daily News, two leading newspapers, in the month following the devastating Chin‐Chin earthquake in Taiwan in September 1999. The study identified four possible corporate strategy motives in post‐crisis corporate communications: social responsibility, communal relationship building, enlightened self‐interest and impression management. A content analysis of adverts (n=100) suggested communal relationship building drove corporate advertising endeavours. Corporate philanthropy was the most common gesture described in the adverts, and the most frequent themes and message components focused on the restoration of society. No significant differences were found between companies headquartered in Taiwan versus elsewhere, or between companies headquartered in Asia versus the West. Implications for examining crisis communications and underlying motives behind public relations communications are discussed.

The paper aims to explore the adoption attitudes of internal and external motivations by multinational enterprises (MNEs) concerning transfer pricing manipulation and to discuss on pricing strategies of MNEs under different motives of transfer pricing manipulation.

The paper conducts literature reviews regarding motives of transfer pricing manipulation and then conducts questionnaire survey and expert interview to select and generalize the transfer pricing manipulation decision making. Analytic network process (ANP) is then applied to obtain factors' weights and model construction.

The paper finds that tax minimization is no longer the focus of transfer pricing manipulation strategies of Taiwanese MNEs, and their real concerns are winning maximum economic profits, enhancing the competitiveness of the enterprise, and effectively repatriating profits to parent companies in order to facilitate greater economic profits.

It is found from the model that most of the transfer pricing manipulation motives are based on low‐price strategies, which circumvent the exchange rate risks of low quotes. A possible reason is that current business operational patterns that have been limited to the electronic industry adopt the quantity‐based pricing strategy of “narrow profit margin and large volume.” However, the transfer pricing manipulation has great influence on the financial structures of the enterprises. The enterprises, as a result, must understand and reinforce the working of pricing transfer manipulation in the business development.

The paper collects questionnaires and investigation results from experts and scholars and uses ANP to construct a complete pricing strategic decision‐making model that may be taken by actual MNEs under different motives, in order to provide reference to MNEs when making transfer pricing manipulation strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how the communication of corporate social responsibility (CSR) contributes towards a favourable corporate reputation. It explores the communication strategies and channels organisations deemed reputable by stakeholders use to achieve an effective CSR communication.

To achieve this, a qualitative content analysis using the directed approach was conducted on the textual CSR communication materials of ten reputable organisations in South Africa based on the 2018 South Africa Reptrak survey.

Result showed that seven out of ten organisations use both self-serving and society-serving motive in their CSR communication, while the other 3 use only the society serving motive. The informing strategy was also more evident in the CSR communication materials than the interactive strategy. In terms of the communication channels, the study found that organisations mainly utilise controlled channels for CSR communication.

The literature reviewed and the findings of this study reveal a gap between the theory and practice of CSR communication. This drives the need for organisations to research and tailor CSR communication based on stakeholders' unique characteristics and preferences. The paper also contributes to improving the knowledge on the role different CSR communication strategies and channels play in CSR communication.

While the natural expectation is that students seek greater depth of learning as they develop intellectually during their studies, some research calls this into question and even suggests that student learning can become shallower from year to year. The present study aims to investigate the relative depth of students' learning at different stages of their undergraduate studies by comparing second‐year with third‐year students in two statistics units.

A survey was conducted using Biggs's Study Process Questionnaire. The survey results were used to compare second‐ and third‐year groups, as well as to investigate other variables by comparing the performances of: international and domestic students, male and female students, students who worked and those who did not work, and students who intended to register for a higher degree and those who did not.

Significant differences in approaches were found between male and female students; and between students who intended to enrol in a higher degree and those who did not.

Characteristics of the learning and teaching environment, including quality of teaching, were not investigated in this study. These and the possibility of students' mixed approaches to learning depending on the unit of study might have significant impact on the results. Additionally, this study is specific to one Sydney university; therefore the results might not be generalisable.

The findings from this study provide evidence that there is no significant difference between second and third year; or in international and local students' approaches to learning in statistics.

A large number of industrial manufacturers are forming various types of alliances in a bid to improve their competitive position. The number of strategic alliances has almost doubled in the past ten years and is expected to increase even more in the future. However, while many organisations often rush to jump on the bandwagon of strategic alliances, few succeed. The failure rate of strategic alliances is projected to be as high as 70 percent. Interestingly, marriage relationships are found to have similar failure rate. In spite of the high failure rate of strategic alliances, very little is known about the potential failure factors and their possible correlation with alliance motivation and objectives. This paper aims to examine the importance that industrial manufacturers place on various motives for alliance formation and the potential reasons for alliance failure.

This is in the form of a case‐ and survey‐based study of two large Swedish auto‐manufacturers in Russia.

The study demonstrates that strategic and managerial motivations are more important than financial and technological motivations, and that a strategic alliance (joint venture) strategy is better rewarded but riskier than a go‐it alone strategy in Russia.

Surprisingly, the results do not show strong support that a go‐it‐alone strategy is less desirable than a joint venture alliance.

The existing literature indicates that in developing countries, much remains to be done in terms of improving understanding of international joint venture (IJV) issues such as the motives for firms to pursue IJVs and the factors which affect their performance. In view of this, the present paper seeks to identify the motives of Malaysian firms for engaging in offshore IJVs, and analyze the interplay among four key variables – motive, strategic fit, knowledge transfer and innovation performance – from the perspective of Malaysian IJVs.

Based on a literature review, theoretical linkages among the variables and relevant hypotheses were developed; then subsequently tested using bootstrap analysis. A total of 234 questionnaires were sent to managers of Malaysian IJVs abroad and 74 usable responses were returned, yielding a response rate of 31.62 percent.

The results suggest that Malaysian firms pursue IJVs abroad mainly to expedite profit generation and market penetration, while acquiring knowledge is considered only as a secondary motive. At the same time the results affirm that knowledge transfer mediates the effect of strategic fit on the innovative capacity of the IJVs. This implies that although knowledge transfer is very important to IJV innovation performance, that importance is seriously underestimated by Malaysian businesses.

The study highlights the need to incorporate moderating factors in the future when examining the effect of motive and strategic fit on innovation. Results of the reliability tests also question the generalizability of existing strategic fit and knowledge transfer scales in a Malaysian setting.

The findings provide lessons for foreign businesses by improving understanding of what Malaysian businesses seek most in an IJV, which in turn will help foster better strategic fit between partners. For Malaysian firms and policy makers, the study should serve as a reminder that knowledge transfer is very important in improving innovativeness and deserves greater attention and commitment.

Research on IJV suggests interesting differences between firms from developed and developing nations. The current paper helps to enrich the literature on IJVs, particularly from the perspective of knowledge and learning orientation in developing nations.

This study aims to investigate how judgments of firms’ underlying motives are affected by corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication which features percentages of profit allocations to CSR causes. It also examines how firm size interacts with CSR spending allocations affecting motive attributions for firms of different sizes.

Two experiments were carried out manipulating CSR spending allocations (smaller vs larger percentage of profit) and firm size (small vs large firm).

A larger percentage of profits allocated to CSR enhanced value-driven motives and inhibited inferences of manipulative intent, which produced lower egoistic-driven motives. Large firms allocating smaller percentages to CSR were judged as less value-driven and were more prone to elicit manipulative intent.

Two routes of motive attributions were identified – a direct route, contingent on CSR spending allocations and firm size; and an indirect route via inferences of manipulative intent, which inhibited favorable motives and prompted unfavorable ones. Both routes resulted from numerical cognition associated with the processing of numbers. Managerial implications include suggestions for firms wishing to overcome negative consumer bias arising from communication featuring CSR spending allocations and firm size.