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Contemporary entrepreneurial education (EE) has global reach and impact, with a growing number of entrepreneurship courses, specializations, and degrees in all parts of the world. There is no longer a question of the significance and demand for EE in the higher education system. At the same time, the interest in scientific knowledge and proven experience of “what works” has accelerated, resulting in a rapid growth in the number of scholars and research-based publications conversing vividly about the field. This chapter elaborates on the historical evolution of EE as a scholarly field. First, an overview of important milestones and major events that shaped the field is provided. Second, by focusing on the development over the last three decades, the authors present an overview of the advances that have occurred within the field in terms of practice, social, and research-based aspects. The historical review shows how EE began in, but gradually separated from entrepreneurship as a field, which can be observed in the development of research outlets, meeting places, and teaching practice. Consequently, this historical review can serve as a point of departure for showing how the field has emerged and how knowledge has been developed and accumulated over time. The authors believe that this review can be helpful for scholars, particularly new entrants such as PhD students and other scholars entering the EE field, to learn from and contextualize their own research-based historical insight.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the various supplier selections construct impacts on firm’s operational competitive capability as well as an overall performance from a developing country’s environment.

Structural equation modeling was used to study the relationship between supplier selection criteria, competitive operational capabilities and overall organizational performance using survey of informants.

In this work, the authors demonstrate that an effective supplier selection will lead to an enhanced competitive capability of the buying firm. Specifically, the authors show that selecting suppliers based on quality will lead to an improved quality of the buying firm, service will lead to improved delivery time and supplier strategic fit will lead to reduced cost, improved delivery time and improved flexibility of the buying firm. Furthermore, the buying firm competitive operational capabilities in terms of improved delivery time will lead overall performance from the Ghanaian business environment. The results indicate no significant difference between the manufacturing and service sectors.

The results indicate the relevance and the implications of the various supplier selection criteria from a developing country’s environment such as Ghana.

The research shows how supplier selection criteria should be structured to enhance operational competitive capabilities and overall performance of the buying firm.

The work illustrates and provides some insights and build on the literature in the area of supply selection strategies from a developing country’s environment.

The competitive business environment in the automotive industry has forced vehicle manufacturers (VMs) to improve their relationship strategies towards their suppliers. VMs have implemented supplier segmentation in order to optimise current business activities and existing resource allocations. Supplier selection criteria have also become crucial in order to achieve an appropriate evaluation of suppliers. Models of supplier segmentation and supplier selection criteria underpin theoretically this research. Empirical illustrations of supplier segmentation based on the perspectives of a VM and its suppliers are presented. The principal contributions of this study are the various models therein. One of the models consists of two dimensions: the supplier's commitment to a VM; and the commodity's importance to a VM. In extension, another model of dynamic relationship strategies is introduced. It consists of four relationship strategies towards suppliers in the automotive industry, such as family, business partner, friendly, and transactional. Furthermore, a four‐phase process for the analysis, selection, and managerial decision of a dynamic relationship strategy towards suppliers in the automotive industry is outlined.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the interplay of skill-enhancing human resources practices, customer orientation (CO) and tourism small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) performance indicators.

Data for 194 valid cases are gathered through face-to-face techniques in Albanian tourism SMEs. Structural equation modeling is implemented to analyze data and test the hypothesis proposed.

Overall, both skill-enhancing human resources (HR) practices (i.e. recruitment/selection and training) are not associated with SMEs performance. Results suggest that using HR selection/recruitment practices are not associated to SME’s CO. Contrary, implementing skill-enhancing HR training practices is significant for SMEs strategy to focus and address customers’ wants and needs. Finally, it was found that the CO mediates the relationship between skill-enhancing HR training practices and performance, but this was not true on the skill-enhancing HR recruitment/selection practices-performance relationship.

This study makes contributions by further informing the debate about the direct and indirect link between skill-enhancing HR practices and performance. Additionally, it examines the precise role of the skill-enhancing HR practice on SMEs’ culture and or strategy to create value for customers.

The purpose of this paper is to develop and test a structural model of the factors that explain the level of perceived relationship effectiveness between marketing managers and sales managers.

The model integrates trust‐based and power/influence/interdependence‐based models of relationship effectiveness. The data were collected from 113 sales managers in the UK and Australia. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the validity of the measures, while AMOS Version 4 was employed to estimate the model using structural equation modelling with observed variables.

The study found, on average, that the perceived level of relationship effectiveness between sales managers and marketing managers is surprisingly high. The findings clearly demonstrate the potency of interpersonal trust (both cognition‐based and affect‐based) in building effective cross‐functional relationships (CFRs) and also show how interdependence affects both dimensions of trust and the marketing manager's level of manifest influence. In addition, the findings indicate that, when marketing managers have greater manifest influence, the CFR is more effective. Importantly, evidence is provided regarding the consequences of marketing managers using the two influence tactics of legalistic pleas and threats, in terms of their effects on trust and manifest influence. Finally, insights are given about the sequencing of these two influence tactics and how the power of the marketing unit indirectly affects relationship effectiveness.

This is one of the very few studies to use a large empirical survey to examine the marketing and sales dyad.

HARROGATE will be notable as the venue of the Conference in one or two ways that distinctive. The Association Year is now to begin on January 1st and not in September as heretofore; and, in consequence, there will be no election of president or of new council until the end of the year. The Association's annual election is to take place in November, and the advantages of this arrangement must be apparent to everyone who considers the matter. Until now the nominations have been sent out at a time when members have been scattered to all parts of the country on holiday, and committees of the Council have been elected often without the full consideration that could be given in the more suitable winter time. In the circumstances, at Harrogate the Chair will still be occupied by Sir Henry Miers, who has won from all librarians and those interested in libraries a fuller measure of admiration, if that were possible, than he possessed before he undertook the presidency. There will be no presidential address in the ordinary sense, although Sir Henry Miers will make a speech in the nature of an address from the Chair at one of the meetings. What is usually understood by the presidential address will be an inaugural address which it is hoped will be given by Lord Irwin. The new arrangement must bring about a new state of affairs in regard to the inaugural addresses. We take it that in future there will be what will be called a presidential address at the Annual Meeting nine months after the President takes office. He will certainly then be in the position to review the facts of his year with some knowledge of events; he may chronicle as well as prophesy.

The purpose of this paper is to verify if Brazilian companies are adopting environmental requirements in the supplier selection process. Further, this paper intends to analyze whether there is a relation between the level of environmental management maturity and the inclusion of environmental criteria in the companies' selection of suppliers.

A review of mainstream literature on environmental management, traditional criteria in the supplier selection process and the incorporation of environmental requirements in this context. The empirical study's strategy is based on five Brazilian case studies with industrial companies. Face‐to‐face interviews and informal conversations are to be held, explanations made by e‐mail with representatives from the purchasing, environmental management, logistics and other areas, and observation and the collection of company documents are also employed.

Based on the cases, it is concluded that companies still use traditional criteria to select suppliers, such as quality and cost, and do not adopt environmental requirements in the supplier selection process in a uniform manner. Evidence found shows that the level of environmental management maturity influences the depth with which companies adopt environmental criteria when selecting suppliers. Thus, a company with more advanced environmental management adopts more formal procedures for selecting environmentally appropriate suppliers than others.

This is the first known study to verify if Brazilian companies are adopting environmental requirements in the supplier selection process.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a new composite model using structural equation modelling (SEM) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) for the selection of suppliers.

In this paper the authors have made an attempt to arrive at the supplier selection score using SEM and AHP. An attempt has been made to develop a new composite model using SEM and AHP technique, based on the survey of 151 respondents. Attributes' weightage are found out using cluster analysis.

Based on the output from the composite model, cluster analysis has been carried out to find out the strengths and weakness of each supplier on the influencing factors. Based on these findings, the supplier can improve on factors where they lag and can maintain the factors where they excel.

In this paper the authors have made an attempt to arrive at the supplier selection score using SEM and AHP.

The purpose of this paper is to examine retailer response to the use of alternative currency, or scrip, as an emergency measure during the Great Depression. Advocates of scrip argue that it would help recovery efforts, encouraging consumer spending and keeping dollars “at home” within the local community. Merchants face a dilemma, as they hope to use any means to increase sales, but are worried that they would be left holding a stack of worthless paper that they would not be able to pass on to their suppliers. Two cases of scrip in action in Chicago and Atlanta are contrasted.

This paper draws upon primary data sources including period newspapers from across the USA, business periodicals, archival materials from retailers and city councils, and government reports.

There is no uniform response to the use of scrip by merchants. Some retailers hope to use scrip to boost sales and encourage consumer loyalty, and even organized their own campaigns to use alternative currency. In other cases, retailers felt the risks of accepting scrip were too high. Without the participation of retailers, scrip schemes were doomed to failure.

In the early years of the Depression, alternative currency enjoyed a remarkable popularity across the USA. It is now known that scrip would not end the crisis, as boosters hoped, yet this episode reveals much about popular understandings of the economy, and the role of retailers in local communities.

Increasingly, sourcing decisions are routinely including contract manufacturers and suppliers in developing countries. While many studies have researched and identified the criteria for selecting suppliers in general terms, there has been a dearth of studies on the criteria for choosing amongst suppliers in developing countries including suppliers in Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the criteria for choosing amongst suppliers in different developing countries.

The methodology consists of a series of case studies involving six firms some of which are sourcing from developing countries and some that are based in developing countries and supply lead firms in developed countries.

Cost, physical and cultural proximity, political factors and reliability are found to be the primary criteria for sourcing decisions that include suppliers in Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. Further, the paper identifies why these criteria are used and the drawbacks in using them.

A key limitation of the study is generalizability. Based on the use of a case study methodology, caution should be exercised in generalizing the results of the study.

In spite of the limitations, this paper contributes to the extant literature on sourcing from developing countries. It provides valuable insights for global purchasing managers interested in sourcing from developing countries in terms of the criteria for choosing a particular location for sourcing and selecting a supplier within a given location.