Search results

Interim managers (IMs) are consultants who take on managerial positions during limited periods to perform changes, handle crises or cover vacancies. The increasing use of these short-term outsiders shapes new conditions for organizational learning in contemporary work life. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to research-based knowledge and theoretical understanding of the relationship between interim management and organizational learning.

The paper presents a literature review on interim management published within the years 2000–2020 and analyzes it through the lens of organizational learning.

An interim management assignment is characterized by a period of uncertainty, a limited time frame, knowledge from the outside and rather invisible outcomes. The concepts of shared mental models, dialogue, knowledge creation and organizational culture shed light on possibilities and constraints for organizational learning in these arrangements. The findings highlight the IM’s position as central for transforming the organizational culture, put a question mark for the establishment of the IM’s knowledge, show the need for defining outcomes in terms of learning processes and indicate tensions between opportunities for dialogue and the exercise of power.

The study provides a new conceptual understanding of interim management, laying the foundation for empirical studies on this topic from an organizational learning perspective.

With the rise of the gig economy, management positions are increasingly staffed with flexible labor, so-called interim managers. They plunge into organizations for a limited period, operating in a liminal position as partly insider, partly outsider. Although several contributions to their client organizations are acknowledged, it is unknown how the interim manager’s knowledge from previous assignments is made useful in the new context under these particular working conditions. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to increase the understanding of how the interim manager’s knowledge is transferred to the client organization while operating from a liminal position.

This paper presents an interview-based multiple case study of six interim assignments where knowledge transfer is considered a social and context-dependent process.

The findings unveil the multifaceted nature of the liminal position, which consists of task orientation, time limitation, political detachment and cultural distance. These facets contribute to knowledge transfer in terms of new shared understandings and joint interests, which in turn might create new practices that augment continuous knowledge-sharing patterns.

The results contribute to the research on flexible work arrangements by shedding light on how the liminal position, predominantly depicted as an obstacle for the individual, might facilitate knowledge transfer. Through the process of knowledge generation, it is shown how a short-term engagement might enable the organization to increase its knowledge over time.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the potential predictors of anxiety about digital security, terrorist threats and support for high-tech counter measures.

In Study 1, 195 participants indicated their anxiety about digital security systems, data protection and social networking sites. In Study 2, 107 participants indicated their anxiety about domestic terrorism, international terrorism and extremist groups. In Study 3, 261 participants indicated their support for high-tech counter-terrorism measures.

Study 1 suggests that whereas anxiety about digital security systems, data protection and social networking sites was positively predicted by right-wing authoritarianism, anxiety about social networking was also negatively predicted by time spent online. Study 2 shows that time spent online was a negative predictor of anxiety about domestic terrorism. Study 3 indicates that the strongest positive predictor of support for all the measures was right-wing authoritarianism, followed by national identity.

The findings show the relevance of terror management theory to digital security and counter-terrorism.

It appears that right-wing authoritarianism and national identity may serve as mechanisms for people to subjectively counter the presented threats. This notion may inform relevant policy and practice aimed at making communities safer and potentially helps introduce counter-terror measures with less public backlash.

When designing counter-terror measures, policy makers should consider compound national identities (e.g. Catalan or Basque people).

The paper makes contribution to under-explored areas of terrorism anxiety and support for counter-terror measures.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the drivers for voluntary intellectual capital (IC) reporting based on agency theory. This study responds to calls for critical investigations of IC reporting utilising Goebel’s (2015a) IC measuring approach to investigate the role of IC value and mispricing for IC reporting.

A mandatory management report offers a unique research setting in Germany. The content analysis results of 428 German management reports are used in a regression analysis with leverage, ownership diffusion, IC value and mispricing. Additionally, a propensity score matching approach examines the relationship between IC reporting and IC value.

The regression results show that companies use voluntary IC reporting to encounter mispricing. IC reporting is negatively associated with leverage, whereas ownership diffusion and IC value show no significant results. The propensity score matching approach is also not significant.

This study contributes to strengthening and testing agency theory for IC reporting. As mispricing is identified to play an important role for IC reporting, IC research should account for mispricing.

The findings suggest to reopen a discussion on the declared aims of the German management report and the international integrated reporting model to provide information on value creation, as IC value shows no link to IC reporting.

This study innovatively links IC reporting to IC value and mispricing to investigate drivers for voluntary IC reporting.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze efficiency and its evolution in teams that played in the UEFA Champions League during nine seasons. The aim is to present a research procedure for determining the most accurate data envelopment analysis to estimate and compare the efficiency.

First, the authors analyzed the existence of a temporal trend using the S-statistic. The authors calculated the Kruskal–Wallis statistic to verify if there is stability in relative ranks. The results of the aforementioned tests have indicated that window analysis is an accurate methodology to apply to the sample. The authors analyzed 94 clubs with a sample of 288 observations, obtaining 768 efficiency ratios. They have been calculated using super-efficiency which enables to discriminate efficient units.

Results indicate that there is a low efficiency level in the nine seasons observed. There is a strong correlation between sports results and the efficiency of semifinalists. The authors conclude that improvement in a club’s efficiency could enhance its sports results. Finally, as practical implications, the authors highlight benchmark teams and alternative sports tactics to help clubs become more efficient and achieve better sports results.

This paper contributes to sports efficiency literature by presenting a research procedure to identify the most accurate methodology to be applied to panel data. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first empirical study on international football competitions applying WindowDEA to incomplete panel data.