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This study aims to examine the mediating effect of four antecedents of competitive advantage on the linkage of risky strategy to firm performance, measured by revenue dynamics. It considers the roots of competitive advantage to highlight different patterns and foundations of achieving superior performance. It investigates whether pursuing a risky strategy fosters revenue dynamics growth and whether different mediators are included in that relationship.

Path analysis (structural equation modeling) method is used to analyze data from 122 companies of various sizes and industries. All respondents were responsible for executing strategic management processes. The paper used the subjective perspective, which is based on the individual opinion of senior company managers and owners.

The authors find a positive relationship between risky strategy and firm performance, but no evidence of a mediating role of competitive advantage and dynamic growth in this relationship. Competitive advantage should be perceived as a set of integrated factors that can be analyzed from an aggregated perspective. Integrating all antecedents requires a holistic and systematic approach and the development of a particular mindset. Aggregated competitive advantage is related to setting dynamic growth as a priority. However, no relationship between risky strategy and achieving competitive advantage, or between implementing a risky strategy and setting dynamic growth as a priority, is observed, which was assumed to explain the revenue dynamics growth.

Secondary data should be analyzed to explore how risky strategies are manifested, and which managerial decisions are reflected in high-level risk. A multidimensional scale could be developed to check how risk shapes the constructs’ interdependence. Therefore, the dynamic capabilities approach could be further expanded.

This research offers insights into the short-term relationship between risky strategy and revenue dynamics, although competitive advantage does not mediate that relationship. Special attention should be paid to the selected antecedents of competitive advantage, as they influence dynamic growth.

This work provides insights into different antecedents of competitive advantage, which is not necessarily based on making risky decisions, and into factors that facilitate firm performance measured by revenue dynamics.

In a rapidly shifting market, organizations seek more diverse and innovative employee development interventions. Yet, these initiatives may have limited impact without employees’ engagement. This conceptual paper aims to propose self-leadership as a value-added strategy for promoting both individual and organizational development.

The authors conducted a conceptual analysis with three case examples. The cases were purposefully selected, aiming to comprehend how the concept of self-leadership has been applied within organizations and to identify real-life examples where self-leadership has been adopted as an organizational strategy.

This study demonstrates that self-leadership plays a significant role in facilitating human resource development (HRD) initiatives. Specifically, the authors illustrate how self-leadership interventions in companies empower individuals to take charge of their development, aligning personal and organizational goals. When effectively applied, self-leadership strategies positively impact HRD practices in the areas of training and development, organization development and career development, yielding benefits for both employees and employers.

This study addresses knowledge gaps in the emerging field of self-leadership in HRD by providing three companies’ examples of how self-leadership can add value to HRD. The findings offer unique insights into the synergy between self-leadership and HRD, benefiting academics interested in this line of inquiry and HRD practitioners seeking innovative approaches to employee and organizational development.

Lean Thinking is an operation management discipline which aims to identify, map and analyse the activities forming a process to detect “value waste” and outline the most effective flow of activities to execute in sequence. Process mapping is often developed in lean projects through the use of the Value Stream Map (VSM). Like many other management tools, the VSM adopts a static and non-systemic perspective in the representation of an organizational process. This may result in the implementation of Lean projects inconsistent with the overall organizational long-term strategy, thus leading to dysfunctional performance. In order to overcome this limit, the paper suggests combining VSM with System Dynamics (SD) modelling.

The paper is based on a review of the literature on VSM. This review is matched with an analysis of SD modelling principles aimed at explaining the practical and theoretical contribution of this approach to operation and strategic management practices. An illustrative case study is then provided to explore the practical implications of the proposed approach.

Our results show that SD modelling provides robust methodological support to VSM and Lean Thinking due to its inner characteristics, namely: simulation, systemic view, explicit link between system structure and behaviour and effective visual representation.

This research proposes a novel approach to design VSMs aimed at fostering a strategic perspective in Lean Thinking applications. Such an approach connects two fields of research and practice – i.e. VSM and SD modelling – which have traditionally been kept separated or, at least, partially combined for specific organizational sub-systems, thereby neglecting a broader strategic view of the entire process system.

This study aims to map scientific publications, intellectual structure and research trends in the development of human resource management (HRM) by adopting innovative practices. Specifically, it aims to (1) identify the fundamental contributions of research and to (2) determine the lines of research that constitute the most prominent intellectual structure to contribute to defining a future research agenda.

This study employs bibliometric, bibliographic coupling and cluster analysis techniques. To evaluate any potential patterns among the articles, it is analyzed how those were jointly cited. Hierarchical cluster analysis was also applied to those subject to bibliographic coupling analysis within the scope of grouping the interrelated articles into distinct sets.

The results enabled the identification and classification of various theoretical perspectives on human resources development through the adoption of innovative practices into four main approaches: (1) organizational factors of success, (2) strategic HRM, (3) human behavior and (4) learning management.

This study identifies, explores, analyzes and summarizes the main themes contributing to deepening the literature by identifying the priority areas concerning HRM through the adoption of innovative practices that can guarantee international standards of excellence.

This paper empirically explores the types and extent of cultural diversity strategies in Sweden, a developed economy with many migrant workers. The role of organizational culture as the context and the association with diversity strategy and the selection of international skilled migrant workers are examined.

Empirical data are collected by surveying 249 Swedish large or medium-sized firms. Cluster analysis is used to explore the configuration of organizational culture, cultural diversity strategy (CDS) and selection and development criteria.

The authors identify five clusters of organizations. Organizational culture is the main contextual factor that influences the CDS and human resource (HR) approaches for selecting skilled migrant workers. The profile of the clusters including organizational culture, diversity strategies, the selection criteria and firm demographics is presented. The empirical results indicate that organizational culture and demographics are associated with the choice of diversity strategy and, consequently, HR processes.

This study's main focus is on international skilled migrants, which is among empirically less-studied areas in global mobility literature. Furthermore, until now more attention has been directed toward studying the consequences of diversity than toward understanding the factors that influence choice of diversity strategies and practices. This study focuses on antecedents of diversity and attempts to understand the factors that influence adoption and implementation of different cultural diversity strategies.

A major part of knowledge management for knowledge-intensive firms such as professional service firms is the increasing focus on thought leadership. Despite being a well-known term, it is poorly defined and analysed in the academic and practitioner literature. The aim of this article is to answer three questions. First, what is thought leadership? Second, what tensions exist when seeking to create thought leadership in knowledge-based organisations? Third, what further research is needed about thought leadership? The authors call for cross-disciplinary and academic–practitioner approaches to understanding the field of thought leadership.

The authors review the academic and practitioner literature on thought leadership to provide a rich oversight of how it is defined and can be understood by separating inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors also draw on qualitative data from 12 in-depth interviews with senior leaders of professional service firms.

Through analysing and building on previous understandings of the concept, the authors redefine thought leadership as follows: “Knowledge from a trusted, eminent and authoritative source that is actionable and provides valuable solutions for stakeholders”. The authors find and explore nine tensions that developing thought leadership creates and propose a framework for understanding how to engage with thought leadership at the industry/macro, organisational/meso and individual/micro levels. The authors propose a research agenda based on testing propositions derived from new theories to explain thought leadership, including leadership, reducing risk, signalling quality and managing social networks, as well as examining the suggested ways to resolve different tensions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, they are the first to separate out thought leadership from its inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors show new organisational paradoxes within thought leadership and show how they can play out at different levels of analysis when implementing a thought leadership strategy. This work on thought leadership is set in a relatively under-explored context for knowledge management researchers, namely, knowledge-intensive professional service firms.