Search results

The paper explores the links between network structures and internationalization, conceptualized as a process of value innovation. The exploration sets off from the concept of an entry node, i.e. whether network entrance is facilitated by a direct dyadic or an indirect triadic relationship.

The paper is mainly conceptual, but also presents an empirical cross-border actor constellation which highlights the implications of the study.

Bi-directionality implies that value innovation is contingent on the fit between the actors involved in the entry node, not on the fulfilment of the needs of a focal actor. Further, the attractiveness of an entry node depends on network structures, the network positions of the actors in the entry node, the desired outcomes of entry (immersion or reach), and the actual behavior of the actors. The dynamics of transitivity can influence triadic entry nodes. However, transitivity operates differently in business networks than in social networks constituted by inter-personal ties. Therefore, closure of open triadic entry nodes is neither an automatic outcome of strong ties, nor a normatively better outcome.

The theorizing offered by this paper must be further explored in different empirical contexts to assess its practical adequacy. Still, the presented empirical case indicates that the expected attractiveness of entry nodes is closely linked to (in)transitivity.

The paper supports the relevance of expanding from a dyadic to a network perspective in order to capture the dynamics of value innovation in an international setting.

This paper aims to explore changes in communication networks during organizational crisis. In the literature, various terms such as organizational mortality, organizational death, bankruptcy, decline, retrenchment and failure have been used to characterize different forms and facets of organizational crisis. Communication network studies have typically focussed on nodes (e.g. individuals or organizations), relationships between those nodes and subsequent affects of these relationships upon the network as a whole. Email networks in contemporary organizations are fairly representative of the underlying communication networks.

The changing communication network structure at Enron Corporation during the crisis period (2000-2001) has been analyzed. The goal is to understand how communication patterns and structures are affected by organizational crisis. Drawing on communication network crisis and group behaviour theory, three propositions are tested: communication network becomes increasingly transitive as organizations experience crisis; communication network becomes less hierarchical as organizations are going through crisis; and communication network becomes more reciprocal as organizations are going through crisis.

In this research analysis, the support of these three propositions was noticed. The results of tests and their implications are discussed in this paper.

This study builds on an emerging stream of research area that applies social network analysis to organizational interaction data to study various questions related to organizational change and disintegration. These findings could help managers in designing an effective approach to monitor regular functionalities of their organizations.

This paper responds to a call in the literature for methodological and empirical studies to advance research into accounting narratives, in the light of acknowledged areas of weakness and gaps in the accounting literature and with a view to investigating impression management. A general line of critique in the accounting literature points to a need to expand both the syntactic and thematic dimensions, with a particular focus on developing objective methods of analysis that allow computer‐based measurement. The paper draws on the literature of managerial business communications, supported by that of applied linguistics, in bringing to accounting research a transitivity index and the application of DICTION analysis. Both have the potential to extend computer‐based analysis of accounting narratives, subject to careful initial research design and specification. The potential for a richer empirical analysis is demonstrated through an illustrative empirical application.

This study aims to explore how social networks could be used in the measurement of transactive memory systems (TMS) or other team constructs and provide motivation for future analyses of TMS measurement.

TMSs describe the structures and processes that teams use to share information, work together and accomplish shared goals. This paper proposes the use of social network analysis in measuring TMS. This is accomplished by describing the creation and administration of a TMS network instrument and evaluating the relation of the proposed network measures, previous measures of TMS and performance.

Findings include that proposed network measures perform similarly to previously proposed, frequently used measures of TMS.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is among the first papers to propose network measures for the evaluation of TMS.

The paper aims to answer the question “can the bipolar Negative‐Neutral‐Positive logic be extended and motivated in some probabilistic framework?”

Using the context of cognitive map interpretation of the conjunction and disjunction connectives in bipolar logic, three probabilistic causal reasoning have been put forward. The first one is based on the infinitesimal representation of material implication while the second one relies on the qualitative representation developed by Suppes and Cartwright. In both cases special conditions for transitivity of inference and multiple inputs scenarios are examined. The third developed approach implicitly omits the cognitive interpretation and rather relies on the idea that the causal independence structure can be substituted by some functional that combines independent inputs in such a way to force the output to be in full agreement with results expected through the conjunctive and disjunctive connectives.

The paper reports several theoretical findings regarding the different conditions ensuring the agreement and equivalence between the bipolar logic connectives and their probabilistic counterparts for each proposal. The paper also provides useful insights to link the finding to probabilistic argumentation system where pro and con arguments are considered simultaneously.

The paper offers theoretical basis for researchers investigating different categories of logics and contribute to the discussion linking logic to probability.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the human dimension of project management by establishing the extent to which social networks influence the commitment of project stakeholders. Up to date, project managers still identify inadequate stakeholder commitment to project undertakings as a key antecedent of project failure and so efforts aimed at addressing this challenge are highly valued. The paper therefore explores the use of social networks as one of the possible strategies to enhance project-stakeholder commitment.

The paper adopts a quantitative, cross-sectional study design. Based on responses from 172 project stakeholders who took part in a sample of 92 citizenship projects conducted by major commercial banks in Uganda, hierarchical regression was used to indicate what happens to a model as different predictor variables are introduced The use of specific type of projects minimizes bias in results due to the unique nature of specific projects hence enhances reliability of results.

The results from statistical analysis reveal that social network elements (network transitivity and network degree) are significant predictors of project stakeholder commitment. The results also suggest that network transitivity is a better significant predictor of project-stakeholder commitment than network degree

Project-stakeholder commitment has been widely studied in relation to project performance and the study makes a number of contributions to the theory and study of projects. First and foremost, the paper studied project social networks and project-stakeholder commitment in citizenship projects in commercial banks in Uganda which is a developing country. The study therefore contributes to an understanding of project social networks and project-stakeholder commitment in citizenship projects of commercial banks in a developing country. The implication of the findings is that it provides a different view point of understanding the aspects that affect project commitment. A lot of focus has been placed on improving project performance in Uganda, but none has specifically focussed on building project-stakeholder commitment through the use of project social networks.

Earlier attempts to investigate the impact of social networks on commitment in projects did not study commitment among individuals. Also, no previous empirical study in less developed countries has given special attention to the effect of social networks on project-stakeholder commitment especially in the domain of citizenship projects which have gained a lot of momentum around the globe. The study results indicate that getting concerned with the nature of social networks the project creates and the means it uses to maintain such networks has implications for project-stakeholder commitment.

The paper aims to provide a theoretically informed critique of current measurement practices for word-of-mouth marketing (WOMM) campaigns.

An exploratory field study is conducted on a real-life WOMM campaign. Data are collected from two generations of campaign participants using a custom-built Facebook app and subjected to social network analysis (SNA). We compare our theoretically informed measure of campaign reach with industry standard practice.

Standard metrics for WOMM campaigns assume campaign reach equates to the number of campaign-related conversations. These metrics fail to allow for the possibility that some participants may be exposed multiple times to campaign-related messaging. In this exploratory field study, standard metrics overestimate campaign reach by 57.5 per cent. The campaign is also significantly less efficient in terms of cost-per-conversation. SNA shows that multiple exposures are associated with transitivity and tie strength. Multiple exposures mean that the total number of campaign-related conversations cannot be regarded as equivalent to the number of individuals reached.

SNA provides a sound theoretical foundation for the critique of current WOMM measurement practices. Two social-structural network attributes – transitivity and tie strength – inform our critique. A single WOMM campaign provides the field study context.

The findings have significant implications for the development and deployment of WOMM effectiveness and efficiency metrics and are relevant to WOMM agencies, agency clients and the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Association.

This is the largest field study of its kind having collected data on >5,000 WOMM campaign-related conversations. Participants specified precisely whom they spoke to about the campaign and the strength of that social tie. This is the first SNA-informed critique of standard WOMM campaign measurement practices and first quantification of offline multiple exposures to a WOMM campaign. We demonstrate how standard campaign metrics are based on the false assumption that word-of-mouth flows exclusively along intransitive ties.

The purpose of this paper is to capitalise on three waves of longitudinal data from a cohort of 4,351 secondary school pupils to examine the effects on individuals’ cannabis use uptake of both peer cannabis use and position within a peer network.

Both cross-sectional and individual fixed effects models are used to estimate the effect on cannabis use of nominated friends’ cannabis use, of reciprocity and transitivity of nominations across the friendship cluster, and of interactions between these nominated friends. Post hoc analyses parsed the behaviour of reciprocating and non-reciprocating friends.

Cannabis use varied depending on the stability of friendship network and the degree of reciprocity and interconnectedness within the group. Behavioural influence was strong, but interaction effects were observed between the prevalence of cannabis use among friends, the structure of the friendship group and ego’s proximity to group members. These interactions demonstrate that behavioural influence is more salient in more cohesive groups. When reciprocating and non-reciprocating friends’ mean cannabis use were separated, influence from reciprocating friends was estimated at twice the magnitude of other friends.

While preventing any one individual from using cannabis is likely to have a multiplier effect on classmates, the bonds and interactions between classmates will determine which classmates are affected by this multiplier and the salience of that effect.

Choice under risk has a large stochastic (unpredictable) component. This chapter examines five stochastic models for binary discrete choice under risk and how they combine with “structural” theories of choice under risk. Stochastic models are substantive theoretical hypotheses that are frequently testable in and of themselves, and also identifying restrictions for hypothesis tests, estimation and prediction. Econometric comparisons suggest that for the purpose of prediction (as opposed to explanation), choices of stochastic models may be far more consequential than choices of structures such as expected utility or rank-dependent utility.

Destinations have in the scholarly literature been labeled as communities of interdependent organizations that collectively coproduce a variety of products and services. The paradigm comes close to describing destinations as firms which are embedded in interfirm networks. Recent studies provide crucial insights into an understanding of destinations' orchestration and structuration as coproducing interfirm networks. However, systematic knowledge about how these systems evolve and develop is lacking. This chapter addresses this issue and elaborates how the concepts of scale-free and small-world networks together can explain the process of destination evolution. The discussion also suggests how such theorizing can spur avenues for future research.