Application of human resource management's universal model: An examination of people versus institutions as barriers of internationalization for SMEs in a small developing country

Although the importance of people and institutions has been highlighted in multinational enterprise studies, the association between people, institutions, and the internationalization of small to medium‐sized enterprise (SMEs) is an underexplored issue from the context of a small developing country. We examine theories subsumed under the Universal Model of human resource management (HRM) onto SMEs to study the hypothesized people and institutionally orientated barriers posed to SMEs’ internationalization. Using quantitative analysis, the impacts of the barriers on internationalization are highlighted with particular attention to employer attractiveness. Following extant literature review, this study has used primary data collected through questionnaires from 212 Bangladeshi SMEs. We developed and validated the partial least square‐based structural equation model (PLS‐SEM) to assess the impacts and successfully framed people versus institutional barriers as a second‐order hierarchical reflective model, which has not been done previously. Given their marginal significance over institutions, people‐oriented cultural barriers should be included as an extension of the Universal Model to study SME internationalization.     

The institutional work of a social enterprise operating in a subsistence marketplace: Using the business model as a market‐shaping tool

The void between formal and informal institutionalized practices that coexist in subsistence marketplaces can render them inaccessible to subsistence consumer–merchants. We conducted an in‐depth auto‐ethnographic study of Novo Dia Developments, a social enterprise in Maputo, Mozambique, seeking to make the housing market accessible. Our study extends the extant understanding of the transformation of subsistence marketplaces in two ways. First, our study characterizes the institutional work done by a social enterprise to open up a subsistence marketplace. Second, our study theorizes the business models in use as a mechanism through which institutional work can be organized and performed, by (a) transforming an idea for market change into new market offerings and practices that begin to fill the void, (b) materializing and making visible other institutional voids that need to be filled, and (c) serving as a juncture at which formal and informal institutionalized practices can connect.     

How Institutions Influence SME Innovation and Networking Practices: The Case of Vietnamese Agribusiness

This paper addresses impacts of the institutional framework on small and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) innovation and networking practices. Through an explorative study of a domestic SME‐dominated sector in Vietnam, we find that the institutional framework limits incentives for long‐term investments, resulting in exploitative cost‐control strategies rather than product‐oriented innovation. Due to dominating social norms, SMEs form trust‐based friendship networks, potentially limiting knowledge acquisition and weakening business rationality. Institutional pressures reinforce negative influences on SMEs' incentives to develop innovation ambidexterity. The findings suggest that new institutional economic sociology provides a promising foundation for understanding how institutional frameworks influence SMEs' innovation practices in emerging economies.     

民营企业成长的路径依赖

我们必须用产权方法和路径分析方法分析中国民营企业成长性差的制度原因 ,找出民营企业制度创新的路径。众多的民营企业锁定在低的甚至无成长只能说明存在重大的制度障碍。有效的企业制度应当最有利于企业的成长。分享型的产权制度和治理结构能使所有者和经营者关注企业成长。     

In search of the right fusion recipe: the role of legitimacy in building a social enterprise model

Social enterprises, as typical hybrid organisations, are embedded in a plural institutional environment in which some stakeholders regard achieving social goals as fundamental, while others see economic profit as the priority. A great challenge for social enterprises is dealing with the conflicts resulting from the diverse expectations of stakeholders. Based on the existing works on organisational legitimacy and the social business model, we propose a legitimacy‐based social enterprise model composed of three main phases, namely, legitimacy proposition, legitimacy strategy planning, and legitimacy strategy implementation. Our model is meant to serve as an effective legitimacy‐building tool for social enterprises of various kinds.     

Institutional Barriers to Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprise Operations in Transition Countries

Building on institutional theory and on existing literature regarding barriers to private businesses in transition countries, this paper examines the inter-related effect of nineteen factors grouped into four types of barriers (formal, informal, environmental and skills) on existing small- and medium-sized enterprise operations in Lithuania. Regression analyses on a sample of 332 business owners indicate that perceived formal barriers are associated with perceived informal barriers such as corruption and perceived environmental barriers are associated with perceived skill barriers such as management problems. The transition effect based on business start-up date was not found to play a significant role.     

Exploring the multi-level processes of legitimacy in transnational social enterprises

Transnational entrepreneurship has emerged as a form of migrants' participation in the social, economic, and political lives of both their countries of origin and of residence. Leveraging increasing evidence about migrants' involvment in transnational social enterprises, we examine the multi-level processes through which organizational legitimacy is molded by transnational entrepreneurs to reflect country-level institutional settings, and how organizational-level legitimacy affects entrepreneurs' social status. We longitudinally examine the multi-level processes of legitimation in a transnational social enterprise operated by Ghanaian migrants across Italy and Ghana. We analyze secondary and ethnographic data for two years, observing how transnational social enterprises harvest moral and pragmatic legitimacy from the institutional contexts in which they operate. We study how entrepreneurs construe their social status through pragmatic legitimacy obtained from their transnational ventures, and their institutional environments inspired by micro- and meso legitimacy reconfigurations. We discuss theoretical implications for social and transnational entrepreneurship and practical contributions for policy-making.     

企业社会责任的制度理性及行为逻辑:合法性视角

对企业社会责任的研究,学界一直是分歧多于应有的共识,主要原因是基于效率视角的经济理性分析主导着话语权,却过于注重技术环境和效率机制,而忽视了基于合法性视角的制度理性分析,忽视了制度环境和合法性机制。为揭示企业社会责任的行为逻辑,文章首先反思经济理性,并从新视角——合法性视角突出制度理性,指出制度理性是企业社会责任行为逻辑的起点。接着,按"制度环境—制度压力—企业行为"逻辑,着重分析了制度环境和制度压力对企业社会责任行为的作用机制,构建了合法性机制模型,其核心观点是制度环境对企业产生制度压力,通过规制机制、规范机制和模仿机制导致企业行为。最后,得出结论及其启示。     

Institutional work to navigate ethical dilemmas: Evidence from a social enterprise

Social entrepreneurs encounter ethical dilemmas while addressing their social and commercial missions. The literature has implicitly acknowledged the ethical dilemmas social entrepreneurs face; however, the nature and implications of these ethical dilemmas and how social entrepreneurs navigate them are underexplored and undertheorized. We address this by conducting a 36-month field study of a social enterprise operating in a rural resource-constrained environment in India and dealing with a stigmatized product. We found four categories of ethical dilemmas faced by social entrepreneurs: challenges in engaging the community (equality vs. efficiency and fairness vs. care), challenges related to spillover effects (right vs. responsibilities), challenges in balancing diverse stakeholders (emotionally detached vs. emotionally engaged), and challenges related to cross-subsidization efforts (utilitarianism vs. fairness). Further, we identified three types of institutional work social entrepreneurs engage in to address ethical dilemmas: recognition work, responsibilization work, and reflective judgment work. We label these three institutional works as inclusion work - purposive actions of an entity to address ethical dilemmas by implementing its program in a way that supports the most marginalized. Our study makes an important contribution to the literature on ethics in the context of social entrepreneurship by identifying specific ethical dilemmas social entrepreneurs face in managing hybridity (balancing social-commercial objectives) and enhancing social impact (managing social-social objectives). Moreover, through the concept of inclusion work, our research not only integrates insights from ethics and institutional theories but also responds to the recent call to address grand societal challenges through institutional work.     

基于企业基因理论的企业成长研究述评

企业的健康成长是社会经济发展的重要因素,结合企业基因理论探讨企业成长状况的研究越来越多。通过对相关文献的梳理,从企业成长的实质、影响因素和作用机制三个方面对现有研究成果进行综述,并在此基础上对未来研究提出了展望。     

Trust and SME attitudes towards equity financing across Europe

The decision by a small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) to take on equity requires trust, due to reliance on the good intentions of the parties involved. Drawing on a social capital perspective, we argue that national interpersonal and institutional trust positively influences SME attitudes towards equity financing. We also hypothesize a substitution effect between interpersonal and institutional trust. Through a large survey of European SMEs in 26 countries, we confirm the presence of these direct and interaction effects. By making explicit the link between trust and attitudes to equity financing we extend the theory on institutional drivers of SME financing.     

Business Environment Index for Developing Countries: The Case of Latin America

This article develops a new business environment index with indicators that are appropriate, broadly available for developing regions, and, most importantly, are not double-edged. We used the index to analyze the business environment in Latin America, and it suggests the main role of basic economic principles, institutional economics approach and historical context. We propose the identification of an interdisciplinary variable as well as interpretation of the index, based on 10 factors divided into three dimensions (economic, institutional, and social). The novelty is in the consideration of past values; it is neither based on popularity votes, and nor does it favor large economies.     

Dare to be different? Investigating the relationship between analyst categorisation hierarchies and corporate social responsibility (CSR) conformity

This paper investigates how analyst categorisation hierarchies (CH) affect corporate social responsibility (CSR) conformity. We argue that firms that are labelled as either high rank or low rank by analysts have higher institutional immunity, while firms that are categorised as middle rank have lower immunity. These heterogeneous institutional immunities will affect the levels of CSR conformity differently. Our results, which originate from a sample of Chinese listed firms from 2009 to 2016, suggest that CH exhibit an inverted‐U‐shaped relationship with CSR conformity. High‐ranked and low‐ranked firms are most likely to be CSR nonconformist, while middle‐ranked firms tend to conduct CSR like the majority of their industry peers. Moreover, we also investigate the environmental boundary conditions of this curvilinear relationship. This relationship is moderated by environmental munificence (positively) and dynamism (negatively). Our findings fill the theoretical gap by proposing an institutional‐based explanation for the CSR conformity heterogeneity which is rarely discussed and extending the boundary conditions for the categorisation‐CSR conformity relationship.     

企业社会资本与企业组织变革

企业社会资本是企业内外个人及组织之间建立的社会信任网络。作为组织变革的制度基础,企业社会资本的存量、构成及管理者所采用的内部或外部导向的管理战略对组织变革能力、水平有着重要影响。因此,对企业而言,富有成效的管理在于采取外部与内部导向并重的管理战略,提高组织变革能力,增强企业竞争实力。     

Institutional investors as stewards of the corporation: Exploring the challenges to the monitoring hypothesis

The study explores the challenges UK‐based institutional investors face when trying to monitor investee companies and influence their social, environmental, and governance practices. Consistent with previous research, I find that misalignment of interests within the investment chain and dispersed ownership are factors which inhibit investor activism. However, other underexplored challenges include lack of investee company transparency and investor experience in activism, as well as low client demand for engagement and internal conflicts of interest. The results contribute to the literature on institutional investor activism by using direct empirical evidence to systematically discuss the challenges to stewardship. Given the intensification of media and regulatory attention on shareholders in the post‐global financial crisis era, coupled with investors’ growing awareness and practice of stewardship, the research opens new avenues for enquiry which go beyond the on‐going debate about the monitoring versus short‐termism roles of institutional investors.     

The Institutional Requirements Of Apprenticeship: Evidence From Smaller EU Countries

To what extent does the experience of other European econom‐ies in which apprenticeship has proved successful suggest scope for reviving apprenticeship in the UK without requiring institutional regulation along German lines? The institutional attributes of apprenticeship in four smaller European economies (Austria, Denmark, Ireland and the Netherlands) are shown to be closer to Germany’s social partnership than to the UK’s deregulated market, in terms of: statutory governance; formal educational requirements; administration at sec‐toral and local levels through social partnership; and funding based upon a clear separation of responsibilities between government and employers, though not between employers and apprentices. At the same time, the introduction of statu‐tory apprenticeship into Irish industry in recent years, in an institutional environment that has traditionally had much in common with that of the UK, suggests that the scope for institutional development in support of apprenticeship has been obscured by the widespread tendency to limit the choice of international comparisons to the Anglo‐Germanic.     

An Investigation into the Formal Institutional Constraints that Restrict Entrepreneurship and SME Growth in Russia

The impact of institutions on the ease of doing business in transition economies has attracted considerable interest in recent years. The literature suggests that institutional quality is crucial in determining levels of entrepreneurship and SME development in such countries. Our research explores the perceptions of Russian SME owners regarding the quality of the institutional environment that they face making use of semi-structured interviews for data gathering purposes. We identify the political, economic and regulatory barriers that restrict entrepreneurship and SME growth in contemporary Russia, together with entrepreneurs’ views as to what reforms are needed for greater business growth in future.     

Blessing in Disguise? Social and Institutional Determinants of Entrepreneurial Intentions following Involuntary Job Loss

In this study, drawing from occupational identity theory, we argue that self‐employment decision is influenced by the extent to which one's perceived social status will be enhanced by pursuing such a career, as well as the presence of favorable institutional climate. Using nonprofit employment assistance agencies, we surveyed 266 individuals in the southern part of the United States who had faced involuntary job loss. The result of our hierarchical moderated regression data analysis indicates that perceived social status and business climate were significant predictors of self‐employment intentions. Overall, our findings highlight the role of social and institutional environment in facilitating self‐employment.     

Organizational attention to corporate social responsibility and corporate social performance: the moderating effects of corporate governance

Many studies have explored the antecedents of corporate social performance (CSP), such as institutional forces and stakeholder pressures. However, few studies examine CSP from a socio‐cognitive perspective. To address this research void, this study adopts an attention‐based approach to examine the relationship between managers' attention to social issues and CSP. More important, this study reports that this relationship will be moderated by governance mechanisms that constrain managerial discretion. Using a sample of Chinese listed firms, this study provides empirical support for these arguments. Therefore, our study adds new insights to the literature addressing CSP from a socio‐cognitive perspective and speaks to the structural features, both inside and outside organizations, that guide managers' attention.     

Do Entrepreneurial Social Networks Boost Enterprise Growth? Evidence from the Pearl River Delta in China

Against the backdrop of China’s traditional culture and economic transition, the effect of entrepreneurs’ social networks on enterprise growth has become an important topic attracting attention from both academics and practitioners. This paper decomposes entrepreneurs’ social networks into three dimensions: the external horizontal social network representing inter-firm relationship, external vertical social network in the form of interactions between enterprises and the government, and internal vertical social network referring to entrepreneurs’ control over enterprise operation. Results based on data from the Pearl River Delta reveal that all of the three dimensions of social network exert a positive impact on enterprise growth. The external horizontal social network plays the most influencing role, while the effects of the other two kinds of networks cannot be neglected either.