Looking for a Needle in a Haystack: How to Search for Bottom‐Up Social Innovations that Solve Complex Humanitarian Problems

The worldwide increase in societal challenges is putting pressure on humanitarian organizations to develop sophisticated approaches to leverage social innovations in the humanitarian sector. Since humanitarian problems are complex problems, with the relevant knowledge being hidden, organizational search theory advocates the application of bottom‐up and theory‐guided search processes to identify the social innovations that solve these. Unfortunately, there has been no theoretical attention to understanding which approaches apply in this context. Further, established theory‐guided bottom‐up search processes, such as the lead user method, are unsuitable to the humanitarian sector, and we lack practice examples of adequate search processes. To start addressing this gap in theory and practice, procedural action research was done with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies to develop a theory‐guided bottom‐up innovation search process for the real‐life humanitarian problem of recurring floods in Indonesia. It revealed that an innovation search process for this context must differ significantly concerning its objectives and the steps to be taken from the lead user method, which was used as a starting point. Further, a comparison of the technical quality and the social impacts of the identified social innovations with social innovations identified through a non‐theory‐guided bottom‐up search process (i.e., an innovation contest) suggests the superiority of this theory‐guided search process. With this conclusion and the insights derived throughout the development of the search process, this study makes important contributions to theory development in the social and open innovation literatures and delivers important recommendations for social innovation practice in the humanitarian sector.     

Erratum zu: Die NAFTA-Verhandlungen — Wohin steuert die US-Handelspolitik?

Wirtschaftsdienst - In Heft 2/2018 muss in dem Aufsatz von Berend Diekmann, Katrin van Dyken „Die NAFTA-Verhandlungen — Wohin steuert die USHandelspolitik?“, S. 100-107, DOI:...     

The Emergence of Proto-Institutions in the New Normal Business Landscape: Dialectic Institutional Work and the Dutch Drone Industry

In the current business landscape, in which technology-enabled entrepreneurship is part of the New Normal, regulatory institutional structures are in constant flux. Previous studies have framed the challenges facing entrepreneurs in mature organizational fields as avoiding the power of overbearing regulators long enough to establish the legitimacy of their ventures. In fields typified by New Normal conditions, however, regulatory frameworks for evaluating new technology-enabled ventures are often still lacking. Regulators may choose to actively reach out to entrepreneurs to arrive at a better understanding of the radical technological changes and high-frequency entrepreneurial behavioural adaptations that occur in these settings. To grasp how novel regulatory institutional structures come about in the New Normal business landscape, we conducted a processual study of the emergence of a new technology that is the Dutch remotely piloted aircraft systems (drone) industry between 2000 and 2018. Our findings show that regulatory proto-institutions result from dialectic institutional work in the form of structured interactions between entrepreneurs and regulators. Specifically, we present a process model that reveals how new regulatory structures evolve in contexts where high levels of technological and behavioural change induce systemic uncertainty, and enlarge the interdependence between entrepreneurs and regulators. We suggest that our process theory of proto-institutional emergence generalizes towards other organizational fields in which technology-enabled entrepreneurship has become the main driver of growth. Theoretically, our findings speak to the literatures on institutional work, proto-institutional emergence, and the New Normal business landscape.     

HRM in dynamic environments: Exploitative,exploratory, and ambidextrous HR architectures

Abstract

The current economic crisis has brought to the fore the need for firms to deal with ambiguity and complexity. Hence, firms need a specific balance between exploration and exploitation in order to keep pace with varying and changing environmental conditions. Hitherto, there is limited research that has examined the nexus of HR architectures, ambidexterity, and environmental dynamics. In this conceptual paper we ask: How do HR architectures serve as a means of balancing exploitative and exploratory learning in different dynamic environments? We explain how exploratory, exploitative, and ambidextrous HR architectures with their embedded HRM systems on the business unit level enable organizations to meet different environmental requirements. Thus, firms in which heterogeneous demands for flexibility and for innovation co-exist need to develop internally differentiated HR architectures. In particular, we elucidate how critical the organization’s ability is to connect different HRM systems to create an ambidextrous HR architecture to find an appropriate balance between exploration and exploitation.     

Consumers’ Willingness to Pay for Sustainable Seafood Made in Europe

Sustainability of increasing relevance also for seafood markets. The aim of this contribution is to analyze consumer preferences and their willingness to pay (WTP) for different sustainability claims, and to identify consumer segments according to their WTP. The contingent valuation method was applied to elicit consumers’ WTP in eight European countries. The WTP varies between seven and almost 20%, depending on attribute and country. Three consumer groups become apparent: the largest group without any additional WTP, a smaller group with a moderate additional WTP of plus 17%, and a very small group with an additional WTP of more than 40%. Clear differences between countries are obvious regarding preferences for different sustainability attributes, particularly in the segment with the highest WTP. A fraction of the consumers is willing to pay significantly higher prices for sustainably produced fish from Europe: given that trustful standards are applied and well communicated.     

The Interdependence of R&D Activity and Debt Financing of Young Firms

We investigate the interdependence of debt financing and R&D activities of young firms. Applying a bivariate Tobit model, we find that there is a positive interdependent relationship between the share of loan financing and R&D intensity. A higher share of loan financing allows for more R&D in young firms and, at the same time, a higher R&D intensity allows for a higher loan share. This result is mainly driven by start‐ups exhibiting high values of R&D intensity or leverage. Another remarkable result of our study is that the positive relationship between R&D and loan financing can only be detected if we consider that, first, the decisions on R&D and on loan financing are made simultaneously and, second, the decision on R&D impacts the decision on loan financing and vice versa.     

Real exchange rate persistence and the excess return puzzle: The case of Switzerland versus the US

The PPP puzzle refers to the wide swings of nominal exchange rates around their long‐run equilibrium values whereas the excess return puzzle represents the persistent deviation of the domestic‐foreign interest rate differential from the expected change in the nominal exchange rate. Using the I(2) cointegrated VAR model, much of the excess return puzzle disappears when an uncertainty premium in the foreign exchange market, proxied by the persistent PPP gap, is introduced. Self‐reinforcing feedback mechanisms seem to cause the persistence in the Swiss‐US parity conditions. These results support imperfect knowledge based expectations rather than so‐called “rational expectations”.     

How to Overcome Pro‐Change Bias: Incorporating Passive and Active Innovation Resistance in Innovation Decision Models

Adoption literature is largely subject to a pro‐change bias; researchers mainly assume that consumers are open to change and thus interested in evaluating new products. However, consumers often reject innovations without considering their potential, such that the adoption process ends before it really has begun. The present study instead argues that innovation resistance, prior to product evaluation, is a regular consumer response that must be recognized and managed to facilitate new product adoption. The authors suggest differentiating passive from active innovation resistance. While passive innovation resistance results from a consumer's generic predisposition to resist innovations prior to new product evaluation, active innovation resistance is an attitudinal outcome that follows an unfavorable new product evaluation. This study also extends extant innovation decision models by describing how passive and active innovation resistance emerge and how they affect decision‐making in later stages of the process.