Women’s entrepreneurship from an institutional perspective: the case of Uzbekistan

This paper aims to make a contribution to our conceptual understanding of women entrepreneurship under ‘early stage’ transition conditions, by researching the nature of it in Uzbekistan. Institutional theory is used as a guiding frame of reference because the specific characteristics of the external environment under transition conditions make the latter a particularly strong influence on entrepreneurship. Empirically, the paper draws on data which was collected in Uzbekistan, within a collaborative research project (INTAS 00-843). The empirical material demonstrates that informal institutions dominating Uzbek society contribute to the prevailing forms of female entrepreneurship.     

Understanding the dynamics of global supply chain sustainability initiatives: The role of institutional distance from the buyer's perspective

Research points to sustainable supply chain management as a core strategic goal for most global firms. However, managers continue to struggle with implementing successful sustainability initiatives both internally and throughout their globally dispersed supply chains. Using grounded theory, our findings uncover a potential explanation for how firms manage sustainability initiatives in the context of global supply chain management, from a buyer's perspective. Institutional theory of the firm is applied to help explain the challenges of developing and implementing global supply chain sustainability-related initiatives within buyer-supplier relationships. Analysis of the data from qualitative interviews show that institutional distance is an influential factor that produces mixed effects on the global buyer-supplier relationships in our sample in the context of buyer and supplier strategic orientation toward sustainability. The findings can help guide managers when approaching sustainability-related initiatives in the context of global supply chains. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed as well as areas for future research.     

Market entry of firms with different legal forms: an empirical test of the influence of institutional factors

Drawing upon institutional theory we develop a conceptual model and investigate the determinants of market entry for worker cooperatives, publicly traded and limited-liability companies. Our results show that formal institutional conditions (i.e., mercantile legislation) influence the start-up choice of entrepreneurs regarding the legal form of their new venture. In addition, we take into account the influence of informal institutional conditions (i.e., local corporate culture) on the market entry rate of firms with different legal structures. Findings show that, while market entry is sensitive to the general economic climate, entry rates of firms with a different legal structure respond differently to the same economic conditions.

Governing local supplier opportunism in China: Moderating role of institutional forces

China provides a vast and prominent manufacturing base, so curtailing its local supplier opportunism represents a primary concern for local and foreign buyers. Drawing on institutional theory, this study examines how regulatory uncertainty and relationship structure moderate the role of contracts and trust in restricting local supplier opportunism in China. An analysis of 293 buyer–supplier dyads in China reveals that contracts are more effective in deterring supplier opportunism when regulatory uncertainty is high. In addition, contracts help curtail opportunism more in domestic, compared with international, buyer–supplier relationships, whereas trust is more effective in restricting supplier opportunism in international relationships than in domestic ones.     

Understanding the adoption of socially responsible supplier development practices using institutional theory: Dairy supply chains in India

Supplier development (SD) initiatives play an important role in building buyer-supplier capacities to deal with social and economic performance. The aim of this paper is to explain the motivations behind the adoption of similar SD strategies to address sustainability (particularly social issues) occurring in local supply chains of a developing country. We compare the economic and social variants of institutional theory to investigate whether efficiency or legitimacy seeking drives the adoption (and copying) of SD practices. Twelve case studies involving private and cooperative dairies were conducted in India via semi-structured interviews. Findings revealed that both private and cooperative dairies adopt similar SD practices to build supplier capabilities and improve social and economic performance of buyers and suppliers. Private dairies imitate SD practices of the cooperatives to survive the competition; i.e., economic performance is the main reason behind their isomorphism. Cooperatives, on the other hand, take up SD practices more for legitimacy and even philanthropic reasons; though also partly note the long-term economic benefits from developing the supplier community. These findings can be used both by practitioners and researchers to gain valuable insights into the reasons driving organisational isomorphism in social sustainability practices from a developing country perspective, something rarely done so far in the literature.     

Managing the digital supply chain: The role of smart technologies

This study investigates the approach required to achieve competitive advantages in the digital supply chain. Moreover, the study examines how digital transformation of companies can fuel smart technologies, leading to improved relationship performance. The results of the survey given to 280 Finnish small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) show that digital transformation of the companies alone cannot enhance relationship performance, and that it needs to be coupled with smart technologies to achieve this goal. This means that smart technologies fully mediate the relationship between digital transformation and relationship performance.     

The impact of institutional quality on manufacturing sectors: A panel data analysis

We use data on Russian regions to examine the effect of institutional quality on institutionally dependent manufacturing sectors in terms of both output levels and growth rates. Unlike the existing literature on this topic, which mostly uses cross-sectional or pooled specifications for either country-level or regional data, we use panel data. This approach allows us to distinguish between short-term and long-term impacts and mitigates endogeneity concerns. As an additional contribution to the literature, we estimate the full marginal effects of institutions on manufacturing sectors with different degrees of institutional dependence. In terms of policy recommendations, our results imply that significant institutional improvements would be needed for the Russian economy to diversify away from heavy reliance on oil and natural gas.     

The iron cage exposed: Institutional pressures and heterogeneity across the healthcare supply chain

The healthcare industry has been known to operate in a strong institutional environment (i.e. government regulations), and the implementation of inter-organizational systems (IOS) has followed an institutional process. Extending this perspective across different tiers in the healthcare supply chain, we investigate how organizations in different tiers in the supply chain (i.e. hospitals, distributors and manufacturers) respond to institutional pressures when implementing IOS. How institutional dynamics unfold across multiple tiers of a supply chain is an uncharted area of research, and we take the theory-building case study approach using data collected from ten organizations. Because organizations are embedded in their respective tiers, our within-tier analyses are equivalent to cross-organization analyses. In this regard, the cross-case analyses occur at two different levels: at each tier level (i.e. across multiple hospitals, multiple distributors and multiple manufacturers) and across the supply chain (i.e. across all three tiers). The study shows how different institutional pressures such as coercive, mimetic, and normative manifest across the tiers. It also demonstrates how a differential mix of endogenous and institutional pressures lead to mixed organizational responses across the tiers. The propositions developed from the study enrich institutional theory arguments within the information systems and supply chain management disciplines. They highlight how the IOS implementation dynamics within and across different tiers in a supply chain result in heterogeneous rather than isomorphic consequences, thereby exposing the “iron cage” of institutionalization.     

Between advocacy,compliance and commitment: A multilevel analysis of institutional logics in work environment management

In this study we explore the development and enactment of institutional logics in the field of work environment management. We show how three historically developed logics constitute different values and practices that guide professionals’ organizational action. Using both historical and contemporary qualitative data, we show how the three institutional logics are present in the field of work environment, and how the logics are enacted simultaneously by actors within four large organizations in Denmark. The study contributes to the literature on institutional logics. The logics perspective is combined with critical realism to describe the inter-relatedness between the levels of society, institutional fields, and organizations, and by elaborating the near-decomposable relations between institutional logics and orders. The study contributes to the literature on work environment management by investigating the ideational lenses through which regulations and interventions are perceived by organizational actors, and how these perceptions may lead to different organizational outcomes and outlooks in work environment management.     

The digital transformation of business models in the creative industries: A holistic framework and emerging trends

This paper examines how digital technologies facilitate business model innovations in the creative industries. Through a systematic literature review, a holistic business model framework is developed, which is then used to analyse the empirical evidence from the creative industries. The research found that digital technologies have facilitated pervasive changes in business models, and some significant trends have emerged. However, the reconfigured business models are often not ‘new’ in the unprecedented sense. Business model innovations are primarily reflected in using digital technologies to enable the deployment of a wider range of business models than previously available to a firm. A significant emerging trend is the increasing adoption of multiple business models as a portfolio within one firm. This is happening in firms of all sizes, when one firm uses multiple business models to serve different markets segments, sell different products, or engage with multi-sided markets, or to use different business models over time. The holistic business model framework is refined and extended through a recursive learning process, which can serve both as a cognitive instrument for understanding business models and a planning tool for business model innovations. The paper contributes to our understanding of the theory of business models and how digital technologies facilitate business model innovations in the creative industries. Three new themes for future research are highlighted.     

Understanding the adoption of project management in Serbian organizations: Insights from an exploratory study

The article contributes to our understanding of the drivers behind, and the nature of, project management implementation in the complex context of a transitional economy. Relevant insights are generated through an integrated and dynamic analysis of interviews and secondary data from a sample of local organizations, based on a conceptual model of strategic transformation. The analysis concludes with propositions about how both adoption of and resistance to project management implementation in the region could be understood from a strategic point of view, taking into account complex and dissonant circumstances of transition, history, cultural tradition, embedded social values, and identities of individual organizational members.     

Product co-development in an emerging market: The role of buyer-supplier compatibility and institutional environment

In emerging markets, supply chains increasingly serve as critical value chains through which ideas, practices and knowledge flow to and from suppliers and buyers. Drawing on buyer-supplier collaboration literature and organizational learning theory, we examine the antecedents and underlying mechanisms of product co-development. Due to emerging markets' unique institutional environments, we further investigate how government intervention and guanxi importance moderate supplier-buyer collaborative outcomes. Dyadic data from 323 supplier-buyer pairs in China largely support our theoretical framework. Partners' knowledge commonality has a curvilinear (inverted U-shaped) relationship to product co-development, whereas goal compatibility has a positive impact on product co-development. Mutual learning partially mediates the main effect. Furthermore, government intervention weakens the positive effect of mutual learning on product co-development whereas guanxi importance strengthens this relationship. This research provides fresh theoretical and managerial implications to supply chain collaboration in emerging markets.     

On the role of institutional factors in shaping working capital management policies: Empirical evidence from European listed firms

The study examines the impact of institutional factors on working capital management for a sample of 5431 European listed firms over the period 2010–2018. Employing a weighted least squares (WLS) methodology, we provide empirical evidence on the role of institutional quality in shaping the working capital policies of European listed firms. The results indicate that firms located in countries with a stronger institutional framework maintain lower levels of working capital on average. The results are robust to different subsamples of firms. The study complements the extant literature by analyzing the effects of institutional quality on working capital management, across a large number of different institutional systems specific to developed and transition economies alike. The results are useful for practitioners and policy makers in understanding the relationship between institutional quality and short-term firm-level decisions.     

Benchmarking institutional variety in the eurozone: An empirical investigation

The European debt crisis has shown that the future of the European Union (EU) depends on the willingness of each member country to implement responsible policies, avoid moral hazard and uncooperative attitudes, and ensure stability and soundness. However, the European institutional variety means that each member country reacts differently to shocks and policies, follows a different path of recovery, and adapts to common institutions, including the common currency, in different ways. Helping countries to converge toward a situation that guarantees well-being, stability, and development at the national and community level is the goal of the European benchmark. This benchmark is a framework inspired by European treaties that, through the distance-to-frontier score methodology, aims to measure member countries’ performance and identify inefficiencies and negative externalities within the economic, social, and political institutions of each member country. The paper presents an empirical investigation of the European benchmark. Based on the results obtained, all countries can improve their performance, and none of them can be considered a model for the others. However, the Mediterranean and post-communist countries have more challenges to face and therefore need to make greater efforts.     

Implementing supply chain information integration in China: The role of institutional forces and trust

This study investigates the effects of Chinese companies’ institutional environment on the development of trust and information integration between buyers and suppliers. Three aspects of China's institutional environment are salient: legal protection, government support, and the importance of guanxi (interpersonal relationships). This study uses structural equation modeling to analyze data collected from 398 Chinese manufacturing companies. Government support and importance of guanxi significantly affect trust, which subsequently influences two elements of information integration, namely, information sharing and collaborative planning. Furthermore, the importance of guanxi has a direct, positive impact on information sharing, and government support has a direct, positive effect on both information sharing and collaborative planning.     

The versatile role of sustainable market entrepreneurs in market transformation: An intervention framework for institutional change

This article investigates in which way sustainable entrepreneurship can generate institutional change that transforms markets towards sustainability. A transformation of models of economic organization and market structures through sustainable entrepreneurship fosters the path towards sustainability. Institutional change involves sustainable market entrepreneurs as institutional entrepreneurs that operate in an effectual manner in different market transformation phases. Sustainable market entrepreneurs while seeking entrepreneurial opportunities simultaneously shape existing market structures and market conditions in different sustainable market transformation phases thereby creating new opportunities. Accordingly, a framework that explains institutional change prompted by sustainable market entrepreneurs in market transformation phases is developed. In this framework, various interventions which encourage sustainable market entrepreneurs to co-create with the stakeholders of their choice are strategized. The provided framework enhances the understanding of the versatile role of sustainable market entrepreneurs and potentially the leverage of their actions towards institutional impact over time.     

Risk-neutral skewness and market returns: The role of institutional investor sentiment in the futures market

This paper investigates the effect of index risk-neutral skewness on subsequent market returns and explores whether this effect will vary with various types of institutional investor sentiment in the futures market. Using index futures returns as the proxy of market returns, the empirical results show that the index risk-neutral skewness has a significantly negative effect on subsequent index futures returns. Moreover, the effect of institutional investor sentiment on subsequent index futures returns varies with various types of institutional investor sentiment. Finally, the effect of index risk-neutral skewness on subsequent index futures returns relies on various types of institutional investor sentiment.     

Women entrepreneurs in sub-Saharan Africa: An institutional theory analysis from a social marketing point of view

This paper takes an international marketing (IM) approach to the study of women entrepreneurs (WEs) in sub-Saharan Africa by examining factors in the environments in which WEs operate. The goal is to understand better how environmental barriers of many types impact the efforts of WEs. Using institutional theory-driven analysis, findings from a wide range of literature are integrated, with special attention to issues of the social legitimacy of women as entrepreneurs. Results of this study demonstrate that WEs in sub-Saharan Africa face a daunting array of challenges arising from the socio-cultural, economic, legal, political, and technological environments in which they live. Moreover, unfavourable conditions in local regulatory, normative, and cognitive systems place additional burdens on women who desire to become entrepreneurs or to expand an entrepreneurial business. In order to address these gender-specific problems, social marketing is recommended with the goals of (1) changing social beliefs, attitudes and behaviours that negatively affect Wes, and (2) improving conditions in institutional systems and market environments. Recommendations in the paper suggest how to bring about changes in attitudes towards women, work and their independent enterprise. In conclusion, directions for future scholarly research are identified.