On the contribution of public procurement to entrepreneurship and small business policy

Public procurement in industrialized nations accounts for a significant share of gross domestic product; hence it is imperative for local, regional and national economic development to utilize this potential. However, previous discussions of entrepreneurship and small business policy have by and large marginalized public sector procurement. As a contribution to giving greater salience to the linkages between regional development, entrepreneurship and public procurement, this paper presents empirical results of a qualitative study into local government authorities in the United Kingdom. In particular, it draws out a range of enablers and barriers for sourcing from small- and medium-sized enterprises that were perceived by procurement managers. The focus on public sector procurement furthermore leads to a more systematic theoretical elaboration of entrepreneurship policy as being based on legal authority or the market or network effects from geographic proximity.     

From admiration to abhorrence: the contentious appeal of entrepreneurship across Europe

Although entrepreneurship seems to offer a universal economic solution, there are some doubts about whether it is universally attractive. We argue that entrepreneurship is a socially constructed concept and consequently the meanings, and hence the appeal, of the enterprise will vary internationally. We argue that how entrepreneurship is understood affects how attractive it seems. Accordingly, we investigated the meanings of entrepreneurship by analysing a range of metaphors of entrepreneurship gathered from schools across Europe. We found that both the meaning and understandings of the practices vary considerably. For most, the concept of entrepreneurship as an engine of the economy is attractive, but for some, the practices of entrepreneurs were considerably less appealing. We find links between national socio-economic contexts and attractiveness. We argue that culture and context seem to influence the social constructions of entrepreneurship and hence the attractiveness of entrepreneurial options. We also find that the pedagogical national narratives of the entrepreneur stand in dynamic tension with the performative national processes of entrepreneurship.     

小企业的定价策略

随着市场经济的进一步深入,小企业的定价策略渐渐成为一个突出的问题。以往的定价方法大多是为大型公司服务,而小企业(包括新技术企业)没有一套理论上完整、实践中可操作的统一定价方法。本文主要说明小企业的定价特点,同时介绍了几个小企业(包括服务型小企业和新技术小企业)的定价方法。     

Social responsibility paradox of small business human resource management practices

This article investigates social responsibility (SR) and human resources management practices focused on internal stakeholders, namely employees, in a context of small business. SR is defined as ‘obligations to constituent groups in society other than stockholders and beyond that prescribed by law and union contract’ Jones (1980, pp. 59–60). Numerous studies have addressed the economic significance and effects of small business but contributions to HR within small businesses have remained relatively unexplored in contemporary SR literature. A case research methodology employing theoretical replication was used to select 10 small businesses across industry sectors. These were chosen with the assistance of the Hunter Business Chamber, Australia. A semi-structured face-to-face interview with the owner of the business who also functioned as the manager was undertaken using a research instrument comprising eight qualitative and open-ended questions. The questions specifically addressed the small business owner's HR priorities, motivations, and financial contribution to SR. This research is designed to fill a gap that exists in the literature and can be considered innovative and timely given the growing interest by society in SR. The principal objective of this research is to broaden the understanding of small business by addressing the research problem: ‘Are human resource management practices of small businesses socially responsibility or market driven?’     

Policies to enhance social development through the promotion of SME and social entrepreneurship: a study in the Colombian construction industry

Abstract

The intent of this research is to propose and analyse a set of policies in the construction industry to enhance social development. First, the paper shows the connections between the development of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and social entrepreneurship (SE), the reduction of the leakage, and then the generation of social value (SV) for sustainable regional development. For that, the article analyses briefly the literatures on SE and leakage, and focuses on the relevance of SME and social entrepreneurs as promoters of SV creation and development. Second, the paper proposes a framework and proposes a set of 20 policies aimed to reduce leakage, reinforce SMEs and entrepreneurship and also to promote SE behaviour by the diverse economic agents in the construction industry, in order to increase the generation of SV and sustainable development. Then, the paper analyses the acceptability, feasibility and viability of these proposed polices, which can be useful for academics and practitioners. For that, the study uses the Delphi methodology, applied to an expert-group of 23 professionals (representatives of the private and public sector) belonging to the Colombian construction industry. The results emphasize the relevance of the development of local incumbents and the social focus of firms to increase the generation of SV. Oppositely, policies interfering economic freedom and free trade receive the lowest rates in the three criteria considered.     

Networking and culture in entrepreneurship

Case studies on three diverse cultural groups are used to investigate how culture norms and practices moderate the way entrepreneurs utilize social networking. Moving away from a universalist mono-dimensional position, prior research calls for studies on how culture moderates entrepreneurial networking. Understandably, the concept of a national culture inevitably refers to the mainstream culture which fails to address the sub-culture and minority culture. This paper explores entrepreneurial networking across three cultures (one mainstream culture and two minority) allowing the researcher an insight into how culture moderates entrepreneurial networking. The empirical results reveal variform universality of entrepreneurial networking in two ways: (1) seven drivers moderate how entrepreneurial networking is practiced across cultures, and (2) being embedded in a mainstream culture rather than a minority culture moderates how entrepreneurial networking is practiced.     

平衡记分卡在中小企业中的应用及案例分析

当今世界不仅在财富1000强的企业中有50％的企业采用了平衡记分卡方式，一些小企业也正在使用这种方法。通过封相关资料的检测发现，在一些中小企业的主要日志中并没有发现所谓的平衡记分卡。本文封什麽是平衡记分卡追行了讨论，接着又论述了中小企业应该应用的必要性；後面又列示了关于中小企业（Hyde Park Electronics）的案例。阐述其如何同大型企业应用平衡记分卡实施企业的战略调整，并最终取得突破性进展。本文研究表明，诸多中小型企业也可以从使用平衡记分卡中获得收益，可以通过一些案例研究来发展适合自己的平衡记分卡系统，从而提高企业业绩。     

Sustainable entrepreneurship,innovation, and business models: Integrative framework and propositions for future research

This article introduces the business models for sustainability innovation (BMfSI) framework to study how business models mediate between sustainability innovations and business cases for sustainability. The BMfSI framework integrates two major perspectives (implicitly) found in the sustainable business model literature. The first is the agency perspective. It takes into consideration that some form of agency is needed, that is, “someone” who takes decisions and acts. Sustainable entrepreneurs are discussed as those agents who align their new or existing business models with sustainability innovations in order to be successful in business and to create value with and for stakeholders. The second perspective is the systems perspective, which acknowledges that business models are always embedded within sociotechnical contexts through which, for example, public policies, private financing, or stakeholder interests influence whether and how business models can be developed. The agency and systems perspectives are integrated in the so‐called business model mediation space. This theoretical notion embraces the decisions and activities pursued by sustainable entrepreneurs as they align their business models with sustainability innovations on the one hand and the influence of environmental contingencies, barriers, and stakeholders from the sociotechnical context on the other hand. The paper concludes with propositions for future research derived from the BMfSI framework.     

Measuring entrepreneurship at the country level: A review and research agenda

The measurement of entrepreneurial activity across national contexts is a relatively recent and under-represented area of study. There was very little research carried out for comparable indicators of entrepreneurship until the end of the 1990s, when the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Consortium launched its annual surveys. In the last decade, other indexes and databases have been created, such as the EIM COMPENDIA database and the World Bank Group Entrepreneurship Survey dataset. The first objective of this paper is to review and analyse the existing entrepreneurship indexes with respect to their conceptual and methodological dimensions. This review shows that the conceptual foundations of most of the indexes are insufficiently developed. The second objective is to integrate and compare the indexes on 21 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries for which complete data is available. Strong convergence was found between the indicators of venture creation, business ownership and growth, while noticeable divergences were observed between these indicators and those concerning innovation. This was further explored through cluster analysis, which indicated that the 21 sampled countries could be classified into three distinct entrepreneurial profiles. The paper concludes by offering research directions and debating the use of unitary or composite measures of entrepreneurship in comparison to the analysis of multiple dimensions as exemplified in this paper.     

The relationship between economic development and business ownership revisited

This paper revisits the two-equation model of Carree, van Stel, Thurik and Wennekers (2002) where deviations from the ‘equilibrium’ rate of business ownership play a central role in determining both the growth of business ownership and that of economic development. Two extensions of the original set-up are addressed: using longer time series of averaged data of 23 OECD countries (up to 2004) we can discriminate between different functional forms of the ‘equilibrium’ rate and we allow for different penalties for being above or under the ‘equilibrium’ rate. The additional data do not provide evidence of a superior statistical fit of a U-shaped ‘equilibrium’ relationship when compared to an L-shaped one. There appears to be a growth penalty for having too few business owners but not for having too many.     

The formation and interplay of social capital in crowdfunded social ventures

The multi-levelled processes taking place in Crowdfunding (CF), when tapping a large heterogeneous crowd for resources, and the often fundamentally different intentions of individual crowd members in the case of highly desirable social ventures with little prospect for economic gains, may lead to a different logic and approach to how entrepreneurship develops. Using this under-institutionalized sphere as both, context and subject, the author seeks evidence and a new understanding of entrepreneurial routes by using the sociological perspectives of Bourdieus' four forms of capital as a lens on 36 cases of social ventures. In the cases, opportunity recognition, formation and exploitation could not be distinguished as separate processes. CF and sourcing help form the actual opportunity and disperse information at the same time. In addition, the ‘nexus’ of opportunity and entrepreneur is breached in CF of social causes through the constant exchange of ideas with the crowd, leading to norm-value pairs between the funders and the entrepreneurs. Issues of identification and control are thus not based upon any formal relationship but based on perceived legitimization and offered democratic participation leading to the transformation of social capital (SC) into economic capital (EC). Success is based upon the SC of the entrepreneurial teams, yet the actual resource exchange and transformation into EC is highly moderated by cultural and symbolic capital that is being built up through the process.     

北京地区国际商务人才需求调查分析

本文从大商务角度出发,采用电话访谈、座谈会、问卷调查等方式,对北京地区534家企业的国际商务人才需求进行了调研。主要调查分析了这些企业对国际商务专业人才需求的情况及其对国际商务人才职业能力和职业素质的要求等,为相关院校有针对性地制订人才培养方案提供了依据。     

Exploring business process modelling paradigms and design-time to run-time transitions

The business process management literature describes a multitude of approaches (e.g. imperative, declarative or event-driven) that each result in a different mix of process flexibility, compliance, effectiveness and efficiency. Although the use of a single approach over the process lifecycle is often assumed, transitions between approaches at different phases in the process lifecycle may also be considered. This article explores several business process strategies by analysing the approaches at different phases in the process lifecycle as well as the various transitions.     

Dimensions of small business performance from the owner-manager's perspective: a re-conceptualization and empirical validation

Owner-managers make decisions and manage their firm as governed by the manner in which they conceptualize or ‘conceive’ performance for themselves and their firm, rather than being governed by researchers' and experts' conceptualizations of small business performance. On the basis of survey data obtained from 433 Canadian small businesses, this study aims at a deeper understanding of what owner-managers conceive performance to be, and to what extent this conception is determined by their objectives and social influences.     

国际创业背景下企业家精神的适应性调整——以温州企业为例

企业家精神是企业成长和经济增长的重要因素。本文认为企业家精神是一个层次模型,只有通过综合特质、愿景、胜任力和文化网络这四个层面才能揭示企业家精神的全貌,通过对温州企业案例的分析,检验了该模型的不同层次在国际创业背景下分别应进行怎样的适应性调整。最后,本文指出了该研究可能存在的问题,并对后续研究进行了展望。     

The effects of environmental,social and governance disclosure on the cost of capital in small and medium enterprises: The role of family business status

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure has become a critical component of corporate reporting. However, the effectiveness of this type of disclosure remains poorly explored among small and medium enterprises (SMEs), despite the fact that these businesses represent the majority of firms around the world. By leveraging on a dataset of Italian listed SMEs, we fill this gap to shed new light on the effects of nonfinancial disclosure on the cost of capital. The study reveals that, in stark contrast with the evidence on large companies, environmental disclosure for SMEs is bound to provoke an increase in the cost of capital. Yet this pattern is capsized when the company is a family SME, as it benefits from environmental disclosure, as large companies do.     

The sustainable start-up paradox: Predicting the business and climate performance of start-ups

Sustainable start-ups introduce new sustainable technologies and business models that facilitate the transition to a carbon neutral economy. To understand how to create viable sustainable start-ups, we study what factors predict their business performance and climate performance (i.e., the ability of the start-up to reduce CO₂ equivalent [CO₂e] emissions) and if these contradict. A critical factor we consider is technology, which is commonly at the root of climate performance, and important for business performance because it influences a start-up's competitive advantage. Using a sample of 197 sustainable start-ups, we find a paradox between business and potential climate performance. Start-ups that exploit hardware technologies have a lower business performance but a higher potential climate performance. Through the use of mediating effects, we show that the sustainable start-up paradox is context specific. Start-ups can partly escape this paradox by focusing on novel and hardware technologies. We discuss implications for theory and practice.     

礼貌用语在国际商务信函中的应用技巧刍议

国际商务信函是重要的外贸书面语言交际媒介,成功的信函除词汇、语法上的准确无误外,礼貌用语的选择与使用也颇有讲究。文章基于外贸英语独有的语言特点和特殊的表达方法,结合大量的例句,从礼貌用语的写作角度出发,对其在国际商务信函中的应用技巧进行了探讨。     

Identifying business opportunities for sustainable development: Longitudinal and experimental evidence contributing to the field of sustainable entrepreneurship

Which factors facilitate the identification of business opportunities for sustainable development? To answer this question, we develop a process model of sustainable opportunity identification. We argue that sustainable opportunity identification is a process with transitions from problem to solution identification and from solution to sustainable opportunity identification. Moreover, the transitions are facilitated by two factors—awareness of adverse consequences and entrepreneurial attitude—providing motivation and direction in the process. We tested our model in a field study (N = 107) and two experiments (N = 53 and N = 69). Our findings show that awareness of adverse consequences and entrepreneurial attitude influence the process of sustainable opportunity identification, explaining under which conditions people are more likely to identify business opportunities for sustainable development. Our study thus contributes to the field of sustainable entrepreneurship.