Networking,entrepreneurship and microbusiness behaviour

It has been argued that networking by owner-managers of small businesses will enhance business performance. Yet to define and demonstrate the presence of networking activity is suffused with methodological difficulties. In this paper the authors attempt to disentangle some of these difficulties. The paper draws on quantifiable data from 104 owner-managers and qualitative data from 34 critical incident interviews from a study of microbusinesses to assess the nature and extent of networking activity. The paper shows: a high proportion of owner-managers use their trading contacts as sources of useful additional information; they use ‘weak ties’ for purposes such as recruitment; a sparse use of institutional networks; an association between networking activity and business performance, although it seems that this must be qualified by sectoral differences; an association between type of owner-manager on a scale of entrepreneurship and networking activity. The policy implications of this paper suggest that economic development agencies continue to have problems reaching out to the microbusiness. This paper recommends that such agencies might use a tool to differentiate more finely amongst the microbusiness population.     

Assessing the needs of new technology based firms (NTBFs): An investigation among spin-off companies from six European Universities

New technology based firms (NTBFs) play a major role in the development and commercialisation of new technologies and the development of national economies. Using an entrepreneurship-in-networks approach, this paper examines the early stages of the development of these companies, i.e. from opportunity recognition through opportunity exploration. Case study data was collected on 22 NTBFs from six European universities. The findings highlight specific needs related to five functional areas of importance to NTBFs, namely: R&D, market development and sales, organisation and governance, finance and administration, and production/operation. These needs are reported for both the pre- and post-foundation phases and can thus be utilised by both entrepreneurs and support agencies to guide the development of NTBFs.     

商务英语专业创业教育与专业教育一体化研究

本文研究商务英语专业创业教育融入专业教育的有效途径,改进教师教学理念及方法,优化课程设置,构建基于内容依托教学的创业教育与专业教育一体化有效模式。     

Guest editorial: Female and ethnic minority entrepreneurship

There has been an increasing level of interest in diversity in small business enterprises. This diversity has been largely focused on female and ethnic minority entrepreneurs. Although there is evidence that female entrepreneurship can have a positive impact on economic prosperity, levels of earnings remain low. The articles in this special issue further our understanding of female and minority entrepreneurs. They examine important topics such as the differences between male and female entrepreneurs in terms of confidence, growth expectations, entrepreneurial orientation and social capital, developing management skills in female entrepreneurs, their management competencies and refugee entrepreneurship.     

Realizing new regional core competencies: establishing a customer-oriented SME network

This paper explores the possibilities of combining the recently developed ‘value constellation’ concept and the literature about industrial districts. The advantages related to the geographical concentration of economic activities are insufficient in the competition with companies that are linked to each other within a value constellation - a customer-oriented inter-organizational strategy. This new type of competition forces traditionally operating SMEs in industrial districts to team up with each other in a customer-oriented network. However, these networking strategies are unlikely to emerge because SMEs are locked into their traditional competencies and they lack the financial and strategic resources to develop interactive strategies covering the entire value system. Business associations and local institutions may play a crucial role in changing and shaping the emerging network among the SMEs. However, local institutions are equally susceptible to being locked into traditional patterns of interaction. Their willingness to break away from the past is crucial for the learning capabilities of local SMEs. The difficulties in setting up a customer-oriented network are illustrated by the ‘construction and home furnishings’ business cluster in South West Flanders (Belgium).     

Small enterprises as complex adaptive systems: a methodological question?

Complexity science constitutes an emerging post-positivist interdisciplinary field of investigation of dynamical systems in the natural and physical worlds. The central concept of complexity is that interactions between parts of open systems create novel, unpredictable patterns, and that while the history of the system is relevant in understanding its dynamic, the isolation of individual parts of the system (analysis) does not reveal the casual mechanisms in the system. It is suggested that complexity science can inform our methodologies for investigating the social sciences. The paper explores whether complexity science offers ways of theory building that can take account of pluralistic or interdisciplinary research in enterprise dynamics. The authors offer a model of six theorized ontological layers, derived from the canon of research literature within a small enterprise domain, with boundaries at each end. It is suggested that dynamical concepts of agency (adaption, evolution, fitness, interdependence) coupled with the theory of evolutionary autopoietic structures generate a plausible field for the study of enterprise dynamics. A focus on ontological and experimental adequacy is necessary to develop theory within this framework. An appropriate methodology involves iterations between experimental forms of scientific analysis and the grounding of emergent or evolving theories.     

Policy-driven ecosystems for new vaccine development

This paper examines the relationship between biomedical policies and entrepreneurial R&D strategies. Public health programs have been unable to provide effective and affordable treatment of infectious diseases for the poor. While governments have become more open to private sector contributions to policy objectives, it is rare to find new ventures commercializing healthcare innovations for neglected diseases. Two case studies of entrepreneurial ventures, in the UK and China, provide evidence on how resource-constrained firms mobilize participants in policy-specific ecosystems to achieve their goals of new vaccine development for tuberculosis. Ecosystem analysis reveals how the innovators’ business models can align their strategies with national policy objectives.     

Collectively created opportunities in emerging ecosystems: The case of solar service ventures

This study suggests that in the entrepreneurial communities of emerging industries, individual entrepreneurs may simultaneously create opportunities that spill over to others and discover opportunities already created by others. Extant opportunity literature, focused on single actors and their personal networks or on the information function of market prices, is largely mute on the role of opportunities in value networks with distributed entrepreneurial efforts. Ecosystem theory, a literature stream that seldom intersects opportunity literature, contributes with a conceptual framework to study the question. The paper seeks to shed light on how opportunities are created or discovered by new ventures as they are involved in the interlinked endeavor of forming a new ecosystem.The study examines five case studies of US ventures in the early phase of the solar service industry, an industry in which entrepreneurs offer customers access to solar panels as a service rather than as a product. These ventures inadvertently created an industry ecosystem together, as they could not protect the value created by their business partners׳ new knowledge, or by the emerging social webs between partners. They shaped opportunities together, passing value back and forth amongst themselves. This paper offers fundamental observations on how opportunity creation and discovery is distributed among a community of entrepreneurs as a business ecosystem grows.     

Who consults investment analysts?

This paper shows that the questions: Who consults investment analysts? and Who goes to the El Farol bar in Santa Fe? are similar. Thus, investors use a mixed optimal strategy. The demand for consulting services is also characterized.Received: 25 September 2002, Accepted: 26 May 2003, JEL Classification: D81, C70Jacob Paroush: The author is grateful to Yaw Nyarko, Yigal Milchtaich and an anonymous referee for helpful comments and suggestions.     

基于“学科竞赛、创新项目”培养学生创新能力的思考

基于\"学科竞赛\",对机械原理课程内容、教学方法进行教学改革的探索,目的在于加强课程建设,培养学生创新能力,增强学生发现问题、分析问题、解决问题的能力。     

Client–consultant interaction: Capturing social practices of professional service production

Based on the investigation of seven consultancy projects within an international technical consulting firm, we identify three major practices that characterize client–consultant interaction – shaping impressions, problem-solving, and negotiating expectations – and discuss their respective characteristics, activities, and contingencies. Our discussion of these practices provides not only a more differentiated picture of client–consultant interaction but also uncovers the critical role that clients play in these practices.     

如何提高公共就业培训服务绩效:多边平台战略的启示

提供公共就业培训服务是政府应对结构性就业矛盾、推动高质量就业的重要举措,当前主要以政府购买的方式提供。政府购买服务是合作治理的一种形态,但现实中依然延续官僚制管控思路,因而培训服务的供需匹配不够好,服务绩效不高。多边平台是一种开放的合作战略,强调治权开放基础上的生态系统价值创造,对提高公共就业培训服务绩效有着重要启示。平台战略启示政府相关部门要开放治权、完善平台规则、防范平台风险,搭建就业培训服务的多边平台以整合生态资源、促进供需匹配,以网络效应为核心机制推动用户规模的扩展,注重提高供需交互质量与用户黏性,以提高就业培训服务绩效。     

Enhancing female entrepreneurship by enabling access to skills

Literature reveals the need for entrepreneurship training programmes that focus on the skills required by female entrepreneurs. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the Women Entrepreneurship Programme (WEP) as an initiative to provide entrepreneurial and business skills to female entrepreneurs. An experimental group of 116 women attended this training intervention whereas 64 women formed the control group who did not attend the WEP. The findings highlight that through the WEP the experimental group gained new skills and knowledge relevant to running a business; increased their confidence in their entrepreneurial abilities; and used these skills to start new ventures.     

Variable pricing business solutions in a decomposed business environment

Evolving business models and technology advances have facilitated the creation of innovative pricing strategies. Variable pricing represents the ability to configure a pricing schedule from a set of pricing options such as fixed cost, usage, shared benefit, and performance. The objective of variable pricing is to improve a pricing schedule for the mutual benefits of the provider and consumer, based on an evaluation of criteria that results in the setting of a price as a function of the expected value to be derived, as well as the time and materials used. In this paper, we focus on the variable pricing of ‘business solutions’, which is abstractly defined as the capabilities that enable or add value to the purposes of an enterprise. In a decomposed business environment, the structure of a business is partitioned into discrete business components that are assigned specific purposes and are endowed with resources to meet them. Business components interact to achieve business goals, and do so by exposing their capabilities through business services they offer. Business services have suitable levels of granularity offering constituent units of function, which, when selectively chosen and composed, form business solutions. We assert that business services are also suitable units for variable pricing, the implication being that pricing for a given business solution is an evaluation of the variable pricing of its assemblage of business services. The benefits of this ‘variable price composition’ approach offer greater accuracy for the pricing plan, coupled with increased flexibility to compose, modify, calculate and articulate pricing for business solutions.     

Exploring the relationship between media coverage and participation in entrepreneurship: Initial global evidence and research implications

Using a set of variables measured in the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) study, our empirical investigation explored the influence of mass media through national culture on national entrepreneurial participation rates in 37 countries over 4 years (2000 to 2003). We found that stories about successful entrepreneurs, conveyed in mass media, were not significantly associated with the rate of nascent (opportunity searching) or the rate of actual (business activities commenced up to 3 months old) start-up activity, but that there was a significant positive association between the volume of entrepreneurship media stories and a nation’s volume of people running a young business (that is in GEM terminology, a business aged greater than 3 but less than 42 months old). More particularly, such stories had strong positive association with opportunity oriented operators of young businesses. Together, these findings are compatible with what in the mass communications theory literature may be called the ‘reinforcement model’. This argues that mass media are only capable of reinforcing their audience’s existing values and choice propensities but are not capable of shaping or changing those values and choices. In the area covered by this paper, policy-makers are committing public resources to media campaigns of doubtful utility in the absence of an evidence base. A main implication drawn from this study is the need for further and more sophisticated investigation into the relationship between media coverage of entrepreneurship, national culture and the rates and nature of people’s participation in the various stages of the entrepreneurial process.