Structural investigation of supply networks: A social network analysis approach

A system of interconnected buyers and suppliers is better modeled as a network than as a linear chain. In this paper we demonstrate how to use social network analysis to investigate the structural characteristics of supply networks. Our theoretical framework relates key social network analysis metrics to supply network constructs. We apply this framework to the three automotive supply networks reported in Choi and Hong (2002). Each of the supply networks is analyzed in terms of both materials flow and contractual relationships. We compare the social network analysis results with the case-based interpretations in Choi and Hong (2002) and conclude that our framework can both supplement and complement case-based analysis of supply networks.     

风险投资“退出”内涵的系统界定与分析

文章从风险投资微观运作过程入手,对风险投资“退出”内涵进行了系统的界定,详细分析了风险投资“退出”的微观经济功能。文章认为:风险投资“退出”由风险投资项目退出和风险投资基金退出两部分内容构成,是针对风险投资中存在的双重委托———代理关系的最佳制度安排。     

Women nascent entrepreneurs and social capital in the process of firm creation

The main objective of this research is to study gender differences in the process of firm creation, especially in the gestation stage of that process when nascent entrepreneurs carry out the promoter behaviours. A second objective is to analyse if the cognitive and structural endowments of social capital exert an influence on the promoter behaviours and on the kind of firms created by entrepreneurs of both genders. To reach the objectives, firstly, a theoretical framework will be developed and secondly, an empirical analysis starting from a sample of nascent entrepreneurs in the Seville province (southern Spain) will be carried out. Due to women entrepreneurs being considered nowadays essential for growth and development everywhere, results obtained could help to improve the efficiency of policies that lead to the promotion and consolidation of the female participation rate in entrepreneurial activity.      

Antecedents and consequences of social capital on buyer performance improvement

The ability to leverage social capital within strategic buyer–supplier relationships is increasingly cited as a key driver of value creation. Despite the importance of strategic partnerships, the process by which social capital accumulates within buyer–supplier relationships and contributes to buyer performance improvements is not well understood. Drawing on social capital theory, we develop a model linking positive relational capital, and its antecedents, supplier integration and supplier closeness, to buyer performance improvements. Further, we hypothesize that structural capital, as reflected in managerial communication and technical exchanges, is also positively related to buyer performance improvements. Using data provided by 111 procurement executives from the United Kingdom, we find support for our hypotheses. The study extends the supply chain management and social capital literature and suggests important implications for both research and practice.     

Human capital,social capital,and innovation: a multi-country study

The authors examine the effects of two forms of capital, i.e. human capital and social capital, on innovation at the country level. We use secondary data from the World Development Report on a country's overall human development to test for a relationship between human capital and innovation. We also use previous conceptualizations of social capital as comprising trust, associational activity, and norms of civic behaviour to test for relationships between these indicators of social capital and innovation using data from the World Values Survey. Unlike most previous studies that examined human and social capital within a given country, we develop and empirically test a theoretically grounded model that relates human and social capital to innovation at the societal level across 59 different countries, thus providing a more global view of the role of these two forms of capital in generating value. We find strong support for the positive relationship between human capital and innovation and partial support for the positive effect of trust and associational activity on innovation. However, contrary to our prediction, we find a negative relationship between norms of civic behaviour and one of our innovation measures.     

Trust or bust: Growth effects of knowledge,human and social capital revisited

Social capital consists of trust, collective values, and shared norms. It helps society to work efficiently and, hence, promotes knowledge accumulation and growth. This paper identifies the contribution of social capital to differences in total factor productivity among European subnational regions, but, unlike other studies, it focuses on the effects of interregional differences in social capital. To do so, the paper employs a spatial Durbin model of a social-capital extended Cobb-Douglas production function. Our results suggest that transfers of knowledge might be secondary to the presence of collectivism and human capital in knowledge-generating regions. Although knowledge can cross boundaries, an absence of skills and trust limits local growth capacity. Our estimations also suggest the presence of gravity effects emanating from social and human capital in which some regions lose against others nearby that have more abundant social and human capital.     

Primary-school class composition and the development of social capital

We study the development of social capital through adult civic engagement, in relation to social capital exposure having occurred during childhood based on experiences outside the family at primary school. We assume that the types of classmates in attendance at a child's school would have influenced her/his social capital. To identify the types of classmates, we take advantage of the heterogeneity in the ability levels of British primary-school classes during the 1960s. At that time, some schools were practicing a method of streaming, whereas others were not. Using British National Child Development data, we construct a single score of civic engagement and evaluate the effect on adult civic engagement of attending homogeneous-ability classes versus nonhomogeneous-ability classes and being in high-, average- or low-ability classes when enrolled in streamed schools. Our results show that children who were grouped in homogeneous-ability classes developed a lower interest in civic engagement than their peers who attended mixed-ability classes (nonstreamed schools). Moreover, among children who attended streamed schools, a lower attitude toward civic engagement was observed among low-ability students. Thus, streaming appears to be detrimental to social capital development, especially for low-ability individuals.     

Structural social capital and knowledge acquisition: implications of cluster membership

This paper analyzes the implications of belonging to a cluster through the relationship between structural social capital and knowledge acquisition. The findings suggest structural social capital only indirectly affects knowledge acquisition through the relational and cognitive dimensions of firms’ membership of a cluster. However, the structural dimension also has a direct impact on knowledge for external firms outside a cluster. This paper contributes to the cluster literature with a better contextualization and understanding of the relationship between structural social capital and knowledge acquisition. In addition, the paper also consolidates the inter-organizational approach to social capital theory by helping to understand how and in what context social capital dimensions are interrelated. The study analyzes how firms can acquire valuable knowledge from their networks, filling the gap in the literature on how this process occurs inside and outside clusters. This works also proposes recommendations for companies and institutions, and new complementary lines of research.     

The dark side of buyer-supplier relationships: A social capital perspective

The literature on supply chain management (SCM) has consistently promoted the “bright side” of collaborative buyer-supplier relationships (BSRs). Based on the social capital argument, SCM scholars have investigated how a buyer can gain access to and leverage resources through its collaborative BSRs. Our study extends this research stream by considering the “dark side” of social capital in BSRs. It evaluates how social capital in its cognitive, relational, and structural forms contributes to or impedes value creation within BSRs. Both primary survey measures and secondary objective measures have been used in data analysis. The results show the presence of both the bright side, confirming the existing literature, and the dark side, extending the literature. There is an inverted curvilinear relationship between social capital and performance: Either too little or too much social capital can hurt performance. This study confirms that building social capital in a collaborative BSR positively affects buyer performance, but that if taken to an extreme it can reduce the buyer's ability to be objective and make effective decisions as well as increase the supplier's opportunistic behavior. Our study also examines how a buyer can delay the emergence of the dark side. It opens up new research avenues in the collaborative BSR context and suggests directions for future research and practice.     

Entrepreneurial orientation and social capital as small firm strategies: A study of gender differences from a resource-based view

Women entrepreneurs have recently been the subject of many studies which have revealed that though women possess some of the same resources as male entrepreneurs, success levels are not the same. The current study looks at the resources utilized by small business owners within downtown business districts. Using a sample of 467 small business owners, we test differences in entrepreneurial orientation and social capital between men and women entrepreneurs. Though women actually reported higher levels of entrepreneurial orientation and social capital, there were no differences in their abilities to utilize these two resources in achieving firm performance. We offer discussion of why these findings are relevant, as well as research implications.     

Refugee-entrepreneurship: a social capital perspective

Abstract

This paper seeks to identify the characteristics of refugee-entrepreneurial startups, which distinguish them from other immigrant entrepreneurial ventures. The author employed a single case analysis as a means of qualitative research into the phenomenon under study, from the perspective of social capital theory. A typical case of a refugee entrepreneur was selected based on his propensity to tell his story in a way that transparently reveals the various peculiarities of his entrepreneurial behavior. The case study involved the use of interviews with key individuals, the review of printed materials, and member checking. The findings revealed five distinctive attributes that characterized that startup and which corresponded to the three dimensions of social capital. Those attributes were: a ‘one-way-ahead’ attitude, a pseudo family business perception, collective bootstrapping, a distinct network structure, and opportunity-seizing proliferation, thereby depicting how social capital is used by refugee-entrepreneurs to maximize the pool of opportunities in their host nations.     

Global careers: a social capital paradox

Global careers, typically defined as involving multiple international relocations including various positions and assignments in several countries, have recently received increasing research attention. This interest is driven by a growing corporate need for managers who are able to deal with global integration and co-ordination in large multinational corporations. An important aspect of the competency of a global manager is his or her social capital, i.e. the network relationships he or she possesses. However, while the concept of social capital has been widely used in a number of research fields recently, it has received relatively little attention thus far in the IHRM context. This paper contributes to this research gap, and seeks to answer the empirical research question of how multiple international relocations affect the social capital of a manager. Our qualitative interviews of 20 Finnish MNC managers with global careers identified that such careers represent a ‘social capital paradox’. Global careers are characterized by a broad and diverse network of both internal and external ties. This breadth and diversity relate to (1) the managers' internal contact networks of weak ties (2) their internal support networks of strong ties and (3) their external networks of both strong and weak ties. These typical characteristics represent three major social capital paradoxes in the sense that they carry both significant social–capital-related benefits as well as potential risks.     

Job matching, social network and word-of-mouth communication

Workers can find a job either directly or through personal contacts. From this micro scenario, we derive an aggregate matching function that has the standard properties but fails to be homogeneous of degree one. We show that, when the network size increases, on average, the unemployed workers hear about more vacancies through their social network. However, above a certain critical value, job matches decrease with network size. We then establish existence and uniqueness of the labor market equilibrium and study its properties. Finally, we demonstrate that the decentralized market equilibrium is not efficient because of both search and network externalities.     

An envelopment-based approach to measuring regional social progress

Today, more than ever, it is becoming evident that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) alone is not sufficient in guiding national development strategies. In this sense, measuring the social progress of a country can provide an additional lens on national performance, which would eventually help policymakers to not only gain an advanced understanding of the ways that would unleash greater long-term economic success, but also be able to propose strategies that would create the conditions for all individuals in a society to reach their full potential, enhancing and sustaining the quality of their lives. In this paper, we propose a method to measure social progress at the sub-national level, with an application to the Peruvian regions. As such, this paper builds a unified envelopment-based model for integrating a two-stage process of the index generation. We compare and contrast the radial and non-radial envelopment approaches; it is evident from the model that the non-radial approach provides better insights when compared to the radial approach.     

The emergence of human capital: Roles of social capital and coordination that drive unit performance

Empirical work on human capital has tended to focus on the direct effects of human capital on performance, whereas little attention has been paid to behaviours through which human capital influences performance. This study uses the “human capital emergence” model to examine relationships among human capital, social capital, coordination, and performance over a 2‐year period of time. Findings indicate that human capital, social capital, and coordination each influence performance. Human capital and social capital also positively predict coordination. Lastly, coordination mediates the relationships between human capital and performance and social capital and performance.     

Uniting partners to cope with environmental uncertainty: Disentangling the role of social capital in developing supply chain agility

Based on social capital theory, in this study, we investigate how a firm utilized social capital to coordinate partners in the achievement of supply chain agility under different levels of environmental uncertainty. We test the proposed hypotheses via a hierarchical regression analysis using questionnaire survey data collected from 190 firms in China. The empirical results show that cognitive, relational, and structural capital positively influence supply chain agility. Furthermore, environmental uncertainty positively moderates the positive relationship between relational capital and supply chain agility, whereas environmental uncertainty negatively moderates the positive roles of cognitive and structural capital. The findings suggest managers should adopt different strategies when leveraging social capital according to the business environment. In unpredictable and volatile business environments, managers should motivate their firms to embrace relational capital to obtain sufficient resources for achieving supply chain agility.     

Understanding supplier structural embeddedness: A social network perspective

Despite a significant amount of attention, the potential of supplier structural embeddedness (i.e., the value of the structural position in an extended network) to improve the performance of a buying firm remains poorly understood. This study drew on the social network theory to empirically examine a conceptual framework specifying a relationship between the efforts of a buying firm to understand supplier structural configuration and operational and financial performance. This study also examines how the comprehension of structural embeddedness is transformed into performance for a buying firm through relational embeddedness (i.e., the strength of a dyadic relationship). Survey data collected from companies in the U.S. were analyzed using hierarchical regression analysis. The results indicate that the understanding of the structural dimension does help to enhance operational performance of a buying firm, but it does not lead to better financial performance. Empirical evidence shows that a buying firm does improve the quality of a dyadic relationship between the buying firm and a supplier by understanding how the supplier is connected to other firms and what positional values are produced. Further, relational embeddedness is found to mediate the influence of the enhanced understanding of the structural configuration on operational performance.     

The processes of social capital and employee creativity: empirical evidence from intraorganizational networks

The aim of this paper is to extend and elaborate social capital approaches to organizational creativity by identifying different mechanisms that employees can deploy to promote the development of social capital through social interaction, relationship quality and network ties. The findings, based on data from a sample of 382 employees across different areas of expertise and countries in a multinational manufacturing firm, indicate that relationship quality and network ties play a mediating role between social interaction and organizational creativity. The findings of this study contribute to the development of a conceptual theoretical model for explaining the interrelationships among three mechanisms of social capital and organizational creativity performance.     

Space-related antecedents of social capital: some empirical inquiries about the creation of new firms

This paper analyzes the spatial aspects of social capital creation between co-localised start-ups and customers, aiming to explain the factors which may influence the diffusion of inter-organizational social networks inside industrial clusters. We suppose that local social capital is not a public good, but its creation depends both on proximity. between actors and on a sense of affiliation of an entrepreneur to the cluster. While the embeddedness of a start-up inside a cluster has a positive influence on the relational and cognitive dimensions of social capital, it negatively influences the structural dimension. Implications and future lines of research are discussed.