The Warwick way: A case study of entrepreneurship within a university context

The University of Warwick perceives itself as an innovative and entrepreneririal organization, and has a reputation as such amongst institutions of higher education within the UK. The Conservative Government of Mrs. Thatcher has since 1979 applied steadily increasing pressure on the British system of higher education for it to be more flexible, responsive and business-minded, with less dependency on public funding. The result has been a turbulent and challenging environment for the quasi-public sector universities, with a premium being placed on their ability to manage change. At the time ofwriting, Warwick appears to have operated successfully within this new climate, both to its benefit and to that of its local industrial district. The airticle examines the factors which facilitate and stimulate innovative and entrepreneurial activity amongst the Warwick academic community - factors which will become increasingly important if the university world .is to adapt with flexibility, responsiveness and imagination to the changing and increasingly demanding economic and governmental climate now prevailing not only in the USA and the UK, but also in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Nigeria.     

Toward a sustainable conceptualization of dependent variables in entrepreneurship research

Entrepreneurship researchers have yet to explore the full range variance that occurs in entrepreneurial value creation because we have focused almost exclusively on financial performance as the dependent variable in our research. However, such arbitrary narrowness is not supported by research, which shows entrepreneurs to not focus exclusively on income maximization. Consistent with calls for an expanded view of the consequences of entrepreneurship, we develop a typology of entrepreneurship dependent variables that supports broadening the scope of entrepreneurship research to include economic, environmental and social value. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Myth-busting and entrepreneurship policy: the case of high growth firms

Abstract

Promoting high growth firms (HGFs) has become a strong fixation within enterprise policy. This is a debate article seeking to examine and challenge the mythology perpetuated by policy makers and embedded within high growth entrepreneurship policy frameworks. Within the article we argue that a number of distinctive ‘myths’ have become deeply embedded within these policy frameworks. Such myths have been built on misconceived preconceptions of HGFs, which has resulted in policy-makers taking a myopic view of these firms. A key aim of the paper is to highlight how false perceptions of HGFs translate into inappropriate policy interventions. The paper challenges some of the most commonly held myths about these firms (that they are predominantly young, small, high-tech, VC-backed, university spin-outs, who grow in an orderly organic fashion, operating similarly irrespective of location) and identifies a clear mismatch between how policy makers perceive HGFs and what they actually look like in reality. Suggestions for the design of future policy approaches are forwarded.     

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.     

从城市社区看社会分层与社会不平等——对天津市两个商品房社区的比较研究

依据对天津市两个居住区进行参与观察和个案访谈所获得的田野材料,通过比较研究的方法,揭示了社区的阶层化现状,勾画出不同社区居民之间的社会分层和不平等状况。并进一步指出,缩小城市区位差异、减少城市中的居住隔离不仅牵涉自然资源和社会资源的公平分配和使用,同时也关乎个体发展的代际公平。     

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.     

城市化社区开发的探索——以重庆北部新区大盘开发为例

本世纪初,以"睡城"为典型病症的城市病问题伴随着一大批城市新区的兴起在我国出现.究其原因,根源在于缺乏科学的统筹规划及战略引导.政府应该从城市规划入手,引导开发商在城市总体战略规划下共同参与城市的社区开发.以重庆市北部新区大盘开发为例,探讨了如何在规划实践中贯彻城市化社区开发的理念,进而提出使这个颇具潜力的城市新区健康发展的具体措施.     

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.     

Pursuing sustainable development through green entrepreneurship: An institutional perspective

Pursuing sustainable development through green entrepreneurship has been advocated, conceptualized, and empirically examined in the recent environmental management and entrepreneurship literature. However, green entrepreneurs are embedded in institutional environments that may discourage them from embracing sustainable development because of the “paradox of embedded agency.” How can a firm overcome the liability of such an agency issue and escape what has become known as a “green prison”? This study proposes that, because international venturing exposes firms to foreign institutions, it provides them with opportunities for institutional learning. Thus, we examine how international venturing influences green entrepreneurship which, in turn, impacts firm performance. Specifically, based on institutional theory, this study develops a firm-level green entrepreneurship framework with three dimensions: green initiatives (a firm's active adoption of green practices), received government green support (benefits that a firm gains from the government by adapting to governmental incentives, programs, and policies related to green practices), and green political influence (a firm's attempts to influence legislation that enacts laws, rules, and regulations related to green practices). The results obtained by analyzing 152 firms that engage in international venturing activities and 151 firms that do not show that international venturing is positively associated with green initiatives and government green support while these two factors further directly enhance firm performance and mediate the effects of international venturing on performance.     

Culture,entrepreneurship and uneven development: a spatial analysis

Interest in the proposed connection between culture and entrepreneurship has grown significantly in recent years. However, less attention has been given to the nature of the overall impact of this proposed association on development outcomes, particularly at the local level. In response, this paper analyses the relationship between the nature of the culture, entrepreneurship and development experienced across localities, proposing that the link between culture and development is mediated by entrepreneurship. It focuses upon the concept of community culture, as well as embracing a notion of development incorporating both economic and social well-being outcomes. Drawing upon a multivariate spatial analysis of data from localities in Great Britain, the findings indicate that differences in rates of entrepreneurship are strongly influenced by the community culture present in these localities. Furthermore, a bidirectional relationship is found to exist between entrepreneurship and economic and social development outcomes. It is concluded that the embeddedness of local community culture presents a significant challenge for those places seeking to promote entrepreneurially driven development.     

The impact of institutional change on entrepreneurship in a crisis-hit economy: the case of Greece

This paper examines how changes to the institutional environment in a crisis-hit economy impact on entrepreneurial activity. Through a case study of Greece, the paper demonstrates how the institutional environment has changed in light of the crisis and the resultant response of entrepreneurs to these changes. Drawing on in-depth interviews with entrepreneurs, the findings suggest that changes to institutions have served to limit entrepreneurial activity rather than enhance it, and that this has worsened in the midst of the crisis. We argue that this will detrimentally impact Greece's ability to navigate out of the crisis and regain competitiveness in the longer term. The paper concludes by offering a number of theoretical and policy implications which are focused on improving institutional environments so that entrepreneurship can play an appropriate role in recovering from economic crises.     

Information technology for sustainable supply chain management: a literature survey

In supply chain management (SCM), two topics have gained importance over the last years. On the one hand, sustainable SCM (SSCM) has become increasingly relevant and many publications have contributed to the topic. On the other hand, information technology (IT) is being progressively considered as a key enabler for efficiency in supply chains. Several research efforts have contributed to the field of IT for SSCM. However, this paper is the first recent attempt to summarise the current state of the art of how IT can affect SSCM in any structured way and to compare it with IT for ‘general’ SCM to give guidance for future research. This paper surveys 55 peer-reviewed articles that were retrieved through keyword searches (until May 2014). The analysis identifies research deficits as well as a lack of scientific discourse employing empirical techniques and a lack of investigations on the social sustainability. Additionally, possible topics for further research were derived by comparing the survey’s results with the current research on IT for ‘general’ SCM following the analysis of 631 articles. Six fields could be identified, namely output/effects of IT, machine communication and multiagents, inputs and IT-supported processing, IT-enabled interorganisational exchange, quantitative IT approaches and a sector focus.     

Strategic human resource management and inertia in the corporate entrepreneurship of a multinational enterprise

Abstract

Corporate entrepreneurship (CE) supports sustained competitive advantage through the continuous exploration and exploitation of new sources of knowledge. With an emphasis on combining knowledge in new configurations, strategic human resource management (HRM) activities are core to these entrepreneurial endeavours. We explore how strategic HRM activities may facilitate and impede CE through a rich, qualitative case study of three local entities within a business unit of a large multinational enterprise facing business stagnation and low levels of corporate entrepreneurship. Responding to a call for more empirical research that probes the subtle and complex interactions between HRM activities and other organisational factors affecting CE, we identify a configuration of inter-dependent factors that mutually reinforce each other and sustain inertia in corporate entrepreneurship. We also make two novel contributions to theory by (1) elaborating the links between organisational process-orientation, strategic HRM and CE; and (2) refining to our current understanding of human competencies for CE.     

Harnessing Innovation for Change: Sustainability and Poverty in Developing Countries

To date, a well‐developed business perspective on how to promote sustainability for those in poverty is sorely lacking. For sustainability enhancing innovations in developing countries, poverty presents unique challenges. In this paper, we argue that if sustainability enhancing innovations introduced in developing countries are to stick, they need to be designed with local customers, networks, and business ecosystems in mind. We illustrate this view using case examples from mobile telephony, fuel efficient stoves, clean drinking water, and household electrification. Our paper underscores the need for today's managers to understand poverty as an integral part of the sustainability nexus and the new international business equation.     

The language of social entrepreneurs

This paper questions the application of the entrepreneurship discourse to social entrepreneurship in the UK and looks at how people ‘doing’ social enterprise appropriate or re-write the discourse to articulate their own realities. Drawing on phenomenological enquiry and discourse analysis, the study analyses the micro discourses of social entrepreneurs, as opposed to the meta rhetorics of (social) entrepreneurship. Analysis using both corpus linguistics software and Critical Discourse Analysis showed a preoccupation among interviewees with local issues, collective action, geographical community and local power struggles. Echoes of the enterprise discourse are evident but couched in linguistic devices that suggest a modified social construction of entrepreneurship, in which interviewees draw their legitimacy from a local or social morality. These findings are at odds ideologically with the discursive shifts of UK social enterprise policy over the last decade, in which a managerially defined rhetoric of enterprise is used to promote efficiency, business discipline and financial independence. The paper raises critical awareness of the tension in meanings appropriated to the enterprise discourse by social enterprise policy and practice and illustrates the value of discourse analysis for entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship research.     

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.     

Rural entrepreneurship in place: an integrated framework

ABSTRACT

Agglomeration-oriented theories have grown significantly in the past decade in the explanation and promotion of entrepreneurship. Theoretical frameworks and normative models such as entrepreneurial ecosystems are insufficient to observe, explain, and inform policies at the communal level in rural contexts. In this paper, we propose a socio-spatial lens as a more fruitful way of understanding the holistic picture of rural entrepreneurship. By means of abductive research, we explore the distinct elements of entrepreneurial places in rural contexts and derive an integrated meso-level framework, comprising place-sensitive determinations and dimensions, to observe and further analyse the enabling conditions of such places. The findings obtained and the framework developed will be of great use for the evaluation and decision-making, regarding entrepreneurship in rural communities.     

Entrepreneurial activity in the informal economy: a missing piece of the entrepreneurship jigsaw puzzle

This paper takes stock of the current debate around the informal sector and informal entrepreneurship. Informal entrepreneurship represents a worldwide characteristic of entrepreneurial activity, the main distinguishing feature of which is that it is operating outside the law. Since what is legal can vary considerably between countries, studies of entrepreneurship which exclude informal activity must be considered partial. Moreover, it can be argued that the distinction between formal and informal is not black and white but rather shades of grey. Although informal economic activity is often more prominent in developing countries and transition economies, it is by no means confined to them. There are parts of the UK, for example, where local economies are dependent upon informal employment and for many goods and services. More generally, much of the home-based economic activities, such as cleaning, painting and decorating and other services, are typically provided, at least partially, in the informal sector. As a consequence, it is difficult to argue against including informal activity as part of the study of entrepreneurship, and particularly where the entrepreneurial potential of an economy is being assessed.     

Family embeddedness and entrepreneurship experience: a study of Indian migrant women entrepreneurs in Australia

India has emerged as a major source of migrants for developed countries including Australia; yet, there is a dearth of research on Indian migrant entrepreneurs, particularly women. Using qualitative methods of enquiry, we explore the perceptions of Indian migrant women entrepreneurs (MWEs) and their partners in Melbourne, Australia, about their entrepreneurship experiences from a family embeddedness perspective. More specifically, we explore how family embeddedness of Indian MWEs is influenced by certain factors which in turn influence their entrepreneurship experience. Our findings suggest that entrepreneurship among Indian MWEs is a complex phenomenon influenced by their being an Indian, a woman and a new Australian, all of which interact and influence their family dynamics and entrepreneurial experience. Our findings shed light on the duality of Indian culture which exerts both an enabling and a constraining influence on the family dynamics of MWEs, the constraining role of gender and the positive impact of their integration into the host country’s sociocultural context which all influence their family embeddedness and entrepreneurship. Contributing to the discussion on ‘ethnic’ and ‘women entrepreneurship’ from a family embeddedness perspective, we offer policy implications for facilitating entrepreneurship in the growing but under-researched cohort of Indian MWEs.     

On becoming and being an entrepreneurship educator: a personal reflection

Entrepreneurship education has been studied intensively since 1990, yet little attention is given in the literature to the critical role and impact of the individuals that design and deliver it; the entrepreneurship educators. Who are they and what do we understand about them? Professor Alain Fayolle in 2013 challenged us to address this gap. In this article I aim to take on board Fayolle’s challenge and provide a single case of my own experience on the journey to becoming and being an entrepreneurship educator. After exploring the purpose and value of autobiographical methods, I then present the reader with my life story as an emerging entrepreneurship educator in the UK. This provides the basis for self-reflection and self-discovery to highlight key patterns of development that have shaped me as an entrepreneurship educator. Finally I provide personal thoughts on the important role of entrepreneurship educators as entrepreneurial leaders within their institutions. This paper has been produced in the hope that it will encourage other educators to share their journeys so that as a community we can better understand the ‘who’ of entrepreneurship educators.