Assessing the maturity of crowdventuring for corporate entrepreneurship

Corporate entrepreneurship is a process of strategic renewal and development of an existing business through the creation of new products, services, and activities, as well as new competitive postures and independent ventures. The performance of this process, which leverages the creativity and the initiative spirit of employees and managers, thus relies on the capacity of the organization to create favorable conditions for the emergence of such latent entrepreneurial potential. The development of participatory innovation models and collective intelligence offers new insights for conducting research on factors enabling corporate entrepreneurship. In particular, the internal company ‘crowd’ can be investigated with the purpose of studying the conditions under which the corporate entrepreneurship process can be successfully nurtured and conducted. In such view, this article moves from an extended review of corporate entrepreneurship and organizational innovation literature to define the concept of crowdventuring and to present an assessment tool aimed at evaluating the maturity of the crowdventuring process within an organization. The tool, which captures both individual and organization-related factors, is also used for an illustrative application into a multinational IT company. Some implications are drawn at the theory and practitioner levels.     

Intra-organizational networking for innovation-based corporate entrepreneurship

This study takes a network theoretical perspective in its examination of innovation-based corporate entrepreneurship (ICE), focusing on how project-specific ties can form for non-routine phenomena. A comparative case analysis of 246 interviews in twelve industry-leading global corporations identifies constructs associated with individual network capacity at the individual level, organizational network capacity at the organization level, and program network capacity at the ICE program level. In addition, we recognize the managerial facilitating roles of cultivator and broker. We develop propositions aimed at providing insights about the relationships among these constructs, and identify implications for managerial and ICE program responsibilities.     

Organizational rejuvenation for knowledge exploitation: Exploring corporate entrepreneurship in an MNE

The purpose of this paper is to study how organizational rejuvenation is used to increase and support knowledge exploitation in multinational enterprises. Using case-study data to explore the theoretical arguments, interesting findings emerge. The main finding is that entrepreneurial activities in IT industry enable organizational rejuvenation with repercussions beyond the focal function. Other findings relate to how corporate entrepreneurship activities provide possibilities for continuous knowledge exploitation within the MNE and how entrepreneurial groups inside MNEs form the foundation from which the organizational rejuvenation originates. Finally, the form of organizational rejuvenation studied embraced both structural and behavioral changes. The authors acknowledge an equal share in the development of this article.     

Sustainable corporate entrepreneurship: Evolving and connecting with the organization

Corporate entrepreneurship necessarily entails both risk and high levels of uncertainty; yet, established organizations are typically positioned as efficient engines that function best via cautious and routine progress, which can hinder attempts to inject innovative ideas into mature businesses. As such, conscious effort is required to build a corporation's capacity for sustainable entrepreneurship. While a few exceptional companies have built and maintained an enduring capability for entrepreneurship, the majority of firms possess a general resistance to these initiatives. Commitment to entrepreneurship may cycle between high or moderate support for the activity, to floundering interest or disbanded initiatives, as conditions in the internal and external environment shift. This cycling pattern, unfortunately, prevents the development of enduring capabilities. Herein, it is revealed how companies can progress their entrepreneurial capabilities over time, adjusting and improving them as the firm learns and adapts to change. To accomplish this, companies must develop strategic objectives to guide entrepreneurs, a management structure to support their work, and processes that inform assessment and decision making. Through an Evolve and Connect model, these three contexts can adjust to shifts in the external environment and the changes and progress happening within the organization. Over time, however, managers need to maintain a link between entrepreneurial activity and the organization's mainstream.     

The role of an entrepreneurially alert information system in promoting corporate entrepreneurship

The literature has suggested that an entrepreneurially alert information system may be a salient driver of corporate entrepreneurship, even though this role has been neither theoretically articulated nor empirically substantiated. Building upon the organizational learning, information orientation, and entrepreneurial awareness literatures we identify three key elements of a firm's entrepreneurially alert information system, and then develop a parsimonious model that examines the impact of these elements on corporate entrepreneurship. Using both single- and multi-source survey data from 495 small- to medium-sized firms, we test our model and find that each element individually and collectively imparts significant positive influence on corporate entrepreneurship.     

Properties of balance: A pendulum effect in corporate entrepreneurship

Organizations tend to evolve in ways that are inherently resistant to entrepreneurship. Yet, entrepreneurship is instrumental for ensuring the long-term sustainability of any enterprise. The key to maintaining relatively high levels of entrepreneurship within a company lies in understanding the basic nature of the entrepreneurial experience, recognizing the inherent entrepreneurial potential of all employees, and creating work climates that allow employees to act on that potential. Five primary design elements are identified for facilitating such climates. Underlying these design elements is a set of seemingly conflicting properties. The challenge to companies is to achieve a balance between these properties whereby they are allowed to co-exist. Approaches to implementing this balance are addressed herein.     

Integrating customer orientation, corporate entrepreneurship, and learning orientation in organizations-in-transition: an empirical study

The paper addresses the issue of interrelationships between market orientation, corporate entrepreneurship, and learning orientation in the context of emerging economies. These three constructs have drawn an increasing level of interest in both marketing and management fields as organizations face challenges in a volatile environment. With a national sample of state-owned enterprises in China, the present study simultaneously tests potential relations between these structural constructs and their relationships with the organizational outcome that is reflected with marketing program dynamism. The findings of this study indicate that: (1) sampled state-owned enterprises demonstrate a higher level of changes in organizational outcome resulted from a stronger customer orientation, corporate entrepreneurship, or learning orientation; (2) learning orientation fully or partially mediates the impact of customer orientation and corporate entrepreneurship on outcome; (3) state-owned enterprises with foreign partnership have a higher level of customer orientation, entrepreneurship, and learning orientation; and (4) state-owned enterprises in the service sector have a higher level of customer orientation.     

Gender and ethnic diversity on boards and corporate information environment

Prior studies argue that demographic diversity on a firm's board impacts its information environment, yet there is limited empirical evidence regarding the relation between board diversity and corporate opacity. We extend this line of research by examining whether gender and ethnic diversity of directors impacts corporate opacity. Using a Herfindahl Index based on directors' gender and ethnicities to measure board diversity, and an opacity index based on analyst following, analyst forecast error, bid–ask spread, and share turnover to measure corporate opacity, we find that board diversity is negatively associated with corporate opacity. Our results are robust to alternative measures of board diversity and the various tests we employ to address potential endogeneity concerns.     

Technological variables and absorptive capacity's influence on performance through corporate entrepreneurship

Technology and corporate entrepreneurship constitute an important source of competitive advantage for organizations, as they enable the development and exploitation of new opportunities. This study proposes a model to analyze the effects of top management support for technology on the promotion of technological skills, absorptive capacity, and technological distinctive competencies. The research also considers the impact of technological skills and absorptive capacity on the development of technological distinctive competencies, analyzing the influence of these variables on organizational performance through corporate entrepreneurship. The study tests these relationships empirically using 160 European technology firms. The paper ends with discussion of the findings and provides several theoretical and practical implications for future research.     

Middle managers' perception of the internal environment for corporate entrepreneurship: assessing a measurement scale

This study assesses the measurement properties of a scale that measures the key internal organizational factors that influence middle managers to initiate corporate entrepreneurship activities. In this study, corporate entrepreneurship is used in a broad sense to include the development and implementation of new ideas into the organization. Using this definition, this study describes an instrument used to empirically identify the internal conditions that influence middle manager's participation in corporate entrepreneurship activities. During the last decade, the role of the middle manager in corporate entrepreneurial activity has been recognized in the literature. The empirical research on the internal organizational factors that may foster middle manager activity has been limited, both in volume and scope. However, the literature does converge on at least five possible factors. The appropriate use of rewards: The literature stresses that an effective reward system that spurs entrepreneurial activity must consider goals, feedback, emphasis on individual responsibility, and results-based incentives. This factor, therefore, highlights middle managers' role in this regard. Gaining top management support: The willingness of senior management to facilitate and promote entrepreneurial activity in the organization, including championing innovative ideas as well as providing necessary resources, expertise or protection. This factor captures middle managers' role in this area. Resource availability: Middle managers must perceive the availability of resources for innovative activities to encourage experimentation and risk taking. Supportive organizational structure: The structure must foster the administrative mechanisms by which ideas are evaluated, chosen, and implemented. Structural boundaries tend to be a major stumbling block for middle management in corporate entrepreneurial activity. Risk taking and tolerance for failure: Middle managers must perceive an environment that encourages calculated risk taking while maintaining reasonable tolerance for failure. The literature on the internal factors was utilized to develop an assessment instrument called the Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument (CEAI). The instrument contained 84 Likert-style questions that were believed to assess a firm's internal entrepreneurial environment. Understanding middle manager perceptions about the internal corporate environment is crucial to initiating and nurturing any entrepreneurial process. A scale such as the CEAI, therefore, could be very useful for companies that wish to embark on a strategic transformation through corporate entrepreneurship. The measurement properties of the CEAI, including a factor analysis and reliability assessment, were determined. Results confirmed that five distinct internal organizational factors, similar to those suggested in the literature, do exist. Based on how the items loaded on each factor, the factors were entitled management support, work discretion, organizational boundaries, rewards/reinforcement, and time availability. The reliability of each of these factors also met acceptable measurement standards. From a managerial perspective, the results indicate that CEAI can be a useful tool in diagnosing a firm's environment for corporate entrepreneurship, identifying areas where middle managers can make a significant difference, and develop strategies that can positively spur and sustain corporate entrepreneurship efforts. The results of such diagnosis can be useful in designing effective training programs for middle managers.     

Legitimizing the apprenticeship practice in a distant environment: Institutional entrepreneurship through inter-organizational networks

This paper asks how Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) engage in institutional entrepreneurship to successfully transfer the organizational practice of apprenticeship-based training from Continental Europe to the distant host environment of the United States. In our case study, we highlight the important role of inter-organizational networks to coordinate engagement with the cognitive, normative, and regulative pillars of host country institutions. This networked form of institutional entrepreneurship involves the formation of inter-organizational networks for the purpose of bringing about institutional change collaboratively. In the process of transferring apprenticeship, a particular vision of workforce training was created, support gathered, and institutional change was sustained locally around the issue of training. We argue further that networked institutional entrepreneurship is a useful strategic tool to overcome the particular kind of institutional distance between the institutional settings of more coordinated market economies (CMEs) and more liberal market-oriented economies (LMEs). We contribute to existing knowledge by showing how practice transfer is shaped by particular kinds of institutional distance, and highlighting the role of inter-organizational networks as a way of governing collective agency associated with institutional entrepreneurship and the emergence of new local proto-institutions.     

Using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis for a finer-grained understanding of entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship theory has largely been developed and tested using symmetrical correlational methods, effectively describing the sample-average respondent and subsuming individual differences. Such methods necessarily limit investigation of asymmetries that are evident in entrepreneurship, and provide only a single explanation that belies the multiple pathways to entrepreneurship observed in practice. This paper employs a case-based approach—fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA)—to identify configurations of antecedent attributes of individuals in groups within samples, thereby revealing asymmetries and multiple entrepreneurial pathways that are otherwise hidden in the data. We explain the application of fsQCA to reveal these common issues in entrepreneurship; demonstrate how fsQCA complements correlational methods and offers finer-grained understanding of individual entrepreneurial behavior; and offer a comprehensive research agenda to build new entrepreneurship theory.     

A corporate entrepreneurship perspective of pre‐entry strategies for internationalization: A case study of a Chinese business conglomerate

The international expansion of Chinese firms is a remarkable phenomenon of contemporary international business. However, international expansion is particularly challenging for firms expanding from emerging market economies such as China because they have relatively few ownership advantages and suffer disadvantages. We apply a corporate entrepreneurship perspective to explore this under‐researched topic via a longitudinal case study of a large Chinese business conglomerate. Thirty‐one semistructured interviews and seven focus‐group discussions were conducted with 55 informants; company documents were also analyzed. We found sophisticated pre‐entry entrepreneurial initiatives are critical for successful internationalization, as they enable emerging market firms to overcome some constraints, leverage their assets, and build competences for international venturing.     

Social entrepreneurship as an essentially contested concept: Opening a new avenue for systematic future research

Social entrepreneurship has emerged as an active area of practice and research within the last three decades. Nevertheless, in spite of its growing popularity, scholars and practitioners are far from reaching a consensus as to what social entrepreneurship actually means. This has resulted in a number of different definitions and approaches within the field of social entrepreneurship. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the ongoing contestation of social entrepreneurship and to offer a novel conceptual understanding of the concept that can facilitate the development of systematic and structured future research. To this end, we analyze social entrepreneurship on the basis of the theory of essentially contested concepts, which was proposed by Walter Bryce Gallie in 1956. Building upon this theory, this article shows that social entrepreneurship can be regarded as an essentially contested concept and that a universal definition that would be accepted among contestant parties is hardly possible. Responding to this recognition, the article proposes the conceptualization of social entrepreneurship as a cluster concept, which can serve as a conceptual tool to help advancing social entrepreneurship as a coherent field of research despite its contested nature.     

The nonprofit case for corporate volunteering: a multi-level perspective

ABSTRACT

This article argues that the nonprofit case for corporate volunteering is complex, requiring a multi-level perspective on the outcomes for nonprofit organizations (NPOs). To develop this perspective, we adopted an inductive research approach, conducting 39 exploratory semi-structured interviews with NPO staff. We argue that NPO scholars and practitioners should disentangle individual and organizational-level outcomes resulting from interactions between corporate volunteers and NPO staff, as such micro-dynamics ultimately affect NPO services. Moreover, these outcomes are subject to conditions at the organizational level (e.g. involvement of intermediaries), as well as at the individual level (e.g. type of assignment). Our study highlights the complexity that should be considered when addressing the fundamental question of whether corporate volunteering contributes to the ability of NPOs to provide their services, and under what conditions. We therefore propose that corporate volunteer management within NPOs is inherently, albeit contingently, intertwined with the services that these organizations provide.     

Using consumer perceived ethicality as a guideline for corporate social responsibility strategy: A commentary essay

“Consumer Perceived Ethicality” presents a framework of perceived consumer ethicality as summarized from in-depth interviews with 20 citizens of the United Kingdom and Germany. The framework identifies six broad domains and 36 sub-items (6 for each domain) that serve as examples of consumer-generated “unethical corporate behaviors.” This commentary highlights the contributions, discusses the limitations and presents an alternative perspective on the study of consumer perceived ethicality.     

Determining the antecedents for a strategy of corporate social responsibility by small- and medium-sized enterprises in the UK fashion apparel industry

This paper seeks to increase the understanding of the antecedents of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in small UK fashion garment manufacturing firms. A review of CSR practice is used to inform the theoretical development of the wider aspects of small business competitive advantage. A causal map of the antecedents of CSR in the context of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is presented which will help guide the selection of the constructs to be used for measuring the existence of CSR in SMEs in the UK fashion garment manufacturing industry. Future research will gain a greater understanding of this phenomenon through evaluating the obstacles and drivers for the implementation of a CSR strategy in small garment manufacturing businesses.     

Multinational enterprises and corporate tax planning: A review of literature and suggestions for a future research agenda

Corporate tax planning by the multinational enterprise (MNE), that is, the MNE’s ability to plan its tax affairs by using a multitude of strategies to reduce its tax bills legally, is a central research question in the literatures of international business, public economics, tax, finance, law and accounting. Underlying theoretical assumptions, approaches to empirical testing, profit shifting estimation strategies and findings are varied. Thus, it is important to conduct a critical literature review. In this paper, we offer new insights by studying the phenomenon from the international business (IB) perspective. We survey the academic literature on the MNE and corporate tax planning to examine the extent of knowledge on this topic and identify areas that we hope will stimulate interest among IB scholars for further research. We find materials across disciplines that are relevant to IB readers. We examine 120 articles in 51 scholarly journals and classic books published during the period 1966-2017. We identify the key mechanisms and the firm characteristics that may influence corporate tax planning. We suggest a research agenda where IB research can make clear contributions.     

The battle for commercial hearts and minds and the internal brand within a charity shop network in Ireland

ABSTRACT

Charities are increasingly adopting commercial branding strategies to capture consumer hearts and minds for competitive gain, with little attention on the internal organisational battle for hearts and minds within a not-for-profit context. This paper explores the internal brand of a charity that currently operates 227 charity shops on the island of Ireland, using Hankinson’s 2004 framework that focuses on functional, symbolic, behavioural and experiential components. An exploratory case study was developed based on a survey of organisational members (n = 138), interviews with six regional shop managers, observation in retail stores and supplemented by organisation documentation. Findings indicate a clarity of perception on mission, purpose and core values for the charity, but more ambiguity around perception of the charity shop brand and identified issues relating to communication of policies and procedures, managerial practice and the workplace environment. The study also reveals a gap between the charity’s organisational identity and the brand identity for the charity store network, a clarity in the perception of core values that does not underwrite the store brand and resistance to the implementation of commercial practice within a volunteer-led charity. Trust may be the key in the internal battle for hearts and minds within the charity and may be crucial for the charity to realise its’ potential and successfully meet its’ mission for maximum societal gain.     

Why a poor governance environment does not deter foreign direct investment: The case of China and its implications for investment protection

It is widely believed that countries with a poor governance environment (e.g., weak laws and rampant corruption) do not attract foreign direct investment (FDI); however, our study suggests otherwise. Using China as a case study, this article argues that the prevailing theory that a good governance environment begets FDI is incomplete. When faced with a poor governance environment, investors choose direct investment over indirect (portfolio) investment because the former can be better protected by private means. In fact, China attracts a large amount of FDI because of, rather than despite, its lack of a good governance environment. In conclusion, this article offers strategies to better protect investments and to chart through the pitfalls resulting from rapid changes in the governance environment.