Résultat de la recherche
Innovation-Centric Cluster Business Model: Findings from a Design-Oriented Literature Review
How should a cluster be designed to foster the innovativeness of its members? In this article, we view self-aware and organised clusters as “meta-organisations” which can deliberately shape their internal structures through design-based interventions. To formulate interventions for cluster design fostering its innovativeness, we adopt a methodology combining a systematic literature review and a design-oriented synthesis. We distinguish between six cluster business model elements: actors and their roles, resources and capabilities, value flows, governance, value propositions and value-creating activities. To gain insight into the properties of these elements conducive to cluster innovativeness, we review literature at the intersection of cluster, meta-organisation, business model and innovation studies. Our study allows to consolidate the extant research into “organised” clustering and the drivers of the cluster actors’ innovativeness. It also helps identify several important unanswered questions in the literature and to suggest potentially fruitful directions for further work.
The mapping of an agile strategy in a new business world from atoms and recipes to bytes and mental agility
In a hostile post-industrial business environment characterized by globalisation and the immaterial age, we first establish an Initial Strategy Map which is based on the state of knowledge and focuses on the agility requirement. After this, based on the data collection of the empirical research, we adopt, synthesise and specify this initial framework as the Proposed Dynamic Strategy Map. Finally, as a result of an in-dept analysis of six business cases, the Proposed Dynamic Strategy Map is validated and clarified at the end of the thesis.
Such a framework offers a strategic approach for small and medium companies (SMEs) from established economies with tradable goods that have a low likelihood of imitation and (the potential for) a global brand. Due to their simple structure and manageable sites and scopes, our decision to analyse SMEs as units of observation can methodologically be justified and adds value to the understanding of their characteristics.
Clusters as institutional entrepreneurs: lessons from Russia
In this article, we explore whether organized clusters can act as institutional entrepreneurs to create conditions favorable to innovation in their constituent members. We view self-aware and organized clusters as “context-embedded meta-organizations” which engage in deliberate decision- and strategy-making. As such, clusters are not only shaped by their environments, as “traditional” cluster approaches suggest but can also act upon these. Their ability to act as “change agents” is crucial in countries with high institutional barriers to innovation, such as most transition economies. Focusing on Russia, we conduct two cluster case studies to analyze the strategies these adopt to alter and shape their institutional environments. We find that clusters have a dual role as institutional entrepreneurs. First, these can act collectively to shape their environments due to the power they wield. Second, they can be mechanisms empowering their constituent actors, fostering their reflexivity and creativity, and allowing them to engage in institutional entrepreneurship. Moreover, both collective and individual cluster actors adopt “bricolage” approaches to institutional entrepreneurship to compensate for the lack of resources or institutional frameworks or avoid the pressures of ineffective institutions.
Success Factors of the Fair Trade Chains: A Managerial Perspective
Background
Ethical consumption and business practices aiming at managing the social and environmental responsibility of firms are on the rise for several years. These phenomena raise several questions, since the economic agents involved, consumers and firms, are commonly considered as governed respectively by rationality and profit maximisation. Does this mark the emergence of a new social rationality? Or do these observations simply represent new means of reaching materialistic objectives? Is this tendency a flash in the pan or is it a movement that will eventually reform our understanding of business theory and trade? In this research, these background reflections are apprehended through the analysis of Fair Trade, from a managerial perspective. Fair Trade is a field which is guided by ideology, political activism and discursive approaches and has only recently been researched scientifically. There is a need for managerial research in order to foster good business practices and professionalism among the actors.
Objectives, content and structure
The main objective of the research is to draw broad success factors of Fair Trade, at different levels of analysis. The thesis is constituted of four individual studies (Chapter 2 to 5), having their own research questions, units of analysis and methodology, but related by this common underlying objective. Chapter 1 introduces the field and the approach, defines Fair Trade and states the research problem, as well as the epistemological approach. Chapter 2 dissects the two types of distribution channels existing in Fair Trade, namely the alternative channels and mainstream channels. It is an exploratory research, which introduces the core of the thesis composed of Chapter 3, 4 and 5. Chapter 3 aims to develop an initial typology of business strategies with regard to Fair Trade product distribution. The organisation of the Fair Trade distribution knowledge is a first step towards the optimisation of the related processes. Chapters 4 and 5 focus on Fair Trade consumers. An instrument to analyse and predict consumer behaviour is developed in Chapter 4 for the specific case of Fair Trade consumption. In Chapter 5, consumer segments are hypothesised and their behaviour is analysed with the help of the instrument previously developed. The aim of these two chapters is to have a precise understanding of Fair Trade consumers in order to know how to address the different market segments.
Contribution, Findings and Implications
The two main theoretical contributions to current researches related to Fair Trade consist first in the preliminary typology of strategies explaining why companies distribute Fair Trade products, how they organise this distribution and how they engage with the Fair Trade principles. Then, the involvement model developed refines the common generic instruments which are insufficient to fully apprehend the specificities of ethical consumers. Findings show that firms have various motivations pertaining to the distribution of Fair Trade products, ranging from alibi to altruism. Consumer motivations are also heterogeneous and several criteria (age, education and distribution channel) proved to be efficient in segmenting the market according to consumer attitudes and behaviour. The research leads to three categories of managerial implications. First, it presents the key factors in organising the distribution of Fair Trade products. It also analyses several strategies that can be implemented by companies in order to benefit from Fair Trade products and make the Fair Trade movement benefit from this distribution. Second, it explains marketing professionals how to structure Fair Trade communication efficiently according to the segments identified. Finally, the emphasis is placed on how to improve Fair Trade product competitiveness, which is useful to both distributors and the Fair Trade movement.
Designing organised clusters as social actors: a meta-organisational approach
In this paper, we aim at exploring whether and how ‘organised’ clusters can be conceived of as deliberate actors within their contexts. Seeing such clusters as meta-organisations, we suggest that these can make ‘organisationality’ design choices, or decisions regarding full or partial implementation of the five elements constitutive of formal organisations: membership, hierarchy, rules, monitoring, and sanctions. To explore the relationship between clusters’ organisationality and actorhood, we conduct two qualitative case studies of organised clusters in Australia. Our findings suggest that clusters can deliberately ‘construct’ themselves both as organisations and social actors. Furthermore, drawing upon the institutional work perspective, we propose that clusters can engage in deliberate identity, boundary, and practice work. However, in doing so, they address both internal and external legitimating audiences. Finally, our findings suggest that clusters’ organisationality design choices may influence the locus of their actorhood resulting in more or less collaborative approaches to institutional work.
Adoption du e-Business dans les activités internationales de la PME: implications des niveaux de e-Maturité et d'engagement à l'international
La divergence des chercheurs concernant l’usage inconditionnel de l’Internet dans les activités internationales de la PME, la pénurie de recherches sur les liens entre e-Business et engagement à l’international et le manque de clarté à propos de l’adoption du e-Business par les PME internationales, sollicite l’approfondissement d’études de certains liens notamment entre e-Business, PME et international. S’inscrivant dans la thématique générale de l’adoption des TIC par les PME, l’originalité de notre travail se situe dans le fait qu’il se penche sur l’implication des modes d’engagement à l’international et des stades de maturité des affaires électroniques pour expliquer l’adoption du e-Business au niveau des activités internationales des PME (e-Trade). Une de nos interrogations concerne la conceptualisation et la mesure des relations de causalité, d’une part, entre le niveau de maturité des affaires électroniques et la sophistication e-Trade (que nous définissons comme l’utilisation optimale des technologies Internet dans les activités internationales) et, d’autre part, entre le niveau d’engagement à l’international et la sophistication e-Trade. Douze hypothèses de recherche sont testées par la méthode PLS sur une centaine de PME installées en Suisse. Les résultats indiquent que le niveau de e-Maturité est influencé par les caractéristiques managériales liées aux nouvelles technologies. Nous constatons aussi que plus la pression des forces externes est importante et plus le niveau de e-Maturité est élevé. Toutefois, nous notons que l’âge de la PME a une influence négative sur son niveau de développement e-Business. D’autre part, l’analyse multivariée nous permet de déduire que le mode d’engagement à l’international n’est pas lié à l’âge ou à la taille de la PME. Il est surtout plus influencé par l’environnement externe de l’entreprise que par les caractéristiques managériales de son dirigeant. Outre cela, nous n’avons pas pu démontrer l’existence de relation de dépendance entre la e-Maturité et l’engagement vers l’international. Nous ne pouvons donc pas conclure que le processus évolutif des affaires électroniques au sein de la PME est lié à l’évolution dans son mode d’engagement à l’international. Notons aussi que la sophistication e-Trade est liée à la e-Maturité et à l’engagement vers l’international. Toutefois même si les PME les plus engagées à l’international ont un niveau de sophistication e-Trade élevé, nous avons pu démontrer que la propension de la PME à adopter le e-Trade serait plus influencée par à son avancement en terme d’affaires électroniques que par son niveau d’engagement à l’international. L’adoption des applications du e-Business par la PME pour ses activités internationales est donc dépendante en grande partie de son évolution en termes de commerce électronique. Enfin nous affirmons aussi que plus les PME sont sophistiquées en termes de e-Trade et mieux elles optimisent les avantages du e-Business à l’international.