Search results

Recent interest in social entrepreneurship among young people has led to a heightened interest in new research. Few studies, however, have yet to investigate motivators of involvement, particularly from countries that are new to social entrepreneurship. The current study set out to better understand this phenomenon among young social entrepreneurs in Malaysia. In-depth one-to-one interviews with 12 young entrepreneurs were carried out to collect the data. Four themes and ten sub-themes emerged from the interviews, including early life experience (childhood experience and family experience), inspiration from clients and colleagues (interactions with the target group and exposure to social entrepreneurs), work-related experience (volunteer experience and job-related experience), and personal meaning (contribute back to society, desire for more meaning in life, and personal passions). The implications for policy-makers and interested parties are outlined in regard to enhancing participation and interest among youth for social entrepreneurship.

This book provides an opportunity to explore the societal effects of entrepreneurship and its result on competitiveness. Over the last decade society has changed as the consequence of demographic shifts and increased usage of information communications technology. This has influenced the type of entrepreneurship individuals and firms to engage in and the focus of their businesses. Despite the importance of society to the speed and rate of entrepreneurship, little research exists that specifically examines societal entrepreneurship and competitiveness. This book aims at narrowing this research gap by discussing the interface between society and entrepreneurship. The core theme emerging from the chapters in this book is that the context of entrepreneurship is dependent on societal perceptions.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether business growth intention (BGI) and entrepreneurial motivations enhance the explanatory power of the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to predict environmental intention (EI) among nascent entrepreneurs.

In the context of nascent entrepreneurship, the authors collected data from 193 nascent entrepreneurs in France. To test the hypotheses, stepwise multiple regression was performed.

The results show that BGI has a positive influence on EI. This indicates that it is possible for French nascent entrepreneurs to plan the simultaneous pursuit of business growth and environmental goals. However, entrepreneurial motivations have a mixed effect on EI. If necessity motivations negatively influence EI, opportunity motivations have no significant effect on the latter.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research is among the first to extend the TBP model with additional factors, namely, BGI and necessity/opportunity motivations, to study EI. Moreover, the extended TBP model is validated in the under-research context of nascent entrepreneurship.

In the 21st century, libraries are experiencing a significant decline in users due to shifting reading habits and the impact of technology, necessitating library transformation and a heightened emphasis on library marketing. Special libraries, in particular, rely heavily on patrons for survival, often due to their private ownership and limited resources. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned objectives.

This paper examines the Taste Library, a special library in Hong Kong, and analyzes its current practices based on an interview with its founder, website content, and social media presence. The 7Ps Marketing Mix model is employed to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the library's current market position.

The Taste Library's existing practices exhibit limitations in attracting young patrons. To address this issue, we propose marketing strategies focused on enhancing social network presence, offering digitized content, and engaging in school outreach.

By concentrating on youth marketing, this study offers valuable insights for special libraries in developing strategic plans for transitioning and maintaining sustainability.

Few studies concentrate on marketing small special libraries, particularly in the East, within today's digitized economy.

This study aims to explore the relative importance of the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction in predicting research and development (R&D) employee creativity. In addition, the study examines the indirect effects of the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction on creativity via work engagement and the moderating role of challenge-related work stress in the first stage.

A two-wave design was used, in which total rewards satisfaction and challenge-related work stress were measured in the first wave. Work engagement and creativity were measured in the second wave. Dominance analysis and the latent moderated mediation model were used for the data analyses.

The analyses show that nonfinancial rewards satisfaction completely dominates indirect and direct financial rewards satisfaction when predicting creativity. Indirect financial rewards satisfaction completely dominates direct financial rewards satisfaction when predicting creativity. Work engagement mediates the relationships between the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction and creativity. Challenge-related work stress moderates the relationships between the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction and work engagement and the indirect effects of the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction on creativity via work engagement.

The results imply that managers should set challenge demands for R&D employees and try to improve their total rewards satisfaction, especially their nonfinancial and indirect financial rewards satisfaction, for them to be more creative.

This empirical study contributes to the literature by comparing the relative importance of the different dimensions of total rewards satisfaction in predicting creativity. The study also clarifies how (through work engagement) and when (based on challenge-related work stress) the subdimensions of total rewards satisfaction are positively related to R&D employees' creativity.

This study focuses on perceptions of registered brands sold in Shanghai. Brand identity has been studied in Western settings; this study expands understanding of brand identity from a Chinese perspective. Chinese shoppers in Shanghai shopping malls were asked to compare US and Chinese brands in a survey about their perceptions of product attributes, brand identification and store environment. In the analysis of data, US brands were evaluated more positively than Chinese on attributes of design innovation, workmanship, brand image, service, and display of products, while Chinese brands received more positive marks on fit and price satisfaction. Low brand loyalty among the Chinese shoppers meant that brand image and competition among brands are keen. To remain competitive, US companies which plan to increase their market in China need to pay attention to product quality and how brand identity is interpreted within Chinese culture.

This study aims to investigate how and why corporate social responsibility (CSR) among domestic firms in emerging countries is affected by foreign competition.

The paper combines the resource-based view with the institution-based view to explain how different levels of firm–government relationships prompt firms to enact CSR when facing foreign competition. First, this paper examines how domestic firms engage in CSR in the presence of foreign competition, followed by the consideration of how different firm–government relationships affect CSR strategies for firms faced with foreign competition. Using a database of 1,665 publicly listed Chinese firms between 2011 and 2017, this paper tests four hypotheses regarding CSR behaviors, foreign competition and firm–government relationships, and the findings of this paper generally support all four hypotheses.

This study contributes to the literature by demonstrating that domestic firms in China respond to foreign competition by increased engagement in CSR, and this positive relationship is heterogeneous among different firm–government relationships. CSR is attenuated by state ownership but enhanced by high industry competition and high regional marketization.

The findings of this research have implications for managers regarding the integration of internal and external resources to enhance CSR as a nonmarket strategy to help maintain firms’ competitive advantages. For the government, policymakers should establish and maintain a fair and market-oriented environment that encourages firms to increase CSR engagement.

The paper contributes to the literature exploring the mechanisms that motivate firms’ pursuit of CSR as a nonmarket strategy under the impact of intensified foreign competition.

This paper aims to present a digital image processing (DIP)-based discrete element method (DEM) for the analysis of heterogeneous geomaterials. Taking a soil and rock mixture as an example, the direct shear test is used to illustrate the application of this method. The numerical result is validated by the laboratory experiment and implies its feasibility in the analysis of heterogeneous geomaterials.

This method has two major steps. Based on a modification of the connected-component labeling algorithm, a novel vectorization method, which can transform the digital photos to vectorized geometry automatically, is proposed first. Then, a simple yet effective method for the generation of heterogeneous DEM models is presented using the simulation of simplicity technique.

DIP-DEM method is a feasible approach for the analysis of mechanical behavior of heterogeneous material. For soil and rock mixtures (SRM), the horizantal deformation at peak shear point becomes larger with the normal stress. Compared with pure soil, the rock aggregates mainly improve the friction angle of SRM.

As a universal method taking advantage of both DIP and DEM, this method has broad application prospects in related fields.

Following previous research highlighting the importance of gastronomy experience through cooking classes, this study aims to explore the relationships among gastronomy experience, cocreation, experience satisfaction, subjective well-being (SWB) and quality of life (QOL).

Data were obtained from domestic tourists who attended the Korean temple food cooking classes. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to verify the hypothesized relationships. The degree of cocreation was also tested for its potential moderating role on the relationships between gastronomy experience and experience satisfaction using a multigroup analysis.

Results revealed the strong and positive effects of the four dimensions of gastronomy experience on satisfaction. Furthermore, experience satisfaction was found to indirectly influence QOL through SWB. The effects of the education and entertainment experiences on satisfaction were found to be more positive in the high degree of cocreation group compared with the low degree of cocreation group. However, the influence of the escapism experience on satisfaction was greater in those less involved with the cocreated experiential activity.

Findings may assist tourism marketers and local stakeholders to better understand the nature of gastronomy experiences and the importance of cocreation when designing and promoting gastronomy tourism experiences.

This study introduced an integrative framework that provides a better knowledge of the cocreated experience in the context of gastronomy tourism, and this model may be useful in designing impactful gastronomy experiences that lead to true value cocreation and consequently enhancing QOL.