Ignacio Tamayo-Torres

Purpose – This study aims to analyze the impact on human development of rates of innovative entrepreneurship and necessity entrepreneurship. Design/methodology/approach – Our empirical study is based on samples from countries with information about rates of entrepreneurship, human development, and social progress. The data are analyzed by means of pooled least squares and panel data techniques. Findings – Innovative entrepreneurship improves the quality of life in the dimensions measured by the Social Progress Index and Modified Human Development Index. Necessity entrepreneurship does not favor an increase of human development, at least in the dimensions measured by the two indexes, since this is a subsistence entrepreneurship type. Originality/value – This study presents new evidence that contributes to the knowledge on how entrepreneurship improves quality of life.

The effects of entrepreneurship and information and communication technology (ICT) on countries’ development have been extensively studied, mainly from the perspective of their contributions to economic growth. However, from the human development paradigm, economic income is only resource helping people satisfy their economic needs. This study provides new evidence to bridge the gap in our understanding of how entrepreneurship and ICT improve the quality of people’s lives. To achieve this goal, we use the capabilities approach as a theoretical framework. The empirical analysis was conducted using ordinary least squares with a sample of countries to provide evidence that innovative entrepreneurship, as measured by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, has a positive relationship with human development, as measured by the Social Progress Index. The results show that ICT, as measured by the Networked Readiness Index, is positively related to social progress, indicating that ICT is a tool that helps people improve their ability to lead the life they desire. Finally, we find that ICT boosts the positive effect of innovative entrepreneurship on social progress, and thus, that enhancing ICT, and with it, entrepreneurial innovation activity, improves the quality of life.

In recent years, numerous scandals concerning working conditions in Asia have threatened the reputation of large companies like Wal-Mart and Inditex. Since such scandals call attention to activities harmful to sustainable development, it is very important to study the relationships between concerns for sustainable supply chain management (SSCM), sustainability, and organisations’ market value. The added value of our study is, first, to explore SSCM controversies as drivers of or pressures for adopting and applying sustainability practices; and, second, to contribute to the recent but growing literature that analyses the channels through which SSCM and sustainability practices influence the firm’s value. We introduce sustainability environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices as a mediator between SSCM controversies and market value to examine whether SSCM controversies with firms’ stakeholders lead to improvements in the ESG dimensions of organisational sustainability. We also examine the relationships between the ESG dimensions and market value, measured as Tobin’s Q ratio. The results confirm both the positive relationships of SSCM controversies to the ESG dimensions two years later and a positive relationship of the dimension of governance to Tobin’s Q. We also confirm a negative and significant relationship of the social dimension to Tobin’s Q, and a non-significant relationship of the environmental dimension to Tobin’s Q.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze the roles played by organizational learning (OL) and innovation in organizations immersed in the processes of adaptation and strategic fit in dynamic and turbulent environments. The authors analyze whether OL and innovation act as sources of strategic fit, and whether strategic fit positively affects performance.Design/methodology/approach: The authors use data from a survey of a representative sample of 204 respondents from European firms active in high-technology sectors (response rate: 10.42 percent) and structural equation modeling (using the EQS 6.1 program) to undertake a transversal study.Findings: The model confirms that OL and the capacity to innovate positively influence managers’ decisions to adapt their organizations to changes in dynamic environments. The achievement of strategic fit, in turn, improves organizational performance. The authors propose considering the innovation climate as a facilitator of new product and process development, although the innovation climate is not a direct antecedent of fit.Research limitations/implications: This study is limited by the fact that the analysis is cross-sectional and by the fact that all measures used are based on managers’ perceptions.Practical implications: Managers should create and support an entrepreneurial culture that stresses continuous learning. They should also foster programs aimed at developing abilities, and promote the development of capabilities that facilitate acceptance of organizational change. Investments in building certain capabilities, such as OL and the capacity to innovate, are strategically justified, especially in turbulent environments.Originality/value: This study is one of the first to investigate the complex interactions among OL, innovation, strategic fit, and performance. The results improve our understanding of the links between strategic fit and performance.

This paper proposes to revise and develop new arguments in favour of the benefits of implementing quality management (QM) programmes for organizational innovation, more specifically, for administrative innovation. To achieve our purpose, we first show that quality and innovation perform a fundamental role as combined alternatives in the management of firms. Second, we analyse the factors that determine the administrative innovation gap and the repercussions of QM implementation for these relationships and for the capacity to adapt to the environment through innovation. The sample of firms was randomly selected from the Duns and Bradstreet database, which includes the 50,000 largest companies operating in Spain. To verify the different hypotheses in the model, we used structural equations modelling. The results show that the factors determining the process of innovation have repercussions for firms' capacity to adapt to their environment. They also show that a QM context facilitates this adaptation. This paper verifies that, while innovation and QM alone do not possess the qualities required to provide organizations with sustainable competitive advantages, the bundle of innovation and QM together with other resources and competences allow organizations to obtain a competitive advantage and adapt to their environment.

This study analyses the concept of strategic fit as a factor explaining organisational performance. We propose that strategic fit should include aspects of environment perception as well as the gap between planning processes and strategic implementation. Studying the firm's capacity to reduce this gap, we identify various organisational capabilities and analyse their relationships. Through managers’ responses from a sample of firms in European high-technology sectors, we find sufficient empirical evidence to affirm that strategic fit facilitates improvement in organisational performance. We also observe that strategic flexibility, real options and organisational learning are sources of strategic fit. So-called learning organisations facilitate generation of options that give the organisation the strategic flexibility needed to achieve fit with the environment. Strategic flexibility is defined in both the adaptive and anticipative sense. Our article thus offers a new perspective to contribute to better understanding of strategic fit and its antecedents.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyse the influence of the manager's strategic orientation concerning technology acquisition and its repercussions for the firm's performance.Design/methodology/approach: These relationships are studied using a sample of Spanish engineering consulting firms, most of them small‐ and medium‐sized enterprises.Findings: The results obtained show that the proactive character adopted by managers will directly influence the decision‐making process concerning technology acquisitions. Managers with a proactive strategic orientation adopt both internal technological development and the external acquisition of technology, but a slight preference is observed for internal development, even though it achieves considerably less satisfactory results than those achieved with external technology acquisition.Research limitations/implications: The paper is exploratory in character, and its goal is to show whether interrelations exist between the variables. The sample refers only to engineering consultancies. Another limitation is the cross‐sectional character of the analysis performed.Practical implications: To obtain perfect adaptation of the firm to its environment, it is crucial that the manager be committed on both the tactical and the operating strategic levels. The paper shows the important role of the manager's strategic orientation in his or her decisions on technology acquisition. Success in this kind of decision is of vital importance to the firm. The high costs of internal development prevent immediate profits, and external acquisition brings high risks.Originality/value: The paper seeks to stimulate new lines of research regarding these two variables (technology acquisition and manager's strategic orientation) and their repercussions for the firm.