Business Networks

The Strategy of Establishing and Managing the Manager and Enterprise Network

by Vasja Roblek

We represent one of various ways of establishing a concept of the virtual organization. The Internet connect the... more We represent one of various ways of establishing a concept of the virtual organization. The Internet connect the managers and entrepreneurs and gives them adviser support. This concept is a result of the theoretical point of a new informational economy, knowledge management and qualitative research. On the basis of interviews with the managers, members of business associations, analysis and active observation of two business associations plans and goals have been set. The network objective is to enable better information flow between the (board) members and beyond. The final result is to increase the synergy of all parties involved.

Dynamische Team-Netzwerke und Performance. Eine empirische Analyse von Email-Interaktionen (Dissertation)

by Lukas Zenk

Zenk, L. (2012). Dynamische Team-Netzwerke und Performance. Eine empirische Analyse von Email-Interaktionen. (Unpublizierte Dissertation). Universität Wien, Österreich.

Durch die immer schnelleren Veränderungen im Markt stehen Organisationen vor der Aufgabe ihre intra-organisationalen... more Durch die immer schnelleren Veränderungen im Markt stehen Organisationen vor der Aufgabe ihre intra-organisationalen Kommunikationsnetzwerke effizient an die gegebenen Anforderungen anzupassen (Brass et al., 2004). Teams nehmen als kooperative Basiseinheiten eine wesentliche Rolle ein um die gesetzten Ziele der Organisationen zu erreichen und es konnte nachgewiesen werden, dass die Kommunikationsstruktur innerhalb und zwischen Teams deren Performance signifikant beeinflusst (Balkundi & Harrison, 2006). Die meisten dieser Studien analysieren jedoch statische Netzwerke, obwohl sich Teams auf Grundlage der dynamischen Interaktionen zwischen Akteuren über die Zeit entwickeln (Katz et al., 2004). In dieser Arbeit wird daher der Frage nachgegangen, wie sich dynamische Teamnetzwerke über die Zeit entwickeln und wie sich diese Netzwerke auf die Team Performance auswirken (Zenk, Stadtfeld & Windhager, 2010).

Learning and External Technology Management: the networks approach

by Apostolos Rafailidis

1st. Founding Conference of the European Academy of Management (EURAM) “European Management Research: Trends and Challenges”, Barcelona, Spain, Apr. 19 – 21, 2001
co-authored with Giannis Tselekidis

It is argued that efficient learning, combined with efficient use and assimilation of available external knowledge,... more It is argued that efficient learning, combined with efficient use and assimilation of available external knowledge, can provide a sound basis upon which the technological capabilities of a firm can be built, for long–term efficiency and survival.This is especially true for firms that lack necessary technological capabilities and seek to improve their position in the global market by gradually creating a competitive advantage.

The contrary forces of innovation: A conceptual model for studying networked innovation processes

by Thomas Hoholm

Published in Industrial Marketing Management (2012), co-authored with Per Ingvar Olsen, Dept Innovation and Economic Organization, BI Norwegian Business School

In this paper, we argue that industrial innovation processes can productively be analysed as consisting of two... more In this paper, we argue that industrial innovation processes can productively be analysed as consisting of two sub-processes that over time create and mobilise contrary forces within both internal and external interactions of the innovation project. One of these forces emerges from the process of mobilising resources, activities, and actors in ensuring commitments to the project over time. The other is the process of explorative learning, which continues to create revised or even new propositions about the realities of the project and its opportunities. We argue that this analytical distinction permits us to expand our understanding of how friction forces develop over time in business networks (Håkansson & Waluszewski, 2001a,b), the patterns of divergence and convergence in innovation processes as identified by Van de Ven et al. (1999) and the processes of “path creation through mindful deviation” as argued by Garud and Karnøe (2001).

Mäläskä, M.; Saraniemi, S. and Tähtinen, J. (2011) Network actors´ participation in B2B SME branding. Industrial Marketing Management, Vol. 41,

by Jaana Tähtinen

References on ARCON reference model for collaborative networks

by Luis M. Camarinha-Matos

Challenging assumptions in entrepreneurship and rural tourism businesses

by Robert Newbery

Keywords: rural tourism business, entrepreneurs, lifestyle business, network

Tourism has been recognised as a key economic driver in rural regions of the UK (Ilbery et al. 2007). These rural... more Tourism has been recognised as a key economic driver in rural regions of the UK (Ilbery et al. 2007). These rural areas are typically endowed with natural resources that are strong attractors of both tourists and tourism businesses. Declining primary industries and an outflow of the younger generation to urban areas mean that the tourism sector is regarded as the best development option in a path dependent economic trajectory.

However development implies change and the change-agents in an economy are entrepreneurs. This presents a problem, since the individuals attracted to the ‘rural idyll’ to start-up in business are the more senior counter-urbanites that are motivated by lifestyle. It is assumed that since they are ‘life-style’ businesses they cannot be entrepreneurs. This is not the only entrepreneurial assumption that is made about rural tourism businesses. It also seems accepted that growth and innovation are appropriate sector-based measures of entrepreneurship, and that the business or owner-manager is the only appropriate unit of analysis.

This paper sets out to challenge these assumptions. Using 2 quantitative data-sets, both based in the rural North of England, this paper shows that the majority of rural tourism businesses can be regarded as entrepreneurial and that they are very likely to be members of organisations that are collectively entrepreneurial.

Given the symposiums future aim to develop as a rural tourism research network, this paper sets out an agenda for future research on entrepreneurship in rural tourism.

« A Business Alla Turca? Levant Trade and the Representation of Ottoman Merchants in Eighteenth Century European Commercial Literature »

by Mathieu Grenet

in Global Economies, Cultural Currencies of the Eighteenth Century, eds. Michael Rotenberg-Schwartz and Tara Czechowski, New York: AMS Press, 2011(forthcoming): 39-56
UNPUBLISHED PAPER - PLEASE DO NOT COPY OR QUOTE WITHOUT THE AUTHOR'S PERMISSION

This essay aims at investigating the role that business patterns played in the Western traders’ perception of their... more This essay aims at investigating the role that business patterns played in the Western traders’ perception of their Ottoman counterparts in the 18th century. It is based on a close reading of a wide portion of the commercial literature available at this time, including business treatises and handbooks, memoirs and correspondences of traders, and public records from Western port-cities (with special reference to Marseilles, Venice and Leghorn).
What emerges through these readings is a twofold picture. On the one hand, the classical image of the Levantine trader, whose features epitomize both the specificity of Ottoman business practices, and the permanence of a European orientalism. On the other hand, a more fragmented and subtle perception that derives from a more practical experience of the commerce with the Ottoman Empire and its subjects. The basic assumption of this essay is that far from being opposed one to the other, these two representations are the two faces of the same coin, and they make the picture of the 18th-century Ottoman trader both a stereotypical and a multifaceted one. It is this picture that I intend to study, and ultimately deconstruct.
My paper thus consists in a brief overview of the Levantine trade and of its importance for the European market and commercial balance, followed by two main points. First, a study of the way the construction of discourses on Ottoman otherness takes into account a certain number of “Oriental” business practices – whether real or assumed. Second, an analysis of how patterns of trade were instrumental in Europe’s acknowledgement of the different ethno-national components that formed the Ottoman Empire.

La fabrique communautaire: les Grecs à Venise, Livourne et Marseille, v. 1770-v. 1830

by Mathieu Grenet

Ph.D. thesis (2010)
European University Institute, Florence, Italy
Supervisor:
Jury: Prof. Anthony Molho (EUI), Prof. Antonella Romano (EUI), Prof. Francesca Trivellato (Yale University), and Prof. Brigitte Marin (Université Aix-Marseille)
UNPUBLISHED Ph.D. - PLEASE DO NOT COPY OR QUOTE WITHOUT THE AUTHOR'S PERMISSION

The point of departure for this dissertation is a historical, epistemological and methodological discussion of the... more The point of departure for this dissertation is a historical, epistemological and methodological discussion of the notion of “community”. Based on a comparative approach to the three cases of the Greeks in Venice, Livorno and Marseilles from the age of the “Greek Enlightenment” (c. 1770) up until the birth of an independent Neohellenic state (1830), this study aims to challenge the conventional image of early modern foreign communities as homogeneous and inclusive groups, by rendering the complex, diverse, and often contradictory trajectories of groups and individuals that formed what we know as “the Greek Diaspora”. Paying special attention to issues such as the administrative control of the migrants, the collective uses of urban space, and the sharing of socio-cultural practices, it reconstructs the multi-layered background that supported the expression of communal identities among the Greeks in Venice, Livorno and Marseilles. By recasting the three cases under scrutiny within the wider context of the many connections and relations that existed among them, the dissertation stresses the ways in which the entanglement of mercantile, migratory and family networks came to “shape” the Greek Diaspora as a space both physical and socio-symbolical. Conversely, and in a micro-historical perspective, it also analyses the role played by the “communal institutions” (namely the Greek-Orthodox churches and brotherhoods) in shaping collective identities and governing plural and heterogeneous social groups, as well as the many types of reaction and resistance to this progressive “institutionalisation” of community life. Lastly, a case-study on the ambiguous involvement of the Greeks in Venice, Livorno and Marseilles in the Greek war of independence (1821-1830), sheds light on the complex issue of the “patriotism of the expatriates”, and argues for an essential distinction between the making of communal identity, and that of national (or even “proto-national”) consciousness.

A network perspective on business models for emerging technology-based services

by Jaana Tähtinen

Sustainable SMEs network utilization: the case of food enterprises

by Jaana Tähtinen

Managing competitive bidding in the Finnish healthcare sector

by Jaana Tähtinen

Twists and turns of triadic business relationship recovery

by Jaana Tähtinen

Roles for managing in mobile service development nets

by Jaana Tähtinen

Social networks in the initiation of a high-tech firm's internationalisation

by Jaana Tähtinen

Situated Organizational Mapping

by Lukas Zenk

Windhager, F., Zenk, L., & Risku, H. (2008). Situated organizational mapping [in german]. In C. Stegbauer (Ed.), Netzwerkanalyse und Netzwerktheorie (S. 239-249). Wiesbaden, Deutschland: VS.

So allgegenwärtig Organisationen in der modernen Gesellschaft auch sind und so unverzichtbar sie zu Regelung und... more So allgegenwärtig Organisationen in der modernen Gesellschaft auch sind und so unverzichtbar sie zu Regelung und Erhalt aller Lebensbereiche auch sein mögen, so allgegenwärtig sind auch Phänomene der Intransparenz oder Unverständlichkeit dieser komplexen sozialen Systeme für externe Beobachter und interne Mitglieder. Als besonders wissensintensive Organisationen treten Universitäten in Erscheinung – und in ihrem Inneren damit charakteristische Formen der Unübersichtlichkeit und Desorientierung. Im aktuellen Angebot organisationstheoretischer Optiken schien zu diesem Zweck die Methode der Sozialen Netzwerkanalyse (SNA) mit ihren komplexen und dennoch kompakten Visualisierungsmöglichkeiten bestens geeignet um diese Black Box zu beleuchten. So wurde das Department für Wissens- und Kommunikationsmanagement der Donau-Universität Krems mit 10 Fragen zu vorhandenen sozialen Beziehungen und Strukturen durchleuchtet und das Resultat in Form von visuellen Netzwerken veranschaulicht

Culturelinks: Cultural Networks and Cultural Policy in the Digital Age

by Colin Mercer

in B. Cvjeticanin, ed., Networks: The Evolving Aspects of Culture in the 21st Century, Zagreb, Institute for International Relations, 2011.pp.31-43

Global sourcing and business networks: quality heterogeneity and firms’ efficiency

by Giuseppe Vittucci Marzetti

Co-authored with Chiara Tomasi and Maria Luigia Segnana,
published in Dallago, B. and Guglielmetti, C. (eds), Local Economies and Global Competitiveness, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.

Global sourcing can increase firms’ productivity via the quality upgrading of intermediates, but, because of the... more Global sourcing can increase firms’ productivity via the quality upgrading of intermediates, but, because of the heterogeneity of suppliers, it also increases screening costs of final firms given the need to search for good suppliers. We build up a simple model to analyze these factors and show that large firms can better exploit the potential gains from quality upgrading. Moreover, we show that business & social networks make both the overall production and firms’ profitability increase via the reduction in firms’ unit screening costs. There are cumulative beneficial effects of these networks: Thicker networks imply higher cost saving and thus further incentives to invest in network linkages. Finally, we sketch a possible extension of the model to analyze the choice of local vs. global sourcing strategies and how their differences, in terms of costs, suppliers’ heterogeneity and degree of embeddedness in networks, affect firms’ choices and their efficiency.

SocialMediaWhitepaper.pdf

by Loveneet S

SocialMediaWhitepaper.pdf

SocialMediaWhitepaper.pdf SocialMediaWhitepaper.pdf

[Infographics] NEW B2B Search Marketing Strategy chart- smebs

by Loveneet S

[Infographics] NEW B2B Search Marketing Strategy chart- smebs

[Infographics] NEW B2B Search Marketing Strategy chart- smebs [Infographics] NEW B2B Search Marketing Strategy chart- smebs