Innovation, Finance, and the Economy

The key challenge for EU Cohesion Policy is to improve SMEs access to capital and innovation. The objective of the article is to analyse use of the EU Structural Funds for innovative projects in SMEs from Pomerania Regional Operational Programme (ROP) 2007–2013. The analysis is based on 119 projects granted by the Measure 1.2. In order to achieve the main objective of the paper, the following detailed objectives are expected to be met: description of conditions and rules of grants awarding, analysis of SMEs in Pomerania region and finally, analysis of granted projects. The results of the analysis confirmed significant diversity of total values of projects, awarded grants and branches. The funded projects were implemented mostly in manufacturing. There were no beneficiaries from section H and section I which are very important for Pomerania’s economy. Most of the projects concerned implementation activity and only few of them were related to investment in R&D activity. More expensive projects and projects implemented in cooperation were more frequently financed with credit. In most cases firms have not declared employment growth. The research results should give recommendations for regional authorities on defining guidelines and implementing the Pomerania ROP 2014–2020.

Competitive intelligence is regarded as a significant topic by many practitioners and academics due to its importance in shaping the organization’s strategic decision making. Competitive intelligence is key in today’s unstable global environment because it leads to creation of ideas and innovation. Two popular areas of study on competitive intelligence are defining what competitive intelligence is and assessment of the organization’s intelligence capability. However, research on competitive intelligence as the foundation of strategic management is very much lacking. Furthermore, research on competitive intelligence practice among the SMEs are also scanty. There is a need to investigate the SMEs attitudinal factor motivation for competitive intelligence because these might influence the development of their attitude towards competitive intelligence in their daily business activities. Thus, the intention of this study is to review the literature on entrepreneurial attitude, competitive intelligence and innovative performance and to propose a conceptual model linking these three variables within the Malaysian SME context.

Workplace bullying is an anti-social behaviour which is defined as continuous harassment or “mobbing” of individual employee experienced for a relatively longer period of time. This may take several forms such as constant abuse, offensive remarks or teasing, ridicule, social exclusion, harassment, physical violence etc. The situation may be damaging to the wellbeing and job performance of the employee. However, if the organisation provided necessary support to the employee the effect of bullying could be mitigated. The paper examines these issues in selected Malaysian organisations. A sample of 231 employees representing different industry, size, gender, age, experience and job position responded to a self-rated questionnaire which measured the study variables, namely workplace bullying, psychological strain, self-rated job performance, and organisational support. Result indicated that nearly 14 % employees faced bullying incidents either weekly or daily. Such incidents resulted in higher psychological strain and lower job performance. Role of psychological support was positive in promoting performance and reducing strain.

High-quality teamwork has been recognized as central for organizational success. As such, researchers and practitioners have attempted to uncover how best to ensure high team performance. A review of the literature on teams suggested that team performance is a function of a variety of factors. While research shows that team context is important, investigations on this subject are still inadequate particularly for manufacturing teams within the context of a developing country like Malaysia. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to review the extant literature on team performance and subsequently propose a model linking team context (team leaders’ transformational leadership style and perceived team support) with team performance in the Malaysian manufacturing industry with a focus on the electrical and electronic sector. In addition, trust is explored as a mediator in the above-mentioned relationship.

The purpose of this study is to describe and analyse the emerging discussion frames in motherhood blogs. The main focus is on interaction and interactivity in motherhood blogs because they are very communal in nature. Blogs are one form of a larger phenomenon of user-generated content that has changed the way consumers communicate with each other. The conceptual framework is constructed from theoretical discussion frames identified in earlier literature. Netnography was chosen as the research method because it is designed for exploring the various communities that emerge through computer-mediated communications. The Finnish blog Suburban Mom was selected for deeper analysis, and the empirical data are based on 54 blog entries and 1,377 comments. This rich qualitative material was analysed using categorization. Eight empirical discussion frames emerged from the data, namely introducing and welcoming, exchanging courtesies, drawing inspiration, searching for information, sharing knowledge, providing peer support, expressing opinions, and opposing values.

In the modern world, where both business sustainability and competitiveness are among the main goals, none of the companies can survive without establishing some kind of informal or formal partnership with others, thus influencing the whole value chain. Meanwhile, business diversification has led to a multivariate construction industry structure challenging the traditional division of roles. Thus, the objective of the study was to establish the research methodology for the assessment of strategic partnerships, as well as to carry out empirical study on the extent to which the existing strategic partnerships influence the industry’s value chain. There was carried out an analysis of the construction industry’s structure in Latvia on the basis of the statistical data, developed the methodology for partnership analysis, approximated and analysed the major partnerships, and carried out the market stakeholders survey and focus group discussions to substantiate the findings. The study highlights partnership differentiation both by structure and strategic goals. It was discovered that customer-focused partnerships tended to last much longer leading to customer loyalty and repeated business, while profit-focused partnerships were often only a temporary solution, the major influencing factor for any successful partnership being the alignment of the strategic goals of all involved partners.

The security risks of Internet banking have always been a concern to the service providers and customers. One of the main issues related to Internet banking in Malaysia is the weak security of the Internet banking application. Therefore this study will investigate further the solution to enhance the security issues in Internet banking services by proposing the biometrics technology implementation. In this work we begin by analyzing user authentication methods being used currently in Internet banking, in order to propose a multi layered authentication technique which integrates to suit different Internet banking services based on risk assessment criteria’s and other constraints. Multi-layered authentication in the Internet banking context refers to the requirement of multiple login names, passwords, and biometrics factors. Many systems utilize a combination of these methods in order to increase the level of security. Thus, a possible option is to introduce biometric authentication.

The purpose of the paper has been to determine to what extent Croatian SMEs gear to accept innovations in the processes, products or organization in general. The aim has been to highlight the importance of innovation management and absorption and diffusion of innovation by SMEs in fostering growth and development of the organization itself. In the first part of the paper a literature review is provided. The empirical research was conducted to determine a present state in Croatian SMEs regarding innovation, perception of innovations and innovation absorption and diffusion. The primary data, collected through questionnaire, was used to find responses on the factors influencing innovations in organizations. The second part of the paper reveals research results. The National strategy of innovation for the period 2014–2020 was used as a frame which determines ways of improvements in innovation capacity and innovation management in Croatian SMEs. It was used also as a base to make a comparison with older EU members.

The objective of this article is to analyze the evolution of the quality criteria of financial information required nowadays by IFAC, the world’s largest professional body for effective decisions taken by owners, managers, employees of the entity. Fundamental characteristics are given by relevance and faithful representation. The second category considers verifiability, opportunity, comparability and intelligibility of information. In Romania, by comparing the quality characteristics of the information provided by financial reporting required by the IASB conceptual framework and by national regulations, there is a substantive difference. The relevance of the financial information must express the predictive and confirmatory value so that investors and creditors decisions should be based on the weather in order to help users confirm or adjust previous forecasts. The predictive and confirmatory (feedback) are attributes relevance of financial information. Romania fragmented applies them by Order 3055/2009 [Order no. 3055/2009 for the Approval of the Accounting Regulations in conformity with the European Directives.], without focusing on the relevance and role of undisputed projections based on historical financial information. Given the current state of development of accounting normalization, the ideal is to create a single standard, unitary standard that does not allow exceptions, conditions, exceptions or options.

Goods and Services Tax (GST) is a consumption tax based on goods and services to be imposed at every production and distribution stage in the supply chain, aims to replace the existing sales and service tax. It is part of the Malaysian government tax reform programme to improve the country’s tax administration and management. It is to be implemented effective April 1, 2015 as mentioned in the Malaysia 2014 budget. As the timeframe for the implementation draws closer, previous research showed that consumers in general still have vague ideas about GST and its implication to the economy. Majority of the consumers were not ready to accept GST and some perceived that the government’s effort in promoting it is inadequate. Therefore, this research was conducted to analyze the effectiveness of communication used by the Government in instilling Malaysian consumers’ mind-set to accept GST, and also to evaluate the effectiveness of communication tools used. The findings indicated that further efforts should be taken by the government to widen the communication channel so that the information on GST will be easily accessible and understood by every consumer in Malaysia, thus it will enhance the acceptance and implementation process of GST.

In today’s world innovation is the key driver of economic development, growth and competition at both the micro and the macro-economy. Result of innovative activity, appearing at the microeconomic level, have an impact on macroeconomic fundamentals, which, in turn, determine the scope of the innovation. Improving the competitiveness of the Russian economy and its successful integration into the global economic system requires to enforce innovation. Therefore the identification and comprehension of interconnections and interdependencies between the fundamentals of the national economy and the parameters of the innovation is the important task to date. In the paper the innovative activity and its institutional structure in Russia are characterized; the system of innovation indicators for the national economy is determined; the trends of innovative development in Russia are identified on the base of numerical analysis of official statistics taking into account regional aspect; the current state, prospects and priorities for the development of innovative sphere in Russia are assessed.

Innovation is essential for the economy due to it accelerates to growth process. Due to technology lowers to cost and time for production stage, innovation is crucial for the economic growth. In this paper, technology intensive exports of the real/manufacturing sectors and regulatory framework, and its relation to the regulatory framework are examined in the emerging market. In this paper, the regulatory framework of innovation activities and its impact on technology intensive exports in Turkey are examined between 1990 and 2010. Obtained results show that there is some technology intensive exports interaction with the regulatory framework, there is technology intensity exports and the regulatory framework interaction is crucial in the long term, and there is no R&D intensity exports of the manufacturing sector in the short term.

Tourism is a multifaceted industry with high economic significance. Its multiplier effects show wide range of sectors that benefit from tourism. Whilst touting economic benefits of tourism, one has to be cautious because tourism activities involve economic costs as well. Additional costs can occur if planning, development and operations in tourism are not properly managed. Sustainable tourism lies at the core of destination stewardship. Destination managers need to be able to forecast economic, environmental and social trends affecting tourism. Thus, destination planning is crucial in balancing developments of tourism and controlling its growth. In this paper authors test various possible tourism scenarios on the total revenue generated from tourism for a 7-year projection period. Every scenario is based on destination planning. The case study destination used for scenario modelling was Labin-Rabac. The forecasts are based on three broad types of drivers: season extension outside the traditional July and August months, growth of accommodation capacity (number of bed places) and growth in the average tourists’ expenditure. The methodology used for scenario analysis is: historical method, deductive method, analysis (particularly horizontal analysis of the income statement which provided information about tendencies and change dynamics on its positions), synthesis, and mathematical methods.

The article analyzes the reasons of the global social system restructuring. The main stages of the social institutions dynamics of the European world and historic projects of its modernization were studied. Negative structural changes that occurred in the process of civilizational confrontation of the Eastern theocratic and Western technocratic systems are noted. The basic restructuring principles of the European world and its impact on the global economic processes were analyzed.

This paper utilizes the multivariate GARCH framework of Engle and Kroner (1995) to examine the return and volatility spillovers among a new group of six frontier markets called ‘CIVETS’. These markets are considered to be the future hosts of investments due to their huge potential and abundance of resources. The analysis of weekly stock market return series revealed that these markets have significant return and volatility spillovers among each other. These findings suggest that the portfolio investors who invest in emerging and frontier markets for better returns should take into account the correlation of risk and returns among CIVETS stock markets. The diversification benefits should be assessed keeping in view the extent of inter-market linkages of Colombia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Egypt, Turkey and South Africa.

SMEs forge relationship with actors in their environment to obtain necessary resources, support and information which they may be unable to generate by themselves. These relationships are born out of linkages through formal and informal networks. Social capital of SMEs evolves out of these networks and generates scarce benefits. Literature provides that information sharing is widely regarded as one of the key returns of social capital which has a significant impact on firm performance (Wu 2008). Various dimensions of social capital in the form of network ties, trust and shared vision in strategic alliances and social alliances of SMEs have unique influences on information sharing among their exchange partners. This study attempts to examine the effects of the dimensions of social capital on information sharing advantages of the SMEs and its influence on firm performance, while drawing a comparison between firms engaged in strategic and social alliances. Analyzing the data from 100 small firms in West Bengal largely support the hypothesis that social capital contributes significantly towards information sharing, the effect of which is consequently translated into firm performance. The influence is found to be more pronounced for firms embedded in strategic alliances as compared to other firms.

This paper examined the impact of vertical specialization on the agglomeration of China’s manufacturing sector from a regional perspective. It also explored the features of the agglomeration process of manufacturing sector in different regions of China. The paper first calculated the degree of vertical specialization and agglomeration respectively by using statistics of 2-digit manufacturing sub-industries at province level from year 2003 to 2008. And then it further built a panel data model to estimate the impact of vertical specialization on the agglomeration of manufacturing sector at both national and regional level. The results of the research reveal the existence of strong regional disparity as to the impact of vertical specialization on agglomeration of China’s manufacturing sector. Vertical specialization is found to be significantly positive related to the formation and development of manufacturing agglomeration at national level. However, this positive effect on national level, as suggested by a more thorough estimation, owes mainly to the positive relation of the two subjects in eastern China. Different from the case in eastern and western China, where vertical specialization stimulates manufacturing sector to be agglomerated, the impact of vertical specialization on agglomeration is negative in the middle part of China.

Online job matching tools to support HR functionalities in organizations is increasingly becoming popular. Fast and efficient employment solutions for disadvantaged groups are especially important since they are a part of social inclusion. Employment process of disadvantaged groups is different than regular job finding processes because these individuals may not have physiological, cultural, economic, technical and/or political resources to reach the candidate evaluation process. Even if they can reach to this process, they can be discriminated because of the prejudices. This might end up with sub-optimal solutions since the disadvantaged individual may be forced to find employment not relevant to their qualifications while the employers may face skills shortages. Solution to this problem requires new approaches to employment process. The objective of this paper is to make a process modeling of the existing employment systems for the disadvantaged people and suggest possible improvements to these systems.

Online systems first emerged as recruiting tools in the mid-1990s have grown rapidly and became a widely adopted medium by both employers and job seekers. However, despite their success, they have important drawbacks. These tools are mostly designed for matching corporate positions to certain elite employees rather than covering disadvantaged groups, SMEs and NGOs. Key features of present systems are determined by a “core team” of experts according to the aggregate requirements of an average target user. Designing an inclusive recruitment system requires a rigorous conceptualization phase where all stakeholders actively participate within a multidisciplinary approach with the collaboration of engineers with social. In this paper, we embraced a user-centered approach to determine the relative importance of different online recruitment tool features for diverse users and conducted conjoint analysis to determine the needs, requirements and expectations of different stakeholders, male–female job seekers and job providers from SME or MNEs, We performed requirement-based segmentation on the output from the conjoint analysis to isolate homogeneous user segments. The results demonstrated that there are significant differences between the groups and suggest that conjoint analysis can provide systematic input for process modeling to customize online tools according to the requirements of different stakeholders.