What do growing early-stage digital start-ups look like? A mixed-methods approach

2023 | International Journal of Information Management | Citations: 0

Authors: Griva, Anastasia; Kotsopoulos, Dimosthenis; Karagiannaki, Angeliki; Zamani, Efpraxia D.

Abstract: Digital entrepreneurship is one of the most important and impactful forms of ent ... Expand

Abstract: Digital entrepreneurship is one of the most important and impactful forms of entrepreneurship. However, the majority of digital start-ups fail to scale, despite their potential to achieve growth. Moreover, what constitutes growth is significantly different for start-ups as compared with established firms: they have limited financial performance, and their growth cannot be accurately measured by metrics such as customers, revenues, profits, and turnover at the early stages of the new venture creation process or before the start-up has reached sus­ tainability. Therefore, the first objective of this research is to contribute to the definition of growth by examining less tangible dimensions of growth. Moreover, the second objective is to identify the characteristics of early-stage digital start-ups experiencing growth. Based on a mixed-methods approach, which combines an adapted Delphi study, a questionnaire-based survey, and a comparative case study, our results suggest that growing digital startups exhibit a set of characteristics that include: an agile culture combining clan with adhocracy; the ability to nurture their absorptive, innovative, and adaptive capabilities effectively; and a human capital with adequate entrepreneurial skills, emotional attachment to and fitness with the start-up. Collapse

Topics: digital entrepreneurship human resource management entrepreneurship innovation management absorptive capacity

Methods: survey delphi study mixed method qualitative interview case study

Theories: dynamic capabilities theory

Can support by digital technologies stimulate intrapreneurial behaviour? The moderating role of management support for innovation and intrapreneurial self-efficacy

2023 | Information Systems Journal | Citations: 0

Authors: Rabl, Tanja; Petzsche, Valentin; Baum, Matthias; Franzke, Sonja

Abstract: Drawing on theorising on digital technologies as external enablers of entreprene ... Expand

Abstract: Drawing on theorising on digital technologies as external enablers of entrepreneurial activities and an interactionist perspective on corporate entrepreneurship, this article examines the relationship between digital technology support and employee intrapreneurial behaviour. We propose that management support for innovation as an organisational characteristic and intrapreneurial self-efficacy as an individual characteristic moderate this relationship. Findings from a metric conjoint experiment with 1360 decisions nested within 85 employees showed that support by social media, support by collaborative technologies, and support by intelligent decision support systems were significant predictors of employee intrapreneurial behaviour. However, the relative impact of support by these digital technologies varied with different levels of management support for innovation and intrapreneurial self-efficacy. Collapse

Topics: system support self efficacy top management support innovation management decision support system

Methods: experiment survey design theory development survey regression analysis method

Bridging the Gap between Security Competencies and Security Threats: Toward a Cyber Security Domain Model

2023 | HICSS | Citations: 0

Authors: Schütz, Florian; Rampold, Florian; Masuch, Kristin; Köpfer, Patricia; Mann, Dominik; Warwas, Julia; Trang, Simon

Abstract: Security incidents are increasing in a wide range of organizational types and si ... Expand

Abstract: Security incidents are increasing in a wide range of organizational types and sizes worldwide. Although various threat models already exist to classify security threats, they seem to take insufficient account of which organizational assets the threat events are targeting. Therefore, we argue that conducting more job-specific IT security training is necessary to ensure organizational IT security. This requires considering which assets employees use in their daily work and for which threat events employees need to build up IT security competencies. Subsequently, we build a framework-based Cyber Security Domain Model (CSDM) for IT-secure behavior. We follow the Evidence Centered Assessment Design (ECD) to provide a deep- dive analysis of the domain for IT-secure behavior. As the leading result relevant for research and practice, we present our CSDM consisting of 1,087 cyber threat vectors and apply it to five job specifications. Collapse

Topics: data security IT security IT security training phishing IT security defense

Methods: literature study survey design process

Market of Makers – How to Promote Corporate Entrepreneurship with an Effectuation Intervention

2022 | DESRIST | Citations: 0

Authors: Braun, Sophia Marie; Mauer, René

Abstract: Corporate entrepreneurship is a challenge for organizations and their employees, ... Expand

Abstract: Corporate entrepreneurship is a challenge for organizations and their employees, for example because of structural rigidities or inertia. A promising approach of how to spark corporate entrepreneurship lies in effectuation research. Effectuation is a mode of action or decision-making logic that is based on empirical evidence from expert entrepreneurs. Following a Design Science Research (DSR) methodology, we develop and implement an effectuation intervention at a German multinational corporation. The intervention consists of two basic parts: The Market of Makers, an event that leads participants through the effectual process, and the Speedboat Regatta, a 3-months long project development phase. The intervention successfully generated 23 projects that identified opportunities for process innovation. This study contributes to design knowledge, theory and practice. First, we designed a blueprint for similar effectuation interventions and are able to formulate four design principles, which show how voluntariness, playfulness, and constraints enable effectuation and promote corporate entrepreneurship. Second, we contribute to corporate entrepreneurship theory by showing that effectuation is promising for approaching corporate entrepreneurship’s theoretical and empirical problems. Third, we contribute to practice by demonstrating that interventions based on effectuation may shift employees towards leading and engaging with innovative projects. Collapse

Topics: intrapreneurship innovation management pandemic electronic mail organizational transformation

Methods: qualitative interview design principle design science personal interview theoretical contribution

The Nexus of Design Thinking and Intrapreneurship: Insights from a large-scale empirical assessment

2022 | HICSS | Citations: 0

Authors: Marx, Carolin; Haskamp, Thomas; De Paula, Danielly; Uebernickel, Falk

Abstract: Although the nexus of Design Thinking (DT) and corporate entrepreneurship being ... Expand

Abstract: Although the nexus of Design Thinking (DT) and corporate entrepreneurship being heralded as promising, the concrete compositional architecture of how DT manifests in practice has received limited scholarly attention. Drawing on the argument that DT can facilitate intrapreneurial innovation by enabling effective cognition, we developed a multidimensional assessment model that measures DT for intrapreneurial innovation in an organizational context and applied it via an online survey to 547 organizations of different sizes and industries. An analysis of the dimensional and sub-dimensional values obtained from the quantitative survey data in general, and concerning industry and firm size types in detail, enriches our understanding of DT’s manifestation in practice. We provide practitioners with a useful tool to assess, benchmark, plan, analyze, and communicate the use of DT for intrapreneurial innovation, and guide future DT and entrepreneurship researchers seeking practitionerrelevant insights with nine propositions derived from our observations. Collapse

Topics: innovation management intrapreneurship online learning system organizational context entrepreneurship

Methods: survey parametric test ANOVA qualitative interview exploratory data analysis

Theories: theory of abduction

In Search of Inspiration: External Mobility and the Emergence of Technology Intrapreneurs

2022 | Organization Science | Citations: 0

Authors: Ng, Weiyi; Sherman, Eliot L.

Abstract: Recent scholarship has established several ways in which external hiring—versus ... Expand

Abstract: Recent scholarship has established several ways in which external hiring—versus filling a role with a comparable internal candidate—is detrimental to firms. Yet, organizational learning theory suggests that external hires benefit firms: by importing knowledge that is unavailable or obscured to insiders and applying it toward experimentation and risky recombination. Accordingly and consistent with studies of learning by hiring and innovation, we predict that external hires are at greater risk of intrapreneurship than internal hires. We test this prediction via a study of product managers in large technology companies. We use machine learning to operationalize intrapreneurship by comparing product manager job descriptions with the founding statements of venture-backed technology entrepreneurs. Our research design employs coarsened exact matching to balance pretreatment covariates between product managers who arrived at their roles internally versus externally. The results of our analysis indicate that externally hired product managers are substantially more intrapreneurial than observably equivalent internal hires. However, we also find that intrapreneurial product managers have a higher turnover rate, an effect that is primarily driven by external hires. This suggests that hiring for intrapreneurship may be a difficult strategy to sustain. Funding: The authors acknowledge financial support from London Business School, the National University of Singapore [Grant WBS R-313-000-128-133], and a dissertation grant from the Ewing Kauffman Foundation, Kansas City, Missouri. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.1530. Collapse

Topics: intrapreneurship LinkedIn IT career entrepreneurship online labor market

Methods: machine learning lasso regression nonparametric test logrank test experimental group

Theories: organizational learning theory

ORGANIZATIONAL READINESS FOR DIGITAL INTRAPRENEURSHIP: TOWARDS THE DESIGN OF AN ASSESSMENT TOOL

2022 | European Conference On Information Systems | Citations: 0

Authors: Pätzmann, Lena-Marie; Bitzer, Michael; Back, Andrea

Abstract: In today's hyper-dynamic business environment, the capability to foster innovat ... Expand

Abstract: In today's hyper-dynamic business environment, the capability to foster innovation is critical. Many organizations recognize their employees as an unresolved source for innovation during digital transformation. Consequently, intrapreneurship has become of strategic importance, and initiatives, such as digital intrapreneurship platforms, arise. However, many initiatives do not provide aspired outcomes due to the lack of organizational readiness. We follow the action design research method to design a multi-dimensional framework that measures organizational readiness for digital intrapreneurship. Hitherto, we identify 27 factors that contribute to an organization's readiness for the successful implementation and usage of digital intrapreneurship platforms. Ultimately, we strive to provide a digital intrapreneurship readiness tool that helps innovation managers to detect and remove hindering factors before implementing solutions. Collapse

Topics: intrapreneurship innovation management digital transformation IS maturity intrinsic motivation

Methods: qualitative interview personal interview literature study action design research qualitative coding

Tapping into the wealth of employees’ ideas: Design principles for a digital intrapreneurship platform

2022 | Information & Management | Citations: 0

Authors: Reibenspiess, Victoria; Drechsler, Katharina; Eckhardt, Andreas; Wagner, Heinz-Theo

Abstract: Digital transformation offers organizations opportunities to involve intrapreneu ... Expand

Abstract: Digital transformation offers organizations opportunities to involve intrapreneurs, i.e., employees sharing the zeal of entrepreneurs, but innovating within organizational boundaries through the generation of new ideas. Despite organizations’ interest in exploiting their employees’ innovation potential, tools as digital intra­ preneurship platforms guiding and hosting this innovation process are limited and their design is challenging. Thus, we provide the results of an action design research project with an IT service provider and describe the iterative design process. The designed intrapreneurship platform is ingrained in the socio-technical system theory. Its evaluation derives design principles, guiding organizations to design viable platforms facilitating intrapreneurial behavior. Collapse

Topics: intrapreneurship innovation management digital platform idea generation digital innovation

Methods: design principle qualitative interview design artifact field study design science

Theories: sociotechnical systems theory socio technical theory

Digital Innovation Culture: A Systematic Literature Review

2021 | International Conference on Business Informatics | Citations: 0

Authors: Kiefer, Daniel; van Dinther, Clemens; Spitzmüller, Julian

Abstract: Digitalization increases the pressure for companies to innovate. While current r ... Expand

Abstract: Digitalization increases the pressure for companies to innovate. While current research on digital transformation mostly focuses on technological and management aspects, less attention has been paid to organizational culture and its influence on digital innovations. The purpose of this paper is to identify the characteristics of organizational culture that foster digital innovations. Based on a systematic literature review on three scholarly databases, we initially found 778 articles that were then narrowed down to a total number of 23 relevant articles through a methodical approach. After analyzing these articles, we determine nine characteristics of organizational culture that foster digital innovations: corporate entrepreneurship, digital awareness and necessity of innovations, digital skills and resources, ecosystem orientation, employee participation, agility and organizational structures, error culture and risk-taking, internal knowledge sharing and collaboration, customer and market orientation as well as openmindedness and willingness to learn. Collapse

Topics: digital innovation innovation management organizational culture database system national culture

Methods: literature study literature sample structured literature research qualitative content analysis synthesis

Building dynamic capabilities by leveraging big data analytics: The role of organizational inertia

2021 | Information & Management | Citations: 12

Authors: Mikalef, Patrick; van de Wetering, Rogier; Krogstie, John

Abstract: Although big data analytics have been claimed to revolutionize the way firms ope ... Expand

Abstract: Although big data analytics have been claimed to revolutionize the way firms operate and do business, there is a striking lack of knowledge about how organizations should adopt and routinize such technologies to support their strategic objectives. The aim of this research is to explore how different inertial forces during deployments of big data analytics hinder the emergence of dynamic capabilities. To do so, we follow a multiple-case study design approach of 27 European firms and examine the different forms of inertia that materialize during big data analytics diffusion. The findings contribute to the growing body of knowledge on how big data analytics can be leveraged effectively to enable and strengthen a firm’s dynamic capabilities. By disaggregating dynamic capa­ bilities into the underlying capabilities of sensing, seizing and transforming, findings indicate that different combinations of organizational inertia including economic, political, socio-cognitive, negative psychology, and socio-technical hamper the formation of each type of capability. Collapse

Topics: big data organizational value intrapreneurship organizational transformation technology diffusion

Methods: qualitative interview case study multiple case study qualitative coding survey

Theories: dynamic capabilities theory