Atitudes dos gestores face à criatividade e às práticas de inovação nas indústrias criativas

This article aims to demonstrate that the relationship between entrepreneurs' attitudes to creativity and business innovation practices is stronger in the case of creative industries. A sample of 454 managers of micro and medium-sized companies (94 belonging to creative industries) was surveyed using an inventory of innovative business practices and the scale of attitudes towards creativity. The results, derived from a linear regression model (two factors for the scale of attitudes - Leadership and Autonomy - and for the inventory of business practices - Performance and Strategy), confirmed the proposition by revealing the influence of the creative attitudes of managers regarding the company's innovative practices, fundamentally on Strategy, especially in the creative industries segment. The innovative manager appeared as a disciplined individual driven to collaborating with the employees. Although this research requires further evidence, the results suggest interesting characterisations of the managers who develop their activity in the cluster of creative industries.Este artigo tem como objetivo demonstrar que a relação entre as atitudes do empresário face à criatividade e as práticas de inovação é mais forte no caso das indústrias criativas. Foram inquiridos 454 gestores de micro, pequenas e médias empresas (94 pertencentes às indústrias criativas), utilizando um inventário de práticas empresariais e uma escala de atitudes face à criatividade. Os resultados, obtidos utilizando um modelo de regressão linear (dois fatores para a escala de atitudes –Liderança e Autonomia - e dois para o inventário de práticas empresariais – Desempenho e Estratégia) confirmaram a hipótese, ao revelar a influência das atitudes do empresário face à criatividade sobre as práticas inovadoras da empresa, nomeadamente na Estratégia e no segmento das indústrias criativas. O gestor inovador surge como um indivíduo disciplinado, orientado para colaborar com os empregados. Apesar desta investigação necessitar de maior aprofundamento, os resultados sugerem uma caracterização interessante dos gestores que desenvolvem a sua atividade no cluster das indústrias criativasinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Burgers for tourists who give a damn! Driving disruptive social change upstream and downstream in the tourist food supply chain

Using the theoretical lens of social capital this paper examines the role of small tourist food businesses and their impact on the sustainability of the destination and local food supply chains. The paper analyses the experiences of small business owner-managers highlighting the complex and subtle nature of the socially responsible strategies used to progress sustainability in a tourist destination. The findings show that authentic lifestyles, motivated by intrinsic not just extrinsic rewards, are driving disruptive social change upstream and downstream in the tourist food supply chain. Small food business owner-managers are catalysts for ‘common’ good, and as supporters for ethical and sustainable food chains have considerable local tourism influence and impact. Social capital strengthens their sense of destination ownership and fuels an obligation to protect their fragile tourist resources. The intersection between social capital, authenticity and responsibility among small food businesses in the tourist industry is demonstrated

Strategies Used by Retail Business Managers to Address Disruptive Changes in Technology

Disruptive changes in technology have shifted the competitive landscape in the retail travel industry and have led to high failure rates of traditional brick-and-mortar travel agencies. Retail business leaders have estimated the loss of market share to new market entrants at approximately 40% in 5 years. Responding to disruptive changes in technology may increase market share and survival rates of incumbent firms. Grounded in Christensen’s theory of disruptive innovation, the purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore the strategies used by retail business managers to address disruptive changes in technology. Participants were 6 owners of travel agencies located in Nairobi, Kenya, who had owned their travel agencies for more than 5 years. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and review of company documents and archival records. Data were analyzed using Yin’s 5-step data analysis approach. Five themes emerged: business opportunities, competitive strategies, changes in technology, dynamic capabilities, and the business model. A key recommendation is to encourage retail business leaders to optimize their dynamic capabilities through collaborations with experienced partners for developing technology, products, and processes. Implications for positive social change include the potential to encourage retail business leaders to focus on sustainable business practices, thereby contributing to increased longevity and sustainability of retail travel businesses, which may lead to increased meaningful employment for unemployed individuals to enhance their quality of life

Artificial intelligence in innovation research: A systematic review, conceptual framework, and future research directions

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly adopted by organizations to innovate, and this is ever more reflected in scholarly work. To illustrate, assess and map research at the intersection of AI and innovation, we performed a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) of published work indexed in the Clarivate Web of Science (WOS) and Elsevier Scopus databases (the final sample includes 1448 articles). A bibliometric analysis was deployed to map the focal field in terms of dominant topics and their evolution over time. By deploying keyword co-occurrences, and bibliographic coupling techniques, we generate insights on the literature at the intersection of AI and innovation research. We leverage the SLR findings to provide an updated synopsis of extant scientific work on the focal research area and to develop an interpretive framework which sheds light on the drivers and outcomes of AI adoption for innovation. We identify economic, technological, and social factors of AI adoption in firms willing to innovate. We also uncover firms' economic, competitive and organizational, and innovation factors as key outcomes of AI deployment. We conclude this paper by developing an agenda for future research

Shifting the digital skills discourse for the 4th industrial revolution

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Innovation Labs for Digital Transformation Strategies and Business Model Innovation in the Digital Age: a Focus on Tourism and Cultural Sector

The research proposes the Innovation Labs as a valuable management initiative to support tourism and cultural organisations in developing Digital Innovation Capacity, fostering Digital Transformation (DT) and Business Model Innovation (BMI). Innovation Labs are innovation management models aimed at fostering creative and critical thinking, driving the organisation in finding the best ways to generate knowledge and digital culture, introduce technologies, digitise operations, and implement digital strategies for continuous and sustainable innovation paths (Santarsiero et al., 2019; 2020). The need for investigating and identifying possible solutions, and governance models, in terms of management initiatives that follow emergent innovation trends, and support tourism and cultural organisations in embracing digital innovation journeys, is having a growing interest, both in scholars and practitioners, especially after the pandemic Covid-19. Tourism and cultural organisations, pursuant their attitude to be a labour-intensive production sector, in which the competitive advantage depends on the differentiation of the tourism product and the humanisation of the offered experiences, resulted as one of the sectors that most repudiate DT, conceiving it as a process that would lead to standardisation and loss of appeal to the end customer. However, nowadays, due to the emerging challenges in the Digital Age that are also affecting the tourism and cultural sector, the need for embracing digital journeys favouring DT and BMI should be considered mandatory to guarantee competitiveness and the gain of a sustainable competitive advantage. The rapid development of digital technologies and solutions, and their democratisation, induced changes in consumers’ and users’ habits and behaviours, resulting in the need for developing new products, services and methods of use based on emerging market needs. In the same way, organisations are asked to become resilient, proactive and able to evolve in the same way the competitive landscape does. After Covid-19, besides, the needs for digital innovation journeys and digital revolutions are even more accentuated, confirming that the pandemic has acted as an accelerator of DT dynamics. The competitiveness and attractiveness of organisations and destinations will therefore depend on the digital innovative capacity and ability of operators and destination managers to rethink the tourist offer according to the new emerging trends and context dynamics. Although the need for embracing digital innovation journeys is crucial, it is not an easy process to manage and exploit. Organisations, indeed, experience several difficulties and innovation barriers. In SMEs, in particular, which represent a typical configuration of tourism and cultural organisations, resistance to innovation, and insufficient skills, finance, culture, attitudes, and often also the time to devote to innovation due to overburden of bureaucratic aspects and various routines, are particularly accentuated. It follows these organisations require forms of support to face these needs and develop an innovative capacity, fostering DT and BMI to improve offers, competitiveness, efficiency, as well as customisation and customer relationships. Despite the relevance of these topics, however, the search for solutions and ways to support tourism and cultural organisations in embracing digital innovation journeys has not structurally explored yet. On this vein, the research aims to explore and investigate, in the field of innovation management, models and approaches to face DT and BMI challenges and opportunities, and thus to investigate the emerging phenomenon of Innovation Labs to understand their management model and assess their suitability for tourism and cultural organisations. In the theoretical section, the study presents a systematic literature review of Innovation Labs to provide a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon and identify critical patterns according to two main dimensions of analysis: space & infrastructure, and strategy & management. Furthermore, the study utilises a multiple-case study approach to better enrich the insights gathered from the literature, and to propose an Innovation Lab’s working definition and a management framework. The working definition takes into account all the emerging aspects, the new principles and paradigms that are governing the field of innovation management and that become essential for the organisations competing in this scenario. The framework describes key phases and relevant issues for effective management of Innovation Labs as catalysts of DT and BMI. Then, the research applies the proposed framework through an Action Research (AR) project involving an organisation operating in the tourism sector, to assess its efficacy in fostering tourism and cultural organisations’ digital innovation journeys. The research contributes to enrich knowledge and build theory in the field of Innovation Labs and tourism innovation management. In particular, the study led to developing theories on the contributions of Innovation Labs in fostering DT and BMI in tourism organisations. A further framework explaining the business model’s dimensions on which DT processes impact thanks to these initiatives has been proposed. Lastly, the analysis of the AR project compared Innovation Labs’ management framework with change management frameworks to detect alignments and to highlight insights to support researchers in considering the model as a tool to support innovation dynamics in times of crisis. This research also has relevant practical implications since it provides managers and practitioners with an overview of the dimensions to be considered while designing and managing an Innovation Lab to develop digital innovation capacity and foster DT and BMI. Expressly, managers and practitioners are provided with a framework supporting them designing and exploiting management initiatives aimed at embracing digital innovation journeys to generate marketable digital solutions, improve performance and develop a mindset continuous learning and innovation. The study also reveals some limitations that may address future research. Further empirical, also quantitative, investigations could be developed to extend the sample and to allow a comprehensive validation of the Innovation Lab’s management framework, focusing the research also on the evaluation of Innovation Labs’ activities

Strategies for Integrating and Sustaining Disruptive Innovations in Small Businesses

The evolution of technology has led to a need for business leaders to embrace disruptive technology for the purpose of capturing new markets and remaining competitive. Multiple challenges have been faced by business leaders in the processes of integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations, resulting in the failure to achieve expected efficiency and profitability. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore strategies used by business leaders to integrate and sustain disruptive innovations. The conceptual frameworks were Roger\u27s diffusion of innovation theory and Christensen\u27s disruptive innovation theory. Semistructured interviews were administered to 10 business leaders and employees from institutions of higher learning in the Northeastern region of the United States. The participants were selected using a purposive nonrandom sampling technique. The selection criteria included organizational leaders, technology professionals, training and development professionals, and organizational end-users. Three themes and several subthemes were identified. The strategies for integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations include training, changeover mechanisms, and the use of critical resources. The procedural and structural factors in processes to integrate and sustain disruptive innovations include identifying critical success factors, ascertaining benchmarks, determining levels of support and effectiveness. Obstacles faced during the processes of integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations were categorized into human, technology, changeover, and external issues. Social change may be realized through the improved success rates of small business leaders implementing disruptive innovations by increasing meaningful employment and enhancing livelihoods

Conceptual Model of Big Data Technologies Adoption in Smart Cities of the European Union

Big data technologies enable cities to develop towards a smart city. However, the adoption of big data technologies is challenging, which is why it is essential to identify factors that influence the adoption of big data technologies in cities. The main goal of the paper is to propose a conceptual model of big data technologies adoption in smart cities of the European Union. In order to derive the conceptual model following is done: i) overview of the previous Technology-OrganisationEnvironment framework - based research on the adoption of selected information and communications technologies crucial for the development of smart cities, and ii) selection of factors based on the critical examination of the previous research. Selected factors, Absorptive Capacity, Technology Readiness, Compatibility, City Managements Support, the Existence of Smart City Strategy and Stakeholders Support, were incorporated into the conceptual model of big data technologies adoption in smart cities of the European Union. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.</p

Using Tripadvisor© for exploring cultural tourism development in Bahrain.

Social networks have brought new opportunities in tourism destinations management and marketing. Based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), the study explores how users in tourism accept and use technology based on the perceived usefulness and perceived ease-of-use, in this case Trip Advisor. The findings suggest that travellers and visitors use TripAdvisor to collect information about a destination and share experiences with other community members, before and after visiting key cultural attractions. Furthermore, cultural tourism has a potential to grow in the region however, there should be more information available on the attractions websites. Cultural attractions should be more organized, offer more information and enhance the cultural experience. This paper recommends that social networks and TripAdvisor should be used by the local tourism authorities for the development and promotion of cultural tourism in Bahrain

Analysing the Adoption of awesome South Africa mobile travel application as a marketing strategy

Mobile Marketing is a critical marketing strategy and a foundation of competitive advantage for small to medium enterprises in the tourism and hospitality industry in South Africa. While many studies focus on mobile marketing, this study focuses on the adoption of mobile marketing innovations by small to medium enterprises in the tourism and hospitality industry in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. Analysing the adoption of Awesome South Africa mobile application, as a marketing strategy among SMEs in the Western Cape tourism and hospitality industry was therefore imperative to understand the factors that influence mobile marketing adoption. The objective was to find out the factors that contribute to the adoption of mobile marketing as well as the factors that would impede the adoption of mobile marketing by the SMEs in this industry. The research employed the Technology Acceptance Model as a theoretical framework as well as a guide in ascertaining the factors that affect the adoption of mobile marketing innovations among SMEs. There is certainty that the Awesome South Africa mobile travel application could partly solve the information asymmetry problem as well as the marketing challenges of the SMEs in the Western Cape Tourism and hospitality industry. An exploratory design was deployed in this study, resulting in the application of a qualitative research approach for data collection, analysis and interpretation. Both content and thematic data analyses were used in this study because data was collected from multiple sources that included reports and face-toface interviews. The research findings showed that the TAM provides a reasonable explanation of the factors that influence technology acceptance amongst SMEs. Perceived usefulness, perceived cost, perceived competitive pressure and perceived employee capability emerged as the significant factors that simultaneously influenced mobile marketing adoption among SMEs. Factors impeding the adoption of mobile marketing application by the SMEs included perceived high cost of adoption, lack of managerial support, employee incompetence, limited financial resources and perceived complexity of the mobile marketing innovations. The recommendation was that the Awesome South Africa mobile application innovators should capitalise on the TAM constructs in order to realise the adoption of their mobile application among SMEs in the Western Cape tourism and hospitality industry