3,600 research outputs found

    On the Mechanism of Building Core Competencies: a Study of Chinese Multinational Port Enterprises

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    This study aims to explore how Chinese multinational port enterprises (MNPEs) build their core competencies. Core competencies are firms’special capabilities and sources to gain sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) in marketplace, and the concept led to extensive research and debates. However, few studies include inquiries about the mechanisms of building core competencies in the context of Chinese MNPEs. Accordingly, answers were sought to three research questions: 1. What are the core competencies of the Chinese MNPEs? 2. What are the mechanisms that the Chinese MNPEs use to build their core competencies? 3. What are the paths that the Chinese MNPEs pursue to build their resources bases? The study adopted a multiple-case study design, focusing on building mechanism of core competencies with RBV. It selected purposively five Chinese leading MNPEs and three industry associations as Case Companies. The study revealed three main findings. First, it identified three generic core competencies possessed by Case Companies, i.e., innovation in business models and operations, utilisation of technologies, and acquisition of strategic resources. Second, it developed the conceptual framework of the Mechanism of Building Core Competencies (MBCC), which is a process of change of collective learning in effective and efficient utilization of resources of a firm in response to critical events. Third, it proposed three paths to build core competencies, i.e., enhancing collective learning, selecting sustainable processes, and building resource base. The study contributes to the knowledge of core competencies and RBV in three ways: (1) presenting three generic core competencies of the Chinese MNPEs, (2) proposing a new conceptual framework to explain how Chinese MNPEs build their core competencies, (3) suggesting a solid anchor point (MBCC) to explain the links among resources, core competencies, and SCA. The findings set benchmarks for Chinese logistics industry and provide guidelines to build core competencies

    Beyond autonomy: rethinking Europe as a strategic actor

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    Strategic autonomy has become the buzzword of the European policy scene in recent years, with a slew of reports and policy proposals dedicated to the subject, and high-level support among European leaders. But big questions remain about what the concept actually means and what its implications are for Europe and the EU. Drawing on contributions to a recent high-level workshop as well as the five briefings contained in this volume, this report seeks to make the case for moving ‘beyond autonomy’ in five key respects - conceptually, thematically, geographically, temporally, and politically. Only by doing this are we able to move the debate on autonomy forward and highlight a number of key debates and issues on which greater attention from policymakers is needed. This report from LSE IDEAS and the Friedrich Naumann Foundation highlights new directions for policy debate and academic research on the concept of strategic autonomy, all of which take us into new domains

    Organizations decentered: data objects, technology and knowledge

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    Data are no longer simply a component of administrative and managerial work but a pervasive resource and medium through which organizations come to know and act upon the contingencies they confront. We theorize how the ongoing technological developments reinforce the traditional functions of data as instruments of management and control but also reframe and extend their role. By rendering data as technical entities, digital technologies transform the process of knowing and the knowledge functions data fulfil in socioeconomic life. These functions are most of the times mediated by putting together disperse and steadily updatable data in more stable entities we refer to as data objects. Users, customers, products, and physical machines rendered as data objects become the technical and cognitive means through which organizational knowledge, patterns, and practices develop. Such conditions loosen the dependence of data from domain knowledge, reorder the relative significance of internal versus external references in organizations, and contribute to a paradigmatic contemporary development that we identify with the decentering of organizations of which digital platforms are an important specimen

    Walking with the Earth: Intercultural Perspectives on Ethics of Ecological Caring

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    It is commonly believed that considering nature different from us, human beings (qua rational, cultural, religious and social actors), is detrimental to our engagement for the preservation of nature. An obvious example is animal rights, a deep concern for all living beings, including non-human living creatures, which is understandable only if we approach nature, without fearing it, as something which should remain outside of our true home. “Walking with the earth” aims at questioning any similar preconceptions in the wide sense, including allegoric-poetic contributions. We invited 14 authors from 4 continents to express all sorts of ways of saying why caring is so important, why togetherness, being-with each others, as a spiritual but also embodied ethics is important in a divided world

    SELLING DIGITAL ART FOR MILLIONS - A QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS OF NFT ART MARKETPLACES

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    When a digital picture, that can be copied and distributed at zero costs, goes on sale for 69million,somethingisup:Non−Fungible−Tokens,orsimplyNFTs,whichbecameoneofthemostexcitingtopicsinthedigitalrealmin2021duetotheriseininterestinblockchaintechnologiesandthehypegeneratedbyinternetpersonasandcelebrities.Thisstudyisapilotandexplorativeapproachtowardsunderstandingthemotivation,needs,goals,andstrategiesofcreatingandsellingnon−fungibletokensbyartcreators.Todosoweutilizeaqualitative,inductivecategoryformationmethodologywithninesemi−structuredinterviewswithdigitalartiststhatsoldtheircreationsonnewlyestablishedNFTmarketplacesforupto69 million, something is up: Non-Fungible-Tokens, or simply NFTs, which became one of the most exciting topics in the digital realm in 2021 due to the rise in interest in blockchain technologies and the hype generated by internet personas and celebrities. This study is a pilot and explorative approach towards understanding the motivation, needs, goals, and strategies of creating and selling non-fungible tokens by art creators. To do so we utilize a qualitative, inductive category formation methodology with nine semi-structured interviews with digital artists that sold their creations on newly established NFT marketplaces for up to 400.000 apiece. Creators` motivations to engage in these new platform ecosystems ranged from to Social, Monetary, to Technological aspects, with classical platform aspects such as control mechanisms and network effects playing a major role in their adoption
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