A critical moment: 25 years of Gender, Work and Organization

Anniversary editoria

Gender inclusion activities in entrepreneurship ecosystems: The case of St. Louis, MO and Boston, MA

Women-owned businesses have an economic impact of nearly $3 trillion in the U.S. Despite the tremendous opportunity for economic growth they present, women entrepreneurs lag behind their male counterparts in terms of number of start-ups and scaling of businesses. To understand how and why this may be taking shape, we focus on the role of entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) or those organizations that act as intermediaries between the resources of a local ecosystem and entrepreneurs. All organizations that have as their proverbial mission to serve, support or partner with entrepreneurs can be categorized as ESOs. Given their role as decision makers, gatekeepers and resource providers, such organizations have the power and capacity to determine who is granted the opportunity to access and benefit from the very networks, mentors, programs and funding that increase entrepreneurs’ odds for success. Through extensive interviews and observations over the course of 2013 to 2016, we compare and contrast the entrepreneurship ecosystems in St. Louis, MO and Boston, MA to understand differences in gender inclusion efforts at ESOs. We focus specifically on cultural cognitive frames, social normative ‘rules’, and regulatory forces as exerting institutional pressures on ESOs in the specific communities in which they are embedded. Our qualitative approach yields in-depth insights as to the mechanisms and dynamics of inclusion and exclusion in the St. Louis and Boston ecosystems by way of ESOs and their practices. Findings indicate that ESOs in the emerging St. Louis ecosystem engage in inclusion efforts through institutional pressures exerted at the grassroots level by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs. These efforts seem to have yielded positive results in that women’s business ownership has increased by 16% in a span of five years between 2007 and 2012, going from 28% to 44%. In comparison, women’s business ownership has stayed around 30%, in Boston between 2007 and 2012, which is a much more established ecosystem. Our findings indicate that inclusion efforts driven mainly by top-down regulatory forces may not be as effective in changing the gender gap in entrepreneurship ecosystems. We expand on these differences and outline steps for ESOs and policy makers to build inclusive ecosystems in their cities

Classics in Entrepreneurship Research: Enduring Insights, Future Promises

Academic inquiry into entrepreneurial phenomena has had a rich history over several decades and continues to evolve. This editorial draws attention to the classics: seminal articles that make profound contributions to the development of an academic field in entrepreneurship studies. We focus on the formative years of entrepreneurship research, specifically the 1970s and 1980s, to identify classics using a key informant approach that surveys members of the journal editorial board. Each nominated classic is introduced and discussed by an editorial board member, with particular focus on research opportunities that may be pursued going forward. Analyzing classics allows for the recognition of substantive advances in entrepreneurship research and provides an opportunity to delve into the academic progress achieved in understanding entrepreneurial phenomena

Politics, Governance, and Leadership: What Can We Learn From the Academy of Management’s Response to EO13769?

Organization design seeks to balance potentially conflicting objectives while achieving a broader mission. EO13769 created a challenge for the president of the Academy of Management in leading through these conflicts, as President Anita McGahan describes: how to be true to her own moral values while leading an organization with well-established design constraints, and members with diverse opinions. This article shares the perspectives of 12 scholars on the lessons we can learn from Professor McGahan’s leadership of a constraining organization through a challenging time

Postcolonial feminist research: challenges and complexities

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to outline the challenges and complexities in conducting research faced by scholars utilizing postcolonial feminist frameworks. The paper discusses postcolonial feminist key concepts, namely representation, subalternity, and reflexivity and the challenges scholars face when deploying these concepts in fieldwork settings. The paper then outlines the implications of these concepts for feminist praxis related to international management theory, research, and writing as well as entrepreneurship programs. Design/methodology/approach – This paper discusses the experiences of the author in conducting fieldwork on Turkish high-technology entrepreneurs in the USA and Turkey by focusing explicitly on the challenges and complexities postcolonial feminist frameworks bring to ethnography and auto-ethnography. Findings – The paper suggests that conducting fieldwork guided by postcolonial feminist frameworks faces challenges related to representation inclusive of the author and the participants in the study. It offers subalternity as a relational understanding of subjects in contrast to comparative approaches to the study of business people. The paper also discusses how positionality impacts reflexivity through gender, ethnicity, and class relations. Originality/value – This paper offers a critical perspective on conducting research related to non-Western subjects by addressing issues arising from feminist and postcolonial intersections. It is a valuable contribution to those researchers who are interested in conducting feminist research particularly with non-Western people and cultures

Postcolonial feminist research: Challenges and complexities

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to outline the challenges and complexities in conducting research faced by scholars utilizing postcolonial feminist frameworks. The paper discusses postcolonial feminist key concepts, namely representation, subalternity, and reflexivity and the challenges scholars face when deploying these concepts in fieldwork settings. The paper then outlines the implications of these concepts for feminist praxis related to international management theory, research, and writing as well as entrepreneurship programs. Design/methodology/approach – This paper discusses the experiences of the author in conducting fieldwork on Turkish high-technology entrepreneurs in the USA and Turkey by focusing explicitly on the challenges and complexities postcolonial feminist frameworks bring to ethnography and auto-ethnography. Findings – The paper suggests that conducting fieldwork guided by postcolonial feminist frameworks faces challenges related to representation inclusive of the author and the participants in the study. It offers subalternity as a relational understanding of subjects in contrast to comparative approaches to the study of business people. The paper also discusses how positionality impacts reflexivity through gender, ethnicity, and class relations. Originality/value – This paper offers a critical perspective on conducting research related to non-Western subjects by addressing issues arising from feminist and postcolonial intersections. It is a valuable contribution to those researchers who are interested in conducting feminist research particularly with non-Western people and cultures

Publishing without betrayal: Critical scholarship meets mainstream journals

In this paper, I discuss challenges critical scholars face with respect to publishing qualitative research in ‘top tier’ mainstream journal outlets. Relying on ideas and insights from postcolonial and feminist thinking, I discuss how these theoretical positions inform reading, writing, and reflexivity in the production of critical management scholarship. To this end, I use examples from reviewers’ comments on work I’ve submitted to the Academy of Management Journal as well as conferences to demonstrate specifically the problematic assumptions that guide qualitative research expectations particularly in ‘top tier’ management outlets. Adopting a reflexive stance that recognizes the limits of individual agency, I suggest that engaging in interdisciplinarity across social science disciplines may promote critical and socially engaged scholarship as legitimate business knowledge

Globalization and identity formation: A postcolonial analysis of the international entrepreneur

In the United States, the past twenty years has witnessed a growing academic interest in understanding \u27globalization,\u27 i.e., a series of interconnected social, cultural, and political processes occurring under integrated economies. Management scholars have tried to understand globalization in terms of its potential consequences for companies conducting business in various countries and regions. However, globalization involves more than this, for as new relationships between people and places occur, new ideas about who they/ us are in those relationships also emerge. How can international management scholars thus understand these complex relationships occurring under globalization? How can they theorize and study such relationships? Although there are multiple ways to address these questions, the approach to globalization within U.S.-based international business and management research has been insufficient. First, meta-theoretical assumptions supporting U.S.-based management theories and practices have seldom been questioned in regards to their deployment in non-Western contexts. Second, the emphasis of this research on cultural differences implies separation and may conceal social and cultural formations established through global relationships. Thus, alternative approaches to understanding business practices in the context of globalization are needed. To this effect, I first develop the notion of identity formation , based on poststructuralist and postcolonial theories, as a conceptual framework, in contrast with the modernist views of identity informing the extant international management literature. I suggest this notion as an appropriate focus of analysis for understanding contemporary relationships between people in the world. To demonstrate these arguments, I conduct fieldwork focused on the international entrepreneur, specifically the Turkish entrepreneur. Relying on an extended case study design and a multi-method approach, I examine how Turkish entrepreneurs in high-technology sectors in the U.S. and in Turkey engage in identity formation processes. The identity formation framework allows me to demonstrate how globalization processes occur relationally through embedded discourses of hybridity, gender, subalternity, and nation articulated by international entrepreneurs. I further address how postcolonial lenses allow for conceptualizing encounters between West and non-West occurring under globalization as a series of interdependent events at the locus of identity formation. As such, my dissertation offers a theoretically distinct conceptualization for globalization research in international management

Globalization And Identity Formation: A Postcolonial Analysis Of The International Entrepreneur

In the United States, the past twenty years has witnessed a growing academic interest in understanding \u27globalization,\u27 i.e., a series of interconnected social, cultural, and political processes occurring under integrated economies. Management scholars have tried to understand globalization in terms of its potential consequences for companies conducting business in various countries and regions. However, globalization involves more than this, for as new relationships between people and places occur, new ideas about who they/ us are in those relationships also emerge. How can international management scholars thus understand these complex relationships occurring under globalization? How can they theorize and study such relationships? Although there are multiple ways to address these questions, the approach to globalization within U.S.-based international business and management research has been insufficient. First, meta-theoretical assumptions supporting U.S.-based management theories and practices have seldom been questioned in regards to their deployment in non-Western contexts. Second, the emphasis of this research on cultural differences implies separation and may conceal social and cultural formations established through global relationships. Thus, alternative approaches to understanding business practices in the context of globalization are needed. To this effect, I first develop the notion of identity formation , based on poststructuralist and postcolonial theories, as a conceptual framework, in contrast with the modernist views of identity informing the extant international management literature. I suggest this notion as an appropriate focus of analysis for understanding contemporary relationships between people in the world. To demonstrate these arguments, I conduct fieldwork focused on the international entrepreneur, specifically the Turkish entrepreneur. Relying on an extended case study design and a multi-method approach, I examine how Turkish entrepreneurs in high-technology sectors in the U.S. and in Turkey engage in identity formation processes. The identity formation framework allows me to demonstrate how globalization processes occur relationally through embedded discourses of hybridity, gender, subalternity, and nation articulated by international entrepreneurs. I further address how postcolonial lenses allow for conceptualizing encounters between West and non-West occurring under globalization as a series of interdependent events at the locus of identity formation. As such, my dissertation offers a theoretically distinct conceptualization for globalization research in international management