Organizing an Online Community for Open Strategizing in a Large Organization

The creation of an online strategy community is increasingly attractive for companies as a mean to make the strategy process more inclusive and open. However, the fundamental difference between the flexible approach of open strategizing afforded by an online community and more controlled approaches of the traditional strategy formulation and implementation posits fundamental challenges for co-existence of these two processes. I argue that for these two processes to effectively co-exist, complex bridging process needs to take place in organizations. Furthermore, effective co-existence implies that open strategizing within an online community influences the formal strategy-making process. This thesis explores an online community as a distinct form of open strategizing in a large organization, to address two interdependent research questions related to organizing an online community for strategic influence: (1) ‘How do managers bridge open strategizing within an online community and formal strategy-making, characterized by closed and hierarchical decision-making?’ and (2) ‘How do managers organize an online strategy community to influence strategic decision-making in large organizations?’. This in-depth inductive single case study investigates strategy professionals at a large telecommunications firm Telco that instigated a unique online strategy platform to increase the openness of participation and to influence the formal strategy process. This empirical study utilizes multiple sources of data including interviews, online community logs, observations, and document analysis, the findings of which are summarized in two theoretical models. I identify three mechanisms that enable bridging between different strategizing processes, namely: 1) bidirectional framing with strategic concepts; 2) bidirectional structuring of communication; 3) building legitimacy of openness. The simultaneous enactment of three bridging mechanisms provides the greater influence of the formal decision-making process. Furthermore, I identify three main decision areas that managers have to consider carefully when organizing and online strategy community: 1) design of an online community structure; 2) cooperation of internal and external actors; 3) formulation of adequate strategic content. These decision areas are characterized by interdependencies and trigger contradictory demands that make open strategy processes a paramount organizational challenge

Folklorism of the Contemporary Youth’s Creative Work

Since the second half of the 20th century, there has been an increased interest in traditional forms of culture, which is probably associated with an increase in the national self-awareness of the peoples of the Russian Federation. Based on this, the authors considered the features of the use of the folklore heritage of Russian creative youth. The authors have studied the creative works of 24 young writers aged from 25 to 35. In particular, they have studied the types of folklorism in their creative works, provided the general estimate of the productivity and significance of the youth’s experience of using the folkloric heritage in the modern literary process and generally in culture. The paper is defining the phenomena of the youth culture in the early decades of the 21st century (fiction, CG). The authors have made a conclusion on the diversity of the youth’s creative works’ connection with the folkloric samples: the construction of the social-ethnographic reality, the field of the characters’ identity, a new ‘cosmos’, creation of the individual universes as well as the literary version of folkloric fairytale on their basis. We have also noted the tendency towards the use of the Russian folkloric characters with the purpose of giving them some universal traits of the characters of the popular computer games. The authors found that the fabulous texts are used by young authors in both the genre category and one of the ways to create on their basis new texts, various types of aesthetic experiments and games

Этнолингвистическое картографирование фрагментов масленичной обрядности южных славян

В настоящей работе на основе этнолингвистического подхода к явлениям языка и народной культуры, предполагающего их изучение в тесной, взаимообусловленной связи, представлен опыт ареального этнолингвистического исследования фрагментов масленичной обрядности южных славян. Картографируются названия последнего дня масленицы и обычай взаимного прощения; обычай разжигать масленичный огонь (костры, факелы, стрелы) и обслуживающая его лексика; а также ритуалы, связанные с летним (ивановским, петровским) огнем (костры, факелы, стрелы) и обслуживающая его лексика

Forming Linguistic Competence of Foreign Students at the Preparatory Department of a Technical University

The article describes the technique developed by the authors to organize classroom lessons and independent work for foreign learners studying in Russian at the Preparatory department of a technical university. At the classroom lessons in Mathematics students worked with five types of tasks: sample tasks; text analysis; micro essay; model task; mastering mathematical symbols. During the independent work in the study of Mathematics, foreign students performed tests and teamwork tasks placed on the platform Moodle. We have carried out the experiments, which showed that the technique of organizing classroom lessons and independent work, developed by the authors, had a positive impact on the level of linguistic competence in Mathematics of foreign students of the Preparatory department

Barriers to Innovation in the Implementation of the Investment Strategy: An Empirical Study

The problem of inward investment to the innovative economic sector is very acute today. The investment determines the economic development, but nowadays the low efficiency of investment activity in the sphere of innovations is obvious. This indicates the need for correction of the strategy taking into account social processes. The implications of innovative changes are not always predictable. The society takes innovations with a great caution. The innovation resistance can differ by the degree of its manifestation depending on the scale of innovative changes. Barriers encountered in the innovative changes hinder the innovative activity of financial companies, prevent the creation of new institutions and formation of innovative strategies, hamper the development of the actors implementing investment projects. This article studies the causes of innovative resistance and the parameters of existing barriers. The existence of innovation barriers and their detailed classification is described for the first time. The aim of this study is to create a model that allows to assess the barriers to the innovative development basing on their parameters. The study justifies the factors of the investment strategy adaptation in order to create the environment of successful activity for a company in the innovative region. The study determines the influence of these parameters on the state investment strategy. The suggested model is based on the statistical data from the State Statistics Committee of the Russian Federation. It can be implemented to analyze the innovative situation in a region in order to provide a necessary adaptation of the investment strategies

Наименования социально незащищенных групп лиц в правовом пространстве и за его пределами

This article examines a group of lexical units which belong to the category of “socially disadvantaged individuals”: people with disabilities, physically challenged, people with impaired mobility, the unemployed, orphans, and those in need, and studies the peculiarities of their use in everyday speech and in legal discourse. The set phrase “person with disabilities” is analysed in detail as a hyperonym for more specific terms, i.e. a wheelchair person, an autist, deaf-blind and deaf-mute, etc. Interpretations given in traditional explanatory dictionaries emphasise physiological features over social ones, and the ideographic dictionaries of the Russian language tend to group the units studied according to the type of disease/disability. Semantically and pragmatically, the relevant factors include the foregrounding of individual elements of the meaning of the word in context and whether a unit can be used as a form of self-identification. The author studies the problem of lexical reference to these individuals as recipients of charitable assistance. The asymmetry and lacunarity of the lexical system become apparent since it contains plenty of units denoting the subjects of charity, whereas, for the addressee of charitable assistance, called the beneficiary in the language of law, an official name is lacking. The current system of names of socially disadvantaged groups and recipients of charitable assistance testifies to the development of social institutions of philanthropy. At the same time, the formation of the philanthropic thesaurus in the Russian language is complicated, as many lexical units are semantically opaque and loaded with ideological and emotional-evaluative connotations.В статье рассматриваются лексические единицы, образующие категорию «социально незащищенные лица»: инвалиды, лица с ограниченными возможностями здоровья, маломобильные граждане, безработные, сироты, нуждающиеся. Характеризуется использование номинаций в обыденном языке и языке закона. Подробно анализируется устойчивая единица «лицо с ограниченными возможностями здоровья» как гипероним по отношению к гипонимам инвалид, колясочник, аутист, слепоглухонемой и др. Словарные толкования традиционных толковых словарей демонстрируют доминирование физиологических признаков над социальными, а в идеографических словарях русского языка исследуемые единицы включаются в группы номинаций лиц по виду заболеваний. Семантически и прагматически значимыми являются такие факторы, как актуализация отдельных элементов значений слов в контексте, возможность либо невозможность использовать языковые единицы в функции самоидентификации лица. Рассматривается проблема номинации лиц в качестве адресатов благотворительной помощи. Несимметричность и лакунарность лексической системы обнаруживается в том, что при наличии лексем, обозначающих субъекты благотворительности, адресат благотворительной помощи, называемый в языке закона благополучателем и бенефициаром, не имеет стабильного наименования. Складывающаяся в настоящее время система наименований социально незащищенных групп и адресатов благотворительной помощи свидетельствует о развитии социальных институтов филантропии. В то же время формирование тезауруса благотворительности в русском языке осложняется диффузностью семантики слов, их идеологическими и эмоционально-оценочными коннотациями

Burgenland Croats between Vienna, Bratislava and Sopron: Historical, Cultural and Linguistic Aspects

The present paper discusses the written tradition of Burgenland Croats currently residing in the South of Slovakia. Before the Second World War this group of Burgenland Croats belonged to Hungary, so the preserved letters of rural residents of the border village Chunova retain a number of features characteristic of the Hungarian orthography of the beginning of last century, lexical borrowings from the languages of the environment (primarily German) and dialect features which have been lost by now. The correspondence from the beginning of the last century reflects the cultural, historical and linguistic situation typical of Burgenland Croats living in the enclave. A study of their letters published recently, in 2017, reveals the traits of their language, everyday life and some features of traditional folk culture

Fairy tale traditions in amateur and professional young writers’ creativity

The turn of the 21st century has seen Russian writers’ increased interest in the genre of fairy tale. This paper discusses young Russian writers’ approaches to fairy tale traditions in texts of their own. The subjects of the study consisted of the Debut Prize winners and the so-called amateur writers (fans of Tolkien’s and Rowling’s books, and gamers) and their literary works. The study is aimed at establishing main trends in usage of folklore traditions in the first two decades of the 21st century; the paper is also concerned with examining similarities and differences between two generations of modern Russian writers in the matter of their approaches to classical heritage. To compare fairy tale texts, Vladimir Propp’s narrative model has been applied. One of the central claims of the study is that young authors tend to emulate literary samples by prominent contemporary Russian writers (mostly by Lyudmila Petrushevskaya). Thus, an efficient way of creating a contemporary fairy tale by a young author is to immerse its characters into the modern reality that is presented in a variety of its manifestations – from everyday routine to philosophic ideas. The young writers’ texts display such traditional features of literary folklorism as genuine fairy tale plots and motifs, their structural and style models, characters, magical objects, and the artistic device of estrangement

Исповедный вопросник староверов Латгалии: лингвокультурный анализ текста

During the expedition to the Old Believers in Latgale (Latvia) a group of Slavists investigating the Russian language of Old Believers abroad got a scanned copy of the confessional questionnaire as a present from Basil Trishkin, a mentor of Gayok Old Believers’ House of Prayer (Daugavpils). This questionnaire is used by Basil Trishkin during confessions in conversations with the parishioners. As the study of the manuscript revealed the questionnaire according to its content, structure and features of language dates back to the pre-Raskol texts of the XѴII century. The next expedition, 2017, confirmed the assumption that the questionnaire is a part of the Old Believer’s prayer book. The expeditions did not pursue archeographic objectives, the conversations with mentors were mostly focused on prohibitions and prescriptions in the Old Believers’ community in Latgale for the purpose of its further sociolinguistic and ethnolinguistic analysis. Nevertheless the scanned manuscript certainly deserves attention as a piece of the Old Believers’ written culture. On the one hand, the Old Believer’s prayer book is written in Church Slavonic. On the other hand, the scanned manuscript is a source of information about the Latgalian Old Believers’ Russian language as a language for everyday communication, including lexical and other dialect features. The oral comments of the mentors Basil Trishkin and Ioann Zhilko about prohibitions in the Old Believers’ community, use of the questionnaire in the practice of worship and opportunities to pass it on to a group of researchers, with subsequent publication of the text, are particularly noteworthy.Во время экспедиции 2016 г. к староверам Латгалии (Латвия) группа славистов, исследователей русского языка старообрядцев за рубежом, получила в подарок от Василия Тришкина, наставника моленной беспоповцев на Гайкé (район г. Даугавпилса), сканированную копию вопросника, используемого им для исповеди прихожан. По мере исследования рукописи выяснилось, что вопросник по содержанию, структуре и особенностям языка восходит к текстам до никоновской справы XѴII в.; следующая экспедиция, 2017 г., подтвердила предположение, что вопросник находится в старообрядческом Требнике. Экспедиции не преследовали археографических целей, в беседах с наставниками обсуждались главным образом запреты староверов Латгалии с целью дальнейшего социолингвистического и этнолингвистического анализа. Однако попавший в распоряжение ученых исповедный вопросник, несомненно, заслуживает внимания как часть письменной культуры староверов и как источник сведений об используемом староверами Латгалии церковнославянском языке богослужения и русском языке повседневного общения, включающем лексические и иные диалектизмы, отраженные в тексте исповедного вопросника. Особую ценность представляют устные замечания наставников Василия Тришкина и Иоанна Жилко по поводу запретов староверов и использования самого вопросника в практике богослужения и возможностях передачи его группе исследователей с последующей публикацией текста

PSYCHOLOGICAL FEATURES OF CONFLICT BEHAVIOUR AMONG FEMALE INMATES

В статье приводятся результаты исследования особенностей поведения в конфликте осужденных женщин, анализируются психологические особенности осужденных женского пола, приводится их психологическая типология, характеризуются гендерные различия осужденных, психологические причины межличностных конфликтов осужденных женщин в исправительном учреждении, выделяются наиболее конфликтные категории осужденных.Цель: выявление доминирующих стратегий поведения в конфликте осужденных женщин, особенностей конфликтного поведения осужденных женщин в зависимости от возраста и от вида совершенного ими преступления.Метод: констатирующий эксперимент.Результаты: доминирующими стратегиями конфликтного поведения осужденных женщин являются компромисс и приспособление.Область применения: пенитенциарная система.In this article the results of the research concerning the special features of behaviour in the conflicts among the female inmates are given, psychological features of the female inmates are analysed, their psychological typology is presented, inmates gender differences are characterized as well as psychological reasons of interpersonal conflicts among the female inmates in the correctional facilities, the most conflict categories of female inmates are distinguished.Purpose: revealing of dominant strategies of behaviour in the conflict of the female inmates, specific features of female inmates conflict behaviour according to age and type of committed crime.Method: ascertaining experimentResults: dominant strategies of female inmates conflict behaviour are compromise and adjustment.Areas of use: the penitentiary system