Enhancing competitive advantage and financial performance of consumer-goods SMEs in export markets: how do social capital and marketing innovation matter?

PurposeBuilding on the resource-based view (RBV), this study examines the differential roles of internal and external social capital (SC) in enhancing the marketing innovation (MI), competitive advantage and financial performance of Korean small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) in export markets.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 197 valid cases were obtained from Korean manufacturing SMEs in the consumer goods sector. Then, a path analysis was employed to test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsFirst, SME internal SC positively influenced MI, whereas external SC positively influenced foreign distributor's MI (or foreign distributor MI). Second, SME MI was positively associated with foreign distributor MI. Third, no statistical differences were found in the strength of the paths from foreign distributor and SME MI to competitive advantage. Meanwhile, foreign distributor MI positively affected financial performance more than SME MI. Fourth, SME competitive advantage predicted a positive financial performance. Finally, the effect of SME MI on financial performance had an inverted “U” shape.Originality/valueThis study fills a research gap in the MI literature by identifying MI in terms of its actors (SMEs and their foreign distributors) and examining the differential roles of internal and external SC in MI.

Systematic Mapping of Long-Term Urban Challenges

This paper investigates on long-term challenges faced by local governments. Using empirical evidence from Estonia, this paper aims to help fill a research gap in that there is a lack of a systematic approach on how to analyze common urban challenges via direct involvement of local governments. In terms of conceptual framework, a unique combination of public value theory and mission-oriented innovation is proposed. The data is collected via questionnaire, interviews and workshops involving up to 35 local governments. It is important that instead of current problems relating only to one city, this study focuses on finding shared, long-term challenges and, from them, generates a list of top 10 challenges. This provides valuable input to initiating new research and innovation projects in the key, smart city domains (e.g., energy, mobility, built environment, governance and data).

Conservation Status of Forest Types Vary Greatly in Myanmar - the Most Forested Country in the Indo-burma Biodiversity Hotspot

Diverse forests with distinct forest types, harbor exceptional biodiversity and provide many ecosystem goods and services, making some forest types more economically valuable and prone to exploitation than others. The high rates of deforestation in Southeast Asia endanger the existence of such vulnerable forest types. Myanmar, the region’s largest forest frontier provides a last opportunity to conserve these vulnerable forest types. However, the exact distribution and spatial extent of Myanmar’s forest types has not been well characterized. To address this research gap, we developed a national scale Forest Type map of Myanmar at 20m resolution, using moderate resolution, multi-sensor satellite images (Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and ALOS-PALSAR), extensive field data, and a machine learning model (RandomForest). We mapped nine major forest types and developed a Conservation Status Score to evaluate the conservation status of the mapped forest types. Swamp, Mangrove, Dry Deciduous, Lowland Evergreen and Thorn forests were ranked as the five least conserved forest types. We also identified the largest remaining patch for each of the five least conserved forest types and determined their protection status to inform future forest conservation policy. In most cases, these patches lay outside protected areas indicating areas that may be prioritized for future conservation.

Changes in Teacher Burnout and Self-Efficacy During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Interrelations and e-Learning Variables Related to Change

Although the reciprocal relationship of teacher burnout and teacher self-efficacy (TSE) is well documented, the literature still lacks studies investigating their (latent) changes and interrelations of change over time. By applying a latent change regression model in our study, we aimed to contribute to this research gap by examining changes in burnout and their relations to changes in TSE during the COVID-19 pandemic—a very challenging time for teachers. As the implementation of digital learning material played a major role during the pandemic, we were also interested if attitudes and self-efficacy toward e-Learning were related to changes in burnout and TSE. Our sample consisted of 92 German in-service teachers who completed a questionnaire twice during the 2019–2020 school year. Our main findings are that the burnout components depersonalization and lack of accomplishment significantly increased from the pre- to post-COVID-19 outbreak, whereas emotional exhaustion did not. Changes in burnout were negatively correlated to changes in TSE, but we found little evidence for relations of change in burnout and TSE with variables concerning e-Learning. Our findings indicate that the challenge was not the work overload but rather a lack of resources. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

The Ecosystem Services and Green Infrastructure: A Systematic Review and the Gap of Economic Valuation

This study was conducted to determine the trends at the intersection of studies made on green infrastructure and ecosystem services, which have frequently become preferred in establishing urban−green space relationships in global research. Green-related concepts have frequently been used from past to present in order to neutralise the increasing pressures on urban dynamics resulting from rapid urbanisation. Green corridor, green belt, green structure, and green finger/hand concepts have been used to provide recreational opportunities, protect nature, and keep urban sprawl under control. For the last decade, however, in addition to the traditional green concepts, green infrastructure (GI) and ecosystem services (ES) have been preferred in contemporary urban planning, as they enable the integration of the ecological concerns of the landscape and the socio-political perspective. The aim of this study is to detect the trends of the green infrastructure and ecosystem services association, and to reveal these trends in the common area with the bibliometric mapping method. The economic concept and its analysing use at the intersection of green infrastructure and ecosystem services were explored with VOSviewer using the Scopus® database. Furthermore, the number of documents, which initially began with around 39,719 studies, was reduced by filtering through systematic reviews, to only three documents that met the economic valuation criteria. In this way, a lack of economic analyses, creating a serious research gap within the framework of green infrastructure and ecosystem services, was quantitatively determined.

Sustainability Education in China: Lessons Learnt from the Teaching of Geography

Since its emergence, the concept of sustainability has been incorporated in geography education across the globe. China is no exception. As one of the pioneer countries in advocating environmental protection, the Chinese government has called for a paradigm shift in pedagogies in order to encourage students to effectively learn the concept and develop their ability to think in new ways, especially engaging themselves with contemporary worldviews. However, many teachers may feel that they are incapable of teaching sustainability. Therefore, it is important to examine whether subject teachers have the ability to implement sustainability education. To fill this research gap, the present research focused on a case study of an in-service Chinese geography teacher teaching sustainability in a junior middle school in China. In order to deeply understand his teaching, this research adopted the form of interviews, supplemented by the analysis of relevant teaching documents. The results indicated that the two themes taught in the seventh and eighth grades, respectively, involved mainly environmental sustainability with some connection to economic sustainability, but fell short of socio-cultural sustainability. This study calls for more sustainability elements in geography curriculums, particularly with the inclusion of socio-cultural sustainability. In this article, research and practical implications have been given.

Examining the cohesiveness and nestedness entrepreneurial ecosystems: evidence from British FinTechs

It is not clear if entrepreneurial ecosystems are cohesive wholes within a region that support high-growth entrepreneurship across a variety of sectors or if ecosystems are made up of several, nested sectoral-specific sub-ecosystems. This debate speaks to larger disagreements about what entrepreneurial ecosystems are and how they work. This paper addresses this research gap by using a novel methodology based on career history data of founders and top management teams of high-growth FinTech ventures. This method is used to classify the backgrounds of 1,570 individuals in 380 British FinTech firms based on their prior job histories and employers into categories such as technology or finance. The paper finds substantial evidence of nestedness in the ecosystems, but rather than FinTech ecosystems being specialized finance or technology clusters, more generic forms of managerial know-how remain crucial to firm innovation and growth. This suggests that even very advanced ecosystems remain nested, with few cross-over points between different communities.

A Methodological Approach to Analyzing Digital Game-Based FL Use and Learning

The potential of digital gaming to facilitate foreign language (FL) learning has been established in many empirical investigations; however, the pedagogical implications of these investigations remain rather limited. A potential reason for this limitation is that the FL learning potential of digital games is embedded in the gaming ecology and shaped by different forces in that ecology. However, to date most empirical studies in the field have focused primarily on the linguistic behavior of gamers rather than the gaming ecology. A potential reason for this is the lack of a robust methodological approach to examining game-based language use as an ecological, multidimensional activity. To address this research gap, this chapter proposes the diamond reconstruction model, a dynamic, multidimensional, and ecology-sensitive approach to de- and re-constructing game-based FL use. Grounded in theories of gameplay, and informed by a conceptual model of game-based FL use, the model reconstructs gameplay episodes by gathering detail-rich data on social, cognitive, and virtual dimensions.

Socio-Intercultural Entrepreneurship Capability Building and Development

This study aims to analyze the socio-intercultural entrepreneurship as capability building and development. The analysis departs from the assumption that entrepreneurship is a culturally embedded concept, although the intercultural category used in entrepreneurial studies has not found full conceptual, theoretical, and empirical support. Based on this existing research gap, this analysis reviews the literature to address the main issues of the socio-intercultural entrepreneurship focusing on the capability building and development to conclude that it is more situational in context and environmentally oriented. The methodologies used are the exploratory and analytical tools. Socio-intercultural entrepreneurship competence is highly related to be situational in context and environmentally dependent on awareness and understanding of cultural differences.

The Digital Payment Service Automation Attributes Model

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of automation attributes in railway digital ticket payment toward the commuters' satisfaction and retention in railway transportation. Digital payment security is one of the essential qualities which was little discussed in determining public transportation service performance. This study used the partial least square structural equation modeling method study to measure the six effects indicated by the proposed research framework to fill the last research gap. The results showed two automation attributes, reliability and security, significantly influenced commuter satisfaction, supporting the behavioral theory as commuter satisfaction also substantially affected the commuters' retention attitude. This study revealed that the reliability factor was the most significant. The findings communicate important insight for local government in improving its railway transportation's quality of service. The study's scope was to train commuters who live in Jakarta metropolitan area and use the railway as their public or mass transportation.