...Methodologies for Understanding Innovation in Small-Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Course : Qualitative Case Study Research Faculty : Prof. Rajen Gupta, MDI Submitted by : Davinder Singh, EFPM (2011) Research Focus and Methodologies for Understanding Innovation in Small - Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Introduction Innovation is a product, service, or process that is new or perceived as new by its developers and provides increased value to user and organization (Van de Ven, 1986). The ability of an organization to innovate is increasingly being considered as the most important factor for competitive advantage (Tidd et al., 2001). Importance has been laid on building innovative organizations and the management of the innovation process with the organizations. This is increasingly being considered important for small-medium enterprises (SMEs) and has been researched from multiple perspectives. The aim of this paper is to discuss, the areas of innovation in SMEs which are focus of recent studies, and the various research methodologies utilized for these studies. The importance to study innovation in SMEs is discussed in the succeeding section. This is followed with discussion on research studies undertaken in this field in the recent past. The difference in the ontological perspective and the consequent use of different research methodologies has been discussed using construct of ‘knowledge’ as illustration. Innovation in SMEs The role of SMEs in a country’s economy cannot...
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...manufacturing SMEs Summary: The article explores about the different types of supply chain strategies in manufacturing SMEs. Kamel A. Fantazy, Vinod Kumar and Uma Kumar are professors at Sprott School of Business. They did a research on what kinds of supply chain management strategies are usually adopted by SMEs. A research survey was created and distributed among 1500 Canadian SMEs, out of which only 175 were used as a sample. That’s how many responses were collected. Previously, the supply chain strategies of all the SMEs were classified into the following four: * Modularizing * Appending * Innovating * Following After the responses were computed, it was found out that modularizing and appending does not really exist, but there is another one which has been prevailing the manufacturing SMEs. It is known as Customer Oriented Strategy. So, now there is three types in total which are COS, INS and FOS. The results did not show any correlation with modularizing and appending and hence, were dropped off. Lessons Learnt: * Activities within the supply chain must be Customer Based. SMEs should be Customer Oriented. They should try to satisfy the customer needs. * Understanding customers’ need knowing how to satisfy them, is a key. * Every supply chain must have a Customer strategy. But this is going to be different for every supply chain company because every company is going to adopt a different approach. Article 2: Open Innovation in Practice:...
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...contend that organisational leadership is an embellished concept in that it is not necessary in attaining organisational performance since there are other internal and external factors that come into play ( Ismail et al,1998; (Bass& Avolio,2002;(Munjis,2011). A number of researches and studies have been carried out to demonstrate that leadership and organisational performance, commitment and innovation go hand in hand (Judge, Bono, Ilies and Gerhardt, 2002; Judge and Piccolo, 2004; Keller, 2006; McGrath and MacMillan, 2000; Meyer and Hepard, 2000; Purcell, Kinnie, Hutchinson and Dickson, 2004; Yukl, 2002). Conversely, some studies for instance, House and Aditya (1997) suggest that is not a key factor in achieving organisational performance, commitment and innovation. Due to the conflicting findings concerning the role of leadership and organisational performance, commitment and innovation, point out there is a need to study the role of leadership comprehensively. House and Aditya (1997), suggests studying the importance of leadership on organisational performance, commitment and innovation is necessary...
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...distribution SMEs are very crucial. In addition to developing countries SMEs are important to almost all economies in the world. In many countries, SMEs are the key actors in generating well-brought-up employment in most developing countries involves the expansion of this sector fast enough to absorb people previously unemployed (a few) or engaged in low productivity informal sector jobs and the majority of jobs are provided by SMEs, In low-income countries, especially where the informal sector is large, but it is still significant. The SME sector’s contribution to GDP also confirms its economic importance. In high-income countries,...
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... Table of contents 1. Open innovation for SMEs in developing countries - An intermediated communication network model for collaboration beyond obstacles....................................................................................................................... 1 2. Model of Thai Small and Medium Sized Enterprises' Organizational Capabilities: Review and Verification 15 3. SMALL BUSINESSES AND INTERNATIONAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN THE ECONOMIC HARD TIME: A GLOBAL STRATEGIC PERSPECTIVE............................................................................................ 33 Bibliography...................................................................................................................................................... 48 24 September 2014 ii ProQuest Document 1 of 3 Open innovation for SMEs in developing countries - An intermediated communication network model for collaboration beyond obstacles Author: Vrgovic, Petar; Vidicki, Predrag; Glassman, Brian; Walton, Abram ProQuest document link Abstract: Although there is increasing interest in exploring open innovation in developing countries, the conceptual and potential applications of using open innovation in the small to medium enterprise sector are rarely explored. Since SMEs often have a dominant impact on national economies, their innovative potential should not be neglected. While SMEs in developed countries have learned how to innovate, SMEs in developing countries face...
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...Question 1: Answer: SMEs (Small & Medium Enterprises) are those business enterprises which run their business in small and medium level. Small and medium business has no single definition but have some standards on the basis of which we can say they are small and medium enterprises. Different institutions has given different definitions but in Pakistan SMEDA (small Medium enterprises development authority) has defined SMEs as “the enterprises can be small and medium which has up to 250 employees and having annual return about Rs.250 million.” In Pakistan we can say that there are about more and less about 2 million small and micro level business and enterprises are exist. In among these 2 million there are about 400000 are form manufacturing side about 600000 from services side enterprises and about one million are exists from trade sector mean retailers. In Pakistan Small Medium enterprises is almost near to ninety percent of the whole business enterprise. It contributes a lot in almost every sector of Pakistan like manufacturing, agricultural and services based organizations. The part of every province in SME are contributed in SME Punjab province has the highest contribution about 65.26% share is in Punjab, KPK has about 12.21% while Sindh province has about 17.82% share in SME in total of 2.96 million units in Pakistan of which about 93.9% are established enterprises and 6.1% are household enterprises. Baluchistan share is about 2.09% in over all units in Pakistan....
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...SMALL and Medium enterprises (SMEs) have been playing a significant role for socio-economic development in all countries, particularly in the developing economies. In Asia, they play even a greater role as the sector constitutes about 98% of all enterprises, accounting for 30% of total employment and 30% of direct exports. However, SMEs face a plethora of challenges in terms of lack of access to information, technological disadvantages, lack of adequate finance and backdated marketing and managerial skills. Bangladesh, being one of the least developing countries and faced with several constraints, has not been able to meet the challenges in SME sector appropriately. This has deprived the country of the substantial benefits that could come from the SMEs through their contribution to overall development of the national economy. According to a study conducted by Canadian Integrated Development Association (CIDA), there are about 6.0 million SMEs in Bangladesh and among them only 27 thousand enterprises are ready to expand and export. SMEs contribute 50 per cent of total industrial output employing 82 per cent of industrial labour force. This statistics show that the productivity of labour is low as 82 per cent of workforce is producing only 50 per cent of output. Therefore, there is a high labour-capital ratio. Although Bangladesh is an overpopulated country with abundance of labour, a large portion of its total workforce still remains unskilled and semi-skilled. One of...
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...Managing Quality Performance in Supply Chains through Diffusion of Innovations Nadeem Kureshi Center for Advanced Studies in Engineering, Islamabad, Pakistan nadeemk@msu.edu 1. ABSTRACT Supplier Management is fast becoming one of the most critical determining factors in businesses as companies around the world are relying on outsourcing as a strategic tool to achieve competitive advantage. The growing trend of focusing on core competencies and letting the experts do their job has furthered the importance of Supplier Management. While the driving force behind any outsourcing remains increased competitiveness with a particular focus on reducing costs, it essentially requires certain strengths on part of the suppliers. Considering the fact that most of the suppliers around the world are SMEs, who are resource constrained by nature, the idea of outsourcing can potentially end up to be dichotomous;” competitiveness to be achieved through using resource constrained entities”. Such situations can be much more pronounced in developing economies and in situations where less liberty is available in choosing suppliers. Of the various initiatives undertaken to address this problem, Supplier development stands out. Contemporary literature however suggests that among the major Supplier Development activities, those carrying higher costs are seldom or never undertaken, and even the large firms tend to concentrate on activities involving less or no costs. This paper establishes a relationship...
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...theme ‘Malaysia - Towards Global Competitiveness’ and other countries also working towards on that. Industries must strive for global competitiveness through the transformation and innovation of the manufacturing and services sectors. According to The Small and Medium Industries Development Corporation (SMIDEC) SMEs account for close to 99 % of all the establishments in the manufacturing, services and agricultural sector, provide around 65% of total employment and it is expected that the value added production of SMEs to be around RM120 billion or 50 % of total production in the manufacturing sector by 2020. Malaysian SME contribution to the GDP was only 32 percent in 2006 compared to that of 40 percent in the United States, 57 percent in Germany, 55 percent in Japan, 60 percent in China, 57 percent in Indonesia and Thailand at 38.9 percent. Innovation and the capacity to innovate are among the most important factors that affect an organizations competitiveness and performance SMEs due their small size, limited managerial capabilities, as well as limited resources do face a challenging task in innovating. SMEs as compared to larger firms are weakly structured in innovation, low market power and scarcity of resources in order to appropriate the benefit of their innovation. In nature, SMEs do not require a statutory audit may still want some degree of independent assurance to increase the credibility of their statements, in which case a review can be an ideal solution...
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...large companies, it received less attention on small and medium-size enterprises（SMEs）. Considering the significant impact of SEMs on the world economy and the important position of SMEs in the modern market, whether should these companies undertake their corporate social responsibility or not has become a considerable debate. Different from large companies, SMEs may not have the power or ability to handle social activities, so it may make itself less competitive by pursuing CSR (Carroll and Shabana, 2010). Other studies indicate that voluntary initiatives will be less effective than regulation (Williamson et al., 2006). Moreover, profit-maximization is the ultimate goal of SMEs. However, the CSR agenda could provide SMEs with significant scope for competitive advantage (Tilley et al., 2003). At the same time, SMEs account for 99.8% of European enterprises (European Commission, 2003), and have a greater environmental impact per unit than large firms and are the largest contributors to pollution (Environment Agency, 2003). In light of this, it is necessary for SMEs to undertake CSR (ibid.). Nevertheless, the benefits or drawbacks of CSR are not the reasons whether SMEs should undertake it or not. CSR is the indispensable responsibility that SMEs should undertake. Supports from governments, attempts made by SMEs and lessons from large companies all contribute to the fulfillment of CSR in SMEs. This essay will first define corporate social responsibility and...
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...enterprises (SMEs) form a crucial part of the U.S. economy. The SMEs create the most jobs in the country; they target the ordinary Americans for employment thus making them a very important component of the economy. Without the SMEs, the economy will bleed millions of jobs, adversely affecting the economy. This is the reasoning behind the drive by President Obama to give this sector newly acquired impetus and promote it to create more jobs for Americans and grow the economy. The target of the National Export Initiative (NEI) is to boost the export capacity of the SMEs in the U.S. by supporting them; the administration reasons that this will result in the creation of two million jobs. The intention is good, but the challenge lie in the operationalization of the policy and ensuring it works in the actual market (Audretsch, 100). The international market and the export market is often dominated by the big corporations with many resources to invest; this makes them strong and gives them the ability to compete with the big corporations that are players in the international market. The SMEs form the U.S. lack, the resources, know how, and the experience to compete with the established world trade players form the Europe Union, China, and India. This is where the Export Promotion Cabinet steps in to help the U.S. SMEs succeed in the competitive export market (Audretsch, 101). The cabinet should take action to remove both foreign and domestic barriers that curtail the SMEs players in the...
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...Present By 1. Atthaya Pancharin 53441642 2. Korntatan Patarataweetip 53441602 3. Panchabhorn Bodhintrsopon 53441617 4. Pikul Sithichan 53441620 5. Varatip Silapapong 53441625 May 2011 สารบัญ ประวัติความเป็นมา 3 ความหมายของตราสัญลักษณ์รวงข้าว 3 ความหมายของสีในสัญลักษณ์ ของธนาคารกสิกรไทย 4 ภารกิจ 4 วิสัยทัศน์ 4 ค่านิยมหลัก 4 นวัตกรรม กับธนาคารกสิกรไทย ตั้งแต่อดีตจนถึงปัจจุบัน 5 สรุป นวัตกรรมต่างๆของธนาคารกสิกรไทย 15 นวัตกรรมของธนาคารกรุงเทพ 19 บทวิเคราะห์ 20 จุดเปลี่ยนธนาคารกสิกร ผู้นำนวัตกรรมการเงิน 20 การสร้าง Positioning 24 กลยุทธ์การบริหาร Strategic Management 26 ตารางการเปรียบเทียบสินทรัพย์รวม และกำไรสุทธิ ของธนาคารกสิกรไทย และธนาคารกรุงเทพ ระหว่างปี 2549-2553 29 ข้อเสนอในการทำ Innovation เพิ่ม/ลด/เปลี่ยน 30 วิธีการวางแผนและ ดำเนินงานภายในกลุ่ม 31 วิธีการค้นหาข้อมูลต่างๆ 31 แหล่งข้อมูลที่ใช้ในการค้นหา 32 แผนการดำเนินการ 32 ประวัติความเป็นมา ธนาคารกสิกรไทย ก่อตั้งเมื่อวันที่ 8 มิถุนายน พ.ศ. 2488 ด้วยทุนจดทะเบียน 5 ล้านบาท และพนักงานชุดแรกเริ่มเพียง 21 คน มีอาคารซึ่งเป็นสาขาสำนักถนนเสือป่าในปัจจุบันเป็นที่ทำการแห่ง แรก การดำเนินงานของธนาคารประสบความสำเร็จเป็นอย่างดี เพียง 6 เดือน หรือเพียงงวดบัญชีแรกที่สิ้นสุด ณ วันที่ 31 ธันวาคม พ.ศ. 2488 มียอดเงินฝากสูงถึง 12 ล้านบาท มีสินทรัพย์ 15 ล้านบาท จากจุดที่เริ่มต้นจนถึงวันนี้ ธนาคารกสิกรไทยเติบโตอย่างมั่นคง ณ วันที่ 31 มีนาคม พ.ศ. 2554 มีทุนจดทะเบียน 30,486 ล้านบาท มีสินทรัพย์จำนวน 1,677,862 ล้านบาท เงินรับฝากจำนวน 1,182,390 ล้านบาท เงินให้สินเชื่อจำนวน...
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...influencing the adoption of e-business technology by SMEs. To this end, the paper draws on a range of literatures on the diffusion of new information and communication technologies (ICTs), many of which have hitherto been treated as separate. The reasons for this are two-fold. First, e-business technologies are the latest in a line of new ICT technologies. When exploited successfully, ICTs have increased firm competitiveness either by raising the efficiency of internal communication and organisation and/or supply chain relationships, or by facilitating the development of new/improved products and services. Second, it is hypothesised that many of the factors affecting the successful adoption of new technologies are generic in nature. With regards to SMEs specifically, consideration of earlier research may assist us in identifying a set of enablers and barriers to e-business adoption. Hence, by explicitly acknowledging the context and prior history of research in the area, we are able to map out the dimensions of future theoretical and empirical research in e-business adoption by SMEs. In addition to drawing together factors identified by existing research, the paper highlights the implications of network externalities for the timing of technology investments and the returns that accrue to early and late adopters. It also draws attention to a number of problems associated with the analytical concept of ‘the SME’ when it is applied to this area. The research proceeds...
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...industrial SMEs P. Pecas and E. Henriques ¸ Technology and Management Group, Department of Mechanical Engineering, ´ Instituto Superior Tecnico, Lisboa, Portugal Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the implementation of best practices of collaboration between university and industrial small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Design/methodology/approach – This paper presents the experience carried on by a university group fostering the collaboration with SME companies involving young engineering students and researchers in projects designed for the resolution of real industrial problems. A collaboration model is proposed and described. Four real case studies are presented. Findings – The purposed model promotes the involvement of the young engineers with authentic industrial experiences, enables the build-up of their practical framework and encourages their entrepreneurial growth. It also promotes the innovation process in SME companies through the close collaboration with universities. Practical implications – The collaboration between universities and SME companies should be based on a small projects base. These projects must be focus in localized and specific problematic areas in the industrial companies, where the potential of improvement and innovation is large, must diagnose the problematic situation and propose new and efficient solutions supported by technical/scientific methodologies. The involvement of managers and collaborators of SME companies...
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...enterprises (SMEs) form a crucial part of the U.S. economy. The SMEs create the most jobs in the country; they target the ordinary Americans for employment thus making them a very important component of the economy. Without the SMEs, the economy will bleed millions of jobs, adversely affecting the economy. This is the reasoning behind the drive by President Obama to give this sector newly acquired impetus and promote it to create more jobs for Americans and grow the economy. The target of the National Export Initiative (NEI) is to boost the export capacity of the SMEs in the U.S. by supporting them; the administration reasons that this will result in the creation of two million jobs. The intention is good, but the challenge lie in the operationalization of the policy and ensuring it works in the actual market (Audretsch, 100). The international market and the export market is often dominated by the big corporations with many resources to invest; this makes them strong and gives them the ability to compete with the big corporations that are players in the international market. The SMEs form the U.S. lack, the resources, know how, and the experience to compete with the established world trade players form the Europe Union, China, and India. This is where the Export Promotion Cabinet steps in to help the U.S. SMEs succeed in the competitive export market (Audretsch, 101). The cabinet should take action to remove both foreign and domestic barriers that curtail the SMEs players in the...
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