Browsing by Author "Britzelmaier, Bernd"

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    Corporate Social Responsibility in mittelständischen Unternehmen: Eine synoptische Betrachtung
    (Springer, 2015-06-30) Kraus, Patrick; Britzelmaier, Bernd; Moore, Neil; Stokes, Peter
    Abstract attachment pending
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    Cultural Antecedents of Sustainability and Regional Economic Development - A Study of SME 'Mittelstand' Firms in Baden-Württemberg (Germany)
    (Elsevier, 2020-01-20) Kraus, P; Cooper, Cary; Stokes, Peter; Liu, Yipeng; Moore, Neil; Britzelmaier, Bernd; Tarba, Shlomo
    This paper examines behavioural and regional/geographic cultural antecedents of sustainability in SME contexts. The study identifies prevailing macro-representations of sustainability in the literature and highlights an over-focus on large firms constituting the predominant unit of analysis. Moreover, there is a propensity in the literature to view sustainability primarily in terms of ‘environmental’ – closely linked to a corporate strategic imperative narrative of economic competitiveness and profitability. Overall, this perspective tends to generate accounts which are acultural, apolitical and ahistorical in terms of innovative actions and sustainability practices. In response, using a conceptual framework of moral identity, the paper develops a more micro-foundational insight to sustainability (developing notions of ‘tangible’ and ‘intangible’) and examines regional economic development attitudes at individual owner-manager/managing director level in small-to-medium sized firms. Methodologically, an inductively-framed interview schedule was employed with owner-managers and managing directors (n= 30) of manufacturing SMEs in the Baden-Württemberg region (Germany). The study identified a range of micro-foundational behavioural antecedents operating in the sample companies. In particular, it underlined that many of the SME owner-managers/managing directors expressed views informed by a particular moral identity connected with a perspective rooted in regionally bound, longstanding and ‘expected’ behaviours of trust, fairness, honesty and community responsibility. They viewed themselves as distinctive from larger companies which they saw as pursuing a different orientation based on weaker value systems, short-term performance and market/shareholder returns. In contrast, the sample exhibited longer-term sustainability perspectives based on a deep historical linkage with local culture, community and a sense of obligation towards economic protection of employees.
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    An Elite Perspective on Interviewing Entrepreneurs – Methodological Considerations for the Entrepreneurship Field
    (Emerald, 2023-07-27) Kraus, Patrick; Stokes, Peter; Moore, Neil; Ashta, Ashok; Britzelmaier, Bernd
    Purpose: Elite interviewing is a well-established area of interview research methods. Nevertheless, the actual casting of an ‘elite’ has been generally conducted in a prima facie or broad manner. A consideration of entrepreneurs and owner-managers as ‘elites’ has been less profiled and received less attention, therefore the paper views them as constituting a form of ‘local elite’ within given and varying sectorial, regional and community boundaries. We argue that a consideration of entrepreneurs as ‘local elites’ and transferring knowledge from an elite interviewing perspective may strongly support scholarly research in the entrepreneurship field. Design/methodology/approach The study conducts a comprehensive narrative literature review of elite interviewing literature and transfers key methodological insights to the entrepreneurship field. The methodological contribution based on literature is complemented by experiences and observations from an extensive inductive interview study with over 30 entrepreneurs of German manufacturing Small and Medium-sized Entities (SMEs) and are used to reflect on, and refine, interview research approaches with entrepreneurs. Findings: The reflections and discussions in this paper provide valuable insights for other researchers conducting research in entrepreneurship domains regarding the power dynamics of negotiating access, procedural issues of interviews and thereby enhancing the quality of data. Originality: The contribution to knowledge is mainly of a methodological nature. While the paper takes a novel act of recasting elite interviewing in the SME and entrepreneurship context, it methodologically contributes to the entrepreneurship and elite interview literature thereby facilitating higher quality interviews.