Human Resource Management (HRM) research, theory and practice overwhelming views the staffing of firms as a series of discrete functional activities, such as recruitment, selection and training. In this study, we investigate how organisation theory, specifically transaction cost economics (TCE),...

The aim of this paper is to provide a better understanding of the evolution of small firm performance. We do so by studying performance changes on a two dimensional "growth– profitability performance space". It is well established that both growth and profitability are important dimensions of...

This paper explores the phenomenon of Thailand's female entrepreneurs and account for some of the cultural drivers in the way in which Thai women operate to be the leading country in the world for female entrepreneurship in terms of entrepreneurial activity. Based on interviews, media reporting,...

It has been argued that entrepreneurship research has not come far enough, fast enough (Low, 2001). Although the volume of research has grown dramatically, as has the number of specific sub-topics covered, there are relatively few issues on which the entrepreneurship research community has...

The performance of the often young and independent businesses studies in entrepreneurship research is not only difficult to assess (Brush & Vanderwerf, 1992) and hard to predict (Cooper, 1995), but also a challenge to interpret. Is discontinuation a sign of failure, and always a worse outcome...

Encouraging entrepreneurship amongst Indigenous people, and fostering the development of small businesses, has been advocated as the most promising avenue for economic development amongst Indigenous communities (Fuller et al., 2003). Unfortunately, the number of Indigenous people engaged in...

Employee motivation is fundamental to business performance, and thus underlies business profitability and global competitiveness. (Mowday & Shapiro (2004). Economists would say that it is the task of managers and leaders to personally motivate and create working conditions that serve to properly...

Small and micro-enterprises play a significant part in most economies.However, in developing countries these enterprises have tended to be looked at from a development, or poverty alleviation perspective, rather than as potentially growing businesses. This paper explores the possibility of...

"Marriage is like an elephant-- the husband is the front legs that choose the direction, the wife the back legs, providing the power!" – Thai Legend Introduction The Thai legend above illustrates the important yet veiled role of women in Thai society. Women comprise 46% of the labour force,...

The purpose of this study is to identify key institutional determinants of firm emergence and growth. We do this using various types of data from Sweden. A characterization of a number of institutions and policy measures shows that they are likely to have contributed to an environment that...