Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe the entrepreneurial intention (EI) among Danish university students applying the theory of planned behaviour.Design/methodology/approach: Using cross-sectional data from the Danish Global University Student Spirit Survey 2013 (n=1,027) the analysis is based on a joint correspondence analysis (JCA) investigating the relationships between the variables.Findings: Results indicate that students prefer a career as employee showing a low EI. Both very high and very low EI are related to very high/low self-efficacy and perception of entrepreneurial climate and learning.Research limitations/implications: The study points to an improvement of entrepreneurship education through customised offers dependent on the student’s level of EI and entrepreneurial self-efficacy.Originality/value: Moreover, this study has proven that the JCA is a useful method to analyse the relationship between EI and other related variables in an exploratory study.

Exposing under which conditions management innovation diffuses within firms, this study investigates at the individual level the mediating influence of middle managers’ voice behavior on the relationship between CEOs’ empowering leadership behavior and perceived management innovation. We also propose that the magnitude of this relationship depends on middle managers’ collectivist orientation. This study exploits a unique Moroccan sample of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and utilizes structural equation modeling to analyze the studied relations. We found that the positive relationship between CEOs’ empowering leadership behavior and management innovation is mediated by middle managers’ voice. This effect is conditioned by middle managers’ collectivist orientations, which positively influence their attention to CEOs’ signals and the value and frequency of their contributions to management innovation. While research has identified the external and organizational factors that shape management innovation, our study concentrates on the individual level and accentuates that middle managers’ closeness to management processes, combined with their access to technical knowledge, renders them essential to management innovation. We contradict arguments that middle managers may be less inclined to help management innovation to emerge. SMEs can systematically invest in management innovation by advancing their managerial capabilities and considering individual value orientations.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper was to explore the role of empowering leadership, organizational climate for initiative and job autonomy in spurring innovative work behavior (IWB).Design/methodology/approach: This study resorted to the structural equation modeling technique along the Bayesian estimation approach to analyze the mediating role of the organizational climate for initiative and job autonomy in the empowering leadership-IWB link in data gathered from CEOs, middle managers and non-managerial employees of 444 small and medium enterprises in Morocco.Findings: The findings revealed that empowering leadership is a prerequisite of IWB as subordinates, who are empowered by their leaders, demonstrate IWB. Further, organizational climate for initiative and job autonomy mediate the empowering leadership-IWB link.Practical implications: This research has demonstrated that firms and organizational leaders who seek to make their middle managers innovative in their job should adopt empowering leadership practices, build an organizational climate that is favorable for initiative-taking and grant middle managers with autonomy in the way they carry out their tasks.Originality/value: This paper extends our understanding on the mechanisms linking empowering leadership and IWB by testing the mediating effects of organizational climate for initiative and job autonomy.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) within the framework of the job demands-resources (JD-R) model. Design/methodology/approach: The sample of N=597 white-collars in the German media and IT industry is drawn via the professional network XING. Cross-sectional mediator models are used to test the hypothesis. Findings: The processes proposed by the JD-R model find empirical support. Job demands primarily cause exhaustion while job resources increase job satisfaction. Besides, job demands reduce job satisfaction and job resources lead to less exhaustion. An exception is found for cognitive workload which rather acts like a job resource. EO mediates these effects in a favorable way. High job resources foster EO, which in turn reduces exhaustion and enhances job satisfaction. For job demands, EO shows a negative mediation reducing the health-impairment process and increasing job satisfaction. Research limitations/implications: Future research should broach the issue of adverse effects related to extreme employee entrepreneurship and potential negative effects. Practical implications: Supporting and supervising an EO may help employees to cope with modern job profiles in agile organizations. Originality/value: The findings provide support for a favorable mediating role of an entrepreneurial personal resource within the JD-R model. This knowledge may be used to consider individual work orientations and to organize work in a “healthy” way.

Purpose: Networking and being a part of an established business network supports the process of translating new ideas into marketable solutions and acquiring customers. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how aspiring entrepreneurs in a Danish rural area setting manage to get embedded into relevant business networks. Before the literature background on social capital and regional development, the authors use the embeddedness approach in explaining whether weak or strong ties are most beneficial to get the business started and how lacking strong ties can be compensated.Design/methodology/approach: This paper takes an economic sociology perspective on social capital and is empirically based on a case study. The sample consists of a group of young aspiring entrepreneurs, living in the rural area of Southern Jutland, who are all committed to an organization which supports regional start-ups.Findings: The authors found that aspiring entrepreneurs have different needs depending on their development status and type of innovation. Founders, who are developing or have developed new product innovations, seem to have an increased need for “strong ties” with consultants and those with knowledge about building up a professional network. Founders, who are developing or have developed a significantly improved service, have strong ties with former fellow students and researchers at the university.Originality/value: This study illustrates that aspiring entrepreneurs connected to a regional entrepreneurship center gained access to a wider relevant network. Depending on their level of embeddedness, they could build new strong relationships and exploit information stemming from new “weak ties” and as such harness more benefits. The study shows that less privileged start-ups can substitute strong ties, especially through the support of professional managers of startup-supporting organizations. Finally, a model explaining the impact of social capital on the entrepreneurial sphere of regional business networks and on its innovativeness is deduced.