Martina Gianecchini

The mediating influence of career success in relationship between career mobility criteria, career anchors and satisfaction with organization

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to evaluate how perceived career channels and career anchors are related to objective internal career success, and how subjective career success mediates the effects of objective success on employer satisfaction. Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected using questionnaires, and hypotheses were tested on a sample of 800 engineers and managers. Of the sample, 35 percent were female and 67 percent worked in the private sector. Findings – The findings show that the more respondents perceive that performance carries weight in promotion decisions, the higher their level of objective career success. In contrast, the importance placed on relations with the hierarchy has no significant influence. Respondents with a strong management anchor report greater objective career success, and those with a strong life style anchor report lesser objective career success, but greater success in life outside work. Finally, the findings indicate that job success is associated with greater satisfaction with employer, whereas life success is related to lesser satisfaction. Research limitations/implications – This study is based on a sample taken from one profession (engineers), in a specific cultural context. The cross-sectional research design precludes the inference of some causality conclusions. Practical implications – Organizations may benefit from disseminating promotion attribution criteria and reducing perceptions of favoritism in reward allocation. In addition, this study shows that not only individuals but also the employer can benefit from greater positive interdependence between career success and life success. Originality/value – This study represents the first comprehensive attempt to examine the role of perceived career channels and career anchors in objective and subjective career success.

‘Absolutely free’? The role of relational work in sustaining artistic innovation

Drawing on the relational perspective of artistic innovation, which suggests that different types of ties (weak vs. strong) lead to different outcomes in terms of the development and implementation of new artistic ideas, this study uses an in-depth case study of Italian choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti to explore the role of the relational work artists deploy to develop and implement their artwork. We investigate how artists engage in specific relational actions (broadening, bonding, embedding and dis-embedding) with producing organizations, and how these actions lead to innovation over time. The findings suggest that artistic innovation moves through four stages – proximal innovation, fuzzy innovation, established innovation and maintained innovation – sustained by an artist’s oscillation between a network characterized by strong ties with few organizations and a network characterized by weak ties with many organizations, depending on the artist’s quests for inclusion and differentiation. In this process, a long-lasting relationship between the artist and a specific organization may ‘pivot’ artistic innovation.

Post-acquisition integration process: use a stick or a carrot? A sensemaking-sensegiving perspective

Le operazioni di Fusione e Acquisizione (Merger & Acquisition) sono un fenomeno rilevante nello scenario economico globale. Numerosi pero sono i casi di fallimento spesso imputati a una mancata integrazione organizzativa seguente all’operazione. Il presente studio applica una prospettiva cognitivista (sensemaking-sensegiving) al processo di integrazione che ha seguito il processo di acquisizione di un’azienda italiana da parte di una multinazionale americana. Questa integrazione, che si puo definire di successo da un punto di vista operativo di integrazione tra procedure, ha mostrato pero alcune difficolta nell’integrazione tra le persone delle due aziende. Attraverso la prospettiva cognitivista e stato possibile evidenziare come queste difficolta siano collegate a una diversa interpretazione (divergent sensemaking) dei reciproci comportamenti e azioni (sensegiving). Questa diversita di interpretazione e stata inizialmente originata da una scarsa e poco efficace comunicazione del piano di integrazione da parte della multinazionale americana e successivamente dall’utilizzo di alcune tradizionali strategie di supporto, che sono state intese in maniera opposta dagli attori coinvolti. L’analisi presentata contribuisce alla letteratura sull’integrazione post-acquisizione che si e concentrata sugli strumenti e gli effetti del processo, ma raramente sul suo svolgimento.

Public Support and Corporate Giving to the Arts and Culture in Times of Economic Crisis: An Exploratory Analysis on the Italian Case

Abstract In line with the reappraisal of the welfare state concept started in the 1980s and culminated in the recent economic crisis, governments have reduced the public funding available to cultural institutions. Thus, cultural institutions have progressively adopted more market-oriented practices, rethinking their relationship with the world of business in order to get additional economic resources. This chapter addresses corporate support to the arts and culture in the case of Italy, a country where government has traditionally played a central role in supporting culture. Drawing on the extant literature on sponsorships and corporate philanthropy, we propose a cluster analysis carried out on 160 investments in artistic or cultural activities made by 95 mid-sized Italian companies between 2008 and 2015. Results provide an up-to-date empirical evidence of corporate giving patterns in Italy and suggest an original typology of business investments in the arts and culture. Our study, focusing on the case of a Latin country and on a sample of mid-sized companies, extends the empirical settings usually investigated. Moreover, different from previous studies, we elucidate the influence that the characteristics of supporting organizations have on business investments in the arts and culture.

Educational Context and Entrepreneurial Intentions of University Students: An Italian Study

Abstract In this chapter the authors explore some drivers of entrepreneurial intentions using the theory of planned behaviour on a sample of Italian students. Our objective is twofold. First, the study investigates if both perceiving that becoming an entrepreneur is risky and having non-financial career motivations affect university students’ entrepreneurial intentions. Second, it investigates if students’ perception that university education has an effect on their entrepreneurial skills and attitudes and their perception that the university favours and supports entrepreneurship moderate the relationship between cognitive antecedents of intentions (i.e. attitudes, norms and control) and entrepreneurial intentions. This chapter presents an analysis of a sample of more than 1,500 students from the University of Padova (Italy). According to the national ranking, this University – which is one of Italy’s oldest and largest universities – has been classified as the one with the best Faculty of Economics and Statistics in terms of teaching for more than 10 years among 45 Italian public universities. Data from the Global University Entrepreneurial Spirit Students’ Survey (GUESSS) carried out in 2013 was used. Our analysis highlights not only on the importance of individual characteristics, but also on the role of the learning experience students have during their university studies. This means that it is important to consider how much students perceive that their university education has an effect on entrepreneurial skills and attitudes.