Foreign Direct Investment, Clean Development Mechanism, and Environmental Management: A case of Sub-Saharan Africa

This doctoral dissertation explores the contribution of environmental management practices, the so-called clean development mechanism (CDM) projects, and foreign direct investment (FDI) in achieving sustainable development in developing countries, particularly in Sub- Saharan Africa. Because the climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions is one of the most serious global environmental challenges, the main focus is on the causal links between carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, energy consumption, and economic development in Sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, the dissertation investigates the factors that have affected the distribution of CDM projects in developing countries and the relationships between FDI and other macroeconomic variables of interest. The main contribution of the dissertation is empirical. One of the publications uses crosssectional data and Tobit and Poisson regressions. Three of the studies use time-series data and vector autoregressive and vector error correction models, while two publications use panel data and panel data estimation methods. One of the publications uses thus both timeseries and panel data. The concept of Granger causality is utilized in four of the publications. The results indicate that there are significant differences in the Granger causality relationships between CO2 emissions, energy consumption, economic growth, and FDI in different countries. It appears also that the causality relationships change over time. Furthermore, the results support the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis but only for some of the countries. As to CDM activities, past emission levels, institutional quality, and the size of the host country appear to be among the significant determinants of the distribution of CDM projects. FDI and exports are also found to be significant determinants of economic growth.

CSR and CSR communication’s effect on prospective employees

The aim of this Master’s Thesis was to examine whether corporate social responsibility and CSR communication has effect on company’s image in the eyes of 18-25 year olds young job seekers and thus study young adults perceptions on these issues. By utilizing previous academic literature a through picture of the main topics was built and by conducting quantitative research, research’s aim was sought to answer. The framework defines the link between research’s main concepts corporate image, CSR and CSR communication and how this can lead to attracting prospective employees. A quantitative research method was applied and an online survey was sent to people whom had applied for L&T by June during the year 2015. Out of these people, those who were aged 18-15 and had vocational education were qualified to answer the survey. The data was analyzed by utilizing statistical analysis and causal relationships were found though which the explanation of perceptions and impacts was possible. The results showed that young adults are influenced by CSR and CSR communication and thus these factors have an impact on prospective employees.

Collectiveness within startup teams – Leading the way to initiating and managing collective pursuit of opportunities in organizational contexts

While traditional entrepreneurship literature addresses the pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities to a solo entrepreneur, scholars increasingly agree that new ventures are often founded and operated by entrepreneurial teams as collective efforts especially in hightechnology industries. Researchers also suggest that team ventures are more likely to survive and succeed than ventures founded by the individual entrepreneur although specific challenges might relate to multiple individuals being involved in joint entrepreneurial action. In addition to new ventures, entrepreneurial teams are seen central for organizing work in established organizations since the teams are able to create major product and service innovations that drive organizational success. Acknowledgement of the entrepreneurial teams in various organizational contexts has challenged the notion on the individual entrepreneur. However, considering that entrepreneurial teams represent a collective-level phenomenon that bases on interactions between organizational members, entrepreneurial teams may not have been studied as indepth as could be expected from the point of view of the team-level, rather than the individual or the individuals in the team. Many entrepreneurial team studies adopt the individualized view of entrepreneurship and examine the team members’ aggregate characteristics or the role of a lead entrepreneur. The previous understandings might not offer a comprehensive and indepth enough understanding of collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams and team venture performance that often relates to the team-level issues in particular. In addition, as the collective-level of entrepreneurial teams has been approached in various ways in the existing literatures, the phenomenon has been difficult to understand in research and practice. Hence, there is a need to understand entrepreneurial teams at the collective-level through a systematic and comprehensive perspective. This study takes part in the discussions on entrepreneurial teams. The overall objective of this study is to offer a description and understanding of collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams beyond individual(s). The research questions of the study are: 1) what collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams stands for, what constitutes the basic elements of it, and who are included in it, 2) why, how, and when collectiveness emerges or reinforces within entrepreneurial teams, and 3) why collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams matters and how it could be developed or supported. In order to answer the above questions, this study bases on three approaches, two set of empirical data, two analysis techniques, and conceptual study. The first data set consists of 12 qualitative semi-structured interviews with business school students who are seen as prospective entrepreneurs. The data is approached through a social constructionist perspective and analyzed through discourse analysis. The second data set bases on a qualitative multiplecase study approach that aims at theory elaboration. The main data consists of 14 individual and four group semi-structured thematic interviews with members of core entrepreneurial teams of four team startups in high-technology industries. The secondary data includes publicly available documents. This data set is approached through a critical realist perspective and analyzed through systematic thematic analysis. The study is completed through a conceptual study that aims at building a theoretical model of collective-level entrepreneurship drawing from existing literatures on organizational theory and social-psychology. The theoretical work applies a positivist perspective. This study consists of two parts. The first part includes an overview that introduces the research background, knowledge gaps and objectives, research strategy, and key concepts. It also outlines the existing knowledge of entrepreneurial team literature, presents and justifies the choices of paradigms and methods, summarizes the publications, and synthesizes the findings through answering the above mentioned research questions. The second part consists of five publications that address independent research questions but all enable to answer the research questions set for this study as a whole. The findings of this study suggest a map of relevant concepts and their relationships that help grasp collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams. The analyses conducted in the publications suggest that collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams stands for cognitive and affective structures in-between team members including elements of collective entity, collective idea of business, collective effort, collective attitudes and motivations, and collective feelings. Collectiveness within entrepreneurial teams also stands for specific joint entrepreneurial action components in which the structures are constructed. The action components reflect equality and democracy, and open and direct communication in particular. Collectiveness emerges because it is a powerful tool for overcoming individualized barriers to entrepreneurship and due to collectively oriented desire for, collective value orientation to, demand for, and encouragement to team entrepreneurship. Collectiveness emerges and reinforces in processes of joint creation and realization of entrepreneurial opportunities including joint analysis and planning of the opportunities and strategies, decision-making and realization of the opportunities, and evaluation, feedback, and sanctions of entrepreneurial action. Collectiveness matters because it is relevant for potential future entrepreneurs and because it affects the ways collective ventures are initiated and managed. Collectiveness also matters because it is a versatile, dynamic, and malleable phenomenon and the ideas of it can be applied across organizational contexts that require team work in discovering or creating and realizing new opportunities. This study further discusses how the findings add to the existing knowledge of entrepreneurial team literature and how the ideas can be applied in educational, managerial, and policy contexts.

Triadic Perspective to Sport Sponsorship Relationships

Often the empirical studies about sport sponsorship co-operation have concentrated on the relationships between the sponsor and the sponsored target excluding the phenomenon sports manager, i.e. the intermediating actor from further examination. In this study the purpose was to contribute to the research gap in the current literature by thoroughly describing the roles and relationships in the sport sponsorship co-operation that includes an intermediating actor, that is a triad. The main objective was pursued to fulfill with the help of two sub-level research questions that were identified as ”What is the nature of the sport sponsorship triad?” and ”What is the role of the intermediating actor within the sport sponsorship triad?” First, the theorethical framework was constructed based on the existing literature of business relationship triads and sponsorship co-operation that were integrated in the synthesis of the theories the purpose of which was to produce a framework for empirical research. Then a qualitative research was conducted by using a single-case study approach. The data was collected through a semi-structured theme interview in person with the sports manager. Similar questionnaires were sent out to the sponsor and the athlete and answered in writing. After collecting the data, the actor roles’ and their relationships were examined individually, after which the analysis of the results was carried out and divided according to the research questions. The nature of the sport sponsorship triad was found to be a serial triad that could be likened to a system of two dyads connected by the intermediating actor. Each actor seemed to occupy a specific justifiable position within the co-operation, even though the relationships were found to be unbalanced in terms of resources, power/strength, interaction patterns and interconnectedness. The core role of the intermediating actor was found to be the role of a mediator, which was seen to increase the other parties’ dependence of the manager’s performance. Therefore, the role of the intermediating actor should be considered crucial for the very existence of the sport sponsorship co-operation, especially in cases where the nature of the triad is a serial triad.