Social innovation in managing diversity: COVID-19 as a catalyst for change

PurposeCoronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic had an adverse impact on workforce diversity internationally. While in the Global North, many countries have sophisticated laws and organizational mechanisms and discourses to deal with such adverse impacts on workforce diversity, such structures of diversity management are either ceremonial or poorly developed in the Global South. The global pandemic disproportionately impacted Global North and Global South increases the existing gap due to vaccine rollout inequality and divergence in recoveries. The authors explore social innovation as a possible option for responding to the challenges induced by the COVID-19 pandemic.Design/methodology/approachThe study draws on interviews in 26 distinctive organizations operating in various industries in Turkey. The authors have adopted a qualitative design to explore how social innovation helps to respond to diversity concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.FindingsThe authors demonstrate that social innovation presents a viable option for a country with a poorly regulated context of diversity management. Social innovation could help overcome the challenge of the absence of supportive legislation, discourses and practices of diversity in poorly regulated contexts.Originality/valueThe field study revealed several distinct forms of social innovation for diversity management, which emerged as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors demonstrate that in the absence of supportive diversity management structures and frameworks, social innovation in diversity management at the organizational level could provide a viable response to the emergent needs in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Metastructuring for Standards

This chapter focusses on the appearance and implementation of process standards in software development organizations. The authors are interested in the way organizations handle the plurality of process standards. Organizations respond by metastructuring to the increasing demand for standardizing their development processes. Standards metastructuring summarizes all organizational mechanisms for facilitating the ongoing adaption of global standards to the organizational context. Based on an in-depth single case study of a software developing organization in the automotive technology sector, the authors found four areas of metastructuring, four roles for standard mediation, and four types of metastructuring activities. With the case study, they encourage further research that proves standards in use and how organizations respond to the challenges of standardization.

New organizational mechanisms of infrastructure development of small agricultural businesses in Russia

The developed infrastructure of a small agricultural business (ISAB) ensures the innovative development of production of small enterprises of the agro-industrial complex (AIC), solves social problems of rural areas and provides employment for the rural population, performing a number of functions, including: property, financial, consulting, information, legal, innovative , social and export support for small agricultural businesses (SAB). The aim of the study is to identify the problems of the infrastructure development of the SAB and search for their solutions. The methods of generalization, economic and mathematical modeling, functional analysis were used, the data of the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, the reporting of the Ministry of Agriculture of Russia, publications of foreign and domestic authors and other sources served as the material for the study. It was proposed to use the institution of “commercial procurement”, to functionally expand the “financial” service, to organize a Single Industry Center for Infrastructure Development (Center), which will ensure effective interaction of all participants through the use of a digital platform based on a service-oriented architecture (SOA). The platform needs to be integrated with government information systems that support the infrastructure development of the SAB. The cluster organization of infrastructure facilities will increase efficiency, will contribute to the concentration of resources and their greater purposefulness. The main result of the implementation of new organizational mechanisms should be the effective development of the IMAB.

Investigating the Impact of Cybersecurity Culture on Employees’ Cybersecurity Protection Behaviours: A Conceptual Paper

As technology and digital applications increase in volume and complexity, organization is facing greater security risks in cyberspace more than ever before. However, organizational cybersecurity requires more than just the latest technology. All the technology available to secure systems will not keep an organization secure if the people in the organization make bad or unexpected decisions that open up the system to attackers. To secure an organization, all employees of the organization must act positively to reduce company risks from cyberattacks. All leaders have a main responsibility to understand and align with the entire organization with cybersecurity objectives. Leaders need to keep continue to invest in security technologies and also need practical solutions for dealing with the human error of cybersecurity. The conceptual paper presented in this paper describes cybersecurity culture, external influencing factors, and organizational mechanisms, the elements that contribute to each employee of the organization that having protection behaviour from cyberattacks.

influence of internal organizational mechanisms on gender mainstreaming effectiveness Morogoro region, Tanzania

The paper sought to analyse the influence of the existing internal organizational mechanisms on gender mainstreaming effectiveness (GME). The study used cross sectional research design where a total sample of 368 respondents was drawn from population of 4481 by using systematic sampling from employees of the Morogoro Municipal Council, whereby questionnaire was the main tool used to collect data. The linear multiple and hierarchical regression models were used analyse data. The study found that a positive and significant influence of existing internal organizational mechanisms on gender mainstreaming effectiveness at Morogoro municipal council. The paper concludes that the GME was influenced greatly by the internal organizational mechanisms. Therefore, it is recommended that the Local Governmental Authorities to increase efforts of committing resources on the internal organizational mechanisms for gender mainstreaming effectiveness in the work place.

Changes in Methodological Systems of Education as a Result of the Development of the Educational Process in Higher Education Institutions

The article is devoted to the study of modern changes in the methodological systems of education in higher educational institutions as current pedagogical problem in the organization of professional training of specialists. As a result of the analysis of scientific works the author offers the generalized characteristic of essence, place, role and structure of methodical systems, features of their construction and functioning in a structural combination with the basic components are highlighted. The article presents the conditions of functioning of methodical systems of education, describes the main modern features of the development of methodical systems in higher education and describes the functional and organizational mechanisms of the system of integrated educational environment. The ways of taking into account the main features of modern changes in the methodological systems of teaching of higher education institutions in the professional training of specialists in order to organize an effective educational process are proposed.

Innovation and economic growth: The Belarusian aspect

The article deals with the correlation of the results of theoretical research concerning the causality of the concepts of innovation and economic growth with their practical implementation in the economic sphere of Belarus. The author assesses the level of innovative development of the Belarusian economy and suggests organizational mechanisms for its systemic growth.

Strategic corporate changes under the conditions of developing digital twin management systems

The key postulates of company management, strategic changes in business activity management are considered. Regularities of business behavior, conditions of achievement of business efficiency and limitations of functioning, tasks of macro- and micro-management, principles of centralization and decentralization of management, methods of evaluation of effectiveness of strategy of changes, organizational mechanisms of corporate system action in conditions of innovative transformations are consistently deployed. The necessity of using a digital twin of the management system for solving planning tasks and compliance with proportions and ratios at different phases of the company’s development cycle is substantiated.

Digital Technologies as a Tool for the State Regulation of Conflicts in the Economic Sphere of Social Life

The study aims at determining the main directions for the development and application of digital technologies in the regulation of economic conflicts. Within digital space, such conflicts are difficult to regulate due to the lack of close interaction among organizations and different interests. The negative consequences of conflicts can have an impact on the economy of a particular country or world community as a whole. Therefore, it is necessary to study tools that can prevent and resolve such conflicts. The state is of great importance in the regulation of economic conflicts as Its toolkit comprises legal and organizational mechanisms to resolve conflicts.

Building Programmatic Linkages in the Periphery: The Case of the TRT Party in Thailand

Did the Thai Rak Thai (TRT) Party of Thailand, the first party in the country’s history to gain parliamentary dominance in 2001, represent a departure from traditional clientelistic Thai parties or was it old wine in a new bottle? This article argues that the TRT represented a new hybrid party that successfully established programmatic linkages in rural parts of the country by systematizing its use of informal social networks in local communities. By routinizing recruitment, training, and evaluation of its parliamentary candidates and their vote-canvassing networks, the TRT imparted midlevel politicians with the incentives and ability to promote the party’s policy agenda to rural voters and to cultivate new policy-oriented linkages alongside traditional clientelistic ones. By identifying specific organizational mechanisms by which the TRT combined programmatic and clientelistic linkages with rural voters, this study contributes to literature that examines hybrid party strategies as well as informal party organization.