Increased understanding of knowledge transfer (KT) from universities to the wider regional knowledge ecosystem offers opportunities for increased regional innovation and commercialisation. The aim of this article is to improve the understanding of the KT phenomena in an open innovation context where multiple diverse quadruple helix stakeholders are interacting. An absorptive capacity-based conceptual framework is proposed, using a priori constructs which portrays the multidimensional process of KT between universities and its constituent stakeholders in pursuit of open innovation and commercialisation. Given the lack of overarching theory in the field, an exploratory, inductive theory building methodology was adopted using semi-structured interviews, document analysis and longitudinal observation data over a three-year period. The findings identify five factors, namely human centric factors, organisational factors, knowledge characteristics, power relationships and network characteristics, which mediate both the ability of stakeholders to engage in KT and the effectiveness of knowledge acquisition, assimilation, transformation and exploitation. This research has implications for policy makers and practitioners by identifying the need to implement interventions to overcome the barriers to KT effectiveness between regional quadruple helix stakeholders within an open innovation ecosystem.

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The aim of this paper is to improve the understanding and inter-relationship of both the people and technical aspects of knowledge management. Studies in knowledge management indicate that there can be an over-emphasis on technology to the exclusion of adequate people/quality planning, or, strong people/quality programmes from a knowledge perspective, hindered by inadequate enabling technologies. Understanding of these issues in practice and academia is currently hindered by a paucity of systematic empirical research, addressing the relationship between the cultural and technological aspects of knowledge management. A survey questionnaire was constructed and tested via a pilot phase. The questionnaire was then distributed to over 1,000 organizations, across three industrial sectors. The ®ndings indicate that a strong relationship exists between KM and other organizational factors, namely organizational culture and internal technical culture. Further analysis of these elements revealed that factors internal to the organization are impinged upon by macro-environmental elements.

Continuous large-scale changes in technology and the globalization of markets have resulted in the need for many SMEs to use innovation as a means of seeking competitive advantage where innovation includes both technological and organizational perspectives (Tapscott, 2009). However, there is a paucity of systematic and empirical research relating to the implementation of innovation management in the context of SMEs. The aim of this article is to redress this imbalance via an empirical study created to develop and test a model of innovation implementation in SMEs. This study uses Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to test the plausibility of an innovation model, developed from earlier studies, as the basis of a questionnaire survey of 395 SMEs in the UK. The resultant model and construct relationship results are further probed using an explanatory multiple case analysis to explore ‘how’ and ‘why’ type questions within the model and construct relationships. The findings show that the effects of leadership, people and culture on innovation implementation are mediated by business improvement activities relating to Total Quality Management/Continuous Improvement (TQM/ CI) and product and process developments. It is concluded that SMEs have an opportunity to leverage existing quality and process improvement activities to move beyond continuous improvement outcomes towards effective innovation implementation. The article concludes by suggesting areas suitable for further research.

Purpose -Despite the strong focus on virtues in firms, humility is little recognized in the management literature and, more particularly in the literature about knowledge sharing (KS). Despite efforts to foster KS among employees in firms, the effectiveness of this process narrows down to the dyadic relationship between the knowledge seeker and provider within firm. This paper aims to investigate the role of humility in the KS process in dyadic activity. Design/methodology/approach -The authors undertake an exploratory investigation to fill some of the gaps found in the literature. The paper draws insights from psychology, history, religion, current events and management literature. Findings -The authors identify several individual propensities that help predict humility towards sharing knowledge from seeker (humble knowledge-inquiry) and provider perspectives (humble response). They propose a new conceptual process model of KS with humility as an important variable to consider. This work highlights several promising directions for future research. Originality/value -As per the authors' knowledge, this is the first paper that investigates the role of humility in knowledge sharing from dyadic perspective. The authors also introduce concepts of humble knowledge inquiry and humble response in a dyadic context for effective knowledge sharing process. j J j on the strength of ties, Chiu et al. (2006) and Wasko and Faraj (2000) on trust and reciprocity norms, and Mueller (2015) on culture at the individual level . However, there is very little evidence for the construct of humility and how it could foster KS. Humility is considered an ethical value in individuals (Jennings et al., 2005), an ethical requirement for managers (Argandoña, 2017) and one of the ethical duties of a leader (Caldwell et al., 2017), but appears to be neglected, or at least not highlighted as a primary virtue, in the business world (Argandona, 2015). Therefore, while being widely accepted as a virtue, humility has received little attention from organizations (Frostenson, 2015), especially in the field of KS. This raises the following questions:In a dyadic one-to-one relationship, does humility play a significant role in the KS process between a knowledge seeker and a knowledge provider?What individual and organizational specificities, if any, facilitate humble knowledge seeking and humble knowledge providing?This paper undertakes an exploratory investigation to answer these questions, attempting to theorize the construct of humility as an antecedent of KS, drawing its sources from research fields that are tangential to management. Specifically, in the context of a dyadic KS relationship within a network of relationships, we refer to two concepts related to humility that are emerging in the literature -"humble inquiry" (originally coined by Schein, 2013) and "humble response" (Leach and Ajibade, 2016). We investigate if there is a reciprocal relationship between these two concepts, and the factors that may moderate or mediate the effectiveness of ...