Pathologies and Paradoxes of Co-Creation: A Contribution to the Discussion about Corporate Social Responsibility in Building a Competitive Advantage in the Age of Industry 4.0

Energy Oriented Concepts and Other SMART WORLD Trends as Game Changers of Co-Production—Reality or Future?

The aim of the study is to identify, map and assess the maturity and impact level of the specific energy-oriented economy and other SMART management concepts and social, technological, finance (economical), environmental, and communication (S.T.F.E.C.) trends which arose from the dynamic development and spread of the Industry 4.0 revolution on processes of effective competitiveness and the creation of modern enterprises. The article presents data and information obtained thanks to an in-depth review of the literature (extensive desk research), as well as that obtained as part of the conducted CAWI pilot study. The authors aim to search for answers to three specific research questions, concluding that recently, special attention is paid to such issues as co-creation and co-production, energy-oriented and circular economy, eco-energy, and sustainability. The findings of this study clearly show that in the SMART WORLD era, there is a growing interest in cooperation, co-creation, co-production issues, and usage of modern technologies and SMART management concepts typical of the Industry 4.0 era. The main reason for this is that enterprises strive to optimize and maximize their efficiency in the processes of competitiveness creation. Researched data allows us to conclude that openness to social, environmental, and technological trends and issues, with an approach based on sustainable and eco-energy-oriented development, play an increasingly important role. However, the level of their importance, implementation level, and maturity differ depending on the type of organization or industry. For example, service and trade companies more often than production companies use and rate the usefulness of social trends higher (reality = mainstream orientation for S&T companies and a future orientation for production companies), while production companies apply a more balanced approach, showing greater commitment to economic technological, environmental and financial trends (reality = mainstream orientation for production companies and a future orientation for trade and services companies). Given that the study shows and describes preliminary research results (pilot studies), the authors plan to undertake further efforts in the in-depth scientific exploration of the issues concerned, including, which is particularly important, conducting full-scale research.

Dynamic Corporate Governance, Innovation, and Sustainability: Post-COVID Period

Recent complex changes of the organizational environment urge the boards of directors of energy corporations to step up quickly in crises (e.g., COVID-19) and foster innovation, to seize new strategic opportunities (e.g., environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investments). The purpose of the study is to provide in-depth analyses of ESG projects during the COVID-19 pandemic, through the lens of an emerging theoretical approach, dynamic corporate governance (CG). The research is built on the multi-case study method at large energy companies and energy startups. The research goal was to empirically analyze theoretical opportunities of dynamic board behavior in this research context. The major findings show that ESG projects faced serious challenges in the fast-changing organizational environment generated by COVID-19, which induced board intervention regarding innovation, networks, and organizational changes. This study is among the first to offer a novel theoretical viewpoint, by integrating CG and strategic management theories, besides the already dominant financial and reporting aspects. From a practical perspective, our conclusions might direct the attention of boards of directors toward innovation, networks, and organizational changes, in order to enable adaptation in turbulent times and increase sustainability in the social and environmental dimensions.

Twitter as a Tool for Citizen Education and Sustainable Cities after COVID-19

The social confinement resulting from the COVID-19 crisis temporarily reduced greenhouse gas emissions. Although experts contend that the decrease in pollution rates was not drastic, some surveys detect growth in social concern about the climate. In this new climate-conscious environment, municipalities and local governments are promoting a new way of living and caring for cities, even before they can regain national and international freedom of movement. This work analyzes the connections between new climate awareness arising from the COVID-19 crisis, proposals of sustainable citizenship around the world, and its communication on Twitter to educate the new eco-conscious audience. The methodology mixes quantitative and qualitative analysis, using the Twitonomy Premium tool and the Twitter research tool with data extracted at the end of December 2020. Among the top ten most influential and active accounts, the results show educational institutions, local institutions, companies, neighborhoods, associations, and influencers. The impossibility of living in the city has not prevented citizen education and commitment to make real change for when that city and its citizens return to normality. However, this new normality must be different: more ecological, more responsible, more sustainable, and practiced from early childhood.

Critical Success Factors of the Project Management in Relation to Industry 4.0 for Sustainability of Projects

Sustainability has recently become a phenomenon; small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are increasingly emphasizing the principles of sustainability in their corporate governance. They implement these changes through project management. The purpose of the paper is to determine the critical success factors in project management, as seen by the managers of Czech manufacturing enterprises, related to the most to the successful completion of the projects. We aim to analyze the relation of these success factors to Industry 4.0, Human Resources, and sustainability. We determined the possible interconnectedness of the critical success factors using correlation coefficients. Then, we compared them using the Mann-Whitney test with new corporate management trends. The results show that companies consider Leadership and Experiences, and Employees and Flexibility to be key factors in project management’s success. The most important critical factor for the sustainability of projects focused on Industry 4.0 is the finances that decide the implementation of projects. The benefits of Industry 4.0 concerning sustainability have been identified in projects aimed at implementing new energy sources. In addition to the results obtained, the development of a methodology for evaluating Industry 4.0 projects’ success concerning sustainability may be based on critical success factors in the future.

CSR, Co-Creation and Green Consumer Loyalty: Are Green Banking Initiatives Important? A Moderated Mediation Approach from an Emerging Economy

The homogenization of the banking segment has made it difficult for banking institutions to practice the quality of services that are needed in order to retain consumers. Thus, these days, finding ways to increase consumer loyalty—especially green loyalty—has become a challenge for the banking industry around the planet. Research has long acknowledged that corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a strategic concern that could help organizations to increase consumer loyalty. However, the impact of CSR practices on green consumer loyalty is rarely addressed in the extant literature. Hence, the present research investigated the impact of CSR on green consumer loyalty with the mediating effect of co-creation in the banking industry of Pakistan. The study also introduced green banking initiatives as a moderator between the mediated relation of CSR and green consumer loyalty, with the intention that such a moderator would strengthen this indirect relationship. The structural equation modeling technique was used for the data analysis. The results confirm that CSR enhances consumer loyalty, and that co-creation partially mediates this relationship. Furthermore, green banking initiatives further strengthen this relation. The results of the current survey could help banking institutions learn how they can develop core strategic considerations based on the integration of CSR co-creation and green banking initiatives.

Impact of Resources on the Development of Local Entrepreneurship in Industry 4.0

The development of Industry 4.0 has a significant impact not only on production processes but also on the functioning and future of regions. It is crucial to understand the phenomena taking place in the social and economic space both from the cognitive and practical point of view. The article is based on research which investigates the prospect of communes in the context of Industry 4.0 development. The aim of the article is to show possible consequences of the development of Industry 4.0 from the local perspective. The basic assumption is a positive impact of entrepreneurship on ensuring sustainable regional development. The model adopted is built on a resource-based view and includes both invariable, external and independent resources such as location, as well as those which are variable in the longer term, such as human and social capital. To verify most of the hypotheses, a linear regression model has been created. The results of the research show that there is a strong correlation between human capital, social capital, proximity of an agglomeration and tourist attractiveness of a region, and regional development operationalised by the number of enterprises. The article presents possible directions of changes in the profiles of local units, as well as the conditions which have to be met in order to enable such a transformation.

Use of the Value Chain in the Process of Generating a Sustainable Business Strategy on the Example of Manufacturing and Industrial Enterprises in the Czech Republic

This paper presents a method of generating a business strategy using value chain analysis. There were 186 manufacturing and industrial enterprises from the Czech Republic. The analysis was carried out using mathematical–statistical methods (dimensional reduction, logit regression and its transformation in order to objectify the opinion level of the managers) and with a neural network in terms of validation of the results of the mathematical–statistical methods. The aim was to determine the significance of different parts of the value chain in terms of their impact on the profitability of an enterprise and to demonstrate its important role in the process of generating business strategy. The significance for the profitability of the enterprises was statistically proven in the area of scientific and technological development, input logistics and human resource management. These parts were identified by the authors as the golden triangle of manufacturing and industry. Purchasing and output logistics were identified as the parts with a negative impact to the profitability of the enterprises. Strong underestimation of scientific and technological development by the top managers of the manufacturing and industrial enterprises is seen as a very negative finding. Neural networks showed higher statistical sensitivity compared to the mathematical–statistical methods (dimensional reduction and logit regression). They defined the value sector chain with the following structure (ranked from the highest degree of positive impact on the profitability of the enterprise): human resource management, scientific and technological development, production, input logistics, purchasing, material management, output logistics, enterprise infrastructure, marketing and sales, service and other supporting services. In conclusion, it is stated that the sector value chain of manufacturing and industrial enterprises will be further decomposed into value chain models of specific industries of the production and industry, such as engineering and construction, intended for direct use in different business entities to generate their unique value chains and corporate strategies.

CODAS HFLTS Method to Appraise Organizational Culture of Innovation and Complex Technological Changes Environments

Sustainable development implies establishing principles, objectives and strategies within organizations that impact the organizational culture in innovation. However, a method needs to be defined in order to know the critical factors that allow the strengthening of the organizational culture in innovation with emphasis on Industry 4.0 and sustainable development in a highly changing environment for a specific organization. In this sense, the paper identifies the set of factors that are documented through reviews and analysis of the literature, subsequently proposes a Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) methodology using hesitant fuzzy linguistic term sets (HFLTS) and combinative distance-based assessment (CODAS), where factors are evaluated to obtain a score and hierarchy value. Weight values were calculated using the ambiguity reduction method, which incorporates the knowledge acquired by researchers in organizational culture of innovation and expert judgment under the Saaty scale used in analytic hierarchy process (AHP). Finally, a model of organizational culture in innovation is proposed that can be used by organizations to focus strategies on the factors of greater hierarchy and thereby optimize their resources considering the sustainable development and the Industry 4.0 approach.