Narrow Results

The study of modes of open innovation in smaller companies is still in the development phase. This study responds to this situation and, drawing upon a data set from 4,679 Turkish small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), explores the influence of inbound open innovation and coupled open innovation on marketing innovation as well as process and organisational innovation in SMEs. Results reveal major differences between small and medium-sized Turkish enterprises with regard to both marketing innovation as well as process and organisational innovation. While inbound open innovation positively influences both, marketing as well as process and organisational innovation, the effects for small-sized enterprises are even higher than for medium-sized ones. Coupled open innovation positively influences both innovation outcomes as well, although the effects for medium-sized enterprises are significantly higher than for smaller ones.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of factors of environmental uncertainty on the innovativeness of small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Innovativeness is widely accepted as an important characteristic for firm competitiveness and it has been studied by both researchers as well as business managers. Environmental uncertainty is a measure of the complexity of changing external forces faced by an organisation and it crucially impacts the responses of organisations in order to stay competitive. Based on approaches in existing literature, this study conceptualises environmental uncertainty comprised three separate dimensions — competitive intensity, market/demand turbulence, technological turbulence. Data for the study were collected from 156 SMEs in Turkey. SMEs are regarded as an important ingredient in the economic growth of nations and especially so in developing nations such as Turkey. The findings of the study reveal that market/demand turbulence and technological turbulence have a positive effect on the innovativeness of SMEs. Interestingly and contrary to popular belief, competitive intensity was not found to have significant effect on an SME's innovativeness. The implication of the results from this research is that the degree of organisational innovativeness for SMEs tends to increase and therefore should be supported in environments with greater technological and market/demand turbulence. This research makes an important contribution to the developing body of innovation literature and provides directions for managers and researchers in influencing innovativeness of firms.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) has become a tool which cannot be ignored in terms of public administrations, which provides advantage to the administrations as far as they can be adapted. The use of ICTs become widespread in the health sector as it is in all other sectors. In hospitals, hospital information systems (HIS) are used to keep records of patients and hospitals securely, to improve appointment, in-hospital management, decision support and workflow processes. Therefore, HISs are also used to increase efficiency and productivity, to reduce error rates, to increase service quality, to reduce service costs and to realize the specific purposes such as ensuring patient satisfaction. It is necessary that the end users should adopt HISs to obtain the expected benefits and to implement HIS successfully in public hospitals. The adoption of a technology product is also a sociological phenomenon at the same time. In this regard, the issue of adoption in the relevant literature is addressed in the context of a wide variety of models and many variables. This study is also a study of technology adoption. The subject of the study is the adoption of HISs in public hospitals in Turkey. In this context. The study aimed to determine the factors affecting the adoption of HISs by the personnel working in public hospitals in Turkey, in accordance with the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model in the literature on technology adoption. In the study, the universe of the study consisted of the personnels (physicians, nurses, health officers, medical secretaries] which were working in public hospitals in the Bursa and Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipalities at the time of the study. According to the results of the study, performance expectancy, effort expectancy and social influence variables have positive and significant effects on the behavioral intention of hospital staff for using of HISs. In addition, facilitating conditions and behavioral intention variables have a positive and significant effect on usage behavior. On the other hand, it was found that gender has a moderator effect on the relationship between performance expectancy, effort expectancy and behavioral intention. Experience has a moderator effect on the relationship between the social influence and the behavioral intention while age has a moderator effect on the relationship between facilitating conditions and use behavior.

The objective of this paper is to explore through in-depth interviews the reasons why diversity management initiatives targeting women is an important strategic management issue for companies. Interviewed are the human resource managers of two of Turkey’s leading business groups: a manager from the HR department of one of Turkey’s largest banks and the deputy general manager of a non-governmental organization. The evidence suggests that these firms exercise carefully honed policies aimed at fostering gender equality and to that end engage in a variety of activities targeting various human resource functions. Their motives appear to be to reinforce their corporate image, enhance employee satisfaction, and reap such anticipated rewards as greater productivity and increased innovation capability. The importance of company leadership is underlined as an antecedent to the adoption of gender-equality focussed diversity management. The study may have important implications for building sustainable corporate brands, especially in the emerging-market context.

This paper presents a comparative study of private returns to schooling of urban men in Egypt, Iran, and Turkey using similar survey data and a uniform methodology. We employ three surveys for each country that span nearly two decades, from the 1980s to 2006, and, to increase the comparability of the estimates across surveys, we focus on urban men 20–54 years old and in full time wage and salary employment. Our aim is to learn how the monetary signals of rewards that guide individual decisions to invest in education are shaped by the institutions of education and labor markets in these countries. Our estimates generally support the stylized facts of the institutions of education and labor markets in Middle Eastern countries. Their labor markets have been described as dominated by the public sector and therefore relatively inflexible, and their education systems as more focused on secondary and tertiary degrees than teaching practical and productive skills. Returns in all countries are increasing in years of schooling, which is contrary to the Mincer assumption of linear returns but consistent with overemphasis on secondary and tertiary degrees. Low returns to vocational training relative to general upper secondary, which have been observed in many developing countries, are observed in Egypt and Iran, but not Turkey. This pattern of returns across countries seems to correspond to how students are selected into vocational and general upper secondary tracks, which is an important part of the education institutions of these countries, and the fact that Turkey's economy is more open than the other two. Greater competitiveness in all three countries over time seems to have increased returns to university education and in few cases to vocational education, but not to general high school.

During the last two decades, Turkey implemented a number of structural adjustment programmes, and changed the economic structural priorities from agriculture to manufacturing sectors. However, agricultural sector has still remained as the most important sector in terms of employing almost 29.5% of total employment in the economy. Despite this situation share of agricultural production in total value added has drastically declined. This research aims to enlighten changing role of agricultural sector in Turkish economy. In doing so, we employ input–output model, in which sectoral inter-linkages can be defined. Our research uses input–output tables from 1968 to 2002 and analyzes the importance of agricultural sector basing upon the forward and backward linkages calculated under different hypothetical cases. Therefore, we can examine the changes in total production in the economy. Through such a sensitivity analyses, we are able to investigate the extent of which other sectors rely on the production of the agricultural sector.

This study aims to explore the use of Twitter by Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) in 2021, which is determined as the year of disaster education. Within the scope of this study, the tweets of the AFAD Presidency in the media section between January 1, 2021, and December 31, 2021, were examined. The tweets were categorized considering hazard types (geological, hydrological and climatological, biological, technological accidents and Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear (CBRN), forest fires, migration, and other) and phases of the disaster management cycle (pre-disaster (mitigation, and preparedness), response, and post-disaster recovery). Five hundred and eighty tweets related to disasters were identified including the number of 88 disaster irrelevant tweets. Most of the tweets were related to hydrological and meteorological hazards. Regarding the biological disaster-induced COVID-19, only two tweets specific to the response process were identified. This study provides an overview of the characteristics and the potential role of social media in risk communication. These institutions can provide the risk information and work closely with the media to reach and share with the community.

Objective: This study aims to investigate earthquake-related and COVID-19 pandemic-related information sources of young people and whether there is a difference in the preferences of information sources regarding COVID-19 pandemic and earthquake measures in Istanbul, Turkey. Methods: This study was descriptive. The study was conducted among university students in Istanbul. A total of 282 students participated in the study. McNemar’s test was used to compare the differences between information sources of earthquake and COVID-19 measures. Results: Although there was no significant difference between taking earthquake and COVID-19 measures in the study, there were statistically significant differences between the information sources related to earthquake and COVID-19 except non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and newspapers. While Internet, activities at school/neighborhood/workplace, and TV were the top three sources of information about earthquake measures, TV, Internet, and social media were the top three sources of information about COVID-19 measures. The reasons of preferences of information sources were similar. Conclusion: There was a statistically significant difference between the information sources related to earthquake and COVID-19 except NGOs and newspapers. The study revealed that the types of information sources change depending on earthquake and COVID-19. Resource preferences should be analyzed well, and risk communication should be carried out effectively. Providing easy, understandable information is important for both hazards.

In this study, we aim to analyse the performance of inflation targeting program named “A Transition Program into a Powerful Economy” in particular since 2002 until the end of 2009 by using Taylor rule in a different way. We divide inflation targeting period in accordance with the governors of the CBRT, Sureyya Serdengecti and Durmus Yilmaz, as a most important element that affects inflation targeting program among other factors.

Results imply that Mr. Serdengecti did not follow a pure Taylor rule while Mr. Yilmaz does. In Serdengecti period, the CBRT does not take in account output gap movements and exchange rate while deciding short term interest rate as said in Taylor rule. But the CBRT takes into account outgap movements and exchange rate movements in Yilmaz period, and these variables have important portion in discussing of short term interest rate while it is not so necessary in Serdengecti period.

This study proposes a three-stage holistic methodology combining an interval type-2 fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (IT2F-AHP) and data envelopment analysis (DEA) to deal with the performance evaluation problems encountered in fuzzy decision environments. In the first stage, prospective inputs and outputs are determined by field studies. The second stage employs IT2F-AHP to identify the most appropriate performance indicators based on vague expert judgements. Finally, DEA is applied to the decision-making units (DMUs) based on the selected set of input and output measures. The proposed methodology proves its merit on a case study addressing the performance of real estate investment trusts (REITs) in Turkey during their 10-year journey of trading on Borsa Istanbul (BIST). The results demonstrate that the average scores for technical, pure technical and scale efficiencies are 66%, 80% and 80%, respectively. Considering the technical efficiency scores, Turkish REITs could have reduced their input factors by an average of 34%. The findings also reveal that the majority of Turkish REITs suffer from economies of scale and could have improved their performance by expansion.

This study investigates which technology management (TM) tools are used in practice, what determines their usage, and whether they affect the user firms' performance. Based on a survey of 52 electronics and machinery firms in Turkey, the study shows there are significant relationships between the number of TM tools and techniques that a firm uses and (i) the hierarchical level of the chief technology officer (CTO) or most senior manager responsible for technology, (ii) his/her field of education, and (iii) the size of the firm. The findings indicate a significant and linear relationship between the extent to which the firms have reached their growth targets and the number of TM tools and techniques used. This relationship is, however, not observed between firm profitability and the number of TM tools and techniques. The findings have important implications for the practice of TM.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of factors of environmental uncertainty on the innovativeness of small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Innovativeness is widely accepted as an important characteristic for firm competitiveness and it has been studied by both researchers as well as business managers. Environmental uncertainty is a measure of the complexity of changing external forces faced by an organisation and it crucially impacts the responses of organisations in order to stay competitive. Based on approaches in existing literature, this study conceptualises environmental uncertainty comprised three separate dimensions — competitive intensity, market/demand turbulence, technological turbulence. Data for the study were collected from 156 SMEs in Turkey. SMEs are regarded as an important ingredient in the economic growth of nations and especially so in developing nations such as Turkey. The findings of the study reveal that market/demand turbulence and technological turbulence have a positive effect on the innovativeness of SMEs. Interestingly and contrary to popular belief, competitive intensity was not found to have significant effect on an SME's innovativeness. The implication of the results from this research is that the degree of organisational innovativeness for SMEs tends to increase and therefore should be supported in environments with greater technological and market/demand turbulence. This research makes an important contribution to the developing body of innovation literature and provides directions for managers and researchers in influencing innovativeness of firms.

Drawing from the literature about international entrepreneurship and emerging multinationals, this chapter undertakes a comparative analysis of three cases of Turkish infant multinationals to understand how entrepreneurial internationalisation works in emerging market contexts. The accelerated internationalisation process of these multinationals is analysed under the light of their historical progress. The findings of the study suggest that the increased presence of emerging multinationals in global foreign direct investment is primarily based on the success of these firms’ founding entrepreneur’s vision and ability to manage the underdeveloped institutional context. Another finding highlights the changing entrepreneurial process and behaviour of these firms as new generations started to control these firms. Finally, the impact of the entrepreneurial background on corporate entrepreneurship has been identified as the determinant factor of internationalisation for these cases. The differences and similarities between emerging multinationals and “born global” firms are also mentioned to link the international business and international entrepreneurship sides of the literature.

Several empirical studies have examined the gender-differentiated effects of education on economic growth or on a steady-state level of economic output, using cross-country data to determine the quantitative importance of these effects and the direction of correlation. This chapter reports on a similar study of the gender effects of education using province-level data for Turkey. It finds that female education positively and significantly affects the steady-state level of labor productivity, while male education has either positive or insignificant effects. A separate examination of the effect of the educational gender gap finds a negative relationship with output. The results are robust to a number of sensitivity analyses, such as elimination of outlier observations, controls for simultaneity and measurement errors, controls for omitted variables through the inclusion of regional dummy variables, the use of steady-state versus growth equations, and the consideration of different samples.

The male-dominated social structure in Turkey constitutes a serious barrier to women's entrepreneurship. Gender discrimination experienced by women in the private as well as the public sphere significantly limits their visible participation in the economic life outside their homes. A sample survey of nearly 5,000 Turkish micro and small enterprises (MSEs), 6 percent of them led by women, shows that women's businesses tend to be very small. Nearly half are in trade and one-third are in industry. Many of the one-person women's enterprises are in home-based manufacturing. Women entrepreneurs tend to be younger and have more education than men entrepreneurs, and about half of the women entrepreneurs were employed as wage earners before starting their own businesses. Virtually none of them made use of credit for starting their businesses and very few had access to business support services of any kind. Recommendations are made for improving the environment for women's MSEs, including establishing a Women's Entrepreneurship Center.

Measuring markups in restaurant services is a difficult task. Although the sales price is observed, cost of the product served is unobserved. In this study, we employ an intuitive framework and focus specifically on markups on soft drinks. We analyze the determinants of markup on soft drinks in restaurants over 2006–2014. Results suggest that current demand conditions (net minimum wage, output gap), major cost items (food and energy prices, exchange rate) and economic uncertainty (exchange rate volatility) significantly affect markups. This strategy enables the detection of relevant factors which may not be possible to detect in other settings.

Make-or-buy decision is an important factor affecting the profitability of the firms in all sectors. The goal of this study is to propose a model for firms in engineering design services sector for make-or-buy decisions. A survey was conducted to determine the importance percentages given in an engineering company in make-or-buy decisions and a model was developed. The results of the case study show intriguing clusters of company personnel.

As the lack of consensus among company managers and personnel may inhibit the successful implementation of the developed strategy, we use K-Means Clustering to determine the different perspectives of different groups of employees (managers, senior engineers, junior engineers, technical and administrative support personnel) which may contribute to the understanding of social dynamics of decision making within the company. 4-cluster and 5-cluster analysis results indicate the need for further study on the dynamics of cluster membership.

In this paper, we introduce a SEIR-type COVID-19 model where the infected class is further divided into subclasses with individuals in intensive care (ICUs) and ventilation units. The model is calibrated with the symptomatic COVID-19 cases, deaths, and the number of patients in ICUs and ventilation units as reported by Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Health for the period 11 March 2020 through 30 May 2020 when the nationwide lockdown is in order. COVID-19 interventions in Turkey are incorporated into the model to detect the future trend of the outbreak accurately. We tested the effect of underreporting and we found that the peaks of the disease differ significantly depending on the rate of underreporting, however, the timing of the peaks remains constant. The lockdown is lifted on 1 June, and the model is modified to include a time-dependent transmission rate which is linked to the effective reproduction number ${{ℛ}}_t$ through basic reproduction number ${{ℛ}}_0$. The modified model captures the changing dynamics and peaks of the outbreak successfully. With the onset of vaccination on 13 January 2021, we augment the model with the vaccination class to investigate the impact of vaccination rate and efficacy. We observe that vaccination rate is a more critical parameter than the vaccine efficacy to eliminate the disease successfully.

Despite its recent growth performance, the Turkish economy has been experiencing current account imbalances, and has so far been able to continue these imbalances without jeopardizing economic growth. However, recent uncertainties in the world economy have urged policy makers to control these imbalances and to take actions accordingly in the short-run. The literature postulates that expenditure reduction and expenditure switching policies are two conventional measures to implement in an economy suffering from current account deficits. In this regard, the aim of the paper is to examine the role of expenditure components in import demand, which is among one of the most crucial elements of current account items. The empirical results indicate that demand for imports has a very sluggish adjustment process in response to any policy shocks, and consumption and export expenditure together with the relative prices are the important factors that seem to influence this adjustment process. The high dependence of domestic production on foreign intermediate goods and the reluctance of the Turkish entrepreneurs for import substitution (mainly due to an unfavorable business climate) could be regarded as the reason for this sluggish adjustment process of import demand. This research accordingly shows that these conventional measures (such as those that are included by expenditure reduction and expenditure switching policies) might be necessary but not sufficient, and it would require more structural and long-run policy actions to deal with recent current account difficulties in the Turkish case. The empirical findings also indicate that the import requirement of exports is very high. This, together with high import dependency of domestic production, calls for structural and long-run policy actions that would help to increase the value added to Turkish exports.

The primary objective of this study is to investigate the determinants of foreign direct investment, with a specific focus on per capita GDP (GDP), alongside various risk factors including economic risk (ER), financial risk (FR), political risk (PR), and geopolitical risk (GPR), in the context of Turkey. This investigation employs an innovative wavelet methodology to analyze the relationships among these variables. The empirical analysis entails the application of wavelet coherence, as well as multiple wavelet coherence (MWC) and partial wavelet coherence (PWC) techniques, to evaluate the strength and significance of relationships between different time series while considering the influence of other related time series. Utilizing quarterly data spanning from 1988Q1 to 2020Q4, this study seeks to fill a gap in the existing literature by examining the nexus between these factors in both time and frequency domains, a novel approach in this field. The findings from the wavelet coherence analysis reveal that GDP, PR, FR, and ER positively impact FDI inflows, whereas GPR exerts a negative influence across various time and frequency intervals. Moreover, the outcomes of MWC and PWC analyses underscore the significant effects of the control variables on the relationships under investigation. Based on these findings, the study puts forth noteworthy policy implications aimed at fostering a more conducive environment for FDI in Turkey.