The study is based on the reactions of a sample of Italian graduate students to the websites of seven companies operating in Italy. It addresses two specific issues in the literature about green recruiting practices, namely (1) the distinct and direct effects of green recruiting practices on attracting applicants, and (2) the interactive effect of ‘green’ and ‘nongreen’ recruitment practices on attracting applicants. With regard to the first issue, the study compares the effects on attracting applicants of two green recruitment practices, that is, the green reputation of a company, and the amount of information provided on the recruitment website about the company's environmental policies and practices. With regard to the second issue, the study examines the substitution effect on attracting applicants between the two green recruitment practices, and additive effects on attracting applicants between them and two nongreen recruitment practices (i.e., company reputation, and the amount of company and job information provided by the company recruitment website). In terms of direct effects, the findings support the impact of a green reputation on attracting applicants, but no impact of information on the recruitment website about company environmental policies and practices. In terms of interactive effects, the findings do not confirm the substitution effects between green recruitment practices, but indicate additive effects between green and nongreen recruitment practices. Overall, the article extends knowledge on green recruitment by contributing to the literature on organizational reputation, and the literature on interactive effects among human resource practices. The implications of these two extensions of knowledge for human resource management research and practice are discussed

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Drawing on the relational perspective of artistic innovation, which suggests that different types of ties (weak vs. strong) lead to different outcomes in terms of the development and implementation of new artistic ideas, this study uses an in-depth case study of Italian choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti to explore the role of the relational work artists deploy to develop and implement their artwork. We investigate how artists engage in specific relational actions (broadening, bonding, embedding and dis-embedding) with producing organizations, and how these actions lead to innovation over time. The findings suggest that artistic innovation moves through four stages – proximal innovation, fuzzy innovation, established innovation and maintained innovation – sustained by an artist’s oscillation between a network characterized by strong ties with few organizations and a network characterized by weak ties with many organizations, depending on the artist’s quests for inclusion and differentiation. In this process, a long-lasting relationship between the artist and a specific organization may ‘pivot’ artistic innovation

PurposeThis study investigates the role of collaborative spaces as organizational support for internal innovation through cross-functional teams and for open innovation with external stakeholders. In particular, the study focuses on collaborative spaces as tools for multiplex (i.e., simultaneous internal and external boundary management in innovation projects).Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a qualitative study in a multi-divisional organization that set up in its headquarters a collaborative space for collaborative product development. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and participant observations.FindingsFindings highlight that the relation between expectations and experiences about the collaborative space impact on employees' ability to perform boundary work inside and outside the organization. In addition to the collaborative space's affording role for expectations about hands-on collaborative innovation (space as laboratory), the study also highlights a set of collaboration constraints. These latter are generated by perceived boundary configurations (i.e. degree of boundary permeability and infrastructure in internal and external collaborations) and by discrepancies between expectations (space as laboratory) and actual collaboration experiences in the space (i.e. space as maze, cloister, showcase and silo). We show that space-generated constraints slow down internal and external boundary work for innovation and generate a trade-off between them.Originality/valueUsing the process-based perspective of boundary work, the paper connects studies on cross-functional teaming and open innovation through the concept of “multiplex boundary work.” It also contributes to the literature on boundary work by showing the challenges of using collaborative spaces as organizational support tools for multiplex boundary spanning.

In digital competitive environments, organizations’ ability to innovate is more than ever the key to competitive advantage. One way to cope with this increased pressure for innovation is to capitalize on employees’ ability to generate new ideas and use these as building blocks for new and better products, services, and work processes. Individual innovation thus emerges as a key competence required from workers, in turn crucially affecting the way managers make employees contribute to organizational goals and assess their performance. This study draws on the process-based approach to HRM ( Bowen and Ostroff, 2004 ) suggesting that HRM practices may have a signaling effect, to address the following research question: which specific characteristics of performance appraisal are more likely to be perceived as promoting individual innovation at work? To address this issue, we carried out a survey on 865 employees working in large, multinational firms operating in digitalized sectors or industries with the potential to become digitalized. We collected data on the main characteristics of the performance appraisal systems adopted by the firm where respondents work, as perceived by employees themselves. We gathered also data on the respondents’ overall perception that performance appraisal boosts innovative work behavior (IWB). Then, we employed logit analysis to test the relationship between data on performance appraisal systems and data on the effectiveness of performance appraisal as a booster of IWB. Our results reveal that, as compared to informal feedback, formal performance appraisal is more likely to reduce the perception that performance appraisal promotes individual innovation and creativity at work. In addition, we found that in the employees’ perception performance appraisal focused on the achievement of pre-set, quantitative outcomes is more likely to affect positively IWB than appraisal focused on pre-defined skills that employees exhibited performing their work. However, performance assessment focused on the new competences developed by the employees has a perceived positive impact even stronger than result-oriented appraisal. Taken together, these results contribute to advance our understanding of how organizations should evaluate employees in the digitalization era.