The aim of this article is to show the increased relevance of soft skills in a continuously changing environment. A research was carried out to examine and compare students' and employers' ...perceptions regarding the importance of soft skills in different European countries. Results show that 86% of respondents indicate an increased emphasis on soft skills over the last 5-10 years and that companies consider soft skills more important than students/graduates. Furthermore, major differences have also been identified in the ranking of the 20 soft skills listed in this paper, indicating different levels of priorities. This paper suggests that companies and Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) need to work together not only to increase students' awareness of the importance of soft skills but also to guide them in taking individual responsibility to acquire and develop these essential skills in order to continuously adapt to the changing labour market and improve their employability.
This paper examines winery owners' attitudes and perceptions regarding the use of social media in marketing and promoting wine tourism online. Empirical evidence is provided by a sample of 20 winery ...owners in the North Italian region of Langhe, who have engaged to a greater or lesser extent in social media. The findings show that while the majority of winery owners recognise the social, economic and emotional benefits of social media, they are far from exploiting its full potential, partially due to barriers such as their agricultural mentality and the time-consuming nature of social media.
This paper develops an identity-based rationale to investigate why winery owners resist and/or limit their engagement in agritourism diversification. Using qualitative evidence from a sample of ...Italian winery owners, the paper draws on social identity theory to explain how owners' identities affect tourism diversification. The findings reveal that they actively construct a producer identity and that this identity is simultaneously regulated by various institutional forces (e.g. local winemaking community), which in turn shape their reluctance to pursue tourism diversification. The paper contributes to a better understanding of why agricultural producers resist tourism diversification. Practical implications and future research directions are discussed.
•Winery owners’ identities are examined to reveal their reluctance to pursue agritourism diversification.•Winery owners strongly identify with their occupation/profession and construct a producer identity.•Agritourism diversification is perceived as a threat to winery owners' producer identity.•Social identity theory (SIT) provides a valuable framework for researching tourism diversification.
This paper examines the motivations underlying family wineries' decisions to diversify into agritourism. Empirical evidence is provided by a sample of North Italian family wineries that have recently ...engaged in agritourism. While the majority of studies have adopted an economic-noneconomic dichotomy approach when examining the motivations for agritourism diversification, this paper highlights the limitations of this approach, outlines the complexity of motivations and argues for the need to take the family context into account. Drawing on the socioemotional wealth (SEW) framework, we offer a conceptual model and derive a set of propositions to show how family owners' motivations for agritourism diversification are primarily driven by family-centred goals. This paper thus contributes to a better understanding of diversification in general, and of farming families' motivations for agritourism diversification in particular. Practical implications at the European and regional level are discussed.
In family business, transgenerational entrepreneurship is an essential component for successful succession that tends to decline over generations. Research gaps still exist, however, on the process ...through which it is transmitted to the next generation. Drawing on an identity theoretical rationale, we explore the facilitating conditions that allow entrepreneurial behavior to occur among next-generation family members in family firms. Using a qualitative study of an exemplary family business, the findings suggest that the family intergenerational cohesion fosters four strategic actions that enable the development of entrepreneurial role identities of the next generation–reducing founder centrality, satisfying exploration needs, promoting individuality, and providing experiential learning. These role identities subsequently motivate the next generation to pursue entrepreneurial opportunities.
This paper examines how involvement in wine tourism has affected winery owners' identity processes. Using Breakwell's Identity Process Theory (IPT) as a conceptual framework, we investigate the ...extent to which place is a part of winery owners' self-identities, thereby giving them senses of belonging, distinctiveness, continuity, and self-esteem. Simultaneously, we find that these senses and feelings influence winery owners' perceptions of the benefits and dis-benefits of wine tourism development in their region. We also discover how personal involvement in tourism can strengthen or threaten winery owners' identities and thereby affect their support or otherwise for wine tourism. Empirical evidence is provided via a sample of twenty-eight winery owners in Langhe, Italy, who have recently engaged in various tourism related-activities due to the continuous development of the local tourism industry. Our research recognises that place is an integral part of the identity process.
The aim of this thesis is to examine family wineries’ wine tourism diversification decisions in terms of wine producers’ self-constructions. The focus lies on understanding which motives drive family ...businesses’ decisions to engage in diversification. A case study approach is adopted, using the Italian wine region of Langhe in Piedmont. The dominant debates within the current literature have primarily concentrated on the economic-social dichotomy in relation to diversification decisions. It has been argued that diversification decisions are predominantly economically driven, highlighting the importance of profit maximisation and risk reduction. This thesis highlights the limitations of the economic-social dichotomy approach and argues for the need to take the social context into account when examining the decision-making process. An interpretivist approach to research is adopted in order to extend current understandings of family businesses and their motives underlying diversification decisions. In line with the interpretivist perspective, this thesis uses discourse analysis (DA) as a methodological approach for analysing and interpreting wine producers’ accounts. The findings reveal that by engaging in discourse about wine tourism diversification, wine producers construct a distinctive, coherent and desired sense of self, which in turn influences family wineries’ decisions to diversification. In this instance, the concept of identity formation plays a central role in explaining family wineries’ motives for diversification. Linking wine producers’ motives for diversification to their self-constructions provides a new insight into how family businesses engage in decision-making. Wine producers’ discourses reveal that their decision-making processes are inextricably linked to sustaining a positive sense of self. Decisions are not only taken to achieve economic goals, but are likely to be influenced by deeper motives, notably wine producers’ identity constructions. The main contribution of this thesis is that it advances understanding of family businesses’ decisionmaking processes by developing a multi-layered conceptual framework to go beyond the economic-social dichotomy in order to reveal wine producers’ semi-conscious and unconscious motives for diversification.
The aim of this thesis is to examine family wineries’ wine tourism diversification decisions in terms of wine producers’ self-constructions. The focus lies on understanding which motives drive family ...businesses’ decisions to engage in diversification. A case study approach is adopted, using the Italian wine region of Langhe in Piedmont. The dominant debates within the current literature have primarily concentrated on the economic-social dichotomy in relation to diversification decisions. It has been argued that diversification decisions are predominantly economically driven, highlighting the importance of profit maximisation and risk reduction. This thesis highlights the limitations of the economic-social dichotomy approach and argues for the need to take the social context into account when examining the decision-making process. An interpretivist approach to research is adopted in order to extend current understandings of family businesses and their motives underlying diversification decisions. In line with the interpretivist perspective, this thesis uses discourse analysis (DA) as a methodological approach for analysing and interpreting wine producers’ accounts. The findings reveal that by engaging in discourse about wine tourism diversification, wine producers construct a distinctive, coherent and desired sense of self, which in turn influences family wineries’ decisions to diversification. In this instance, the concept of identity formation plays a central role in explaining family wineries’ motives for diversification. Linking wine producers’ motives for diversification to their self-constructions provides a new insight into how family businesses engage in decision-making. Wine producers’ discourses reveal that their decision-making processes are inextricably linked to sustaining a positive sense of self. Decisions are not only taken to achieve economic goals, but are likely to be influenced by deeper motives, notably wine producers’ identity constructions. The main contribution of this thesis is that it advances understanding of family businesses’ decisionmaking processes by developing a multi-layered conceptual framework to go beyond the economic-social dichotomy in order to reveal wine producers’ semi-conscious and unconscious motives for diversification.
A versatile and efficient functionalization strategy for polymeric nanoparticles (NPs) has been reported and successfully applied to PEGylated, biodegradable poly(alkyl cyanoacrylate) (PACA) ...nanocarriers. The relevance of this platform was demonstrated in both the fields of cancer and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Prepared by copper-catalyzed azide–alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC) and subsequent self-assembly in aqueous solution of amphiphilic copolymers, the resulting functionalized polymeric NPs exhibited requisite characteristics for drug delivery purposes: (i) a biodegradable core made of poly(alkyl cyanoacrylate), (ii) a hydrophilic poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) outer shell leading to colloidal stabilization, (iii) fluorescent properties provided by the covalent linkage of a rhodamine B-based dye to the polymer backbone, and (iv) surface functionalization with biologically active ligands that enabled specific targeting. The construction method is very versatile and was illustrated by the coupling of a small library of ligands (e.g., biotin, curcumin derivatives, and antibody), resulting in high affinity toward (i) murine lung carcinoma (M109) and human breast cancer (MCF7) cell lines, even in a coculture environment with healthy cells and (ii) the β-amyloid peptide 1–42 (Aβ1–42), believed to be the most representative and toxic species in AD, both under its monomeric and fibrillar forms. In the case of AD, the ligand-functionalized NPs exhibited higher affinity toward Aβ1–42 species comparatively to other kinds of colloidal systems and led to significant aggregation inhibition and toxicity rescue of Aβ1–42 at low molar ratios.
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