Abstract
This paper investigates to what extent bilateral relationships between business partners can positively impact multiple business alliances, such as clusters based on community of practice (CoP). Given empirical facts developed in the clustering process of Romanian companies, this paper investigates the way clusters may contribute to the alleviation of the dark side phenomenon and what ingredients, such as trust building, cluster management dedication, social interaction, pre-existing bilateral business relations, and others, may contribute to this role. Based on questionnaires and interviews, we found the significant importance of these ingredients as cohesion determinants in cluster development. The most influent factors of CF were an immediate and short-term business interest (0.62), pre-existing personal relationships (without business interest) with one or more members of the cluster (0.57), pre-existing business relationships with one or more members of the cluster (0.58), and participation in joint funding (0.48). We collected the information using the questionnaire administered online as a measuring instrument whose role was to collect and systematize data. The collected data were processed, and we obtained tables of frequency and correlation, graphs associated with them, and a regression model designed in SmartPLS software (SmartPLS GmbH, Oststeinbek, Germany). The variables that form the main constructs were introduced in SmartPls Software, where we designed a model and evaluated the Composite Reliability, Cronbach’s alpha, AVE, R-square, and Bootstrapping of the model.
Highlights
Faculty of Economic Sciences, Petroleum-Gas University of Ploies, ti, 100680 Ploies, ti, Romania; Faculty of Economy and International Affairs, Academy of Economic Studies, 010374 Bucharest, Romania; Department Motor Performance, Faculty of Physical Education and Mountain Sports, Transylvania University of Brasov, 500036 Brasov, Romania
The variables were grouped in three categories: Cohesion forces (CF), Firm development (FD), and Cluster development (CD), as our aim was to study if and how cohesion forces will have a positive influence on firm development and cluster development
Combining statistical analysis with empirical observations regarding the dynamics of the group of clusters in this survey, we noticed that communication abilities, especially at the cluster managerial level, informal meetings between members, and processes of communities of practice already mentioned in the literature, largely contributed to the alleviation of the dark side, confirming our hypotheses
Summary
Communities of practice and clusters are concepts with little research constructs related to the dark side phenomenon and dark side alleviation through better interpersonal relations, trust, mediation, and transfer of knowledge. Both communities of practice and clusters have in common a structured and long-term social and business interconnection based on meaning and relationship, and they are economic realities that may be considered models of cooperation in a competitive environment. Communities of practice (CoP) are, as per the scholar who coined the term, groups of individuals who share certain practices, who jointly negotiate the meaning of activities, and describe values Through this perspective, structured activities, irrespective of their purpose, can be seen as negotiations of meaning as jointed enterprises [1]. The value of cooperation is increasingly envisaged by technological progress, where CoPs developed models of open-source solutions
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