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Byline: Ulla Hytti, Katja Maki The incubatees are not homogeneous but they differ in age, size, industry, phase of development and firm strategy. Consequently, the technology incubators should segment the client firms in order to provide the right services for the right firms. In this paper, firstly, we investigate which are the firms that seem to benefit the most from the incubator. Secondly, we investigate if the firms that should benefit from the incubator are actually able to claim these benefits. Our findings suggest that the relatively young firms that have not extended their stay at the incubator for over two years benefit most from the incubator. The incubators should therefore impose strict graduation criterion at this two-year threshold. The innovative, internationally and growth-oriented firms are frequent users of the incubator services, even of the more specialised services. The incubators need to develop actively and improve the quality of these special services by, for example, networking with other incubators.

Previous research has explored the difficulties daughters experience entering family business management, but few studies have focused on their experiences of succession. Previously, a gender-as-a-variable perspective has been widely adopted such that the gendering of succession remains understudied. This article addresses this gap by conducting a gendered analysis of how daughters navigate family businesses and construct identities as family business leaders. Using narrative analysis and case study research, our findings suggest that daughters construct and negotiate their gender and leadership identities in their interactions with others by opposing, expanding and making use of the gendered scripts available to them. They move between concealing their leader identity and producing a masculinised identity as a strong owner. This necessitates tempered disruption and switching between different identities in different contexts. We conclude by discussing the theoretical aspects of a gendered perspective as they relate to identity construction in family businesses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to present a framework for research on gender and innovation. The framework is developed based on a review of the current literature in the area; it is applied to provide a context for the articles in this special issue and to offer suggestions for future research. Design/methodology/approach – The article relies on a literature review of gender and innovation. Additional literature searches on Scopus were conducted to provide an overview of the area. In addition, comparative analogies are sought from research fields of gender and entrepreneurship as well as gender and technology. Findings – The article presents the scope and issues in the current research on gender and innovation. Based on the overview, research in this area is conducted in various disciplines applying a variety of methodological approaches. In order to make sense of the current research, the paper developed a framework consisting of various approaches to, gender and innovation; these include gender as a variable, construction and process and innovation as a result, process and discourse. Research limitations/implications – Based on the review, several recommendations for future research are made. First, future research should question the connection between technology and innovation and purposefully seek innovation activity also in low-tech and service sectors and firms. Innovation scholars and policy makers should not primarily target radical and product innovations but should be equally interested in incremental and process innovations. Second, understanding women's innovation activity needs to be embedded in understanding the normative frames and structural factors at play. A particular theoretical call is linked to the study of power and innovation. Third, it is imperative to develop and apply new methodological approaches and new operationalizations of innovation and innovators. Practical implications – By focusing on gender and innovation, it is possible to discover innovation as a gender biased phenomenon. Policy makers should bear this in mind when developing innovation policies. Social implications – An understanding of innovation literature and innovation policy as gender biased has important social implications. Discovering gendered structures is important to further develop gender equal societies. Further, innovation may be hampered by biases in the understanding of the concept, including gender biases. Originality/value – This introductory article puts forward a framework on gender and innovation that helps to make sense of the current state-of-the-art and to develop new research questions that need to be addressed for further theorising within the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the effect of job satisfaction on the intended retirement age of self-employed and organisationally-employed white-collar professionals. The analysis also examines potential boundary conditions imposed by other domains of life for the applicability of this relationship. Design/methodology/approach – The study employs ordered probit regressions to analyse primary survey data comprising 1,262 Finnish white-collar professionals. Findings – The econometric results suggest that job satisfaction is a significant determinant of the intention to retire later and thus prolong a career. The analysis does not find a difference in the effect of job satisfaction between salary earners and self-employed individuals. However, the analysis finds that other domains of life influence how job satisfaction affects retirement-age intentions, and that these influences differ between self-employed and salaried respondents. Practical implications – The findings imply that developing measures to improve the job satisfaction of (highly educated) older workers is an alternative to the widely debated regulatory approach of prolonging working careers by increasing the statutory retirement age. The principal limitation is the focus on white-collar professionals in a single country. Originality/value – This is the first empirical comparison of the effect of job satisfaction on the intended retirement age between salary earners and self-employed individuals. It is also the first examination of the effect of job satisfaction on retirement intentions or behaviour that accounts for the effects of other domains of life satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The paper aims to describe the manner in which entrepreneurship policies are embedded in the national contexts and then through analysis offers a deeper understanding of the development of Finnish and Irish entrepreneurship policies. It seeks to focus on three questions: What is the context for entrepreneurship policies in the studied countries?; What kind of governance structure for entrepreneurship policy can be identified and derived from theoretical perspectives?; and What policy instruments and content are associated with governance rationale? Design/methodology/approach – The empirical data involve primary data on national entrepreneurship policy documents illustrating the governance structure for policy development and implementation, as well as policy objectives and targets. Additionally, concrete policy measures were studied within six sub-areas of entrepreneurship. The analysis is based on a framework with two layers of policy: governance structure, and specific policy measures. Findings – The results show that the countries studied are implementing strikingly similar approaches in entrepreneurship policy-making: state-institutional coordination marked by a strong role for the government, complemented by a more recent shift towards a competitive approach. Because political, national and economic context plays a significant role in understanding entrepreneurship policy approaches it is justified to add a third layer, context, to the framework. Practical implications – Particular measures or good practices cannot be imported from other countries without understanding the theoretical rationale and policy context for the measures. Originality/value – The study highlights the role of time and path-dependency in policy-making; therefore, future research and evaluations on entrepreneurship policies need to be strongly contextualised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]