Based on the premise that self-managing team members need political skills, we examine the relationship between members’ political skills and job performance. We hypothesized that achievement-oriented motivation, degree of self-management, and pro-social motivation would each positively affect the relationship between political skills and job performance. Findings revealed that a degree of self-management positively affects the relationship between political skills and job performance. Also results suggest that team members with low political skills may experience a significant decline in job performance when the degree of self-management is high. This study contributes to the theory of the efficient operation of self-managed teams and suggests, vis-à-vis practice, that selecting team members with political skills is necessary when increasing the degree of team autonomy.

This paper examines why some small family businesses producing local products with limited management resources are able to export their own products, and how they succeed in the difficult task of entering to foreign markets, which is a difficult overseas business; it examines the process and mechanism behind this. Focusing on one rare company that has achieved direct exports, I have taken a long-term look at the dynamic internationalization process to find out why and how it successfully entered the foreign market. As a result, it is argued that the concept of the boundary spanning roles can be a useful perspective in this regard.

The term “statistical significance” is commonly found in the management journal papers. In comparison with a complete survey, a sampling survey can economize on sampling costs while it cannot be free of sampling errors. However, the sampling error of a random sample can be rated on the scale of probability. When a deviation from the hypothesis is beyond the sampling error, the deviation is statistically significant.

This essay examines bad research questions in academic writing in the business administration field. First, we investigate a research question that is not suitable for academic papers but more likely business reports. Second, we brief through three kinds of research questions which are academic but still not good; (1) an ‘unlearned’ research question that prior studies have already answered though the researcher is unaware of due to lack of knowledge; (2) an ‘unanswerable’ research question owing to its nature or lack of researcher’s capability and resources; (3) an ‘unfit’ research question which cannot be answered because the data collected is unsuitable. Further, we discuss how to avoid such bad research questions.

Histories of Japanese companies are usually written by employees of the company and privately published. While some are written by scholars, their names are rarely showed on a page for publication information. On the other hand, histories of American or European companies are ordinarily written by scholars and published by a publisher, though company executives hold the right to read the manuscripts and make comments on them or request modifications by contracts with authors. This paper also shows how a company history is ‘made’ on the case of hundred-year history of Yamaichi Securities.

This study presents research questions based on an integrative literature review of idiosyncratic deals (i-deals). First, we review the definition, characteristics, and positioning of i-deals, as well as existing review studies on the topic. Next, an integrative literature review of the 32 studies was conducted. We analyzed the current state of i-deals research in terms of timing, negotiation processes, measurement, antecedents, and outcomes. The results of this analysis led to seven research questions for the future from four perspectives: i-deals and their antecedents/outcomes, i-deals related to the workplace, i-deals from a management perspective, and i-deals studies in Japan.