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Aging brings with it a certain commitment to improving the lives of future generations and to giving back by engaging in productive pursuits that provide psychological well-being (Versey & Newton, 2013). Leaders and adults develop a heightened sense of communion with self and others and derive meaning and satisfaction through serving others (Slater, 2003). We present findings from a focus group comprised of nine college-educated women professionals from three countries, gathered for the purpose of discussing generativity in educational leadership. Purposeful sampling was employed to allow variation and representation of women in educational leadership. Positions held by focus group members ranged from principals, directors, professors to deans. The specific purpose was to obtain an in-depth understanding of experiences of women as they engaged with the concept of generativity in their personal and professional lives. The results suggested that commitments to generativity activities varied by experience, age, and race. Another important finding was the categorization of participant women into distinct identity markers of pathmakers, guardians, searchers and drifters (Josselson, 1996) as reflected by the focus and nature of their generativity activities. Further studies with women from different socioeconomic backgrounds and fields other than educational leadership need to be conducted to establish the universality of our findings. Keywords: women, educational leadership, generativity

Platform-based technology ecosystems are new forms of organizing independent actors’ innovations around a stable product system. This collective organization is proving superior to traditional, vertically integrated systems in many sectors because of greater “generativity”—the ecosystem’s capacity to foster complementary innovation from autonomous, heterogeneous firms—which extends the usage scope and value of the platform to users. However, greater generativity can also lead to greater variance in the way ecosystem members’ contributions satisfy users’ needs, and it could potentially hinder the ecosystems’ value creation. We draw on collective action theory to examine generativity’s impact on user satisfaction and the mechanisms driving it. We argue that products enhancing user satisfaction contribute to a collective, shared asset, the platform system reputation, from which all participants benefit. Thus, generativity has both a positive (system reputation) and negative (free-riding) effect on the ecosystem members’ incentives for developing products that enhance user satisfaction. We argue that the negative free-riding effect prevails as the platform system matures and competition with alternative platform systems increases. Using data from the video game industry, we find supportive evidence for the free-riding effect, which generates an average loss in total revenue for first-rate games of about $36.5 million and a drop of about 3.3% in the console’s market share. By identifying the conditions that exacerbate free riding in platform ecosystems, our study contributes to the understanding of the evolutionary dynamics of platform ecosystems. It also highlights one feedback mechanism governing collective action in ecosystems and its implications for value creation.

Purpose Knowledge exchange between older and younger employees enhances the collective memory of an organization and therefore contributes to its business success. The purpose of this paper is to take a motivational perspective to better understand why older and younger employees share and receive knowledge with and from each other. Specifically, this study focuses on generativity striving – the motivation to teach, train and guide others – as well as development striving – the motivation to grow, increase competence and master something new – and argues that both motives need to be considered to fully understand intergenerational knowledge exchange. Design/methodology/approach This paper takes a dyadic approach to disentangle how older employees’ knowledge sharing is linked to their younger colleagues’ knowledge receiving and vice versa. The study applied an actor-partner interdependence model based on survey data from 145 age-diverse coworker dyads to test the hypotheses. Findings Results showed that older and younger employees’ generativity striving affected their knowledge sharing, which, in turn, predicted their colleagues’ knowledge receiving. Moreover, the study found that younger employees were more likely to receive knowledge that their older colleagues shared with them when they scored higher (vs lower) on development striving. Originality/value By studying the age-specific dyadic cross-over between knowledge sharing and knowledge receiving, this research adds to the knowledge exchange literature. This study challenges the current age-blind view on knowledge exchange motivation and provides novel insights into the interplay of motivational forces involved in knowledge exchange between older and younger employees.

This article has three objectives. The first is to show that while co-production was originally tied to service production, co-creation has broader applications in the field of public governance and involves a broader range of actors and activities. The second objective is to demonstrate how the co-creation concept both builds on and extends the concept of collaborative governance, thus adding new dimensions to an already well-established literature. The final objective is to show how a strategic turn to co-creation introduces a new type of 'generative governance' aimed at solving complex problems by constructing platforms enabling the formation of arenas for co-creation that bring together a plethora of public and private actors, including citizens, in creative problem-solving processes. The three objectives are achieved through prospective theoretical analysis aimed at providing a conceptual foundation for analysing cutting-edge societal developments that are not yet commonplace.

PurposeDigital innovation requires organizations to reconfigure their information technology infrastructure (ITI) to cultivate creativity and implement fast experimentation. This research inquiries into ITI generativity, an emerging concept demoting a critical ITI capability for organizational digital innovation. More specifically, it conceptualizes ITI generativity across two dimensions—namely, systems and applications infrastructure (SAI) generativity and data analytics infrastructure (DAI) generativity—and examines their respective social and technical antecedents and their impact on digital innovation.Design/methodology/approachThis research formulates a theoretical model to investigate the social and technical antecedents along with innovation outcomes of ITI generativity. To test this model and its associated hypotheses, a survey was administered to IT professionals possessing knowledge of their organization's IT architecture and digital innovation performance. The dataset, comprising responses from 140 organizations, was analyzed using the partial least squares technique.FindingsResults reveal that both dimensions of ITI generativity contribute to digital innovation performance, with the effect of DAI generativity being more pronounced. In addition, SAI and DAI generativities are driven by social and technical factors within an organization. More specifically, SAI generativity is positively associated with the usage of a digital application services platform and IT human resources, whereas DAI generativity is positively linked to the usage of a data analytics services platform, data analytics services usability and data analytics human resources.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the literature on digital innovation by introducing ITI generativity as a crucial ITI capability and deciphering its role in digital innovation. It also offers useful insights and guidance for practitioners on how to build ITIs to achieve better digital innovation performance.

(1) Background: Environmental issues are among society’s most pressing concerns as they can significantly impact the environment and human health. The Eco Generativity Scale (EGS), a 28-item four-factor scale has been introduced to promote a constructive outlook on the matter. It encompasses two types of generativity, namely ecological and social generativity, as well as environmental identity and agency/pathways. The aim of the current study was to examine the EGS’s psychometric properties among 375 Italian university students. (2) Methods: To evaluate the scale’s factor structure, both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted. Internal consistency was evaluated via Cronbach’s alphas and McDonald’s omega. Concurrent validity was analyzed with the Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS), Satisfaction with life Scale (SWLS), Meaningful Life Measure (MLM), and Flourishing Scale (FS). (3) Results: The exploratory factor analysis showed the best fit for a four-factor solution. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that a four-factor higher-order model provided the best fit to the data with good internal consistency. Furthermore, each factor and the total score showed a good concurrent validity with the PANAS, SWLS, MLM, and FS. (4) Conclusions: The Eco-Generativity Scale (EGS) showed good psychometric properties for its use in research and intervention as a promising tool to measure eco-generativity.

Purpose Drawing on the generativity framework, this study aims to investigate the relationship between the Dark Triad personalities (Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy) and knowledge hiding. This study also identifies the mediating role of generativity motivation and the moderating role of focus on opportunities. Design/methodology/approach Using a convenience sample, a two-wave time-lagged study collected survey responses from 498 employees from manufacturing industries in China, and the data was analyzed using hierarchal regression and bootstrapping methods. Findings This study found that Machiavellianism and psychopathy are both positively related to generativity motivation. The generativity motivation plays a mediating role in the paths of Machiavellianism and psychopathy on knowledge hiding, and a focus on opportunities positively moderates the direct and indirect effect of Machiavellianism and psychopathy on knowledge hiding. Originality/value Based on the generativity framework, we find a new underlying mechanism between the Dark Triad personalities and knowledge hiding, thereby further enriching the literature in relation to their influence over knowledge management. Moreover, it also finds that a focus on opportunities can weaken the negative relationships between the Dark Triad personalities and knowledge hiding.

This paper examines the contributions that generativity in older age may make to the concept of successful ageing. To this end, two perspectives on successful ageing are described: successful ageing as a set of clinical criteria, and successful ageing as the application of adaptive processes aimed at achieving efficient functioning. After showing the limitations of the first perspective, particularly from a developmental point of view, the paper argues that the adaptive version of successful ageing helps to put ageing into a developmental frame, but needs to be complemented by identifying specific content and goals that guide these adaptive processes and establish new feasible gains for older people. Generativity in older age could play that role and provides a conceptual framework that enriches the concept of successful ageing, both by emphasising the social context in which people age and by highlighting a personal growth component.

Technology platform strategies offer a novel way to orchestrate a rich portfolio of contributions made by the many independent actors who form an ecosystem of heterogeneous complementors around a stable platform core. This form of organising has been successfully used in smartphone, gaming, commercial software, and industrial sectors. Technology ecosystems require stability and homogeneity to leverage common investments in standard components, but they also need variability and heterogeneity to meet evolving market demand. Although the required balance between stability and evolvability in the ecosystem has been addressed conceptually in the literature, we have less understanding of its underlying mechanics or appropriate governance. Through an extensive case study of a business software ecosystem consisting of a major multinational manufacturer of enterprise resource planning software at the core and a heterogeneous system of independent implementation partners and solution developers on the periphery, our research identifies three salient tensions that characterize the ecosystem: standard–variety, control–autonomy, and collective–individual. We then highlight the specific ecosystem governance mechanisms designed to simultaneously manage desirable and undesirable variance across each tension. Paradoxical tensions may manifest as dualities, where tensions are framed as complementary and mutually enabling. Alternatively, they may manifest as dualisms, where actors are faced with contradictory and disabling “either…or” decisions. We identify conditions where latent, complementary tensions become manifest as salient, contradictory tensions. By identifying conditions in which complementary logics are overshadowed by contradictory logics, our study further contributes to the understanding of the dynamics of technology ecosystems, as well as the effective design of technology ecosystem governance that can explicitly embrace paradoxical tensions toward generative outcomes.

Research on later-life generativity has promoted a new view of older persons that, far from the traditional images of disability, dependence and frailty, recognises their capacities, and potential to continue growing, while underlining their participation and contributions to families, communities and society. The goal of this study was to carry out a scoping review on later-life generativity, the first one conducted on this topic as far as we know, to show how studies in this area have evolved, which aspects of generativity in later life have been studied, and the methodological and epistemological approaches that are dominant in this area of inquiry. Our scoping review shows that research into generativity in later life has grown steadily over the past 30 years, and particularly during the last decade. However, our results also show how such growing interest has focused on certain methodological approaches, epistemological frameworks and cultural contexts. We identify four critical gaps and leading-edge research questions that should be at the forefront of future research into generativity in later life, gaps that reflect biases in the existing literature identified in the study. These are classified as methodological, developmental, contextual and ‘dark-side’ gaps.