Purpose: The purpose of this article is to identify what are the cause-effect patterns of how company actions influence value drivers in Polish frms.

Method: The method used in the study consists of (1) the generation of informant reports (stories) about what actions performed in their frms influenced the value drivers and (2) the identifcation of the repeating (replicating) patterns of such influence.

Results: The study identifes fve actions that reduce the unproductive time of participants of business processes and three actions influencing new product introductions or modifcations.

Managerial implications: Managers should (1) use standardization and automation, delegation of secondary activities, and trainings in teamwork to reduce unproductive time, more quickly fulfll contracts (with current products), and influence four fnancial value drivers. Moreover, they should (2) gather knowledge about the alternative ways of thinking about particular problems and (3) use personal participation of knowledge possessor’s teams in clients’ problem-solving places.

Limitations and future research: The author identifes fve limitations of the performed study and formulates relevant suggestions for future research.

Originality/value: The study contributes to management theory by (1) clarifying conceptual relations between the actions of frms (causes) and value drivers (effects) and (2) analyzing the manager reports about the real business value-creation processes.

Purpose: The article presents the results of a study conducted for the January effect. This anomaly is best recognized in the capital markets. In this case, we fnd explanation of its appearance based on both fundamental analysis and heuristics used by investors. The research focuses on the markets of the European Union enlargement countries of 2004. There are three hypotheses stated in the article: Hypothesis 1: The January Effect occurs in the analyzed markets. Hypothesis 2: The January Effect weakens over time. Hypothesis 3: The January Effect weakens with the development of a market.

Methodology: Three methods verifed the hypotheses: tests of differences, average and median rate of return, and dynamic models paneled with the estimation of parameters and the generalized method of moments.

Findings: The January Effect exists in the analyzed markets. The anomaly weakens over time but, after accession to the European Union, January return rates increase signifcantly.

Limitation: The defnite verifcation was diffcult due to the available methods and data. Further research in this feld is, therefore, needed.

Originality: The originality of the paper stems from the construction of the sample – new evidence from post-communist countries – which became the European Union members in 2004. The next important issue is the period of twenty years after the economic transformation – ten before and ten after the enlargement of the EU.

Purpose: Crowdfunding is a global phenomenon of rising signifcance and impact on different areas of business and social life, investigated across many academic disciplines. The goal of the article is to present the variety of methods applied in crowdfunding research, assess their strengths and weaknesses, offer the typology of methodological approaches, and suggest the most promising direction for further studies. Research limitations/implications: The overview renders crowdfunding studies more accessible for potential newcomers to the feld and strengthens transdisciplinary discussion on crowdfunding. Despite the broad variety of the analyzed articles that reflect the newest trends, the sample is not representative in the statistical meanings of the term.

Design/methodology: The paper is based on the review of the most recent academic and industry literature on crowdfunding and own analysis of data presented by crowdfunding platforms’ operators.

Findings: The article incorporates interrelations of methods, goals of inquiries, and types of results to propose a typology of methodological approaches that researchers currently apply to crowdfunding: from platform­centred to multi­sited. The authors discuss the advantages and limitations of the identifed approaches with the use of multiple examples of recent and most influential studies from the feld and propose the most urgent direction of future inquiries.

Originality/value: The article offers the frst review of methodologies applied in the transdisciplinary area of crowdfunding studies and connects it to broader methodological discussions about transdisciplinary research on the digital phenomena. The review strengthens the transdisciplinary dialog on crowdfunding.

Purpose: The article explores the grounds of possible interrelations of snob and bandwagon consumers’ inclinations in the luxury fashion sector. The reason to investigate this comes from the growth of inconsistent evidence among analyses of this subject. Consumers’ perception of luxury goods seems not only compound but also quite ambiguous at the same time. One of its reasons may be the wrong assumption that snob and bandwagon inclinations are opposite trends that cannot co-exist among individual motives of luxury purchases.

Methodology and fndings: The mixed method research – in the form of international consumers’ e-survey and semi-structured interviews with affluent consumers – reveals that mutual relations of these two trends are clearly visible and can both motivate purchase at the same time.

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to present the concept of social value added (SVA) as a tool for measuring the effectiveness of the activity of not-for-proft cultural institutions. Findings: The modifcations presented in this article make it possible to adapt economic value added (EVA) to the needs and specifcity of not-for-proft public cultural institutions. Applying a modifed EVA parameter, that is SVA, in cultural institutions may facilitate the process of management and the measurement of effective utilization of resources of these entities.

Methodology: A direct application of the measure of economic value added (EVA) in the case of evaluation of non-proft activity of cultural institutions would be impossible because of the specifcity of such organizations, which – as distinct from standard enterprises – are not oriented on generating fnancial gains. The article covers several successive modifcations of EVA, which lead eventually to the measure of social value added (SVA). This parameter represents the difference between the social impact of an evaluated institution and the social cost of capital involved in the conducted activity. A positive SVA means that the activity carried out by the institution subject to evaluation is socially viable. The method of SVA calculation presented in the article has been supported by a numerical example.

Originality/value: Published sources seldom tend to cover the tools improving management process or making it possible to measure the effects achieved by public cultural institutions. The solution discussed in this paper is a contribution to the body of reference literature in the said scope.

Purpose: The goal of this paper is to develop a framework describing the mechanisms which explain how and when CSR engagement affects company’s bottom line, based on a review of the business case for CSR literature.

Approach: This article is conceptual and based on literature review. By using a CSR stage development model, behavioral and stakeholder perspectives, it offers a descriptive multi­dimensional integrative framework of the business case for CSR.

Findings: The fndings show that the relationship between engagement in CSR activities and corporate performance (CP) depends on a CSR development stage, managerial interpretation of CSR issues, stakeholder management model and moderating factors.

Originality: This article integrates disconnected models and conceptualizations in the subject literature and contributes to the theoretical discussion by arguing that type and scale of benefts from CSR activity progress along the stages of organizational CSR development. Moreover, it also shows that the CSR­CP relationship depends on internal and external factors (mediators and moderators). It therefore supports the contingency argument.

Purpose: The paper analyses etatist and liberal economic attitudes in Poland, their changes after the last economic crisis, and the differences in this respect between socio-occupational groups with a particular focus on managers, professionals, and business owners, on the one hand, and other working and non-working groups, on the other hand.

Methodology: Individual-level data from three representative surveys conducted in 2012,2 2016, and 2017 on stratifed random samples of the whole adult Polish population are analyzed. Findings: Despite public legitimization of economy based on private ownership and the free market, Polish public opinion still shows strong preference for public ownership and state interventionism. This preference slowly diminishes. It differs between various socio-occupational groups: managers, professionals, and business owners are more liberal than others, especially non-working people and farmers.

Research implications: Since strengthening the regulatory and controlling functions of the government in economic life is the recent tendency in Poland and other countries, the slowly growing liberal attitudes may counteract this direction. So far, however, the Polish public opinion strongly supports governmental intervention in the economy.

Originality: So far, no one wrote a similar analysis of changes in etatist and liberal economic attitudes in the post-crisis Poland.