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Which appeals (ethos, pathos, logos) are the most important for Airbnb users to booking?
|
[
"Smart tourism",
"Sharing economy",
"Airbnb",
"Aristotle’s appeals",
"Peer-to-peer accommodation"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The sharing economy is continuously emerging, and it has had substantial impacts on various industries (Tussyadiah and Park, 2018). In particular, the novel business model has generated a strong economic and social impact in the hospitality and tourism industry (Tussyadiah and Pesonen, 2016). As a leading business in the sharing economy, Airbnb provides millions of accommodations in 65,000 cities in approximately 200 countries on a global scale, and its value is estimated at 10 billion US dollars (Gunter, 2018). As Airbnb has become a major player in the hospitality and tourism industry, it is one of the top priority research topics in the field (Liang et al., 2018).\nTheoretical background: Sharing economy and irbnb\nResearch model and hypotheses: In the case of Airbnb, the main platform is its online website, and the sharing transaction is processed primarily based on communications between users (Ert et al., 2016). Individuals who want to share their places join Airbnb and become hosts by registering them. During the registration, potential hosts input various pieces of information about their places and about themselves. Then, the guests search, evaluate and select the places where they want to stay based on the host-created information. Because there are no sources that enable one to become familiar with places other than the host-created information, this information is critical to a guest's decision making (Chen and Xie, 2017). Based on the highly expected importance of host-created information, a general proposition is suggested that assumes the significant influence of host-created information on a guest's purchase decision in Airbnb. The various informative statements' influences are empirically examined based on Aristotle's appeals to explain which piece of information is effective at persuading people (Scott, 1967).\nResearch methodology: Instrument development\nData analysis and results: Data analysis\nDiscussion: This study hypothesizes that various information appeals of host-created information have significant effects on the sharing behavior in Airbnb. Specifically, three categories of appeals would be expected to relate to the guest's actual purchase because the guest's decision-making on Airbnb would be affected by the host-created information.\nConclusions and implications: This research has several theoretical and practical implications. This research could contribute to the theoretical literature on Airbnb and the sharing economy because it addresses the existing studies' limitations. Although many previous works have attempted to study information communications between users in Airbnb by measuring their importance, only fragmentary investigations have been performed and only a partial understanding has been provided, such as the impact of the price information or host profile (Ert et al., 2016; Fagerstrom et al., 2017; Tussyadiah and Park, 2018; Wang and Nicolau, 2017). In the sharing economy context, because the information messages available in online platforms are usually the only sources for checking products, interacting with others, and making decisions, individuals tend to consider various components and aspects of information messages (Chen and Xie, 2017; Gibbs et al., 2017). Thus, to fully understand the communicative role of information in a sharing economy, a holistic perspective is required rather than a partial focus. As a result, this research focused on the various information appeals in host-created information by considering different categories of appeals and examining how they are delivered and perceived by individuals. By addressing the limitations of the previous literature, this study furthers the research into the sharing economy.\n",
"role": "user"
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{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to explain a guest's purchase decision in Airbnb from the perspective of Aristotle's appeals. In host-created information, the authors investigate which information appeals are significantly considered by guests.\nDesign/methodology/approach: It is hypothesized that a guest's purchase would be affected by the host-created information's ethos, pathos and logos.\nFindings: For the ethos, the super host badge and host review have positive impacts on the purchase; for the pathos, the positive impact of the use of social words is significant. For the logos, the authors have determined that although the price, place picture and star-rating have positive impacts on the likelihood of a purchase, the occupancy has a negative impact on it.\nResearch limitations/implications: The dependent variable, the number of place reviews, cannot represent the exact number of purchases. Other possible influential factors, such as direct communications between hosts and guests, are not examined.\nPractical implications: The findings suggest guidelines for Airbnb and its host users. Specifically, the management of normal host users is revealed as a necessary process for Airbnb's development. For host users, several guidelines on how to attract more guests effectively are provided.\nOriginality/value: In contrast to other studies on Airbnb, various pieces of information are considered from holistic perspectives, and each piece's impact on the sharing behavior is understood by means of a unique theoretical model that is based on Aristotle's appeals.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Application of the theory of planned behavior to customer switching intentions in the context of bank consolidations
|
[
"Theory of planned behavior",
"Bank merger",
"Consumer switching intention",
"Past behaviour"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The financial industry worldwide has faced a rising number of bank mergers and consolidations over the past four decades (Srivastava and Tiwari, 2014). These mergers and acquisitions were especially evident in times of financial recession and depression (OECD, 2000; Jagtiani, 2008; Wheelock, 2011) with banks searching for methods to enhance their monetary stability and strength (Novickyte and Pedroja, 2015). In fact, in Europe, a total of 816 mergers and acquisitions, totaling 682 billion Euros, took place between January 1996 and December 2005 (Montoriol-Garriga, 2008). Notably, the 2008 international economic recession caused an unmatched number of bank acquisitions globally (Duchin and Sosyura, 2014), directly resulting in a 12 percent decrease in the number of US banks and financial institutions between 2007 and 2010 (Wheelock, 2011). These mergers were directly related to the increased globalization, financial deregulation, and technological advances, striving banks to provide a wider range of services to customers over a larger geographic base of states and nations (Kumar and Suhas, 2010; Novickyte and Pedroja, 2015).\nLiterature review and hypotheses development: The takeover of Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS) by Lloyds TSB (LTSB) to create Lloyds Banking Group (2009) is the specific merger incident investigated in this study. The deal was concluded on January 19, 2009, under the recommendation of the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown. This merger resulted from the 2008 global financial crisis. At the time of the merger, LTSB held a total of 1,900 branches, 16 million customers, and 70,000 personnel, while HBOS had 1,100 branches, 22 million customers, and 72,000 employees (British Broadcasting Corporation, 2008). The bank merger held one-third of all British customer banking accounts, around 28 percent of the UK mortgage market, raised one billion English pounds in the annual bank's pre-tax earnings in 2011, and constituted the fourth largest bank in Britain (Murray-West, 2008; Connon, 2008).\nMethodology: The researcher started with a qualitative study and conducted 30 semi-structured face-to-face interviews with customers from both banks in the cities of Madrid, Barcelona, and Calpe. These interviews aimed to identify the main factors affecting customers' switching in this specific merger, develop the foundations for the quantitative phase of this study, and refine the research problem (Beall, 2002; Weischedel et al., 2005). The researcher selected a semi-structured design to encourage respondents to elaborate further and help the researcher collect detailed information so as to better understand customers' beliefs and intentions (Cachia and Millward, 2011; Drew, 2014; Gowanit et al., 2016). Moreover, the researcher favored individual interviews to encourage interviewees to privately express their opinions on this sensitive topic (Denzin and Lincoln, 1994; Stahl et al., 2011; Bennett and Sung, 2013); in fact, most people would feel disturbed if discussing confidential information regarding their finances and banking behaviors in the presence of others (O'Loughlin and Szmigin, 2005).\nEmpirical results: Sample and data analysis\nDiscussion and conclusions: Results show that British customers had less favorable attitudes toward switching compared to their Spanish counterparts. British respondents were mostly expatriates, and hence preferred UK banks away from home (Caligiuri, 2000). They trusted and were loyal to the British brand. This result was in line with the literature advancing that expatriate customer behavior is highly influenced by personal ethnicity and local home-country values (Wijnen et al., 2012). Indeed, expatriates are typically loyal to their home country and its brands (Marchant and Ward, 2003). Other studies also highlight that expatriates prefer products and brands that symbolize home, originate from their home countries, and are recommended by expatriate friends (Gilly, 1995). Yet, Spanish and British customers across both banks seemed to feel conservative toward the switching.\nLimitations: The main limitation of this study is that the banks could not disclose the number and identity of their overall customer base due to banking secrecy clauses, and hence provided the list of customers surveyed based on their own discretion. Consequently, the unverified representation of the sample constrained the researcher's ability to propose some generalizations with regards to the findings. Another major limitation is the inability to track the actual behavior of participants, which could have alleviated self-report errors and allowed for more concrete causal relationships and inferences. This would only have been feasible through a longitudinal study facilitated by a second round of surveys within the year after the bank merger took place.\nManagerial and theoretical implications: As a result of the various global financial downturns, characterized by amplified credit risks, enhancing relationships with existing customers is more important than ever to financial services companies. The cost of attracting new customers is increasing infinitely with hidden social and organizational costs. Such facts highlight the importance of this research for bank managers and scholars who look for a deeper understanding of reasons behind customers' switching in the case of mergers and acquisitions. Although switching behavior has gained increased attention in contemporary customer research, previous studies on the individual level were based on narrow theoretical frameworks incorporating the underlying motives and cognitive processes behind this behavior. This gap in literature called for elaborated theoretical frameworks, methods and empirical investigations on switching behavior, and hence encouraged the implementation of this study.\nConclusion and future research: In conclusion, this study shows that customers from both banks had negative attitudes toward switching from their current bank to another, viewing it as a rather useless exercise with many negative repercussions. However, results demonstrate that customers consider switching to be under their personal command to a great extent. This perceived sense of control allowed customers to feel little dependence on their current bank to particularly handle their financial transactions and accounts. Another major finding of this study is that past behavior will influence the likelihood of switching in the event of a disruptive influence such as a merger. Indeed, customers who have a history of switching are more likely to churn in such instances, unlike their non-switching counterparts who would remain loyal to their financial services provider anyway.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that affect customers' switching intentions among banks in the context of mergers and acquisitions, using particularly the case of the merger between Lloyds TSB and Halifax Bank of Scotland, which took place in 2009.\nDesign/methodology/approach: On the basis of the theory of planned behavior, a quantitative survey was developed and administered to 515 account holders from both banks in branches located in Spain. Structural equation modeling was then utilized to evaluate the significance of direct and indirect relationships between the various factors under study.\nFindings: Empirical findings indicate a significant direct relationship between switching intentions and each of: behavioral beliefs, normative beliefs, attitudes, and subjective norms. Results also reveal an inverse significant relationship between switching intentions and both control beliefs and perceived behavioral control.\nResearch limitations/implications: The absence of a longitudinal study measuring the actual impact of the merger on customer switching behavior is the main limitation of this study. Moreover, despite being insightful, the results of this study should be generalized with caution since the sample was based on a list purposely chosen by the banks' management.\nOriginality/value: This paper discusses customer switching behavior in the context of a real-life case of banks' consolidation.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Investigating the critical success factors of corporate social responsibility implementation: evidence from the Iranian banking sector
|
[
"Financial services",
"Critical success factors",
"Corporate social responsibility",
"Banking sector"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Debates over corporate social responsibility (CSR) concepts have entered into the public domain over the past three decades, or so. CSR generally means a company's obligation to contribute to the wellbeing of society (Jones, 1980; Epstein, 1989; Kok et al., 2001). Despite the intensive debate on CSR that has been taking place among academics, consultants and corporate executives, the concept remains open to various definitions and understandings. One of the most quoted conceptualizations of CSR is the model proposed by Carroll (1979, 1991), which is famously known as the \"Pyramid of CSR\". Many studies have provided empirical evidence on people's perceptions and understanding of CSR based on Carroll's Pyramid of CSR framework (see, for example, Pinkston and Carroll, 1993; Ibrahim et al., 2003; Kusku and Fraser, 2004; Ibrahim and Parsa, 2005; Peterson, 2004; Smith et al., 2001, 2004; Maignan and Ferrell, 2003).A recent business trend emphasizes that firms are expected to go beyond their profit-oriented activities and boost the wellbeing of the community, making the world a better place (Robins, 2005). This means that the business sector should develop a marked non-economic function in society rather than only producing goods and making profits, by developing society-driven actions. In fact, Falck and Heblich (2007) suggest that if a company's aim is to survive and prosper, the best way is to take a long-term view and understand that if it treats society well, society will return the favor. Post et al. (2002) go even further and assert that the corporation \"cannot and should not survive if it does not take responsibility for the welfare of all its constituents, and for the wellbeing of the larger society within which it operates\".Therefore, firms have ethical responsibilities that include a range of societal norms or standards (Carroll, 2000), and this seems particularly true for businesses in a consumer-oriented industry such as tourism. Even though Yaman and Gurel (2006) find that, depending on cultural aspects, differences exist in the way marketers look at moral philosophies, this industry has particular and clearly defined duties outside of the business realm on account of its close relationship with the destination environments and societies that are components of its products (Henderson, 2007). According to the World Bank, \"corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a term describing a company's obligations to be accountable to all of its stakeholders in all its operations and activities. Socially responsible companies consider the full scope of their impact on communities and the environment when making decisions, balancing the needs of stakeholders with their need to make a profit\". In fact, the evolution of the notions of \"sustainable development\" and \"sustainable tourism\" made the World Bank consider a wider range of tourism dimensions to be included in new projects to justify the sustainability of investments for environmental and cultural preservation (Hawkins and Mann, 2007). In this regard, Henderson (2007) suggests that the characteristics of tourism add an extra dimension to CSR: society is part of the product and companies have an acute duty and responsibilities regarding the places in which they are selling. This trait is likely to make them more sensitive to the adoption of CSR, even more so considering that such a tendency has been supported by consumer tastes, the environmental movement and public bodies' demands for better tourism management.At this point, a critical issue arises: although the positive effect of CSR actions on society is unquestionable, the relationship between CSR and a firm's performance is debatable, a conspicuous result being that a positive relationship between CSR and a firm's performance would imply a two-fold effect on society:1. social initiatives are inherently designed to enhance the wellbeing of society, and therefore their implementation should obviously have benefits for it; and2. benefits for society would also derive from the increase in the firm's profits obtained by carrying out CSR activities, or as usually stated, by developing and carrying out \"best practices\" (Cone, 2002; Dodds and Joppe, 2005; Bansal, 2006; Gond et al., 2007).1.1 Research question\n2. Corporate social responsibility: Recent scandals involving major corporations such as Enron, Arthur Andersen, WorldCom, Adelphia, and Xerox have dominated the world press. The impact of these managerial shortcomings has been enormous (Bulik, 2002). The corporate world is facing the issue of corporate social responsibility (CSR) wherever it turns these days. On a wide range of issues corporations are encouraged to behave in a socially responsible manner (Welford and Frost, 2006; Engle, 2007). CSR broadly means that a company addresses society's expectations on the environmental and social dimensions (see Figure 1) of their operations (such as pollution, energy consumption, labor conditions, and human rights) and balances the claims of key stakeholders. (O'Rourke, 2003; Sparkes and Cowton, 2004; Hills and Welford, 2006). One of the important issues that exists in the CSR literature is managers' corporate social responsibility orientation (CSRO). This issue seeks to determine CSR orientation and its applications for management and decision-making units (DMUs) in the organization.Ethical behavior and socially responsible practices in business have been discussed extensively in recent years (e.g. Aquilar, 1994; Carroll, 1993; Drucker, 1984; Paine, 1994; Weiss, 1994). A major part of this literature has attempted to develop various conceptual models for analyzing the relationship between business and the larger environment (Angelidis and Ibrahim, 1991; Carroll, 1979; Freeman, 1984; McMahon, 1986). Other studies have been dedicated to empirical investigations of linkages between business and society (e.g. Abbott and Monsen, 1979). The most popular of these studies have focused on the relationship between a firm's social responsibility and its financial performance (McGuire et al., 1988; Aupperle et al., 1985; Ullman, 1985; Moskowitz, 1972; Vance, 1975). Another line of studies has examined the effect of corporate executives' demographic and non-demographic characteristics on their individual corporate social responsiveness orientation (Ibrahim and Angelidis, 1995; Kelley et al., 1987).The corporate social responsibility (CSR) agenda suffers from the lack of a clear definition and seems to be a loosely defined umbrella term embracing a vast array of concepts traditionally framed as environmental concerns, public relations, corporate philanthropy, human resource management and community relations (Lunheim, 2003). For example, CSR has been described as:* the obligations of businessmen to pursue those policies, to make those decisions, or to follow those lines of action that are desirable in terms of the objectives and values of our society (Bowen, 1953);* businessmen's decisions and actions taken for reasons at least partially beyond the firm's direct economic or technical interest (Davis, 1960);* the firm's consideration of, and response to, issues beyond the narrow economic, technical, and legal requirements of the firm (Davis, 1973);* the serious attempt to solve social problems caused wholly or in part by the corporation (Fitch, 1976);* the degree of \"fit\" between society's expectations of the business community and the ethics of business (Zenisek, 1979);* the notion that corporations have an obligation to constituents groups in society other than stockholders and beyond that prescribed by law and union contract (Jones, 1980);* the notion that business organizations have societal obligations which transcend economic functions of producing and distributing scarce goods and services and generating a satisfactory level of profits for their shareholders (Epstein, 1989);* a process through which individuals' moral values and concern are articulated (MacLagan, 1999);* actions that appear to further some social good, beyond the interests of the firm and that which is required by law (McWilliams and Siegel, 2001); and* the obligation of the firm to use its resources in ways to benefit society, through committed participation as a member of society, taking into account the society at large, and improving welfare of society at large independently of direct gains of the company (Kok et al., 2001).Among the various definitions of CSR, that of Carroll (1979) has had extensive influence. He defined CSR in terms of four responsibilities or dimensions:1. economic;2. legal;3. ethical; and4. discretionary.The first component views business organizations as the primary agents of wealth creation for the national economy. It requires the firm to maximize profits for the company's owners and shareholders by efficiently providing a supply of goods and services to meet market demands. The second dimension, legal responsibility, requires the firm to operate within the legal framework. Society allows business firms to operate as legal entities and, in return, expects them to obey faithfully all the pertinent laws and regulations. To be ethical, decision makers should act with fairness, equity, and impartiality. Thus, society expects business organizations to behave in a way that is consistent with social values. This refers to moral standards above and beyond the rule of law. Finally, discretionary activities are guided by a firm's desire to make social or philanthropic contributions not required by economics, law, or ethics. These include voluntary actions undertaken by the firm in its role as a good citizen. The intent is to make a contribution to improve societal welfare. Carroll (1991) contends that these four components \"address the entire spectrum of obligations business has to society\".In Figure 2 the benefits of CSR implementation for the chief departments of the organizations and the key role of critical success factors are illustrated.\n3. Critical success factors: Critical success factors (CSFs; see Figure 3) have been used significantly to present or identify a few key factors that organizations should focus on to be successful. As a definition, critical success factors refer to \"the limited number of areas in which satisfactory results will ensure successful competitive performance for the individual, department, or organisation\" (Rockart and Bullen, 1981). Identifying CSFs is important, as it allows firms to focus their efforts on building their capabilities to meet CSFs, or even allow firms to decide whether they have the capability to build the requirements necessary to meet critical success factors (CSFs).CSFs are tailored to a firm's or a manager's particular situation, as different situations (e.g. industry, division, individual) lead to different critical success factors. Rockart and Bullen (1981) presented five key sources of CSFs:1. the industry;2. competitive strategy and industry position;3. environmental factors;4. temporal factors; and5. managerial position.Each of these factors is explained in greater detail below.3.1 The industry\n4. Research methodology and design: 4.1 Research method\n5. Data gathering and analysis: By using a questionnaire that was distributed among the academics and professionals (practitioners) in the field, the main CSFs for CSR implementation were identified. Tables II and III shows the descriptive characteristics of the case study of the research.Data gathered from the statistical population were analyzed using statistical software including SPSS and Excel, and 23 CSFs for CSR implementation were identified based on the experts' responses. The importance of these CSFs was different as the viewpoint of the respondents differed.Table IV shows the critical success factors for corporate social responsibility implementation for the banking sector based on the expert's viewpoint.H1. The 23 CSFs identified in this research affect CSR implementation for the banking sector.In this section of this research, the effect of the critical success factors identified for CSR implementation in the banking sector is investigated. For this purpose a t-test was run, and the results of this statistical test are illustrated in Table V.The importance of the critical success factors for corporate social responsibility was not equal. Based on the data gathered, Figures 4 and 5 show the importance of these CSFs for CSR implementation.In Figure 6 we present the importance of critical success factors for corporate social responsibility in financial services with a focus on the banking sector from the viewpoint of the experts consulted in this research. As Figure 6 clearly shows, the most important factors are employee commitment to CSR and the competitive orientation of the organization, followed by cooperation, organizational culture, organizational citizenship behavior, and knowledge sharing, respectively.Other factors are affecting the process of CSR implementation; the weights of these factors are also clearly shown in Figure 6.All of the factors identified in this research cover the every aspect of an organization and will provide wide insights for both academics and practitioners in financial services industries and the banking sector.\n6. Conclusions and recommendations: As mentioned, from the point-of-view of the firm, CSR is set of moral duties towards other social actors and towards society that the firm assumes as a result of its economic, social, political, and, of course, ethical reflection on its role in society and on its relationships with those other actors. With regard to external observers, it is the set of moral duties that the other agents and society attribute to the firm as a consequence of the role it assumes and its relationships with those actors. In practice, then, CSR will be the result of a dialog between the firm and its stakeholders about the obligations of the first and the expectations of the second.In this research, critical success factors for CSR implementation are identified and presented. For gathering data and sampling, the banking sector in Iran was selected as the case study of this research. Based on the viewpoint of the experts consulted this research, 23 CSFs for CSR implementation were identified, and then the importance of these CSFs was determined. This is an innovative research work in the field of CSR in the banking sector that presents a new category for critical success factors for CSR implementation. The CSFs identified are categorized into the five main sections of the organizational functional areas. These functional areas include financial, marketing, environmental, strategic and human resources.This study first provides a framework for CSR implementation in the banking sector. The main CSFs are also identified and ranked. By means of the results of this study, decision makers in the field can become more familiar with CSR and can make higher decisions for the chief departments of the organization. Finally, academics in the field can use the framework of this research and to develop CSR for other organizations and business sectors.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The main purpose of this paper is to identify the critical success factors of corporate social responsibility (CSR). By illustrating the CSFs of CSR implementation, policy- and decision-makers can handle the business at a higher level of effectiveness and efficiency and will achieve sustainable development in a turbulent business environment. To achieve this purpose and to identify the CSFs of CSR implementation, evidence from the banking sector of Iran will be gathered. By using the experts in this field, the CSFs identified will be validated and then ranked.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - To achieve this purpose and to identify the CSFs of CSR implementation, evidence from the banking sector in Iran will be gathered. By using the experts in this field, the CSFs identified will be validated and then ranked. This research, implemented in the banking sector, is an innovative study that can contribute valuable insights for both academicians and professionals in the field. In the final section of this work, applied and theoretical recommendations will be presented.\nFindings: - In this research the critical success factors for CSR implementation are identified and presented. For gathering data and sampling, the banking sector of Iran was selected as the case study of this research. Based on the viewpoint of the experts of this research, 23 CSFs for CSR implementation were identified and then the importance of these CSFs was determined. This is an innovative study in the field of CSR in the banking sector that presents a new category for critical success factors for CSR implementation. All the identified CSFs are categorized into the five main sections of the organizational functional areas. These functional areas include financial, marketing, environmental, strategic and human resources.\nOriginality/value: - This study first provides a framework for CSR implementation in the banking sector. Also the main CSFs are identified and ranked. By means of the results of this study, decision makers in the field will be more familiar with CSR and can make higher decisions for the chief departments of the organization. Finally academicians in the field can use the framework of this research and develop CSR for other organizations and sectors of business.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Analysing value added as an indicator of intellectual capital and its consequences on company performance
|
[
"Intellectual capital",
"Value added",
"Company performance",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nI. Introduction: Intellectual capital (IC), innovation and value creation (or value added (VA)) are nowadays the object of particular attention by managers, investors, economic institutions and governments; as they are also the object of several studies recently realised in academic and professional environments.According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) (2008), many companies invest nowadays in employee training, research and development (R&D), customer relations, computer and administrative systems, etc. These investments, often referred to as IC, are growing and they are competing with physical and financial capital investments in some countries[1]. Several authors, such as Stewart (1997) and Zeghal (2000), ascribed this change in investment structure to the advent of a new knowledge-based economy. Other authors, such as Edvinsson (1997), Sveiby (1997) and Lynn (1998) emphasised the importance of IC which they consider to be the main source of value creation in the new economy.However, it is difficult to measure IC since it is intangible and non-physical in nature. The traditional accounting model, which is conceived for companies operating in an industrial economy, remains focussed on physical and financial assets and ignores most IC assets. Interestingly, even the International Accounting Standards/International Financial Reporting Standards (IAS/IFRS)[2], including the ones recently modified by the International Accounting Standards Board, did not contribute to redefining many of the concepts, principles and valuation methods of IC assets. The relative lack of IC accounting recognition and its growing role in the value creation process, imply that financial statements have lost some of their value for shareholders and many other users (Canibano et al., 2000; Ashton, 2005; OECD, 2006, 2007).Many studies, often conducted within a resource-based theory framework, have tried to analyse the problem of accounting for IC. The first studies began with the identification, representation, and classification of IC components (Edvinsson and Malone, 1997; Zeghal, 2000; Guthrie et al., 2004). Other studies were interested rather in the practices of IC reporting in companies' annual reports (Williams, 2001; Abdolmohammadi, 2005; Kristandl and Bontis, 2007). Some studies also focussed on the problem of IC measurement not being recorded in financial statements (Stewart, 1997; Pulic, 1998, 2004; Gu and Lev, 2003; Chen et al., 2004). Finally, a number of studies were related to the validation of IC in a decision-making context, notably in terms of its usefulness to investors on a capital market (Lev and Sougiannis, 1996; Cazavan-Jeny, 2004; Casta et al., 2005; Lev et al., 2007).In this study, we aim to extend the efforts made by researchers and practitioners to find an appropriate measure of IC. We propose therefore the concept of \"value added\" as an indicator of IC measurement in a company. This idea is based on the \"value added intellectual coefficient - VAIC(tm)\" method developed by Pulic (1998, 2004). This method is still in the early stages of its application in management accounting practices and needs to be empirically validated with a large number of companies in a decision-making context. This is precisely the objective of our study according to which we attempt:* to empirically analyse the role of VA as an indicator of IC; and* to empirically validate the method of VAIC(tm) to assess the impact of IC on economic, financial and stock market performance.Our study is motivated by the conceptual link which could exist between IC and VA. Indeed, a recent survey carried out by the UK Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) (2004)[3] shows that successful UK companies recognise that investing in IC is essential to their ability to create world-class VA products and services. Other reports edited by the OECD (2006, 2007) considered IC as the main important source of value creation in a company. More recently, the UK DTI (2007) also reported that, on average, UK companies create much more VA than other European companies. In fact, UK companies' ability to compete in the global economy largely and increasingly depends on creating higher levels of VA through investments in IC.The concept of \"value added\" used in the present study for measuring IC has a strong historical past in the UK (Morley, 1979; Pong and Mitchell, 2005). For many years, UK companies have revealed information about their VA in the \"Value Added Statement\". At present, information on the VA of UK companies is also revealed by the UK DTI in the \"Value Added Scoreboard\". All this explains our choice to carry out our study in a UK context through the analysis of a sample of 300 companies listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) during 2005.We also chose, in this study, to divide our sample into three groups of sectors representing high-tech industries, traditional industries and services. Our expectation is that the contribution of IC to a company's performance differs from sector to sector.The remainder of the present paper is organised as follows: Section 2 briefly describes the theoretical and conceptual framework for both IC and VA and outlines related prior research. Section 3 presents our research objective and the different research hypotheses. Section 4 describes the methodology used in this study and the results of the data analysis are detailed in Section 5. The final section summarises and concludes with suggestions for future research.\nII. Intellectual capital and value added: 1 Intellectual capital\nIII. Research objective and hypotheses: The objective of this study is to empirically analyse the role of VA as an indicator of IC. We attempt also to empirically validate the method of VAIC(tm) to assess the impact of IC under the following triptych: economic performance (Model 1), financial performance (Model 2), and stock market performance (Model 3). Our assumption is that if the company is economically successful, it is going to exhibit a healthy and profitable financial state of affairs, which is going to reverberate on its stock market performance.1 Economic performance model\nIV. Methodology: 1 Data and sample selection\nV. Empirical results: 1 Descriptive statistics\nVI. Conclusions: Given that the traditional accounting model imperfectly and partially measures the IC assets, we tried in this study to extend the efforts made by researchers and practitioners to find an appropriate measure of IC. Using the \"value added intellectual coefficient - VAIC(tm)\" method, we attempted to empirically analyse the role of VA as an indicator of IC. We also attempted to empirically validate the method of VAIC(tm) to assess the impact of IC on company performance.The following associations which constitute the basic hypotheses of our study were tested:* There is a positive association between \"value added intellectual capital coefficient\" and economic performance, financial performance and stock market performance.* There is a positive association between \"value added capital employed coefficient\" and economic performance, financial performance and stock market performance.By using data from UK listed companies during 2005, our findings have important implications. First, our results show a significantly positive association between the value added intellectual capital coefficient and a company's economic performance. This indicates that IC plays a major role in reducing a company's production costs. In addition, our results show that the value added intellectual capital coefficient has a significantly positive association with a company's financial performance. This finding supports the significant role of IC in creating value for stockholders as well as for other stakeholders. However, the association between the value added intellectual capital coefficient and a company's stock market performance is only significant for high-tech industry sectors. This indicates that UK investors perceive IC as a source of \"value creation\" only for this kind of sector. Finally, our results show that the VACA has a significantly positive association with a company's financial and stock market performance. These findings indicate that capital employed (physical and financial) remains important for stockholders and stakeholders through its significant role in value creation. Nevertheless, our results seem to indicate a negative association between the VACA and a company's economic performance.The results of this research have several practical implications. Primarily, they allow managers to apply the VAIC(tm) method to better harness and manage their IC and to benchmark against the best competitors in their sectors. Accountants can also adopt the VAIC(tm) method as a potential measure to report on IC. In addition, investors can use the VAIC(tm) method to help them select companies for their portfolios that have a track record for continuous creation of VA in an efficient and sustainable way. Finally, governments can use the VAIC(tm) method to assess different companies and different sectors in the economy in terms of VA of their IC. This may result in better economic policies and an improvement in the management of the new economy. In fact, our findings will support the UK DTI in their decision to compile and disclose the data on VA in the Value Added Scoreboard. Also, our results are coherent with the OECD's new approach on the role of IC in value creation.This research is not without its limitations. First, the results related to the impact of control factors on dependent variables are mixed and not significant in most cases. Additional research should give more attention to control factors and could eventually introduce other control factors and provide clearer results, if the necessary data were to be available. Second, given that findings from the present study are cross-sectional, future research should be undertaken to examine the associations studied in this paper across time. Finally, future research could revisit some of the basic assumptions of the VAIC(tm) method and assess their potential consequences for the validity of empirical testing and results.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to analyse the role of value added (VA) as an indicator of intellectual capital (IC), and its impact on the firm's economic, financial and stock market performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The value added intellectual coefficient (VAIC(tm)) method is used on 300 UK companies divided into three groups of industries: high-tech, traditional and services. Data require to calculate VAIC(tm) method are obtained from the \"Value Added Scoreboard\" provided by the UK Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). Empirical analysis is conducted using correlation and linear multiple regression analysis.\nFindings: - The results show that companies' IC has a positive impact on economic and financial performance. However, the association between IC and stock market performance is only significant for high-tech industries. The results also indicate that capital employed remains a major determinant of financial and stock market performance although it has a negative impact on economic performance.\nPractical implications: - The VAIC(tm) method could be an important tool for many decision makers to integrate IC in their decision process.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first research which has used the data on VA recently calculated and published by the UK DTI in the \"Value Added Scoreboard\". This paper constitutes therefore a kind of validation of the ministry data.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The service learning projects: stakeholder benefits and potential class topics
|
[
"Higher education",
"Service learning",
"Community partnerships",
"Topics"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Higher education today helps support students in developing subject matter proficiencies, or the ability to combine subject matter knowledge and a set of complementary skills in ways that go beyond traditional classroom classic assignments and objective examinations. Developing such a set of proficiencies might reasonably be expected of undergraduate majors in most disciplines by the time of their graduation, helping them to achieve a successful transition into the workforce. Hansen (1986) proposes five proficiencies required for students entering the workforce including: accessing existing knowledge; displaying command of existing knowledge; interpreting existing knowledge; applying existing knowledge; and creating new knowledge. Incorporating a service learning project into classes allows educators to address these five proficiencies.\nService learning projects: The success of service learning projects is affected by the degree of integration among the institution and public and private community agencies. With proper integration, both the students and the community receive greater benefits from increased knowledge and joint activities. In learning theory, active involvement is required for higher levels of understanding particularly in the application as well as the use of concepts (Becker et al., 1991). As a pedagogical tool, service learning projects expand teaching and learning beyond classroom activities and students benefit from the practical applications (Giles and Eyler, 1994; Kinsley, 1993) as well as active learning (Becker and Watts, 2001; Watts, 2000; Becker, 1997; Jacoby, 1996). In addition, service learning projects are appropriate for final written reports, particularly to share with the community agency partner. Service learning overcomes the problems noted in many disciplines that few classes require students to write papers (Salemi et al., 2001; Salemi and Siegfried, 1999; Siegfried and Kennedy, 1995; Becker and Watts, 1996).\nBenefits of service learning: Service learning involves students in a wide array of diverse activities that are beneficial to the agencies involved and uses experience generated to enhance student's learning, to provide the student with a deeper understanding of the course content, and to enhance the student's sense of civic responsibilities and/or civic leadership (Waterman, 1997; Bringle and Hatcher, 1996). Such applied learning offers opportunities for repetition and reinforcement of concepts, thereby increasing the likelihood of retention and transferring learning to social agencies and business or service organizations (McKeachie, 1999; Schamess et al., 2000). Calvert et al. (2011) found the service-learning methodology bridges theoretical concepts with experiential learning through projects within the larger community. Service learning offers both opportunities and benefits for all involved participants, including students, faculty, community, and the academic institution (Warner et al., 2012). The following sections outline-specific benefits for each key stakeholder.\nTopics for service learning projects: As discussed, service learning has been widely used in business and economics. Service learning has also been applied in a wide variety of disciplines and courses including macroeconomics (Hervani and Helms, 2004), writing and composition (Adler-Kassner et al., 1997), finance (Dahlquist, 1998), engineering (Kvam, 2000), psychology (Wilson, 2003), science and mathematics (Mogk and King, 1995; Duke, 1999), accounting (Cruz, 2001), nursing (Narsavage et al., 2003), sociology (Mooney and Edwards, 2001), Spanish (Plann, 2002), political science (Robbins, 2001), and liberal education (Bloom, 2003; DeVitis et al., 1998; Battistoni, 1995), geography education (Longan, 2005), communication (Bullard et al., 2001), computer technology (Schuler, 2001), urban geography community activism and planning (Dorsey, 2001), environmental conservation (Ward, 1999), and web-based geography (France and Ribchester, 2004).\nAssessing service learning projects: Once topics are selected and student teams are assigned to begin work, faculty may want to assess teams at periodic intervals during the semester to ensure all members are participating, and participating somewhat equally in the service learning project. An assessment rubric can be easily created allowing each student to rate their performance as well as their team members' performance on a five-point Likert-type scale. Variables to assess can include dependability, contribution, performance, cooperation, attitudes, and communication. Using an assessment of team members' performance at mid-term is useful to encourage and motivate all members to participate in the project. The same rubric can be used to assess team performance at the end of the course or at the end of the project.\nAreas for future research: Future research on service learning is needed to expand the topic list and include even more disciplines. Research on the implementation of service learning that includes applications and case studies from a variety of disciplines and that further explores the scoring, pedagogy, structure, conduct, and performance is needed. Ways to use technology are needed, as are studies of student learning, satisfaction, and retention from service learning inclusion.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to summarize the benefits of including a service learning project in college classes and focusses on benefits to all stakeholders, including students, community, and faculty.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using a snowball approach in academic databases as well as a nominal group technique to poll faculty, key topics for service learning across college disciplines are presented.\nFindings: Findings include a wide range of service learning projects across disciplines.\nResearch limitations/implications: Areas for future research are identified to expand the service learning topic list as well as guide studies on the long-term benefit of service learning for each identified stakeholder.\nPractical implications: For new faculty or faculty new to service learning, the list of paper ideas is a good first step to identify projects. While not comprehensive, the list serves to stimulate topic ideas and fills a void in the service learning literature.\nSocial implications: Service learning exists to provide real-world learning for students, but the projects provide benefits for community groups, agencies, and organizations. Societal benefits from the student effort are numerous and there are little or no costs to the agencies who participate.\nOriginality/value: The abundance of service learning literature has studied learning across disciplines and has quantitatively and qualitatively presented benefits, but no studies have worked to compile project ideas across major college disciplines. This research addresses this issue and provides the key first step to implement the service learning pedagogy: the topic idea.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions: Perspectives of human resource development practitioners
|
[
"Human resource development",
"Downsizing",
"Organizational change",
"Acquisitions and mergers",
"Human resource strategies",
"Employees"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Human resource (HR) practitioners are faced with a variety of workplace challenges that are altered as internal and external business environments transform (Gilley and Maycunich, 2003). Aggressive competitive strategies such as downsizing, mergers, and acquisitions impact the responsibilities of practitioners. These challenges typically have a negative impact on employees. Studies of downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions indicate that employees who are concerned about their employment status are either not working at 100 percent of their productivity capability or they are meeting production goals with increased quality errors. Increased errors cause increased \"rework\" and the net effect is a decrease in productivity (Clark and Koonce, 1995; Walker and Price, 2000; Probst et al., 2007; Weitzman, 2002).\n1. Statement of the problem: Human resource practitioners can provide critical expertise regarding the creation of integration strategies that can help mitigate post downsizing and merger failures (Mirvis, 1993; Carlson and Rotondo, 2001). Within organizations, it is the HR practitioners who are most apt to have a deep concern for their fellow employees (Garavan, 2007). Their collective belief is that organizational effectiveness, innovation, and survival \"require respect for and attention to the human side of enterprise\" (Gallos, 2006, p. 130). Human resource practitioners can fulfill important roles in the rebuilding process after these events; however, they may not have adequate opportunities to help restore balance to an organization in transition. Historically the primary focus of downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions is financial. A strong financial focus often means the HR practitioner's primary role is implementing transitional activities rather than ensuring that training and development supports financial goals. Although downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions have become commonplace; few research studies have been conducted that provide perspectives of HR practitioners regarding these events. In general, minimal empirical evidence exists in the strategic HRD literature that would suggest that HR practitioners are involved in making strategic contributions (Anderson, 2009).\n2. Research questions: RQ1. Based on their experiences, what are the perspectives of HR practitioners regarding the phenomena of mergers, acquisitions, and/or downsizings?RQ2. What insights do HR practitioners offer regarding their involvement in mergers, acquisitions, and/or downsizings?\n3. Conceptual framework: 3.1 Downsizing as an organizational expectation\n4. Methods of the study: 4.1 Study participants\n5. Discussion of the findings: Businesses have been forced to make operational adjustments to survive in national and international competitive environments (Hareli and Tzafrir, 2006). When profits spiral downward, the chief financial officer investigates causes and suggests cost reductions to return the business to a profitable position. This study focuses on the experiences of thirteen HR practitioners. Each of them was employed by a different profit or non-profit business during downsizings, mergers, and/or acquisitions. Seven practitioners experienced downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions and eight experienced one or more of the reorganization strategies multiple times. The practitioner descriptions along with the researcher's field notes and journal contributed to the results of the study.The practitioner perspectives of downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions provided an inclusive theme - their conceptualizations of these phenomena. This theme also yielded one sub category - culture. The participants suggest that downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions change \"how we do things around here.\" Good performance for continued or lifetime employment is no longer the prominent assumption in most work settings.5.1 Downsizing - impact in the workplace\n6. Discussion of implications: practitioner perspectives of downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions: 6.1 Downsizing - a financial strategy with employee consequences\n7. Culture changes caused by downsizings mergers and acquisitions: This section discusses the importance of culture in the workplace and the impact that downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions have on an organization's culture, and the subsequent impact that the prevailing or surviving culture has on the work force. The practitioners of this study agree that issues related to culture and change are the problems most frequently encountered and the most difficult to mitigate after these major change events. They explain that neither culture remains, regardless of the fit between two or more firms or whether or not the job titles are similar when the two entities combine. They suggest that a third culture is created because downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions will eliminate artifacts and rituals that are important to the individual pre-combination cultures.7.1 The trauma of downsizing\n8. Discussion and concluding comments: The responsibilities of human resource departments vary greatly depending on the views of the organization's executive leadership. Thirteen human resource practitioners participated in this study and provided perspectives about their roles and responsibilities in their respective organizations. The roles of the human resource practitioner in a downsizing cover a wide range of duties from traditional transactional responsibilities (including benefits and ensuring an accurate final paycheck) to counseling and providing emotional support. This study found that the practitioners were not involved in the decision to downsize. That decision is the exclusive responsibility of the executive leadership team which typically does not include an HR participant. HR responsibilities in a merger and acquisition include the integration of benefits, vacation policy, and orientation. The human resource role begins after the financial team decides to merge with or acquire another entity. Neither the practitioners in this study nor other members of the HR team in their organizations had an upfront due diligence role in determining the merger or acquisition fit. After decisions were made human resource practitioners were assigned leading roles in aspects of the planning and implementation phases. They developed exit policies and procedures for downsizing and set up benefit conversions. Some of the practitioners developed communications plans as well as training and development interventions.When firms merge, acquire another business, or downsize they have set the stage for a transformation. Changing the culture of an organization is complex because the culture is the essence of the organization. Culture establishes policies, procedures, processes, problem solving techniques, language, attitudes, and behavior in social and business areas. It is the organization's culture that provides direction for crafting a strategic approach to HRD (Garavan, 2007). Culture is a firm's values, rites, and artifacts (Schein, 2004; Bowditch and Buono, 2001). When a firm undergoes a downsizing, merger, or acquisition, change occurs at the foundation of the organization, and artifacts and rituals are transformed. The practitioners of this study explain that a change of this magnitude occurs at two levels, and they do not occur simultaneously. The executive team often believes that once the deal closes, the transformation is complete when the payrolls are combined or all downsized employees are off the active payroll. This faulty assumption is aligned with existing literature that cites the dismal success rate of planned organizational change initiatives (Szabla, 2007). Change is difficult and from the practitioners' perspectives, completing the merger or acquisition is not a confirmation that the final change has occurred. Employees have long-term memories of their old comfortable culture and they fight to keep it. Employee resistance includes a variety of passive as well as aggressive techniques. Culture change may take years to complete and can be difficult to manage, even when HR is fully engaged and supported. These transitions are more difficult to manage when HR is not involved. In fact, culture change may never be fully realized without HR support because of the human resistance (Szabla, 2007). Without clear leadership and an effective communications plan, myriad problems leading to reduced productitivity and lower morale can occur. Hareli and Tzafrir (2006, p. 415), for example, explain that for a downsizing to be effective:Organizations must be sensitive to the fact that managerial decisions and behaviors can have a bearing on the emotions, attitudes, and behaviors of the remaining employees.Employees can make or break the success of these organizational change initiatives.\n9. Implications for practitioners and suggestions for future research: A central message delivered by the participants of this study is that HR practitioners are not at the strategic planning table for early discussions involving mergers, acquisitions, and downsizings. If HR practitioners become involved in these actions, their involvement occurs later in the chain of events to perform mop-up duties. Practitioners need to find a way to make their voices heard earlier in the processes of these change initiatives. Wang et al. (2009) explain the importance of strategic HRD to organizational response. HRD practitioners need help in repositioning their roles within organizations so they may be viewed by organizational leaders as strategic partners. This practitioner need is aligned with suggestions by Garavan (2007, p. 11) that HRD \"is best achieved through a strategic approach\" and Marques (2006) that HRD must become a cross-functional unit that is center to an organization's activities and with a direct link to strategic management. An implication outlined by participants of this study is that HRD practitioners have a long way to go to achieve such status in organizations.Although the literature often portrays HR practitioners as change agents and facilitators of workplace learning, the participants of this study were left out of the initial planning of organizational change events. This finding is aligned with Anderson's (2009) view of the strategic HRD literature that found little to suggest that HRD practitioners have engaged in strategic partnerships with organizational stakeholders. Garavan (2007, p. 25) suggests that:The values, competencies, credibility, and integrity of the [HRD] professional will determine whether they are part of the \"dominant coalition\" and are therefore in a position to make HRD more strategic.However, the participants of this study did not point to those factors as reasons for their absence from the decision making process.Another implication for practitioners that emerged from this research pertains to their own physical and mental well being during downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions. Clearly, HRD practitioners are under considerable duress amidst these change initiatives. While they are monitoring the welfare of employees affected by these change events, they also need to realize the toll afflicted to their own physical and emotional well being.Findings of this study provide pathways for additional study relative to the roles of HRD practitioners in downsizings, mergers, and acquisitions. In particular, further research is needed that attends to the current versus desired status of HRD practitioners in organizational change initiatives. The following questions are offered as starting points:* How can human resource professionals re-position themselves to be strategic partners in organizational change initiatives such as mergers, acquisitions, and downsizings?* What skills do HR practitioners need to add to earn a seat at the table?* What is the cost of culture loss as a result of mergers, acquisitions, and downsizings?* How can corporate cultures be more effective and quantifiably measured, so that similar to financial data they can be compared and contrasted for pre merger and acquisition analysis?Although this qualitative study was exploratory in nature and it relied on a relatively small sample of HRD practitioners, the insights offered by the study participants provide a compelling storyline. Change initiatives premised on short term financial gains can leave an organization with deep scars from the destruction of cultural artifacts and severed human connections. HRD practitioners need a greater strategic presence throughout these change events to help minimize the damages.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper seeks to provide perspectives of HR practitioners based on their experiences with mergers, acquisitions, and/or downsizings.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This qualitative study utilized interviews with 13 HR practitioners. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative method.\nFindings: - HR practitioners were not involved in planning decisions related to downsizings, mergers, and/or acquisition. Neither the practitioners in this study nor other members of the HR team in their organizations had an upfront due diligence role in these change initiatives.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Additional research is needed to guide HRD practitioners in repositioning their roles so that they are more central to an organization's strategic decisions. Given the method of this study, the findings are not intended for generalization to larger populations. Future research should address the needs of HRD practitioners who are affected by downsizings, mergers, and/or acquisitions.\nPractical implications: - The primary role of HR practitioners need to be more than transitional activities after these change events are announced. Rather, these practitioners need opportunities during the planning stages to ensure that training and development supports the financial goals of these change events. After these change events occur, HRD practitioners need support for interventions to counter the impact of dismissed cultural artifacts and broken human links.\nOriginality/value: - Study participants explained that failure to identify employee issues in the pre-downsizing due diligence phase creates a chaotic workplace atmosphere and increases employee fears and stress levels. Participants explained how these change events affect career uncertainty, fear, and stress in employees.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Traffic flow routing and scheduling in a food supply network
|
[
"Declarative model",
"Discrete event dynamic system",
"Grid-like structure",
"Periodic vehicle routing problem",
"Traffic flow"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The rapid development of goods, energy, and data-distribution systems, as well as systems of passenger transport fosters economic development and the associated development of the global market for industrial goods and services. Assuming a supply system has a structure and behaviour (Bocewicz and Banaszak, 2013), one can distinguish elements of the structure of such a system (including transport roads, goods transfer facilities, etc.) and processes which determine its behaviour (e.g. the frequency and timeliness of deliveries, costs, etc.). This distinction is reflected in the perspective scientists take on supply systems, with some of them accentuating the context of analysis of behaviour reachable in systems with arbitrarily given structures, and others focussing on the synthesis of structures that enable the processes executed in those structures to run in a desired way.\n2. Related work: The vehicle routing problem (VRP) is an optimisation problem commonly encountered in logistics and transport, which applies to supply chain management in the physical delivery of goods and services. The VRP can be defined as the problem of designing the least cost delivery routes from a depot to a set of geographically dispersed locations subject to a set of constraints. VRP is classified as an NP-hard problem (Kumar and Panneerselvam, 2012) and is one of the most widely studied topics in operations research.\n3. Grid-like supply networks: The numerous road network patterns deployed in public and/or freight transport systems range from the tightly structured fractal network with perpendicular roads in a regular raster pattern to the hierarchical network with sprawling secondary and tertiary roads feeding into arterial roads in a branch like system (Courtat, 2012; Kelly and McCabe, 2006; Levinson and Huang, 2012). The throughput of multimodal processes of passenger/delivery flows depends on geometrical and operational characteristics of public transportation and/or cargo supply networks (Nakandala et al., 2016; Ahmed, 2009).\n4. Traffic flow routing and scheduling: 4.1 Multimodal processes\n5. Time window constrained delivery routing and scheduling: The Diophantine character of the cyclic scheduling problems described above, their diversity associated with the specific nature of the adopted assumptions, and constraints naturally imply their implementation in declarative programming environments. The uniform representation of the problems of analysis and synthesis adopted in this study, treated here as a constraint satisfaction problem (CSP), reduces these problems to an ordered triple: a set of decision variables V, integer domains D which specify their values, and constraints C which describe the relationships among them. Finding a solution to a CSP boils down to determining such values of decision variables V for which all constraints from set C are satisfied.\n6. Computational experiments: 6.1 Food supply grids network\n7. Conclusion: The approach proposed in this paper, which assumes that an intermodal goods supply network has a regular structure composed of a set of cyclic transport processes, allows fast prototyping of deliveries that is very relevant in a food supply chain network. Computer implementation of the declarative model of the problem of supply that assumes a regular network structure of local processes enables a fast online search for routes of supply chains and re-scheduling of local transport processes (related, for instance, to a change in the number of vehicles involved in a given process). At the heart of the presented solutions are two paradigms: scale decomposition of the problem of seeking a cyclic SCCP and layer decomposition of a supply problem into the problems of analysis and synthesis of the SCCP and the SCCMP, respectively. These paradigms make it possible to quickly solve small NP-hard problems and to map (generalise) the results online onto large-scale problems. They also allow separate, phased solving of integrated supply/distribution problems by separating the problems of cyclic scheduling of the SCCP and the problems of routing and scheduling of multimodal processes of the SCCMP. To summarise, computer implementation of declarative models of these problems provides an alternative to solutions that use meta-heuristics and evolutionary methods.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to focus on the reference model of a grid-like supply network that enables formulation of delivery routing and scheduling problems in the context of the periodic vehicle routing problem.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The conditions for seamless (collision-free) synchronization of periodically executed local transport processes presented in this paper guarantee cyclic execution of supply processes, thereby preventing traffic flow congestion.\nFindings: Systems that satisfy this characteristic, cyclic deliveries executed along supply chains are given and what is sought is the number of vehicles needed to operate the local transport processes in order to ensure delivery from and to specific loading/unloading points on given dates. Determination of sufficient conditions guaranteeing the existence of feasible solutions that satisfy these constraints makes it possible to solve the considered class of problems online.\nPractical implications: The computer experiments reported in this paper show the possibilities of practical application of the proposed approach in the construction of decision support systems for food supply chain management.\nOriginality/value: The aim of the present work is to develop a methodology for the synthesis of regularly structured supply networks that would ensure fixed cyclic execution of local transport processes. The proposed methodology, which implements sufficient conditions for the synchronization of local cyclic processes, allows one to develop a method for rapid prototyping of supply processes that satisfies the time windows constraints given.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Towards maximal unification of semantically diverse ontologies for controversial domains
|
[
"Semantic search",
"Maximal ontology unification",
"Ontology unification rules",
"Relation-level ontology unification",
"Textual entailment"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Nowadays, ontologies are widely used as a formal domain vocabulary for content-specific agreements in a variety of knowledge-sharing activities, such as, information organization, retrieval and tagging (Gruber, 1993). However, in the current state of the semantic web for many domains there are multiple diverse ontologies rather than one standard vocabulary. Apparently, when using several ontologies in a common application, mismatches can create incoherent results for the users (d'Aquin, 2009). Reaching agreement between these ontologies has become a big challenge, since typically ontologies are created by humans and thus depend on their view of the world. This situation, where distinct terms and relations are used to express the same ontological knowledge is referred in the literature as semantic heterogeneity (Euzenat and Shvaiko, 2007).\n2. Related work: Standardization of domain vocabulary is a crucial task for semantic web services and applications. Two main approaches exist to achieve this goal:\n3. A new paradigm for maximal ontology unification by statements: The primary goal of this study is to explore whether amplifying the matching level between statements (relations) of diverse ontologies could further lead to their full or exhaustive integration. Our preliminary data analysis reveals three types of correspondences between statements of two ontologies:\n4. Experimental methodology: To empirically assess the applicability and efficacy of the introduced paradigm for ontology unification by statements, we conducted two independent experiments. The main goal of the arranged experiments is to show the maximal potential improvement in agreement between the diverse ontologies, for which the baseline matching level is very low.\n5. Results and discussion: For the first group of ten students who had to build an ontology based on various news sites on the subject of \"social protest in Israel in the summer of 2011\": five ontologies were constructed, ontology 1 consists of 118 triples (based on ynet.co.il), ontology 2 - (based on nrg.co.il) 208 triples, 3 - (based on kikarhashabbat.co.il) 91 triples, 4 - (based on inn.co.il) 50 triples, 5 - (based on haaretz.co.il) 97 triples. All five ontologies together contain 83 distinct relationship types (the most popular are instance_of (159), is_a (94) and part_of (59). Totally, 33 (47 per cent) of the relationship types appear only in one ontology. Altogether the ontologies contain 327 distinct terms, 16 of them are common for more than two ontologies, two are common for all five ontologies (Tel-Aviv, demonstration). The most popular terms were: Tel-Aviv, demonstration, Benjamin Netanyahu, Itzik Shmuli (a leader of the social protest), Prime Minister, protest, tents protest, real estate protest, Rothshild avenue (main site of the social protest), Dafni Lif (a leader of the social protest), deputy, country, Jerusalem, artist, city, student, leaders of the social protest. These terms constitute the core ontology vocabulary.\n6. Conclusion and future work: In this paper we explored the potential for maximizing the agreement between diverse ontologies for controversial domains. In these domains two contradictory statements might be both considered as truthful by different subjects who hold diverse viewpoints on the topic. To this end, we proposed a new paradigm for maximization of matching and unification of multiple ontologies based on their relations or statements. Consequently, if the ontologies express only similar and/or complementary sets of statements or facts, then they can be fully integrated into one model. Hence, the primary idea behind the introduced methodology is to identify and unify similar statements (defined explicitly or derived by the presented unification rules) into one representative statement, then to examine the rest of the statements for contradictions and merge all the complementary ones.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Ontologies are prone to wide semantic variability due to subjective points of view of their composers. The purpose of this paper is to propose a new approach for maximal unification of diverse ontologies for controversial domains by their relations.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Effective matching or unification of multiple ontologies for a specific domain is crucial for the success of many semantic web applications, such as semantic information retrieval and organization, document tagging, summarization and search. To this end, numerous automatic and semi-automatic techniques were proposed in the past decade that attempt to identify similar entities, mostly classes, in diverse ontologies for similar domains. Apparently, matching individual entities cannot result in full integration of ontologies' semantics without matching their inter-relations with all other-related classes (and instances). However, semantic matching of ontological relations still constitutes a major research challenge. Therefore, in this paper the authors propose a new paradigm for assessment of maximal possible matching and unification of ontological relations. To this end, several unification rules for ontological relations were devised based on ontological reference rules, and lexical and textual entailment. These rules were semi-automatically implemented to extend a given ontology with semantically matching relations from another ontology for a similar domain. Then, the ontologies were unified through these similar pairs of relations. The authors observe that these rules can be also facilitated to reveal the contradictory relations in different ontologies.\nFindings: To assess the feasibility of the approach two experiments were conducted with different sets of multiple personal ontologies on controversial domains constructed by trained subjects. The results for about 50 distinct ontology pairs demonstrate a good potential of the methodology for increasing inter-ontology agreement. Furthermore, the authors show that the presented methodology can lead to a complete unification of multiple semantically heterogeneous ontologies.\nResearch limitations/implications: This is a conceptual study that presents a new approach for semantic unification of ontologies by a devised set of rules along with the initial experimental evidence of its feasibility and effectiveness. However, this methodology has to be fully automatically implemented and tested on a larger dataset in future research.\nPractical implications: This result has implication for semantic search, since a richer ontology, comprised of multiple aspects and viewpoints of the domain of knowledge, enhances discoverability and improves search results.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the knowledge, this is the first study to examine and assess the maximal level of semantic relation-based ontology unification.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Establishment of a new school and an innovative school: lessons from two Israeli case studies
|
[
"School buildings",
"Israel"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Educational systems are constantly building new schools. In the ten years between 1993 and 2003, for example, more then 11,000 schools were added to the US educational system (NCES, 2004), there was a 3 percent growth in the number of schools at the pan-Canadian level (CESC, 2003), and 1,100 schools were added to the Israeli educational system (Ministry of Education Culture and Sport, 2004). Most of the new schools were established to meet demographic needs, or due to public disappointment with the public school system (Loveless and Jasin, 1998). Some of the schools are not only new but also innovative, and were established based on novel pedagogy, like some of the Charter Schools (Bulkley and Fisler, 2003) and whole-school reform schools (Datnow et al., 2002).While the establishment process of a new school is usually a clearly defined procedure (Earthman and Lemasters, 2004; Tanner and Lackney, 2006), starting up an innovative school is a nebulous and complex process, which on more than one occasion ends in disappointment and even failure to fulfill the innovative vision (Weedall, 2004; Leonard, 2002). Despite of the large number of new schools, the essential differences between new and innovative schools, and the importance of the startup phase for the schools' prospects, the issue of school establishment has not yet been fully examined. The stages involved in the school establishment phase, and the differences between new and innovative schools startup, is the subject of this paper.\nLiterature review: The organizational literature suggests two directions for studying the organizations' startup phase. One, which is best expressed by the institutional and ecological theories, suggests that a new organization emerges as a response to the needs of the environment and is shaped according to institutional norms and expectations (Etzioni, 1964; Scott, 2003; DiMaggio and Powell, 1983). \"After all\", state Meyer and Rowan (1977, p. 345), \"the building blocks for organizations come to be littered around the societal landscape; it takes only a little entrepreneurial energy to assemble them into a structure\".One such building block, for example, is the business plan. Although a business plan is considered to be one of the most widely regarded aspects of pre-startup planning, Honig and Karlsson (2004) found no evidence to support positive outcomes for those nascent organizations that produced business plans during a two-year initial period. According to this view, new organizations have to follow institutional regulations and mimic successful organizations for ensuring legitimacy, resource flow, and diminish risk of being selected out (Kondra and Hinings, 1998).The second direction which is mainly discussed using the life cycle approach, focused on the process involved in emergent organizations, and attempted to understand the eventuation of this phase and its implications on mature organizations (Aldrich, 1999; Kimberly and Miles, 1980). \"For an organization, as for people\", states Kimberly and Miles (1980, p. 7), \"conditions of birth and early infancy may shape later development in significant ways\". Studies in this framework emphasize the connection between the planning methods used in the creation stage and the success of implementation (van de Ven, 1980), the importance of identity development and finding a suitable \"niche\" (Mulford, 2004), and the hurdles to be crossed in transforming from the charismatic phase into institutionalization (Kimberly and Miles, 1980; Loveless and Jasin, 1998).The life cycle approach, which is interested in organizational development, also offers some stage models. Quinn and Cameron (1983), for example, proposed a four-stage model for organization creation, comprising the entrepreneurial, collectivity, formalization and structural elaboration stages. Mulford (2004), who studied the establishment of new college, found some support for this model. However, studies of stages and factors at the startup phase are usually unconcerned whether the organization is new or innovative, which are viewed by other researchers as two different kinds of organizations.Aldrich (1999, p. 80), for example, distinguishes between the emergence of the reproducer - the new organization, and the innovator - a new type (population) of organization:Reproducer organizations are defined as those started in an established population whose routines and competencies vary only minimally, if at all, from those of existing organizations. They bring little or no incremental knowledge to the populations they enter, organizing their activities in the same way as their predecessors. Innovative organizations, by contrast, are those organizations started by entrepreneurs whose routines and competencies vary significantly from those of existing organizations.Hannan and Freeman (1977) have suggested that the innovative organization is a mutation that has emerged by taking advantage of a specific niche, and Suchman and Cahill (1996) distinguish between a filiation organization which copies the pattern of the existing organization, and the compilation organization which presents a new variation of it.Along the same lines, but with a different focus, the functional theory, which proposes that any social phenomenon serves a social function (Parsons, 1964), differentiates between the two kinds of organization by their functions (Parsons, 1971). While a new organization fulfills the system's adaptation needs for resource achievement, the innovative and renegade organization implements the latent needs of challenging and renewing the system's values (Kondra and Hinings, 1998).Whereas in business and industry the organizational startup phase has been studied quite extensively, in the field of education there are very few studies dealing with the school creation period. These studies point mainly to factors affecting the establishment phase, such as developing organizational identity (Mulford, 2004), appointing a charismatic principal (Giles and Hargreaves, 2006), achieving the necessary resources (Loveless and Jasin, 1998; Leonard, 2002), and obtaining staff cooperation and parental support (Weedall, 2004; Eyal, 2008). Not only are the stages involved in school establishment phase not fully explored (Mulford, 2004), the differences regarding an innovative school are terra incognita. As a result, questions such as when is the best time to appoint a principal to an innovative school remain unanswered, and mistakes arising from the application of a new school plan in an innovative school are reproduced. The aim of the present explorative study is to address this goal by analyzing the startup phase of two Israeli case studies.\nContext: In the early 1990s, following the wave of immigration of a million newcomers to Israel from the former Soviet Union, a city in the center of Israel was about to increase its population in 43 percent, by absorbing an additional 60,000 residents, among which were about 4,000 elementary school students. Over the following decade the municipality gradually built six additional elementary schools for these students. Guided by the idea of equal education for all and the values of diversity and heterogeneity, great efforts were invested by the ministry of education and the municipality to ensure equal conditions for all the new schools. One school was approved by the ministry of education and the municipality to be innovative and serve as educational lab for the entire system. Of the five conventional schools, the one most similar to the innovative school was chosen as a comparison school, so I was able to study the establishment phase of new and innovative schools, while holding other intervenient variables to a minimum (Eisenhardt, 1989).\nThe two case studies: The innovative school\nResearch methodology: This exploratory study combines qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis tools, and was conducted as a multiple case study procedure suitable for examining new and complex phenomena (Yin, 1984). Participating as a researcher during the establishment phase of the innovative school, I collected most of the data in 1994-1995 and completed the data collection in May-August 2007.School selection\nStages and sequence in school establishment phase: Four stages were found in the establishment phase: building construction and resource achievement, goal prioritizing, staff development, and vision formation, but they were found to be in reverse order in the new school and the innovative school, as detailed below.Resource achievement and building construction\nDiscussion: The differences between the establishment process of new and innovative schools can be demonstrated by two Hebrew proverbs about the road and its destiny: one states that \"the road is cleverer than those taking it,\" and the second says \"wherever we go, there will be a road.\" In general, terms, the two studied schools follow these two paths. The new school was established based on the solid path taken by thousands of earlier schools, which over the years were molded into know-how standards and regulations. Thus, the four stages can be arranged functionally according to these regulations and the time required for each stage: first is the building construction that could take a year or two, then obtaining the rest of the resources and experienced staff which bring with them goal prioritization, which can take several months. Vision development is left for the fourth stage during the first year, and in many ways reflects and duplicates the educational system's vision, reinforces its basic assumptions, and increases its sustainability.On the other hand, the innovative school is a pathfinder that creates a new road. Its pedagogical vision serves as a compass for the new road, as well as guide for the startup stages that are formed by the vision and affect it. If it succeeds, the innovative school can be more then a lab for new pedagogy. It can be the beginning of a new population of schools (Aldrich, 1999).Several lessons can be learned from these findings. First, there is one especially important element that should be taken into account in each case. The principal's experience in the new school, and the pedagogical vision in the innovative school, both plays the same role in guiding the startup stages and actions. Like an ill-developed vision, an inexperienced principal increases the likelihood of problems, and postpones, if not abolishes, the prospect of the school becoming what it was planned to be. The idea that vision is a necessary ingredient in a startup organization is not new (Bennis and Nanus, 1985; Fullan, 2005), but its effect on the startup stages' order is the unique contribution of this study.Second, the findings point to a different role that each kind of school plays in the educational system (Parsons, 1971), and the implications it has for the participants both inside and outside the school. Since the new school serves the educational system's adaptation needs, the principal and leading team must reach a profound understating of the norms and regulations governing the school and use them for the school's benefit. At the innovative school, which serves latent needs of emphasizing the system's values, the leading team must gain mastery of the school's vision, and keep on using it to explain how the vision actually reflects the main values of the educational system.With regard to policy makers, the ministry of education and the municipality representatives, there are several steps worth taking. If the principal appointed to establish a new school is a novice, experienced persons should be appointed to mentor her/him. If an innovative school is the goal, a special budget should be allocated for vision development, either by the academic advisor as in the present case, or school principals and other facilitators as found in other studies (Fink, 1999; Meier, 1995; Pretorius et al., 2005).The third issue raised by the findings is the implications of the establishment phase on the school's life cycle. This was not the subject of the present study, but from data gathered recently, more then ten years after their creation, it was found that the new school still has its founder principal, and maintains its good reputation. In the innovative school, after ten years of major success, the principal left and the academic advisor (who accompanied the school one day a week throughout the ten years) has retired. As of 2007, the school is losing some of its innovative zeal, as found in another study (Fink, 1999). According to my findings, the explanation could be that the replacement of the main figures made the attrition of the vision possible and paved the way to the default schooling procedures, which always stands ready to take over the innovative school and turn it into just another regular one. Thus, nurturing the vision over the years is the most important lesson for innovative schools, but further study on the conditions of vision attrition is called for.Finally, the present study's findings can suggest an initial direction for transforming a regular school into innovative one. This study deals with the establishment phase, but many schools embrace innovations during their life cycle. Based on the significance of the vision that was found, I assume that the vision also plays the same crucial role of enlisting partners' legitimacy and support for introducing innovation and changes into a mature school.To sum up, The subject of school establishment merits further study to better understand the efficient ways of handling the high cost of this phase, its effect on the mature school, and the role new and innovative schools play in the sustainability and renewal of the educational system.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The paper aims to explore the stages involved in the school establishment phase and detect differences between new and innovative schools startup.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The exploratory study was conducted on the creation phase of two Israeli elementary schools: one new and one innovative. The data were collected through interviews with central figures in each school, school visits, and documentations analysis.\nFindings: - Four stages were found in the establishment phase: building construction and resource achievement, goal prioritization, staff development, and vision formulation, but these stages were found to be in reverse order in the new and innovative schools.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Although the study is limited by the specific context from which data were drawn, it offers a useful conceptual framework for the establishment process of new and innovative schools.\nPractical implications: - Implications for practice and policy include useful suggestions for the stages and order necessary in the startup of each kind of school, identification of weak spots in the process and apposite remediation, and directions for policy and decision makers.\nOriginality/value: - The study provides a conceptual framework which points to the differences in the startup phase in new and innovative schools, and suggests their different functions for the educational system.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
ICT and environmental sustainability in a changing society: The view of ecological World Systems Theory
|
[
"Green computing/Green IT",
"Socio-technical theory",
"Literature review",
"Power",
"Critical theory",
"Theory building"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Concurrent with the increasing penetration of information and communication technologies (ICTs), society is changing. The ubiquitousness of ICT in society has lead to intense debate about ethical issues. In the light of environmental concerns, such as global warming, ICT is also discussed in relation to environmental sustainability. ICT is said to account for approximately 2 per cent of the world's total CO2 emissions - in parity with the global airlines (Mingay, 2007).\n2. From Marxian critiques of ICT to ecological WST: This section is divided into three subsections. In the first one, ecological WST is discussed in relation to the Marxian critique of ICT proposed by Christian Fuchs. In the second subsection, ecological WST is discussed alongside with the critics of WST and an understanding of the potential for ecological WST is developed. In the third subsection, already existing work on WST and ICT is reviewed, while arguments for more research within this stream of research are presented.\n3. The base and superstructure of ICT and sustainability: 3.1. Superstructure: from Green Computing to Sustainable ICT\n4. Concluding discussion: In this paper we have proposed a framework of ecological WST as a way to advance critical studies of ICT, beyond the most prevalent Marxian approach, namely Fuchs work. The paper has drawn mostly on Alf Hornborg's work to construct the framework, but we have also addressed some of the critiques of WST, responding to the new conditions in a changing world, more specifically to escape state centrism and structuralism, by paying heed to regions (or \"spikes\"), and cultural discourses.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of information and communication technology (ICT) for promoting environmental sustainability in a changing society. Isolated studies exist, but few take a holistic view. Derived from a Marxian tradition, the authors propose Ecological World Systems Theory (WST) as a holistic framework to assess the environmental impact of ICT. The theory is adapted responding to theoretical critiques of absence of change, namely state-centrism and structuralism.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Theoretical study. Empirical examples derived from already published literature.\nFindings: Ecological WST focuses on the unequal distribution of environmental degradation, sees technological development as a zero-sum game rather than cornucopia and holds that technology is often seen as a fetish in today\nResearch limitations/implications: Theoretical contributions to Marxian critiques of ICT, with more environmental focus than earlier Marxian critiques, for example Fuchs' work. Develop a theoretical framework for ICT and sustainability which could be compared with works of e.g. Hilty, Patrignani and Whitehouse. The work is mostly based on existing empirical studies, which is a limitation.\nPractical implications: This theoretical framework implies that unequal environmental degradation in different parts of the world should be taken into account when assessing environmental impact, for example by means of LCA.\nSocial implications: The framework brings together questions of environmental effects of ICT and global justice.\nOriginality/value: The authors apply a rarely discussed theoretical framework to ICT and environmental sustainability. By doing this the authors suggest how the discourses and the value chain of ICT is intrinsically tied to the world system.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
News media coverage and initial public offerings in Germany: explaining flotation performance
|
[
"Initial public offering (IPO)",
"Financial markets",
"Investor relations",
"Financial reporting",
"Financial information",
"Stock markets",
"Investors"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Initial public offerings (IPOs) are exhilarating events for companies. During an IPO, the shares of a company are going to be publicly traded for the first time. This does not only cause the management of an IPO firm to tensely look forward to the stock performance on the first day of trading, going public also means a high level of uncertainty and excitement for institutional and private investors (Jang, 2007; Pollock and Rindova, 2003; Pollock et al., 2008). While institutional investors oftentimes receive first-hand information during the roadshows of IPO firms, private investors primarily fall back on information distributed through the media to estimate the prospective market value of an IPO firm (Jang, 2007; Pollock et al., 2008).\nTheoretical framework: IPOs\nData and method: Data\nResults: Diagnostics and sensitivity analyses\nDiscussion: The objective of this study was to explore the relationship between news media coverage and the performance of IPOs in Germany. In so doing, we have advanced previous research (e.g. Jang, 2007; Pollock et al., 2008) by paying particular attention to media attention, corporate sentiment, corporate information, the recency of news and its impact on IPO performances in the first days of trading. The findings give support for our main assumptions that media coverage on the day of the IPO itself, (negative) corporate sentiment, as well as particular corporate information (i.e. new product information, strategy) seems to be related to the flotation performance of German IPOs.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships of news media coverage and the performance of initial public offerings (IPOs) in Germany. The aim is to find out how media attention, media sentiment, corporate information, and recency of news are related to the flotation performance of firms that go public.\nDesign/methodology/approach: 50 IPOs that went public in Germany between January 2011 and December 2015 were investigated. In total, 3,644 German speaking articles dealing with the IPOs were manually analyzed. Hierarchical OLS regressions were performed to find out how news media variables relate with the flotation performance of German IPOs (cf. underpricing, share price percentage gain after second day of trading). It was furthermore distinguished between news media coverage six days prior to the IPO and coverage on the day of the IPO itself.\nFindings: While more media attention devoted to the IPOs on the day of their flotation might lead to a share price percentage gain after the second day of trading, negativity in the news media and information about new products and products of the IPO firm might be negatively related with their flotation performance. However, information about the strategy change of the IPO firms seems to be positively related with the underpricing of IPOs. Furthermore, news media coverage on the day of the IPO itself seems to be more influential for the flotation performance with regard to negative sentiment and information about new products.\nPractical implications: Financial communication professionals should manage media representations of IPO firms before and on the day of the IPO itself. In this vein, negative media coverage should be prevented and information about new products and products of the IPO firm should be considered with caution. Instead, talking about the strategy of the IPO firm might be advantageous for the flotation performance.\nOriginality/value: This study evolved from a lack of empirical research on the interrelationships between news media and stock market prices in communication science, particularly with regard to IPOs. The study contributes to previous research in paying attention to corporate information and the recency of news when trying to explain IPO performances. The findings of this study provide implications for strategic financial communication and the role of managing news media of firms that go public.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Survey on Shari'ah non-compliant events in Islamic banks in the practice of tawarruq financing in Malaysia
|
[
"Tawarruq",
"Islamic banks",
"SNC events",
"Malaysia"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Tawarruq, commonly known as commodity murabahah, is a financial instrument that has facilitated the launch of unprecedented and sophisticated Islamic commercial products, ranging from deposit and financing instruments to liquidity management and debt restructuring, structuring of sovereign and corporate sukuk (Islamic investment certificates), risk management and hedging instruments. It has gained full acceptance from industry players because of its built-in features and characteristics that can deliver a similar economic outcome to those of conventional products.\nLiterature review: The review of literature in this study is divided into two parts. The first part discusses the concept and application of tawarruq in IBs, while the second part highlights the previous studies on SNC issues in the modern practice of tawarruq.\nResearch methodology: The present study adopts a qualitative research methodology, combining both survey and content analysis. Accordingly, a structured questionnaire was prepared to collect the primary data on SNC phenomena in IBs in the practice of tawarruq financing in Malaysia. Questionnaire survey refers to \"a pre-formulated written set of questions to which respondents record their answers, usually within rather closely defined alternatives\" (Sekaran, 2003, p. 142).\nFindings and analysis: This part is the core of the paper, being devoted to presenting the survey findings on SNC events in IBs in the practice of tawarruq financing in Malaysia.\nConclusion: The study presented the survey findings on the application of tawaruq financing in IBs in Malaysia and its common forms of potential SNC incidents which may emerge in the use of the tawarruq concept in financing products. It is not, however, an exhaustive list. Other potential events may not be captured in the survey.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Tawarruq (Islamic commodity financing) has evolved as the most ubiquitous concept in Malaysia's Islamic banking industry. Nevertheless, the extensive use of tawarruq has invoked a number of Shari'ah (Islamic law) concerns in its practice. This study aims to investigate the Shari'ah non-compliant (SNC) phenomena in the practice of tawarruq financing in Malaysia.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study adopts qualitative research methodology, combining both descriptive and content analysis. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to 16 Malaysian Islamic commercial banks to unveil the Shari'ah non-compliance issues in the application of tawarruq in Islamic banks (IBs) in Malaysia.\nFindings: The study found that some practices of tawarruq in Malaysia might not comply with the Shari'ah, mainly due to the improper sequencing of contracts. The study also discovered that IBs adopt different approaches in dealing with SNC events and the income derived therefrom. Finally, the study noted the influence of board of director/management on certain Shari'ah decisions particularly on the treatment of non-halal (impermissible) income.\nPractical implications: The findings of the study serve as a reference to industry players and regulators in formulating a Shari'ah non-compliance risk management framework for tawarruq practices.\nOriginality/value: The survey on SNC issues in tawarruq practice constitutes the first of its kind in the existing literature.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Evolution and implementation of quality management practices in the manufacturing sector in Eastern Europe after the end of communism: The case of Bulgaria
|
[
"Quality management",
"Transition economies",
"Bulgarian manufacturing sector",
"Evolution of quality management",
"Management Sovieticus"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Since early days, product quality has been detrimental to trade and income, and in the case of emerging economies, it was and still is the very core of competitiveness (Pooley and Welsh, 1994; Matei and Lazar, 2011). Yet, product quality cannot be taken for granted, and as a factor of competitiveness, it has a number of prerequisites, one of them being the presence of effective quality management practices (i.e. total quality management (TQM), Kaizen, and Six Sigma). Those, who are aware of Japan's unprecedented success in product quality, know that it was the Americans and their knowledge of statistical control that led to the foundation of the ultimate quality management philosophy - TQM. However, if we assume even if for a second that the Japanese were lucky as Dankbaar (1993) claimed (*something that we certainly disagree with), then what we are interested in is the following: \"how have the former communist countries and Bulgaria in particular managed to embrace and in certain cases, readapt these new, successful quality management ideas, which preach the total opposite of what the Soviet idea brought in with reference to product quality and manufacturing?\"\n2. Literature review: Little, not to say incremental, research on the quality initiatives in Eastern Europe (*except for Russia) has been conducted so far. It is interesting to note that during the 1990s of the last century, the research works on the topic of quality management in Eastern Europe's manufacturing sector was more prevalent than it has been for the last ten years or so. Of course, Russia has been in the limelight since the capitulation of the USSR, but this must not surprise us, for Russia's domestic market size, educated labor force, and abundance of natural resources make the country a key player in the world economy (Spenner and Jones, 1998).\n3. Research methods: This paper relies mainly on qualitative research methods. For the purpose of this writing, we have used a plethora of secondary data including an array of articles from scholarly journals, books, and conference proceedings. Further, our primary investigation combines five in-depth, semi-structured interviews and one case study in the form of plant visit and observations. The interviews addressed members of government agencies and non-profit organizations, Bulgarian professors of quality management from notable academic institutions, and last but not least, individuals employed in Bulgaria's manufacturing sector. The semi-structured interviews and case study took place between February and October 2013.\n4. Reliability and validity: Previous studies in the region including Russia (Pooley and Welsh, 1994) have indicated a major problem with collecting primary data in terms of gaining access to managers, for which a main reason was the unfamiliarity with foreigners conducting research. Up until the end of communism and shortly after the collapse of the USSR, very few researchers studied Soviet management practices. For instances, Pooley and Welsh (1994) claim that the first ever field work by US scientists at a Soviet industrial site was conducted in 1990.\n5. Findings: Based on our primary and secondary investigation, we have grouped our findings in a number of categories that have had a profound effect on the evolution and implementation of quality management practices in Bulgaria: starting with the political and economic changes in Bulgaria after 1989; the influence of the preparations for and the EU membership; the technological advancement after 1989; the quality of education; and finally, the degree of acceptance of new QM ideologies.\n6. Conclusion: This paper analyzed the evolution of the quality movement in Bulgaria - a former communist state, which underwent a great number of changes throughout the last two decades. Hence, based on an extensive review of literature, five in-depth, semi-structured interviews and a single case study, we as researchers tried to elaborate on the changes in Bulgaria's manufacturing sector from a quality management perspective. In essence, our work revealed the following.\n7. Discussions: 7.1. The challenge\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to answer the following three questions: what influence has the centrally planned economy and Soviet-style manufacturing had on the evolution and implementation of quality management practices in Bulgaria's manufacturing sector since the end of the communism; have Bulgaria and its businesses been able to embrace modern quality management philosophies such as TQM, which at times preach the exact opposite philosophies of the Soviet-style manufacturing; and if so, how advanced is the quality mindset of Bulgarian manufacturing businesses today - 24 years after the end of communism?\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper relies mainly on qualitative research methods. The authors have opted for exploratory approach. Besides an array of articles from scholarly journals, books, and conference proceedings, the authors have relied on five in-depth, semi-structured interviews and one case study in the form of plant visit and observations. The authors have used a framed analytical approach for interpreting the empirical data.\nFindings: The paper argues that the slow and painful transition from a centrally planned to market economy has impeded the evolution and implementation of QM practices in Bulgaria. More precisely, haphazard reforms in education, lack of highly qualified individuals due to the brain drain in the early 1990s, and the workers' strong resistance to change have been among the main obstacles in the case of the quality movement.\nResearch limitations/implications: The work presented in this paper is just the beginning of a series of studies on the quality management initiatives in Bulgaria. To go deeper into the topic, the authors realize that further research in a number of different directions is required. The first direction is related to the degree of relevance of Management Sovieticus in the twenty-first century, which somehow has been completely neglected as a research topic in the last decade. The second direction lies in the aspect of the attributes of Bulgarian managers and their perception toward the importance of the role of quality today.\nPractical implications: Countries with similar, political, economic, and social backgrounds - former Eastern Bloc members - can profit a great deal from the authors' work. More than 20 years since the end of communism, both researchers and entrepreneurs, especially those from the West, have been neglecting the legacy of the centrally planned economy, which has been a major reason for the great number of business failures in the region. The authors' work seeks to awaken those who still believe that two decades are sufficient to eradicate fully the unfortunate legacy of the command economy.\nOriginality/value: Little, not to say incremental, research on the quality initiatives in Eastern Europe (*except for Russia) has been conducted so far. As to Bulgaria, the investigation reveals no significant studies on quality management, especially ones published in English. Hence, the authors' work is the first international study on the evolution and implementation of QM practices in Bulgaria.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Adaptive prediction model for effective electrical machine maintenance
|
[
"Rotating machines",
"Forecasting",
"Statistic model",
"Predictive maintenance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Predictive maintenance employed in industries is focused to detect the problems of the systems ahead to the occurrence of failures through data prediction so as to take corrective measures for prolonged life through prevention of unexpected process failures. The condition monitoring and predictive maintenance techniques, which entail continuous acquisition of physical and operational parameters and application of analysis techniques, have significant impacts in bringing out reliable machine maintenance in the industries. The information of the machine condition interpreted from the analysis is used to reduce the downtime and improve its performance. The predictive analysis applied for machine condition monitoring leads to assertive decision making in automation and control of processes in industrial applications and effective machine maintenance, which rely primarily on prediction accuracy. The prediction and analytics models in combination with data mining have high influence on the forecast of variables significant for preemptive and profitable enterprise decisions. NASA (2000) has listed the widely adopted predictive maintenance techniques such as vibration monitoring and analysis, motor current signature analysis, etc., for inferring the overall status of the system. In the proposed work, deriving an effective prediction model for univariate machine data of dynamic nature has been primarily focused since the precision in prediction enhances the probability of identifying the failures and deterioration and hence maximizes the performance.\n2. Literature review: Predictive analytics encompasses the techniques of statistical modeling, optimization, machine learning and data mining which are relevant to the nature of the application and allow us to apply appropriate algorithms based on the available data to develop models for predicting the target attributes more accurately. Various hybrid models based on time series, mathematical transforms and artificial intelligence with supervised or unsupervised learning have been cited in literature for predictive modeling.\n3. Proposed prediction model: A generalized short-term prediction model using time series analysis with additive trend and cascaded adaptive filter, which encompasses significant prediction factors for optimum online prediction of the machine variables, has been proposed. In this work, development of a reliable prediction model that gives more accuracy and suits the practical conditions has been instigated for non-stationary data of three-phase induction motor. The proposed data prediction model shown in Figure 1 converts the non-stationary data into stationary data through the process of data detrending.\n4. Experimental setup and modeling procedure: The layout of experimental setup shown in Figure 2 consists of a PI controller, three-phase AC drive, three-phase squirrel cage induction motor and a data acquisition system (CompactRIO - cRIO9068) operating in a closed loop. The reference speed of the induction motor has been set as a continuously varying pattern (as given in the pseudocode shown in Figure 3) by generating analog reference voltage of 4-10 V through analog output module NI9263 connected to cRIO9068. The PI controller compares the set point with actual motor speed and generates control output that acts on the AC drive to achieve the speed as specified by the set point. The PowerFlex70 AC drive takes the speed reference as control input and actuates the induction motor by generating variable voltage and frequency corresponding to the PI controller output. The speed developed by the motor in response to the stimulus signal of the controller set point is measured by acquiring the speed feedback reference value from the AC drive through universal analog input module NI9219 interfaced with cRIO9068. The values of speed references generated as controller set points, the corresponding values of speed developed by the induction motor and output of the PI controller are logged in real-time controller of cRIO9068 and plots of all the specified variables are given in Figure 4.\n5. Time series prediction of machine data: To develop the time series of machine data, ARMA(L,N) model has been constructed with the values of the machine physical variables, speed and controller set point (X)k with respect to time sequence k, as represented by the equation below. The auto-regression model coefficients up to the order L, i.e., r1 to rL are computed using various AR methods, namely Yule-Walker, Burg-Lattice, least-squares and forward backward. The MA model coefficients of order N, th1 to thN are calculated using Yule-Walker method:(1)\n6. Application of adaptive filter for identification of adaptive component: An adaptive filter iteratively computes the filter coefficients to obtain the relationship between the input and output digital sequences, either as FIR/infinite impulse response in case of linear systems or Volterra/bilinear filters with respect to non-linear systems. The filter uses adaptive algorithms to adjust its coefficients as per the system configuration (Douglas, 1999). In the proposed prediction model, an adaptive filter structure has been used to identify the adaptive component that minimizes the prediction error and improves accuracy in prediction. The filter uses the time series predicted values, X(n) and actual data, D(n) to identify the adaptive component of the prediction model as shown in Figure 9. The adaptive component that is identified and cascaded with time series prediction includes the unincorporated data characteristics and subsides the factors causing modeling error, thus yielding higher accuracy.\n7. Comparative study with linear adaptive filter prediction technique: The adaptive filter shown in Figure 12 estimates the future values of the signal X(n) from the actual and delayed set of samples of X(n). The filter performs AR model estimation by iterative adjustment of its coefficients in online mode based on the Error(n).\n8. Conclusion: The optimal design of prediction model persuades to effective predictive maintenance of electrical machines. The advanced data analysis techniques emerging with new algorithms affirm data-driven modeling of physical and operational variables and ease the process of machine condition monitoring. A prediction model for non-stationary machine data has been built using the combination of trend and time series closely matching to the data nature along with an adaptive filter in cascade to make the prediction of machine variables at subsequent intervals with high accuracy. The performance of the prediction model is tested on a real-time non-stationary speed reference fed to a PI controller and actual speed acquired from the three-phase induction motor using cRIO9068. The comparative analysis of the developed prediction model with that of linear adaptive filter prediction shows the outperforming attribute of the developed model in making accurate prediction of non-stationary univariate machine data. This model articulates on the interpretation of machine conditions from dynamic machine data through decomposition of data components. The proposed machine data prediction model is capable of making machine failure prognosis at three independent levels namely trend, linear response and dynamic variations. Hence, evolution of machine failures and their severity will be distinctly evident. The prediction of dynamic variables and identification of variations in discrete components will facilitate in making appropriate predictive maintenance decisions that offer an enhanced process coordination and fault tolerance in industrial environment.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to propose an optimal predictive model for the short-term forecast of real-time non-stationary machine variables by combining time series prediction with adaptive algorithms to minimize the error and to improve the prediction accuracy.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The proposed model is applied for prediction of speed and controller set point of three-phase induction motor operating on closed loop speed control with AC drive and PI controller. At Stage 1, the trend of the machine variables has been extracted and added to auto-regressive moving average (ARMA) time series prediction. ARMA prediction has been carried out using different combinations of AR and MA methods in order to make prediction with less Mean Squared Error (MSE).\nFindings: The prediction error indicates the inadequacy of the model to estimate the data characteristics, which has been resolved at the subsequent stage by cascading an adaptive least mean square finite impulse response filter to the time series model. The adaptive filter receives the predicted output including training data and iteratively adjusts its coefficients for zero error convergence.\nResearch limitations/implications: The componentized data prediction based on time series and cascade adaptive filter algorithm decomposes the non-stationary data characteristics for predictive maintenance. Evaluation of the model with different combination of time series algorithms and parameter settings of adaptive filter has been carried out to illustrate the performance of the prediction model. This prediction accuracy is compared with existing linear adaptive filter prediction using MSE as comparison index. The wide margin in the MSE values substantiates the prediction efficiency of the proposed model for machine data.\nOriginality/value: This model predicts the dynamic machine data with component decomposition at high accuracy, which enables to interpret the system response under dynamic conditions efficiently.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Project-management training earns AMEC international quality kitemark: ... and helps to ensure consistent service to clients across the globe
|
[
"Project management",
"Training",
"Customer service",
"Value analysis"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Training is helping to ensure that a 29,000-employee multinational engineering, project-management and consultancy firm provides a consistent service to its clients, wherever they are in the world.\nFinancially sustainable development programs: Working with the AMEC Academy, project-management consultancy and training company 20|20 supported AMEC with the design and delivery of a range of financially sustainable development programs for project managers, project-control specialists and engineering managers across three continents.\nFeedback has been extremely positive: More than 300 project managers have so far completed the AMEC project-management professional-development program.\nOrganizational project-management maturity key to achieving business goals: Ensuring that project managers have the right technical skills is one part of ensuring successful projects. It is also essential to ensure that the organization they are working in is mature enough to support them in achieving successful project outcomes. One way to ensure this is to undertake organization-wide accreditation with the Association of Project Management (APM). This was the route taken by nuclear-energy company Magnox. In doing so, it was able to emphasize the importance of project management for achieving organizational objectives.\nTechnical and behavioral competency feedback assessments: At the individual level, the company developed technical and behavioral competency feedback assessments for its community of project managers, to identify how well they scored for capabilities. These were then mapped to correspond with the 47 technical, behavioral and contextual competence elements specified by the APM. This was combined with company-wide reviews to measure the extent to which projects were being delivered in an innovative and efficient way.\nFinancial impact of good project management: This demonstrates the financial impact good project management has in an organization and the importance of organizational maturity and support. \"The whole ethos of Magnox is enveloped by professionalism, integrity and accountability,\" said Peter Allen. \"We highly value the importance of professional accreditation by the APM and will continue to support our staff to undertake APM qualifications at the highest levels.\"\n",
"role": "user"
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{
"content": "Purpose: Highlights the benefits of project-management training at two organizations - AMEC the multinational engineering, project-management and consultancy firm, and nuclear-energy company Magnox.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Considers the reasons for training at the two organizations, the form it takes and the benefits it has brought.\nFindings: Reveals that both organizations have worked closely with project-management consultancy and training company 20|20.\nPractical implications: Stresses that achieving corporate accreditation for project managers is a complex and lengthy undertaking and 20|20 guided both organizations through the process.\nOriginality/value: Observes how good project-management skills can save time and money on large and complicated projects.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Evaluation of a three-stage, community Smoke-free Homes Project
|
[
"Tobacco",
"Cigarettes",
"Personal health",
"Urban communities",
"Public health",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nBackground: The introduction of comprehensive smoke-free workplace regulations in countries across the world represents a major triumph for public health. However, it is within the home, where the bulk of our time is spent, that the health effects of exposure to secondhand smoke have the greatest impact on health (see the Appendix). Those who co-habit with smokers - particularly older people, those with respiratory problems and children - are particularly at risk. The World Health Organization estimates that half of children worldwide live with at least one smoker (BMA, 2007). Studies from the UK suggest that 40 per cent of children (around five million) live in households with at least one person smokes inside the home (BMA, 2007).Currently, 11,000 adult deaths each year are blamed on exposure to secondhand smoke (Jamrozik, 2005). The vast majority of these deaths - mainly caused by heart disease and strokes - are amongst non-smokers who live with smokers and who are over the age of 65. In addition, the Royal College of Physicians estimates that 17,000 children under the age of five years are admitted to hospital every year in the UK with illnesses resulting from exposure to secondhand smoke (Department of Health, DH, 1998). Children are particularly susceptible to adverse effects from secondhand smoke since they breathe faster, are generally more physically active than adults, and inhale more of the toxic chemicals in smoke per unit body weight than adults (see Table I). In addition, younger children are less able than adults or older children to move away from smoky areas and may therefore have longer and more intense exposure to secondhand smoke.In addition to the health consequences of secondhand smoke on children and adults, children are also affected by adult role models who smoke. Parental attitudes to smoking have been established as a major risk factor for smoking initiation, with permissive attitudes towards smoking increasing the risk (BMA, 2007). In England, 10 per cent of children who smoke regularly report that they are given cigarettes by their parents (National Statistics and NHS Information Centre, 2006). Children of parents who smoke are between two and three times more likely to smoke than those who come from non-smoking homes (Farkas et al., 2000).Exposure to secondhand smoke in the home is therefore a major public health risk to both children and adults and is perpetuating tobacco use from generation to generation.Quitting smoking is the single most important thing an individual can do to improve their health (Department of Health, 2008). At a population level, effectively tackling smoking in our deprived communities is the single most important thing that can be done to reduce health inequalities (Jarvis and Wardle, 2005). However, health professionals have traditionally found smokers from deprived areas harder to engage with and smoking prevalence has fallen slowest in the most deprived groups. Research has shown that smoking restrictions in the home can lead to an increase in quit attempts (Borland et al., 2006).\nSmoking in Salford: The burden of smoking on Salford's health\nMethods: The intervention\nResults: Promises made\nDiscussion: Main findings of this study\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to review the effectiveness of a Smoke-free Homes Project in a deprived area, Salford, in the UK. The project aimed to reduce exposure to secondhand smoke within the home, chiefly amongst households with resident smokers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Local people from ten deprived communities were recruited as Smoke-free Advisors, raising awareness of the dangers of secondhand smoke and \"rewarding\" participants for making one of three smoke-free promises, ranging from keeping their home smoke-free (gold promise) to not smoking around children.\nFindings: - In nine months, the project more than doubled its original target of 1,440 smoke-free households, achieving 3,261 smoke-free promises. Three-quarters of these were the full, \"gold\" promise. At follow up, 98 per cent claimed they had kept to their promise, with 72 per cent describing this as \"fairly easy\" or \"very easy\". Most common reasons given for signing up were children's health or meeting a Smoke-free Advisor. The target for 50 per cent of promises to come from households with at least one smoker was narrowly missed: 47 per cent was achieved. Although not directly targeting cessation, 81 per cent of smokers reported changes to their smoking habit: one-quarter quitting, 14 per cent trying unsuccessfully, and 42 per cent cutting down.\nPractical implications: - Smoke-free Homes Projects have much to contribute in terms of denormalising smoking in deprived areas.\nOriginality/value: - Despite their popularity, Smoke-free Homes Projects have rarely been evaluated for effectiveness. This project demonstrated that a three-stage model using local people can reduce exposure to secondhand smoke, alongside smoking itself, in areas where smoking is often seen as \"the norm\".\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Nourish what you own: psychological ownership, materialism and pro-environmental behavioral intentions
|
[
"Materialism",
"Psychological ownership",
"Environmentally friendly products",
"Recycling intentions"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Psychological ownership, defined as \"a state in which individuals feel as though the target of ownership (or a piece of that target) is theirs (i.e. it is 'MINE')\" (Pierce et al., 2003, p. 86), has received increased attention from consumer researchers recently (Brasel and Gips, 2014; Fuchs et al., 2010; Jussila et al., 2015; Shu and Peck, 2011). An important part of this increased interest is because of the observation that many important effects related to consumption and organizational environments are based on psychological rather than legal or factual ownership (Pierce et al., 2001; Reb and Connolly, 2007). For example, employees may develop a sense of ownership for their organization even though they do not have any equity in it (Van Dyne and Pierce, 2004), and consumers may experience feelings of ownership for a consumption object even before a purchase occurs (Peck et al., 2013). Further, in an area of post-ownership where sharing may become more important than owning (Belk, 2014; Hwang and Griffiths, 2017), it is psychological ownership, rather than legal ownership, that gains relevance for tangible and intangible goods, such as shared cars and streamed music (Lamberton and Rose, 2012; Sinclair and Tinson, 2017).\nTheoretical framework: Psychological ownership: essence, boundary conditions and motivators\nMethodology: Sample\nFindings: To test H1 and H2, we inspected the correlations between the two types of pro-environmental intentions (recycling intentions and intention to buy green products) and the two types of psychological ownership for the planet (my vs our). Table II shows that psychological ownership for my planet is positively related to recycling intentions (r = 0.317, p < 0.001) and intentions to buy green products (r = 0.224, p < 0.01). Thus, H1a and H1b are supported by the data. In support of H2a and H2b, psychological ownership for our planet is positively related to recycling intentions (r = 0.217, p < 0.01) and intentions to buy green products (r = 0.288, p < 0.001). As can be seen from Table II, no clear pattern emerged for the relationships between the three dimensions of materialism and intentions to recycle/purchase green products. Whereas the happiness dimension of materialism is positively related to purchase intentions for green products (r = 0.133, p < 0.05), success and centrality are not (ns). Similarly, whereas the success dimension of materialism is positively related to recycling intentions (r = 0.128, p < 0.05), centrality and happiness are not (ns). Thus, H3a and H3b are not supported by the data. However, it is important to note for the subsequent mediation analyses that, opposing the original conceptualization of mediation effects suggested by Baron and Kenny (1986), a statistically significant main effect of the independent on the dependent variable is not a necessary condition for mediation to occur (Zhao et al., 2010; Hayes, 2013). In support of H4a and H4b, all three dimensions of materialism are related to psychological ownership for my planet (success: r = 0.214, p < 0.01; centrality: r = 0.186, p < 0.01; happiness: r = 0.184, p < 0.01), but not to psychological ownership for our planet (ns).\nDiscussion and conclusion: Theoretical implications\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Researchers have become increasingly interested in the construct of psychological ownership in recent years. The purpose of this paper is to extend the target of psychological ownership to planet Earth as a whole and investigate its relationship with materialism and pro-environmental behavioral intentions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper is based on a survey with 236 college students from a public university in the Southeast of the USA. The model fit from a confirmatory factor analysis is very satisfactory. Mediation of psychological ownership for the planet is formally tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) and Hayes' (2013) macro for SPSS.\nFindings: The findings of this paper support the expectation that both the individual (my planet) and the collective-oriented dimensions (our planet) of individual-level psychological ownership are positively related to recycling intentions and the intention to purchase green products. Further, formal mediation tests show that psychological ownership for my planet, but not for our planet, mediates the relationship between material values and pro-environmental behaviors.\nPractical implications: Companies that aim to gain competitive advantage through green citizenship can highlight the individual or shared ownership of the planet to align the political agenda of government officials with their company mission, vision and brand positioning.\nOriginality/value: The current paper contributes to the emerging body of literature on psychological ownership by extending its target to planet Earth as a whole. It is the first paper to explain the previously observed negative relationship between materialism and pro-environmental behaviors through the mechanism of psychological ownership.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
ANRT Lille: the French national centre for the reproduction of PhD theses
|
[
"PhD theses",
"Microform",
"Digitizing",
"Print‐on‐demand",
"Document supply",
"Scientific and technical information",
"France",
"Information management"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The ANRT[1] Lille is one of those institutions that are more or less unknown to the wider public and even to LIS professionals. A small structure (less than 20 employees), for over 40 years the ANRT has played a significant role in the back office of the French network for the dissemination and preservation of PhD theses. Today, the development of electronic theses and dissertations (ETD) and open access is challenging the future of the ANRT. It is time to review how the ANRT is working and develop some options for the future.\nA national mandate: The history of the ANRT started when the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research decided on the creation of a national network for the dissemination and preservation of PhD theses (Vitoux, 1984). The idea was simple[2].On each of the French academic campuses, a local service was created for the handling of their PhD theses. After validation, one copy of the original print was sent to a national structure that reproduced it on microform. Based on the registration form, different information services produced the bibliographic record for a national database of PhD theses. From 2001 on, the local academic libraries created their records themselves directly in the national union catalogue called SUDOC[3].For nearly 20 years this infrastructure guaranteed the deposit of PhD theses, facilitated their identification and availability and moved the format of preservation and dissemination from print (offset) to microfiche (for more details, see Paillassard (et al., 2007)).The national structure that reproduced the print copy on microform was called ANRT. Initially, the ANRT was created on two sites, in Lille for social sciences and humanities, economics and law and in Grenoble for sciences, medicine and technology but the activity of the Grenoble facility was later transferred to Lille. One of the models of the ANRT at that time was the UMI (now ProQuest) and their contribution to the dissemination of PhD theses from American universities (Power, 1946).The national mandate of the ANRT was defined as \"production, dissemination, and archiving of French PhD theses from all disciplines\". To fulfil this mandate, the ANRT is funded by the government. Yet, this funding does not cover all related expenditures; the difference is assured/provided for by revenues from other sources. Human resources (16 employees) and budget are managed by the Lille 3 administration.Reproducing the print copy on microform means that the ANRT prints an original microfiche on silver halide film for conservation, which is then duplicated on diazo-sensitised microfiches. The number of diazo copies depends on the discipline and varies between 50 and 80. The ANRT disseminates these copies each month to the French network of academic libraries for local preservation, consultation, and interlibrary loan and to other institutions on demand. This service is run upstream from the French academic interlibrary loan network.The ANRT maintains an online catalogue with more than 200,000 PhD theses that academic or other research institutions can order in print format or on microfiche. All these theses are preserved on microfiche on the ANRT site (see Figure 1).For more than ten years, the ANRT has transformed the former microform workflow into a modern digital production chain where all print copies are digitized and where microfiches are produced from the digital files (PDF format). So far, this computer-output-microform (COM) workflow has produced more than 70,000 digital files in TIFF format and partly in PDF (for the print-on-demand (POD) service, see below) that are safeguarded on an ANRT server.\nPOD: Complementary to this national mandate, the ANRT runs a POD service for PhD theses called \"Theses a la carte\". ANRT customers can order print copies from an online catalogue that contains more than 7,200 titles. \"Theses a la carte\" allows for the dissemination of validated versions of a limited number of French PhD theses in a book format.This service is based on bilateral and non-exclusive agreements with the authors (not with the institutions). In fact, the ANRT pre-selects interesting titles and contacts their authors with a licensing proposal. This means that the POD service does not concern all theses. The pricing depends on the number of pages and other features such as colour illustrations and covers the production-induced overheads.During the period 2003-2012, the ANRT sold more than 53,000 POD items to customers from all around the world (Figure 2).Nearly half of the customers are scientific and academic bookstores in France and other countries, another third are university libraries and institutes mainly from North America and Asia. This activity is independent of interlibrary loan and document delivery.\nDigitising and other services: The ANRT equipment includes microfiche, open book, and rapid scanners. This technical potential enables the ANRT to operate in other digitization projects. These projects are local which means that the ANRT partners are laboratories or libraries from the Lille universities.In particular, the ANRT digitized several millions of pages of scientific heritage collections and older dissertations. This was done for instance, for the NordNum website on local history[4] run by the Lille 3 research laboratory on history[5] and for the IRIS repository on history of science and technology[6] run by the academic library of the scientific campus Lille 1.Always on demand, the ANRT helps local PhD students to prepare their copies for the commission and prints copies from microfiches for the authors and/or their institutions (\"micro-publishing\").\nThe emerging ETD environment: After some years of discussion and experimentation, the French government launched a new infrastructure for the processing, dissemination and preservation of electronic theses and dissertations (ETD) in 2006. This infrastructure called STAR[7] allows universities to upload their ETD together with standard metadata. The digital file is archived on a central server at the French national Higher Education computation centre[8] and the metadata are transferred to the national union catalogue SUDOC and the portal Theses.fr.The main objective of the national infrastructure is long-term archiving and metadata handling. The choice as to how to disseminate the ETD is left with the local university. The university can decide to upload its ETD on a local server, for instance an institutional repository, on the national server of the STAR infrastructure, or on another site. In any case, STAR will handle the permanent link to the document. Together with the metadata, this link will provide access to the full-text via the ETD portal Theses.fr (see also Colas, 2009).More and more universities are moving to the new infrastructure. For the ANRT this means that the number of print PhD theses is steadily decreasing. And even regarding the remaining print copies, a recent survey on dissemination showed that the universities would prefer PDF files to microfiches. What is the future of the ANRT in this emerging ETD environment?Actually, the ANRT explores three options:1. Retro-digitization of the microfiche collection. Universities started locally and often without coordination to retro-digitize their own holdings of print PhD theses, most often in order to add the digital files to their institutional repositories. Retro-digitizing the microfiche collection could have three benefits/advantages; it would be faster and less expensive than local initiatives, and it would be comprehensive, at least it has been so for the last 30 years.2. Printing microfiches from ETD. The long-term conservation of digital files is expensive and not without risk. Based on COM technology, the ANRT could maintain an inexpensive backup copy of the native digital files for the long term (100+ years) and conform to the LOCKSS[9] philosophy of risk reduction.3. POD service for ETD. For digital PhD theses that are not published elsewhere, a low-scale demand for print copies exists. Low-scale means/implies not enough to be interesting for commercial publishing. With its experience and equipment, the ANRT could run this service within the context of the public infrastructure for dissemination of ETD. Mittler and Schulz (2004), Wilson-Higgins (2011), and Geitgey (2011) discuss POD models which might serve as inspiration for the ANRT in this area.As a matter of fact and due to copyright, an increasing number of ETD are available only on the campuses but not on the web. In this case, the traditional dissemination on microform may be an acceptable solution for authors and institutions. In the pursuit of its national mandate, the ANRT could guarantee this dissemination as an alternative to prohibited or unauthorized digital access.\nOn the campus: Alongside its national mandate, the ANRT is expanding its integration on the Lille campus. This integration is connected to both education and research:* Education. The ANRT already assists Lille PhD students during the preparation and submission of their dissertation. Since 2010, the site has also been organising internships for BA and Master's students in subjects such as auditing, marketing, and image processing. Actually, the purpose of the ANRT is to become a technical support for new BA and Master programs in digital humanities, summer schools, etc.* Research. The ANRT is developing a modular research program on the development of ETD as a specific case of academic publishing in change. This research program is a combination of service activities (best practices) and joint research on business models, legal environment, enhanced content, and scientometrics.The ANRT is also contributing to a new publishing strategy on the Lille campus that will integrate its institutional repository publishing, university press publishing, and labelled support to the laboratories' journals and monographs.\nValue proposal for foreign customers: What service can the ANRT offer to customers abroad? First of all, the ANRT offers one of the richest collections of recent French PhD theses, especially in social sciences and humanities. Foreign customers generally ask for two services: they order books via the POD service \"Theses a la Carte\", and they ask for microfiche copies. Sometimes these orders (POD and microfiches) reflect an acquisition policy of collection building (research libraries, information centres). In other cases (only POD), the ANRT customers are intermediaries such as bookstores serving their own clients. Both cases are in line with the ANRT mandate, which is to contribute to the dissemination of French PhD theses and in particular, to disseminate theses on microfiches to higher education and research institutions.What do customers appreciate? The ANRT conducted a survey in 2012. The customers - often regular and long-term customers - are globally satisfied with the quality of the ANRT service, more with customization, product quality, and personal contact than with pricing and delay. This means that the ANRT can make some progress in the future, even if serving the international communities will remain a marginal activity, adjacent and complementary to its national mandate.\nConclusion: The national mandate of the French ANRT is closely related to the infrastructure of print PhD theses. This infrastructure will gradually disappear in favour of the emerging infrastructure of ETD. Will the ANRT disappear with this fading landscape? Not necessarily.On the one hand, someone has to maintain the microform archive and exploit it for the academic communities. This collection is unique in France, and it is not hidden but available for institutions as a kind of special document supply service, related to but outside (upstream) of the national interlibrary loan network.On the other hand, the ANRT developed complementary services, such as POD and digitization of print material, images and so on that can survive without dissemination of microfiches.Also, there may be a future for microfiche printing even alongside with digital dissemination and archiving of theses, not as an alternative but as a complement. For the preparation of this future, other studies and projects, such as the JISC-funded Digital Curation Centre, and exchange with other national and international stakeholders with experience in microform printing (ProQuest and so on) is important.And hopefully there may be a future on the Lille campus, integrated as a technical support in education, research, and academic publishing.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to describe the ANRT, its purpose and activity in the French national network for the dissemination and preservation of PhD theses.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper includes a historical study and an evaluation of current activities and future perspectives.\nFindings: - The ANRT has played a significant role in the back-office of the French network for the dissemination and preservation of PhD theses for over 40 years. Its online catalogue contains more than 200,000 PhD theses that academic or other research institutions can order in print format or on microfiche. Complementary to this national mandate, the ANRT runs a print-on-demand service for more than 7,200 PhD theses called \"Theses a la carte\". Today, the development of electronic theses and dissertations (ETD) and open access is challenging the future of the ANRT.\nOriginality/value: - The ANRT Lille is one of those institutions that are more or less unknown to the wider public and even to LIS professionals. This paper presents it for the first time to a larger and international readership.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Knowledge mapping of office workspace: a scientometric review of studies
|
[
"Organization",
"Management",
"Office",
"CiteSpace",
"Scientometric",
"Workspaces"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The efficient use of office workspace resources is critical in the modern competitive business era. The duo of technological advancement and globalization have not only enhanced the expansion of business sectors but also they have brought significant changes to office space usage patterns. These two influential drivers have brought about changes to the organizational structure of corporate offices (Cattell, 2002; Harris, 2015) through new working practices (NWPs) such as teleworking, team-work, hot-desking and flextime (Haynes et al., 2009; Rabianski and Gibler, 2007). Laing et al. (2011) posited that using twentieth-century spaces to do twenty-first-century knowledge work will result in productivity losses and higher capital expenses. A significant change to the office workplace and space usage has been noticed over the past two decades (Harris, 2015). Recent research revealed that some technology-driven NWPs do exert an increasing impact on office workspace management by altering the way in which firms use space - e.g. more communal space rather than territorial offices (De Been and Beijer, 2014; Dixon et al., 2003; Harris, 2015; Miller, 2014). Such new ways of working have become increasingly a common strategy to manage expensive real estate around the world (De Bruyne and Beijer, 2015). There is a growing interest in workspace design (De Paoli et al., 2017), which can be linked to the contemporary approach to organizing office workspace that started to evolve in the late 1980s (Strati, 2017).\nStudies on office space management: The concept of office workspace was almost not in existence in medieval eras, as most people worked from home, but it changed in the seventeenth century when professionals began to work from offices in places such as Amsterdam, London and Paris. Hence, a clear distinction between the office as a workplace, and the home, as a place of comfort, privacy and intimacy emerged (Rybczynski, 1986). The office is more than just a place, rather a strategic resource that enables and sustains organizations to achieve competitive advantage and maintain operational efficiency (Khamkanya et al., 2012). The efficient use of resources, especially space, is crucial as business organizations use space to enhance their profitability (Hills and Levy, 2014). However, organizational workspace is continuously evolving and transforming even as the business itself is changing. The origin of the modern office could be traced back to the middle of the nineteenth century. As a result of the industrial revolution, it triggered a significant increase in information-related problems demanding measures of control (Bradley, 2007). As businesses feel the pressure to sustain in the market, strategies such as new work practices emerged, in which workplace managers changed their role from reactive traditional focus to strategic and proactive space management (McGregor, 2000b).\nMethodology: This study adopts a descriptive research approach of scientometric analysis to explore the quantity, characteristics and productivity of global research publications in the field of an office workspace. The descriptive scientometric approach was used as it is capable of comprehensively engage and explore the totality of intellectual core of a scientific domain instead of focusing on its individual outputs (Sidorova et al., 2008). A visualization software (CiteSpace) was used to visualize the output of the results of the analysis.\nResults of analysis: Analysis of core strength\nAuthor co-citation network: For the authors' co-citations analysis, CiteSpace generated a network of office workspace publications (Figure 5). The authors with the highest co-citation count were Nourse HO (58 citations) and Becker F (58 citations), followed by Gibson V (53 citations), Duffy F (53 citations) and Haynes BP (43 citations). The top 10 co-cited authors related to office workspace, based on betweenness centrality, are presented in Table IV .\nDiscussion: Core subject areas, countries and institutions (strengths)\nImplication of the study for the built environment profession: While this study focused on office workspace management, the findings hold useful implications for the built environment in general and facility management in particular, being a sector that encompasses multiple disciplines involving building, office assets, people, processes and technology, which enable effective functionality of the built facilities (Aishah Kamarazaly et al., 2013). The fundamental role of a Facility Manager involves maintaining, improving and adapting built infrastructure to enable the organizations to sustain their core activities. There is a global change in business operations that are influencing corporate real estate requirements, thereby generating spatial issues. Although many organizations have attempted to manage their workspace, their achievements seem low especially in the areas of cost reduction and user's satisfaction (Lah et al., 2012). To address the workspace issues in the organizations world over, professionals within the built environment must embrace innovativeness to achieve efficient workplaces (Lindahl, 2004). Moreover, issues that are paramount to office workspace and demanding more attention of researchers in workspace research domain, have been revealed in this study.\nConclusion: Workspace management is more vital than ever in an increasingly diverse business organization. In the context of organizational workplace development, academic communities have been paying attention to the office workspace advancement. In this context, the authors performed a knowledge map analysis based on scientific literature obtained from the Scopus. Using 1,620 bibliographic records of published office workspace related research, the study explored subject categories, countries, institutions, author co-citations, keyword co-occurrences, journal co-citations and document co-citation networks to map and characterize the intellectual research base and hotspots of an office workspace. This study analyzed and presented comprehensive knowledge maps of office workspace research, which provide valuable insights and relevant information for potential researchers to identify research trends, potential collaborators and their locations and intellectual base and research hotspots. As commonly identified in similar studies, the authors also recognized that there are several potential limitations that may warrant caution when interpreting or generalizing the findings from this study. First, the study was not set out to review the entire population of workspace management. Hence, the results presented herewith are exclusively based on the research articles related to office workspaces that were published within the studied period. Second, the data set used in this study were mainly sourced from the Scopus database and other literature databases (e.g. WoS) were not considered. While the results may be highly credible and reliable, the use of a single database may have possibly excluded relevant studies. Besides, not all the articles obtained from Scopus were successfully converted by CitSpace for analysis. The same reason holds for the interpretation of research outcomes in this study. Hence, the unconverted references may influence the results if included in the analysis. For instance, there is a potential bias of underestimation for some countries and authors' contributions to research in this domain. More literature databases could be explored in future research. However, the limitations should not undermine the usefulness of this study as it has contributed to the existing body of knowledge significantly. The findings presented herein will be valuable to interested researchers to gain insight into the future direction of office workspace research.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Office workspace is more than a place but one of the essential resources in business organizations. In recent years, research in office workspace management has become an increasingly important scholarly focus. However, there is a dearth of bibliometric studies to date on the subject. This study aims to explore a scientometric analysis of office workspace field.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The title/abstract/keyword search method was used to extract related papers from 1990 to 2018. A total of 1,670 papers published in Scopus were obtained and subjected to scientometric data analysis techniques via CiteSpace software.\nFindings: The results revealed the active research institutions and countries, influential authors, important journals, representative references and research hotspots in this field.\nPractical implications: While this study focused on office workspace management, the findings hold useful implications for the built environment in general and facility management in particular, being a sector that encompasses multiple disciplines involving building, office assets, people, processes and technology, which enable effective functioning of the built facilities.\nOriginality/value: This is probably the most comprehensive scientometric analysis of the office workspace field ever conducted. This study adds to the so far limited knowledge in the field and provides insights for future research.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Impact of culture on religiosity, cosmopolitanism and ethnocentrism
|
[
"Country of origin",
"Cultural values",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Ethnocentrism"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: It would be impossible to develop in-depth understanding about the macro business environment without studying the social and cultural dimensions (CD). Culture and its influence on consumer behaviour is well established (Millan et al., 2013; Millan and Howard, 2007; McCracken, 1986). Study of social and CD would be incomplete without understudying religion (Mittelstaedt, 2002). Religion and religiosity are the major institutions that are included in almost all social systems. Religion provides guidelines to individuals thus directing their life paths. The word religion is derived from the Latin word called religare which means to bind back. It refers to institution with accepted communicants who assemble regularly for worship, etc. Researchers have validated the influence of religion on consumer behaviour (Mittelstaedt, 2002).\nCultural diversity in India: Though India is the second largest untapped retail market behind China (Field, 2005) still in India it seems that there has been very few research conducted to explore diversity and its impact on retail (Kumar et al., 2009). To explore India's striking market potential; companies must first understand Indian consumers' purchase behaviours (Jin and Son, 2013). However, understanding Indian consumers is not an easy task because of their diversity in languages and regional disparities. India is similar to the European Union, consisting of 35 states and union territories. India is a religiously diverse nation: the Hindu population is 80 per cent (828 million), the Muslim population is 13.5 per cent (140 million), the Christian population is 2.5 per cent (24 million), the Sikh population is 2 per cent (19 million) and other religious groups including Buddhists, and Jains make up another 19.5 million (Dalal, 2006).\nConceptual model: Part A: Impact of cultural dimension on religiosity and cosmopolitanism\nMethodology: Sample\nData analysis and interpretation: Measurement items evaluation\nManagerial implications and conclusion: The main objective of the study was to investigate the impact of culture on religiosity, cosmopolitanism, and ethnocentrism among two religious classes in India. The relationship between masculinity and religiosity was found negative. Masculine culture is more achievement oriented and sacrifices group goals for individual goals hence they do not like to conform to group norms and believes. Hence they are not religious. The relationship between masculinity to cosmopolitanism was found positive. Masculine culture is found of status purchase, they are more open to learning from other cultures and also consuming clothing materials of other cultures (Hofstede, 2001). Hence they were found to have cosmopolitan outlook.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of culture on religiosity, cosmopolitanism, and ethnocentrism on attitudes towards foreign products, among two religious classes in India.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Quantitative data analysis was employed to attain the above objective. In order to explore the existence of difference between clothing preferences between two religious classes analysis of variance (ANOVA) was employed. It was employed to analyse the difference between group means. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was employed to test the hypothesized paths. SEM was used separately for both the religious classes to explore the possibility of difference between both of them. Before testing the measurement model confirmatory factor analysis was run to test the cleanliness of the measurement items. Data were analysed in two parts A and B. In part A SEM was employed to test the hypotheses developed and in part B ANOVA was used to test the difference between group means.\nFindings: It was found that both the religious classes were significantly different from each other in their apparel preference. It was also found that the Indians were not collectivist as often labelled in a stereotypical way.\nPractical implications: The findings of this study would provide useful in-depth knowledge on Indian religious groups for both international and national marketers. The study confirmed that ignoring the diversity of an emerging market and adopting a standardized marketing strategy could prove fatal. It provides better understanding about the cultural diversity and its impact on buying imported products. Such insight should enable marketers, policy makers, and social planners to act more effectively by designing their positioning strategies accordingly.\nOriginality/value: Some unexpected differences was found in individualism and collectivism dimensions and it was also found that the inter-cultural differences between Hindus and Muslims have changed since the original Hofstede data were collected on Hindu and Muslim dominating countries.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Brand personality and brand equity: evidence from the sportswear industry
|
[
"Sportswear",
"Brand equity",
"Brand personality"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this issue.\nIntroduction: Brand management is considered useful in fully exploiting the assets of an organization and in generating additional value from the investments already made into brands (Pappu et al., 2005). Brand building can create a powerful and effective communication between marketers and consumers which brings advantages such as defending against competitors and building market share. Therefore, branding strategy, as a key element in the marketing mix, is increasingly viewed as a powerful tool to obtain sustainable competitive advantages as well as to fully utilize available resources (Wang et al., 2008; Keller, 2009).\nTheoretical development of conceptual framework: Brand personality: definition and its main dimensions\nResearch design and methodology: Measures\nData analysis and results: BPS for sportswear brands\nDiscussion and implications: Branding remains the sportswear industry's largest source of competitive advantage, and sportswear brands are dedicated to using a distinct and memorable brand identity to get customers' attention and build brand loyalty (Tong and Hawley, 2009). This study aims to explore the personalities of sportswear brands and their relationships to brand equity using Aaker's methodology. The study makes an important contribution to the understanding of brand personality and brand equity in the context of sportswear brands. It has both theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, it developed a valid and reliable scale that measures personality for sportswear products, and it confirmed that consumers do associate particular brand personality dimensions with specific brand categories (such as sportswear) and certain dimensions of brand personality have a direct impact on brand equity. Practical applications of this research also exist. Below we summarize the results and discuss the key practical implications of the results.\nLimitations and future research: This research has a number of limitations, which constitute areas for future research. First of all, the study was carried out on a convenience sample. Even if the young consumers surveyed, aged 19-30, are part of the target of sportswear brands, it would seem interesting to replicate this survey on a much more diversified sample of consumers. Then, this study only examined the impact of brand personality on overall brand equity. We think future studies should also investigate the influence of brand personality on the four dimensions of brand equity: perceived quality, brand awareness, brand association and brand loyalty (Aaker, 1991). Finally, the influence of brand personality could also vary depending on demographic variables or consumption-related variables (e.g. involvement and price sensitivity), thus this would let a company to act more specifically depending on the target.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to explore the personalities of sportswear brands and their relationship to brand equity using Aaker's methodology in the context of sportswear brands.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper used Aaker's brand personality framework to empirically investigate the personality of sportswear brands and the impact of brand personality on brand equity based on data collected from 420 college students.\nFindings: Results revealed that the personality of sportswear brands can be described in seven dimensions and 53 personality traits: competence, attractiveness, sincerity, innovation, activity, excitement and ruggedness. The study identified that four dimensions among all the seven personality dimensions, namely, competence, attractiveness, Sincerity and innovation, are the positive and significant contributing factors to the creation and enhancement of sportswear brand equity.\nOriginality/value: This study makes an important contribution to the understanding of brand personality and brand equity in the context of sportswear brands. It confirmed that consumers do associate particular brand personality dimensions with sportswear brands, and certain dimensions of brand personality have a direct impact on brand equity. The study showed that not all brand personality dimensions have the same influence in increasing the value of a sportswear brand from a consumer perspective, some dimensions being more efficient than others. The findings provide insights as to what dimensions of brand personality would deliver the best result in today's competitive sportswear market.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Institutional motivations and barriers to the construction of green buildings on campus: A case study of the University of Waterloo, Ontario
|
[
"Economic sustainability",
"Motivation (psychology)",
"Buildings",
"Universities",
"Canada"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Institutions of Higher Education (IHE) in Canada and across the world are physically expanding to meet the demands of growing student populations. The student population enrolled full-time at universities in Canada has increased by 12 percent over the past decade (CAUT, 2005). The corresponding physical expansion of campuses has considerable impact on both energy and resource consumption at IHE and adds to the rising CO2 emissions that contribute to global warming. IHE worldwide have responded to the challenge of reducing the ecological footprint of campus operations through campus sustainability advocacy, implementation strategies and research. This paper discusses the barriers and opportunities implicit in making a commitment to sustainability at IHE by investigating the initiative that perhaps represents the greatest investment and most durable commitment to sustainability, the constructions of a \"green building.\" This research utilises a case study of the current building decision-making process at the University of Waterloo (UW).\"Green building\" is a term used to describe a building that is more energy and resource efficient, releases less pollution into the air, soil and water, and is healthier for occupants than standard buildings. The construction and operation of buildings today account for one-third of Canada's energy use, consume 50 percent of natural resources and produce 25 percent of Canada's landfill waste (www.buildingsgroup.nrcan.gc.ca/aboutus/about_e.html#innovation). Green buildings have four key benefits over the design and construction of standard buildings. Firstly, environmental benefits typically comprise the primary reason for the design and construction of green buildings (Orr, 2004). Secondly, green buildings can reduce costs to the owner/occupier over the operational life-cycle of the building because of energy efficiency savings, water efficiency savings, mechanical equipment downsizing, reduced insurance and liability costs, building value and demolition and site clearing costs (Johnson, 2000; von Paumgartten, 2003). Thirdly, better indoor working environments in green buildings can increase profitability by increasing customer satisfaction, increasing worker productivity by up to 16 percent, and reducing employee absenteeism by as much as 45 percent (Heerwagen, 2000). Fourthly, the construction of green buildings provides benefits to IHE by presenting a positive image and reputation for the IHE by practically demonstrating progressive social and environmental commitments, and also advances academic literature on green buildings by providing more case studies to research (Scofield, 2002). In addition to these four benefits, in the case of IHE, green buildings can provide opportunities for students (e.g. as a learning tool, leading by example and showcasing technology) and communicate the benefits of green buildings to a wide range of users, including the community in which the university operates (Beaudoin and Tremblay, 2002). The argument for IHE to take the lead in implementing green buildings is supported by Orr (2004) who states that institutions are a microcosm of the real world and should be the site of innovation for experimenting with sustainability. Bordass (2000) identifies that many, however, fear the unknown and are reluctant to be early innovators in this area.Barriers and motivations to the construction of green buildings\nMethodology: Georg and Fussel (2000) show that most attention by researchers of greening organizations has been given to results and little attention is given to process. By considering the process through which decisions are made, it becomes easier to see where the impediments and motivations for green buildings on campus lie. A two-part qualitative research approach was employed in order to understand both the process for constructing new buildings at UW and to analyse motivations and barriers to green building implementation within this institution. The research was conducted between January and May 2005. The first phase of the study involved a review of a variety of UW internal and external documents regarding campus greening initiatives, organizational structure, building policies, procedures and committees related to the design and construction of new buildings on campus. Documents included university guidelines, policies, agendas, minutes, student projects, and news bulletins.The second phase of the methodology consisted of 13 semi-structured in-person interviews with key stakeholders intimately involved in decision-making processes relating to building at UW. Informants were selected by analysing documents relating to previous building decisions to identify key actors and by the recommendations of key informants involved in building decision processes at the university. Informants included both faculty and staff and represented a variety of positions and departments, including:* administration and finance;* facilities;* environmental studies faculty; and* engineering faculty.The diversity of informants ensured a wide variety of perspectives were obtained. The interviews lasted between 30 and 80 minutes.This study will be beneficial to change agents and researchers at other IHE for two reasons. First, the methodology can be replicated to develop an in-depth understanding of the building process at other IHE. Second, the findings that result from the study can be applied, compared and contrasted with other IHE and can aid in identifying barriers to the construction of green buildings at other educational institutions. This research was also intended to have a practical and policy contribution at UW. In summary, this paper is directed towards facilitating reforms to make campus operations more environmentally sustainable.Established in 1957 and located on a 1000-acre campus in South-western Ontario, the UW is currently host to just under 25,000 students. With the mission of producing \"the leaders of tomorrow\" UW has been recognized \"most innovative\" university among 47 contenders in Canada for the 13th year in a row by a survey published in Maclean's (2005) Magazine (www.macleans.ca/universities/article.jsp?content =20041104_162949_2152). UW has also acquired a reputation as an environmental leader among IHE because of its innovative Greening Waterloo (WATgreen) Advisory Committee established in 1990 to transform UW into a showcase for sustainability (Wright, 2002; van Weenen, 2000). In early 2005, UW launched a marketing campaign - green with innovation - to promote the university's wide-ranging environmental research, teaching and education programs[2]. Indeed, UW is endowed with cross-faculty research expertise in green building design, materials and policy implementation.Despite this expertise and environmental leadership reputation, the UW administration has not formally committed the university to constructing any sustainable buildings or implementing a campus wide campus greening or green building policy. UW is representative of many IHE in that they have no formal sustainable or green building policy. In 2004, the student-run University of Waterloo Sustainability Project (UWSP) founded a Green Building Group whose aim was to promote green buildings on campus through a series of lectures devoted to this topic. UW students, through WATgreen, have also identified the barriers, motivations and best practice policies for UW campus-wide greening. The student interest in green buildings illustrates the growing importance that students are placing on campus sustainability and provide evidence of \"grass roots\" support for the construction of green buildings. This is exemplified through the range of student groups that have been established on campus including the aforementioned UWSP as well as Green Roofs over Waterloo, the Sustainable Technology Education Project, B2Green, and the University of Waterloo Environment Network. Furthermore, UW has environmental programs and/or expertise in each of its six faculties. What is missing on campus, however, is the formal institutional commitment to sustainability from top university administrators, and a \"sustainability plan\" to guide and unify current research, planning, operations, teaching and service activities (Kiang, 2004, p. 3). The debate surrounding green building implementation is particularly important at UW because the university is undergoing a building expansion program that includes the impending construction of a three new buildings and the development of a new 700-acre Research and Technology Park. These developments provide a unique opportunity to incorporate sustainable design on campus.\nResults and discussion: The results are presented under two themes, those that relate to financial aspects of decision-making and those that relate to organizational structure and culture at UW. The process for the construction of new buildings at UW was found to move through six stages from the building concept, through to selecting design and construction consultants to a new building's construction and commissioning. This paper does not provide details of the current building process at UW, but rather, factors that are influencing the current decision-making process. For more details on the building process, see Richardson (2005).\nFinancial: The financial barriers that were identified in this study ranged from negative perceptions of green buildings in general, the perception that green buildings incur higher initial capital costs and a lack of incentives to reduce long-term energy and maintenance costs at both the faculty and facilities level.Green building perceptions\nOrganizational: Communication between facilities/administration and the university/public\nConclusions and recommendations: The focus of this paper was to explore the barriers to the planning and construction of green buildings at UW, an IHE, like the majority worldwide, with no green building policy, no campus sustainable policy and no practical implementation of a green building. This study is unique because it does not focus on an institutional success story or an analysis of an attempt to green an IHE. Instead, this study uses a qualitative methodology and an analysis of UW literature to document the building process and identify the influences on the lack of construction of green buildings on campus.This analysis shows that UW has strong academic prowess in sustainable buildings but weak administrative leadership for sustainability, no sustainability targets, only minimal collaboration between UW academic experts and facilities employees, and little financial incentives for either faculty or facilities to improve energy efficiency in the design of new buildings and operations of existing buildings. While it is unlikely that prospective students will choose not to go to UW because of a lack of green building policies, if the University administration looked at green buildings as an opportunity to showcase its innovation to incoming students this may attract and retain additional students and professors to the campus.The findings of this case study of UW complement and support the barriers and motivations that have been identified in the literature. For the successful implementation of green building policies four main organizational and financial factors are important. These four elements were developed into the key ingredients shown in Figure 1. The findings show that UW has weaknesses in all four areas of the diagram. Based on these barriers, this final section addresses recommendations for improving UW building performance and institutionalizing the construction of green buildings. These recommendations focus on changing the culture inherent in the administration at UW. Rather than being revolutionary in nature, they provide examples and incentives that encourage critical thinking and innovation. This approach may be useful to other IHE. These recommendations represent a \"carrot\" rather then a \"stick\" approach which should diminish resistance to the changes and encourage more innovative ideas.Develop strong university leadership\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - To explore the barriers and motivations to the construction of green buildings at the University of Waterloo (UW) by documenting and analysing the UW building process.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The authors conducted 13 semi-structured in-depth interviews with key UW individuals as well as analyzing numerous internal reports in order to document UW's building process. Based on the literature, a set of key ingredients for successful green building projects is developed as a basis from which to evaluate UW's current practices.\nFindings: - Based on the four key ingredients needs for successful green building projects at Institutions of Higher Education (IHE), UW was found to have weaknesses in all four areas including: a lack internal leadership amongst stakeholders with decision-making power, a lack of quantifiable sustainability targets, an operational structure that does not reward building designs with lower energy costs, and lack of communication between professional designers, facilities management and faculty. While UW has implemented many green initiatives on campus, the current financial and organizational structure of the University's current system does lend itself to the creation and implementation of green buildings on campus.\nOriginality/value: - Most research at IHE document existing green building initiatives and the lessons learned from their design and construction. There has been limited research into the processes by which decisions to proceed with the construction of green buildings are made, particularly within large institutions. As a consequence, the research documents many of the pitfalls, traps, and solutions that are experienced during the construction of green buildings, but have limited knowledge of the reasons why some proposed green buildings never get developed. This research identifies barriers to the construction of green buildings within institutional decision-making processes and makes specific recommendations for realizing green building construction based on the UW case study.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Local or global: Analyzing the internationalization of social responsibility of corporate foundations
|
[
"International marketing",
"Social responsibility",
"Strategic orientation",
"Corporate foundations"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Businesses today operate in a world that has almost no boundaries, physically or virtually. Although a company may make a strategic decision to define its scope in terms of purchasing, manufacturing or sales activities, the majority of businesses are forced to expand at least to an international scale in order to enlarge their markets and increase their profits. This expansion policy and increased geographical coverage affect not only the company's organizational structure, customer portfolio and product lines, but also results in a global debate regarding its strategy of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities (Peng and Pleggenkuhle-Miles, 2009). The choice between standardizing marketing strategies across international markets vs adapting them to individual markets is an ongoing discussion in the international marketing literature (Szymanski et al., 1993). CSR has its place in this debate with reference to the globalization or localization of CSR activities in multinational enterprises (MNEs)[1] (Husted and Allen, 2006; Jamali, 2010; Muller, 2006), considering that it is a powerful medium for benefiting from internationalization and achieving a strong global position for these companies (Attig et al., 2013).\n2. Literature review: 2.1. CSR in an international context\n3. Methodology: 3.1. Corporate foundations\n4. Conclusion: Kolk and van Tulder (2010) summarize the five dimensions of the international business literature as institutions, industry dynamics, firm-specific resources and capabilities, upstream and downstream linkages, while suggesting that these dimensions are also related with CSR research. This study can be classified under the downstream linkages of international business as corporate foundations are considered as the downstream distribution canals of CSR for MNEs. That is, these organizations currently exist in the international market not only for their products or services, but also for their socially responsible contributions. As one of the corporate foundations states, a foundation can be \"the first vehicle in which (the company) institutionalize(s) its social commitment\" toward its stakeholders. Considering the role of corporate foundations in CSR, the current study has tried to investigate whether a global or local approach is dominating CSR involvement in international markets.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the link between the globalization/adaptation debate and corporate foundation activity within a small subset of such foundations. In the light of this debate, the study analyzes the corporate social responsibility (CSR) approaches of this sample of corporate-owned foundations using the tri-dimensional CSR research model of Arthaud-Day (2005) to articulate the perspective, content and strategic orientations of the companies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study selects three different corporate foundations based on internationalization scale and field of activities. A content analysis methodology is applied to the data collected from the official web sites of 24 corporate foundations.\nFindings: The analysis results show a general compatibility between the subsidiaries and the main branches of the corporate foundations, at least on the conceptual level. However, the practices of CSR activities, targeted stakeholders or content domains differ at the operational level. Nevertheless, local governance is still not totally independent, especially in terms of received funds. Therefore, this study concludes that the internationalization strategies of these corporate foundations are still at a formative stage of transnationalization.\nResearch limitations/implications: The study explores the three selected international companies and their corporate foundations. Future studies may extend the number of selected industries and companies. Together with increased coverage, future survey studies may help explain the global or local orientations of corporate foundations' CSR in different domains.\nPractical implications: Corporate foundations may extend their transnational strategies to further stages by differentiating between those units that should be managed on a global scale and those that should be managed by local authorities. They may balance the amount of investment in different regions while adopting collaborative governance models to respond to regions where grant applications are not an easy tool for stakeholders to use.\nOriginality/value: Given the relatively paucity of CSR studies with an international focus, this study contributes to the standardization or localization debate in the international business literature. The study's originality lies in its attempt to operationalize the theoretical research model and through its use of corporate foundations as the unit of analysis.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Brand love and positive word of mouth: the moderating effects of experience and price
|
[
"Trust",
"Experience",
"Brand love",
"Price",
"Word of mouth",
"Hedonic product",
"Self-expressiveness"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Phrases such as \"I absolutely love this bag!\" or \"I love Coca-Cola!\" are commonly used by consumers (Ahuvia, 2005). Although these expressions are used more lightly when talking about products than when talking about other human beings, prior research shows that consumers are able to experience a deep emotional attachment toward brands (Albert and Merunka, 2013; Batra et al., 2012; Huber et al., 2015; Langner et al., 2015). In fact, previous research suggests that a customer's deep emotional attachment to a brand is the most reliable measure of a strong brand and should therefore be a primary objective for brand management or customer relationship marketing (Pawle and Cooper, 2006). For example, lasting relationships may be forged based on financial benefits to customers, such as loyalty discounts (Sheth and Parvatiyar, 1995), or are a result of limited number of options available (Albert and Merunka, 2013); however, without emotional connection, those relationships are easily dissolved if such \"relationship enhancers\" disappear. Therefore, repeat purchase behavior alone is an insufficient measure of a strong relationship and an inadequate objective for customer relationship management (Sheth and Parvatiyar, 1995). Thus, although a strong brand with steady and profound customer bonds is acknowledged to be the main objective of brand management (Esch et al., 2006), brand love is the ultimate goal of the customer-brand relationship.\nResearch hypotheses: The conceptual model and hypotheses of the present study are shown in Figure 1. We propose that the self-expressive brand (brand-self connection), brand trust and the hedonic value that the brand delivers are the antecedents of brand love. WOM serves as the behavioral outcome of brand love. Brand experience and price perception moderate the effects of brand love on offline WOM and eWOM. Two control variables - age and gender - are included in the model relating to WOM and eWOM, as the literature suggests that there are significant differences in how younger generations spread WOM compared to older generations (Sago, 2010) and females compared to males (Zhang et al., 2014).\nData collection: The hypotheses were tested with data from an online survey collected in Spring 2014. The convenience sampling method was used to attract respondents to the survey. This was carried out through Facebook, where a link to the survey was posted and advertised. The survey was open for one week, and 342 valid responses were obtained.\nResults: Measurement model\nDiscussion and conclusion: This study contributes to the literature by introducing and testing a conceptual model that shows how the self-expressiveness, trust and hedonic value of a brand drive brand love and how brand love in turn is related to WOM in both offline and online channels. In addition, we test the effects of experience and price perceptions on the relationships between brand love and WOM and between brand love and eWOM. In sum, the findings of the study show that:\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This study aims to test and extend Carroll and Ahuvia's (2006) model on the antecedents and outcomes of brand love by examining the moderating effects of experience and price on the relationship between brand love and offline word of mouth (WOM) and between brand love and electronic WOM (eWOM).\nDesign/methodology/approach: An online survey was conducted on Facebook, which generated 342 valid responses. The data were analyzed using partial least squares-structural equation modeling.\nFindings: The results mainly support the model by confirming that the self-expressiveness of the brand and trust are positively associated with brand love. No association between hedonic product type and brand love was found. The study's findings also suggest positive associations between brand love and both types of WOM. Experience and price were found to strengthen the relationship between brand love and offline WOM but not the relationship between brand love and eWOM.\nOriginality/value: This study contributes to the literature by introducing and testing an extended model of brand love. It tests two moderating effects on the relationship between brand love and WOM.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Constructive intercultural contact: yes we can. Introduction of a new concept
|
[
"Organizations",
"Diversity management",
"Contact theory",
"Intercultural contact",
"Majority/minority"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: A well-integrated Turkish Dutchman speaks Dutch with an accent. When he is collecting his driver's license at the Town Hall desk the official addresses him very slowly and emphatically with great gestures to explain what to do. The Turkish Dutchman feels belittled and isn't sure how to respond appropriately.A Dutch nurse, handing out medication in a hospital, hears a lot of noise coming from a patient-room. It turns out to be half a dozen loudly talking family members visiting their Antillean-Dutch grandmother. The nurse tells them that in behalf of the comfort of other patients only two visitors are allowed at the same time. The old lady's daughter angrily claims their right to visit their mother and accuses the nurse of discrimination. The nurse does not know how to respond.During lunch break an Antillean-Dutch employee discusses an upcoming meeting with some native Dutch colleagues. Smilingly, they tease him by saying he has to be on time at the meeting, \"because you lot are always late.\" He is annoyed but unsure how to react.The above incidents are three examples of challenging intercultural contact, collected in everyday work situations for an intercultural training program (Hofstra and van Oudenhoven, 2013). They show how intercultural contact runs the risk of becoming a negative experience for the participants because of feelings of uncertainty, aggression or threat. This is a challenge for organizations operating in multicultural societies because their employees have to be able to interact effectively with people from different cultures.\nLiterature review: In this section, we review several theoretical concepts which can give clues for constructive intercultural contact within organizations. From the diversity literature, the concept of climate for inclusion (Nishii, 2013) and Guillaume et al.'s (2014) integrative model for managing diversity point to the importance of interactions. Psychological concepts such as contact theory (Allport, 1979; Pettigrew and Tropp, 2011), stereotype content model (Fiske et al., 2002) and intercultural effectiveness (Van der Zee and van Oudenhoven, 2000) indicate relevant aspects of the content of these interactions.\nConstructive intercultural contact: Defining elements\nSpecifications: In this section, we present some specifications of this model. The first concerns majority and minority members, because of their different perspectives and realities. In social reality, impulsive reactions prevail and rarely both participants are triggered to change behavior at the same moment. However, we expect that initially difficult intercultural contacts can be changed into a positive experience for both participants on the initiative of one of them. Although in the end, success depends on the willingness of the other participant to join in and this becomes easier when the different perspectives, realities and intergroup goals are taken into account.\nDiscussion and conclusion: This paper sets out introducing constructive intercultural contact as a new concept in the field of diversity management. Our theoretical exploration leads to the conclusion that constructive intercultural contact needs five key elements of which (1) shared responsibility to make (2) a deliberate choice to postpone judgment together with (3) acknowledgment of the relative importance of cultural differences are important to diminish the influence of prejudices within the contact. The elements (4) showing respect and (5) perspective taking are needed to correct perceptions of incompetence and competition. We have argued that these last two elements require different alertness from majority and minority participants to play their complementary roles in diminishing arbitrary status differences.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to introduce the concept of constructive intercultural contact. This concept refers to intercultural contact in which majority as well as minority participants are intercultural effective, i.e. can perceive themselves as comfortable and successful.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study is based on exploration and review of intergroup, contact, acculturation and organization literature.\nFindings: Five input elements of constructive intercultural contact are distinguished: responsibility, deliberate choice to postpone judgment, acknowledging the relative relevance of cultural differences, perspective taking and respect. What participants have to do to make constructive intercultural contact in organizations not only possible between colleagues, but also in hierarchical relationships is elaborated by reflection on the interrelation between majority/minority and manager/employee positions in constructive intercultural contact.\nOriginality/value: This paper contributes to diversity management literature by introducing a new concept which, focusing on the interaction level, explains how participants can make intercultural contact into a comfortable and successful experience for both. Other contributions are the differentiation between majority and minority actors and the elaboration of the complexity of intercultural employee/manager contacts.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Four alternative models of online purchase behavior in the Asia-Pacific Region: A lesson of gender difference from South Korea
|
[
"South Korea",
"Internet shopping",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Modelling"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With the growth of online business consumer, their attitudes have become popular topics in marketing literature, precipitating a surge for research. A complete understanding on the nature of the process through which a positive attitude (PA) influences e-purchasing behavior is an area of inquiry among marketing scholars. Since Asian countries' are endowed with well-organized infrastructure of e-commerce (e.g. South Korea, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong and Taiwan), an opportunity arises to evaluate the attitudes of these consumers. However, most of the data for this area has been predominantly referred to the US or Western countries (Liao and Cheung, 2002). Thus, the present study particularly reflects the changing attitudes from new Asian consumers, which is appropriately placed within the parameters of this special issue of the Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics.There is an extensive and growing body of research on attitudes that focus primarily on marketing mix variables with particular services in online environment (Sundar and Kim, 2005). Relatively, little attention has been given to the competing process of attitude toward website, which is defined here as overall feelings towards a particular website with some degree of favor. In this study, Armstrong et al.'s (2001) notion is adopted to show that the role of the scientist is changed from advocating a single hypothesis to evaluating a number of competing models. The current research attempts to empirically test competing mechanisms and how each of the variables affects the PI.The mediating role of attitudes explains how internal or external events impact the internal psychological significance. One meaningful way to frame a study is in terms of its hypothesized underlying model, which allows researchers to understand the significant mediating role of PAs. This is an important approach with potential implications for the way data is collected, analyzed and interpreted. A direct consequence of such an approach is the model selection and its application to the developmental process (Ferrer and McArdle, 2003). Consequently, the possible outcomes of the research is to select a model that presumably best represents the most important features of online purchase processes.In this study, we also focus on gender differences in order to better understand the roles of attitudes on the internet. Although gender differences in attitudes and behavior have been extensively researched in general psychology and the business research, Akhter (2003) points out that understanding gender purchase intention (PI) on the internet is still essential. Chiu et al. (2005) also demonstrate that an understanding of gender differences in perceptions and attitudes towards buying on the internet is valuable not only to online practitioners responsible for implementing and deploying e-service, but also to researchers interested in elucidating online PIs.There is a pressing need to have a better understanding of the role of online attitude toward different groups with respect to broader landscape of consumer behavior theory. This, in turn, can lead to strategies on how consumer attitudes could be a major contributing factor to any link between a firm's purchasing process and its relevant constructs (Jee and Lee, 2002; Lim and Dubinsky, 2004). Developing an improved understanding of the effect of attitude toward website using alternative models should therefore contribute to the further explication of the underlying developmental process of the online purchase model and its association with other possible constructs.\nOverview of alternative models: Framing a study in terms of its hypothesized underlying model of change provides an impetus to the model selection and its application to the data (Ferrer and McArdle, 2003). This research confirms that such an approach should be supported by a solid theoretical framework as outlined in all alternative models presented in this research as presented in Figure 1.In order to establish objectivity, this research examined evidence from two or more plausible hypotheses. By structuring alternative hypotheses, McKenzie (1998) argues that researchers may be in a better position to evidence their justification. Sawyer and Peter (1983) claim that competing hypotheses (or models) are useful in marketing, and they cite studies by Burger and Petty (1981) as having successful illustrations. In line with researchers' observations, all hypotheses which consist of competing models have been supported by the evidence of prior research.It is posited that PAs with the preferred online website are an important determinant of PI (Sundar and Kim, 2005). Congruent with the proposition that interactivity reactions influence consumer attitudes (Jee and Lee, 2002), studies have demonstrated that attitudes toward the website is an antecedent of behavioral intention (McMillan et al., 2003). Accordingly, understanding the role of PAs on the development of online purchase model is imperative.Simultaneously, however, there is a critical criticism on the relationship between the two constructs. Wu (2005) shows that the relationship between consumer attitudes does indeed depend on two types of web interactivity: actual interactivity and perceived interactivity. The positive impact of perceived interactivity on PA is greater than the positive impact of actual interactivity. However, even though perceived interactivity plays a significant role in facilitating consumer attitudes, the effect of overall interactivity toward the website should not be underestimated. In line with this observation, a linkage of the web interactivity - PA relationship on online consumer behavior literature is necessary.Figure 1 shows four possible specifications of the casual role of PA, each based on prior theoretical (and in some cases empirical) work. All of the competing explanations are couched within a general hierarchy-of-effects framework. In all four explanations, information is seen as determining web interactivity (Sundar and Kim, 2005), and web interactivity controlled by a consumer is posited as causal antecedents of PA. The latter relationship has been documented repeatedly in the behavioral response (Jee and Lee, 2003; Wu, 2005). In line with this observation, it is acceptable that online activities are closely linked to consumer satisfaction in purchasing situations.Similarly, all four explanations depicted in Figure 1 posit a direct causal relationship from PA and PI. Considerable evidence in support of this linkage has been accumulated under the empirical studies between consumer attitude and PI (Chan, 2001; George, 2004; Kim and Park, 2005; Lim and Dubinsky, 2005). In light of the conceptual and empirical evidence in support of the information - web interactivity, web interactivity - PA and PA - PI linkages, they are all incorporated into each of the competing specifications of the role of PA. With the basic similarity of the four alternatives established, this research addresses the process of comparison of each. Further, if web interactivity meets consumer expectations positive emotional connection occurs, which result in PA (Agarwal and Malhotra, 2005). It is evitable that web interactivity - positive emotional bond (PEB) - PA will be reached.Independent influences model\nMethodology: Scale development\nResults: Reliability confirmation\nDiscussion: In this study we applied alternative methods to examine the dynamics of a mediating variable in different data sets. Our empirical study was aimed at assessing whether PA has indeed better explanation than other proposed models. We analyzed the data using four different models, which, in turn, yielded different results. These findings are the result of applying techniques with different underlying models of change. Such findings suggest that the researchers' underlying theory of change in the developmental process of the online purchase behavior model should drive the selection of alternative methods. In this study, the MMM appears to be reasonable because the model involves the dynamics of two mediating roles of PA plus the role of PEB and, at the same time, identification of potential applicability in the process of online model development.We employed four hierarchical models of the effects of the mediator on the developmental process of online purchase model that included PA as a crucial mediator. The results confirm the appropriateness of the MMM and indicate that both the dual mediating role of PA and the simple mediating role of PEB in the model significantly improve the explanation of e-purchasing model process in two different data. The hierarchical approach to developing e-purchasing process plays a critical role in extending scholars' knowledge and its practical relevance for managers.First, it reveals that the role of PA provides a new direction of designing online purchase model. Second, the appropriateness of competing models is better achieved with female than male, while comparison between the DMM and the MMM in male data is also acceptable. It may be explained that all paths of PAs, web interactivity - PA (male: b = 0.645; female: b = 0.648), PA - PI (male; b = 0.619; female: b = 0.659), and PEB - PA (male; b = 0.291; female: b = 0.330), are more significant for female than those of male. Although path coefficients for two different groups were significant, female consumers have a tendency to accept valuable information and to participate in interactivity. Since males' models are also significant, it is difficult to posit that females' attitudes in online purchase environment can definitely represent current e-purchasing models. Further the hierarchical models provide a means of identifying the underlying dispositions associated with the mediating variables.Conceptual comparisons do not result in a straightforward preference for one model structure or procedure over the alternatives (Foekens et al., 1997). This research, therefore, provides empirical comparisons relevant to the question of possible appropriateness of one model over other models. A direct consequence of such comparisons is the model selection and its application to the data. In line with this observation, the conclusion is reached that the MMM which focuses on both the dual mediating roles of PA and the role of PEB obtains the best results.There are several limitations to this study. First, this study focuses on only gender difference, it has limited generalizability due to heterogeneity of outcomes and interpretations. Although these results have significantly identified competing models, further research needs to be conducted to ascertain the appropriateness of competing models using multi-industry data (for different sector and regions). Although possible, this extension was not implemented in these analyses because it was not deemed crucial for the purpose of this study.Second, if both PA and PEB from the multiple mediating model are to make a real contribution, the delineation of a relatively exhaustive set of moderating factors that influence the strength of the relationships among information, web interactivity, PI should be the focus of future research. A full understanding how two mediators work will also play a significant role in the developmental process of the online consumer purchase model.Opens in a new window.Figure 1\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to model the development of e-purchasing behavior by examining the simultaneous effects of information, web interactivity, satisfaction and positive attitude (PA) on purchase intentions (PIs).\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Development and testing of four competing models from surveys of 402 consumers.\nFindings: - The results highlight the appropriateness of the multiple mediation model (MMM). The findings also indicate that both the dual mediating role of PA and the simple mediating role of positive emotional bond (PEB) in the model significantly improve the explanation of e-purchasing model process. Particularly, path coefficients for two groups (male vs female) are significantly different. Female consumers have a tendency to accept valuable information and to participate in interactivity.\nOriginality/value: - In this study, Armstrong et al.'s notion is adopted to show that the role of the scientist is changed from advocating a single hypothesis to evaluating a number of competing models. The current research attempts to empirically test competing mechanisms of the variables and their affects on PI.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Achieving employee commitment for continuous improvement initiatives
|
[
"Task commitment",
"Leadership",
"Quality management",
"Continuous improvement",
"Process improvement",
"Influence tactics",
"Leader-member exchange (LMX)"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Total Quality Management (TQM), defined by Spector and Beer (1994) as \"the continuous improvement of work processes to enhance the organization's ability to deliver high-quality products or services in a cost-effective manner,\" is one of the most significant research themes in operations management (Nair, 2006). Continuous improvement, which is the ongoing improvement of products, programs, services, or processes (Blazey, 2006), plays a critical role in a TQM environment (Anderson et al., 1994), and prior research has found that ongoing improvement is one of the most important quality management constructs that lead directly to organizational performance (Olson et al., 2008; Yeung et al., 2005). While there is a substantial body of research that examines the technical aspects of TQM and continuous improvement, only a few studies have examined the role of employee attitudes in contributing to the success of TQM and continuous improvement initiatives. Baird et al. (2011) found that an organization's culture, such as whether or not the organizational culture emphasized teamwork and respect for people, was associated with the use of several TQM practices, such as quality data and reporting, supplier quality and management, and product/service design. Lagrosen and Lagrosen (2005) found that an organization's adoption of key values, including widespread employee participation, correlated to successful quality management.\n2. Literature review and hypotheses development: While several papers have documented a positive relationship between quality management and organizational performance (e.g. Baird et al., 2011; Boulter et al., 2013; Chen et al., 1997; Easton and Jarrell, 1998; Lagrosen and Lagrosen, 2005; Terziovski and Samson, 1999; Yeung et al., 2006) several papers have documented unsatisfactory results (e.g. Degeling and Carnegie, 1995; Brown, 1993; Tatikonda and Tatikonda, 1996; Huq and Martin, 2000). However, the underlying practices in quality management are widely believed fundamental and essential for effective management and a firm's competiveness (Nair, 2006).\n3. Method: To test the hypotheses, we designed and administered a survey in the fall of 2011. Online surveys were sent to health care professionals employed by a large health care organization in the northeastern USA. The health care organization is comprised of two hospitals, ten outpatient health centers, and physician offices in over 40 locations.\n4. Measures: The 44-item Influence Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ) (Yukl et al., 2008) was used to measure the 11 influence tactics: rational persuasion, exchange, inspirational appeals, legitimating, apprising, pressure, collaboration, ingratiation, consultation, personal appeals, and coalition tactics. The question stem was rephrased to clarify that participants were to respond to items in regard to tasks or projects that were part of the continuous improvement initiative at their organization. This change was necessary as the continuous improvement setting is a primary focus of our study. Response options and question items on the IBQ were otherwise unaltered. Extensive support for the validity and reliability of the IBQ was provided by Yukl et al. (2008).\n5. Data analysis and results: We used SPSS 17 and SmartPLS 2.0.M3 for measurement validation and to test our conceptual models. To test the statistical significance of our path coefficients, we used bootstrapping with 200 re-samples.\n6. Results: To investigate our first research question, we identified the influence tactics that were most strongly correlated with subordinate task commitment. Which the exception of Personal Appeal, all influence tactics showed statistically significant correlations with task commitment. The influence tactics most strongly associated (correlations exceeding 0.40 and statistically significant) with commitment were: consultation, ingratiation, collaboration, rational persuasion, and inspirational appeals. These results are reported in Table II.\n7. Summary and conclusion: Improving an organization's ability to deliver high-quality products or services in a cost-effective manner is the objective of TQM programs (Spector and Beer, 1994), and continuous improvement initiatives are the mechanisms used accomplish this objective. Prior research has identified several examples of successful continuous improvement initiatives (e.g. Olson et al., 2008; Yeung et al., 2005). However, prior research has also found that a large percentage of continuous improvement initiatives are unsuccessful (e.g. Beer et al., 1990; Beer, 2003; Huq and Martin, 2000), and our study offers one explanation as to why many of those initiatives may not have succeeded. Additionally, our findings suggest specific actions managers can take to increase the likelihood of success for future continuous improvement initiatives.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Although prior research has found that employee participation is key to successfully implementing quality management initiatives (Baird et al., 2011; de Menezes, 2012; Lagrosen and Lagrosen, 2005), little research in operations management exists that investigates which management actions and behaviors lead to employee commitment to such initiatives. The purpose of this paper is to address this gap in the operations management literature by investigating which influence tactics are the most effective in soliciting employee commitment to continuous improvement tasks. The paper also examines how influence tactics affect the supervisor-subordinate relationship and the manager's effectiveness in implementing continuous improvement initiatives.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A survey instrument was used to measure supervisor-subordinate relationship quality, usage of influence behaviors and participants' task commitment to continuous improvement initiatives.\nFindings: The results indicate that five of the 11 influence tactics identified in the prior literature, i.e., collaboration, consultation, ingratiation, inspirational appeals, and rational persuasion, are significant and strong predictors of employee commitment to continuous improvement initiatives. Further, analyses show that these influence tactics are significant drivers of the quality of the supervisor-subordinate relationship, which was found to partially mediate the relationship between influence tactics and the supervisor's effectiveness in implementing continuous improvement projects.\nResearch limitations/implications: Since the extant CI and Total Quality Management literature has looked at the plant or program level rather than the worker-level as in the research, the findings offer one explanation as to why earlier studies investigating the relationship between quality management programs and increased organizational performance reported mixed results.\nPractical implications: Increasing managers' awareness and usage of influence tactics may increase the success rate of continuous improvement projects as well the quality of the relationship with the manager's subordinates.\nOriginality/value: While the extant literature has argued that management support and employee commitment are key components of a continuous improvement project implementation, little has been written about the specific management actions and behaviors that lead to success.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Open Universities: the next phase
|
[
"Open education",
"Open University",
"Sustainable development goals",
"Leadership in distance and online learning"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This paper reports on an increasing number of recent commentaries expressing concern about the performance and achievement of Open Universities some 50 years after the establishment of the new model for a university, and assesses the sustainability of the Open University model for the next 15 years as governments seek to fulfil the UN Sustainable Development goals (SDGs). The paper also reports on a small investigation of attitudes to these issues from a roundtable of Open University Presidents, Rectors and Vice Chancellor who met in 2017 in Toronto, and identifies the need for renewed international programmes of leadership development as key to the future of their institutions.\nChallenges for Open Universities: However, these first-mover advantages have now been substantially eroded. Other universities, both public and private, are adopting these practices as their own, enabled by digital technologies along with a change in the culture of higher education for which Open Universities can fairly claim responsibility (Scott, 1995). In the recent period, at least four Open Universities in Europe have been threatened with closure or merger, either because of these competitive challenges and/or perceptions of their own poor performance. The narrative of paramount leadership by Open Universities for innovation, inclusion and social justice has begun to be challenged by a number of contemporary commentators, who in one way or another identify the spread of innovation elsewhere in the higher education sector as threatening for the place of Open Universities in that landscape. A summary of recent critical accounts is given below:\nThe views of Open University leaders: In order to provide a basis for discussion at the 2017 Toronto Roundtable of Open University Presidents, Rectors and Vice Chancellors, invitations were sent to all leaders of Open Universities or DTUs in the International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE) membership, asking them to provide information through interviews (see Appendices 1 and 2 for the questions and a list of participants). In the event 14 universities responded, and their replies are summarised below. While the limited size of the sample cannot make this summary representative, it does provide an insight into understanding by institutional leaders of current developments, opportunities and strategic challenges, and stimulates a number of questions. Information was collected under the following headings.\nCompleting the move to mass higher education: The UN SDGs provide a framework for future priorities. Unlike the earlier Millennium Development Goals, the SDGs explicitly embrace tertiary education, including university and lifelong learning, and the supply of teachers. They commit governments by 2030 \"to ensure equal access for women and men to affordable and quality technical, vocational and tertiary education, including university\" (UNESCO, 2016).\nInnovation for survival: As well as the potential to grow the domestic capacity of higher education through Open Universities, the expanded number of places will also be provided in part by student mobility to other countries; increased participation from foreign universities developing local campus and online operations; and renewed competition from local universities offering blended and more flexible patterns of study. Are Open Universities in the strongest position to contribute substantially to the SDG goals, in terms of both scale and quality? And has their achievement of the last 50 years led governments around the world to see them as continuing to be vital drivers of innovation in higher education at scale?\nLeadership development: Finally, these issues create a pressing agenda for leadership development in Open Universities. In some countries leadership is provided through political appointment rather than ability, and the record is in a number of places poor. In other countries Open Universities are not seen as high status or prestige institutions and do not attract the best candidates. In some societies institutional leaders are always appointed from within, and by election. In others leaders are almost always appointed externally and by open selection of the external field. There have been effective and ineffective institutional leaders using any of these processes for it to be impossible to say that one approach trumps all. However, the need to deliver radical indeed revolutionary change for Open Universities today demands institutional leaders of the highest calibre.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to report on research on the views of Presidents and Vice Chancellors of Open Universities of current threats and opportunities for their institutions as the author marks the 50th anniversary of the first Open University in the UK established in 1969. The paper offers a historical account of the development of the Open University model, and assesses the extent to which it remains in the key position as owner of innovation in the higher education sector.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Interviews were conducted with leaders of Open Universities or distance teaching universities. They covered a total of 14 universities.\nFindings: The replies from institutional leaders reveal the current developments, opportunities and strategic challenges of the universities. It is suggested that the digital revolution along with a wider range of environmental changes for higher education have substantially eroded the first-mover advantage that Open Universities had undoubtedly enjoyed in the first 25 years.\nOriginality/value: The paper concludes that there are significant concerns that innovation in Open Universities is not sufficiently embedded to ensure that their contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals will be maximised, or even in some cases their survival, and that a key but undervalued element is leadership development for innovation and change.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Exploring the influence of store attributes on customer experience and customer engagement
|
[
"Customer experience",
"Service-dominant logic",
"Customer engagement",
"Loyalty programme",
"Store attributes"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The importance of customer experience and engagement in marketing literature has become more apparent with the emergence of service-dominant logic (S-D logic) as a new marketing thought (Brodie et al., 2011). Prior literature has established that customer experience as a significant determinant to satisfaction (Grzeskowiak et al., 2016), behavioral intention (Ali et al., 2015; Nadiri and Gunay, 2013), relationship quality (Jung and Soo, 2012), co-creation behavior and attitude (Shamim et al., 2016), and brand equity (Dolbec and Chebat, 2013; Kumar, 2013). Likewise, customer engagement has become an emerging and prominent construct in the relationship marketing due to its potential in influencing brand performance (Brodie et al., 2011), loyalty (Bowden, 2009; Hollebeek, 2011a), and customer relationship (Vivek et al., 2012). Besides being loyal to the brand, an engaged customer is anticipated to play a vital role in new product or service development and in co-creating experience and value (Brakus et al., 2009; Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004; Verhoef et al., 2010). In view of the potential impact of both constructs in achieving competitive advantage and relationship building, the discussion of customer experiences and customer engagement has been well highlighted in prior literatures (Bowden, 2009; Morgan-Thomas and Veloutsou, 2013; Spena et al., 2012), yet none of the studies so far has empirically examined the relationship between the customer experience and customer engagement simultaneously in the context of retailing.\n2. Department store in Malaysia: Malaysia has emerged as the promising site for department stores (the context of the study) because of its growth potential owing to the limited choice of fashion brands in the country and its attractiveness as a shopping destination. International department store retailers such as Galeries Lafayette and Takashimaya Co. Ltd were reportedly seeking entry to penetrate Malaysia's local market (The Borneo Post, 2014). AEON, the well-established foreign department store, with 27 outlets and 22 shopping centers in Malaysia, allocated RM700 million in capital expenditure in 2014 for the opening of three new stores (Jayaraman, 2014) and RM450 million in 2015 in opening two new stores (Inside Retail Asia, 2015). Debenhams, one of the leading UK department stores, set up two outlets in Klang Valley and one outlet in Penang and intends to open up eight more outlets all over Malaysia (Bernama, 2013).\n3. Theoretical background: Underpinned by S-D logic perspective, this study includes customer experience and customer engagement to illustrate the notion that the co-creation value is realized when the offering is experienced, consumed, and assessed by customers through the customer interaction with value proposition provided by the retailer (Schau et al., 2007). This study chooses merchandise, post-transaction service, communication, interpersonal communication, store atmosphere, and loyalty program as the components of store attributes to be evaluated. Figure 1 illustrates the proposed model for this study.\n4. Research method: 4.1 Data collection\n5. Data analysis and results: Prior to data analysis, the data were analyzed in SPSS 21 and subjected to a number of standard procedures such as examining for missing values, outliers, and data distribution. In total, 484 valid responses were obtained with 82.5 percent response rate, with a quota sampling taking into consideration age and gender distribution of department store cardholders. Respondents were asked to assess the most preferred department store. Out of 484 respondents, 27.9 percent were males and 72.1 percent were females. The high percentage of female respondents was considered to be appropriate in view of females being more responsive to promotional elements compared to males (Mortimer and Clarke, 2011; Zeithaml, 1985). The major age group was comprised of mostly 30- to 39-year-olds which was 39.7 percent, followed by 29.8 percent for those in the age group of 20- to 29-year-olds, and 25.4 percent for the age group of 40-49 years (Table I).\n6. Discussion and implications: This study proposes that store attributes may play a significant role in influencing customer experience and customer engagement in the context of department stores. Additionally, this study proposed the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement. A total of 13 hypotheses were tested, eight of which were supported. The effectiveness of store attributes has been empirically studied in marketing literature; however, few studies have considered loyalty programs as part of store attributes. The suggestion to include loyalty program attributes to be tested together with other store attributes has been recommended by marketing scholars (Dorotic et al., 2012; Vesel and Zabkar, 2009) so as to capture the relative importance of the influence of loyalty programs compared to other store attributes. Additionally, the increasing importance of customer experience and customer engagement should not be taken lightly by retailers, due to their major influence on the relationship between the customer and the store (Van Doorn et al., 2010; Vivek et al., 2012).\n7. Limitation and future research: The finding of this study is specific to department store customers in Malaysia. Hence, the finding of this study may vary if it was tested in different retail format and different country. Next, this study is based on non-probability sampling and the survey was conducted through \"drop and collect\" in the area of Klang Valley, Malaysia; therefore, the sample population may not be representative of the overall Malaysian population. Moreover the findings of this study rely on cross-sectional data where the survey was taken at one point of time. Therefore, the strong conclusion regarding the true dynamic effects of the model cannot be drawn compared to if this study was conducted using a longitudinal design. Additionally, this study does not classify the department store into category. The store may fall into a few categories as these retail stores have different target markets and marketing strategies. In fact, the same department stores may provide different attributes depending on the shopping mall they are located. Thus, future research is recommended to examine if the conceptual model utilized in this study would work differently by different category of department stores. Another limitation to be noted is that the study uses PLS-SEM; hence, the analysis does not include the concept of overall goodness of model fit as in CB-SEM. While the lack of model fit is consider the major drawback in PLS-SEM, the quality of the model in PLS-SEM is assessed on the basis of heuristic criteria that are determined by the model predictive capabilities (Hair et al., 2017). In spite of these limitations, PLS has become a standard in marketing research (Hair et al., 2011; Hennigs et al., 2016) due to its ability to assess latent variables at the observation level (outer or measurement model) and test relationships between latent variables on the theoretical level (inner or structural model) (Hair et al., 2017). Moreover, PLS-SEM has also been deployed in many fields such as behavioral science, organization, strategic management, and management information system (Wong, 2013).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The global retail landscape has changed drastically. The rising role of Asia as one of the fastest growing international retail penetration and expansion will continue to make the region to be the driving force in world economic growth. However, the ambitious expansion plans are making the retail sector to be more challenging. Emphasizing on the customer experience and enhancing the value proposition to customers are undeniably vital factors for the long-term survival of any retail business. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of store attributes on customer experience and customer engagement in the context of department store in Malaysia. Subsequently, the influence of customer experience on customer engagement is also analyzed.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using drop and collect survey, 484 valid responses of department store cardholders of age 18 years and above in the area Klang Valley, Malaysia, were collected. PLS structural equation modeling was used to test the hypotheses of this study.\nFindings: Results revealed that customer experience is influenced by merchandise, store atmosphere, and loyalty program, while customer engagement is influenced by merchandise, communication, interpersonal communication, and loyalty. In contrast, post-transaction services were found to have non-significant impact on both customer experience and customer engagement. Analysis also revealed a strong relationship between customer experience and customer engagement.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study is carried out on customers of department store in Malaysia. However, the researchers urge other researchers to replicate the study from different countries and category of department stores.\nOriginality/value: Retail researchers recognize little knowledge on the contribution of store attributes to customer experience and customer engagement. This paper represents original research that encourages foreign retailers to employ service-dominant logic as a new marketing thought in designing strong customer engagement and experience strategies to capture the Malaysia market.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Improving the quality of nutrition in pediatric trauma
|
[
"Quality",
"Quality improvement",
"Trauma",
"Nutrition",
"Child",
"Paediatric"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nBackground: Nutrition plays an important role in the recovery of hospitalized pediatric trauma patients, as recovery is impaired in a catabolic state (Cook and Blinman, 2010). Given that trauma may induce severe metabolic stress and increase the risk of malnutrition, inadequate nutrition during trauma recovery may prolong the recovery period, length of stay and increase the risks of morbidity and mortality (Jaksic, 2002; Prieto and Cid, 2011). Nutrition adequacy and support, in the form of enteral and parenteral nutrition, is one of the most important determinants of outcome in the pediatric trauma inpatient population for the more than 600 pediatric trauma patients who are admitted to Ontario hospitals each year (Jaksic, 2002; OT Registry, 2010/2011). Since nutrition support is usually not administered until the patients are hemodynamically stable, trauma patients may be especially susceptible to malnutrition through feeding delays and further interruptions for diagnostic and therapeutic procedures (Lambe et al., 2007).\nMethods: A retrospective chart review was conducted on all pediatric trauma patients admitted to MCH from January 2010 to March 2014. Patients were identified through the Hamilton Health Sciences Trauma Registry and included all pediatric trauma patients less than 18 years of age with an Injury Severity Score (ISS) of 12 or higher and a hospital length of stay greater than or equal to 24 hours. We excluded patients previously hospitalized at another institution who were then transferred to MCH.\nStatistical analysis: Descriptive data analysis was performed using SPSS version 22.0 (SPSS Inc., Armonk, NY, IBM Corp 2013). Categorical data were reported as frequencies and relative frequencies. Continuous data were reported as mean and standard deviation or median and range. The relationship between continuous variables was reported using Pearson's correlation coefficient or Spearman's correlation coefficient, if not normally distributed. Statistical significance was accepted at a p-value of<0.05.\nResults: In total, 131 pediatric trauma patients met inclusion criteria for the study period, with 130 patients included in the analysis. One patient was excluded due to unavailable medical record data.\nDiscussion: Although nutrition support is an essential component of recovery in hospitalized pediatric trauma patients, it is not well studied. Children have unique metabolic needs compared to the adult trauma population, including higher energy expenditure per kilogram of body weight and higher rates of protein turnover after injury (Cook and Blinman, 2010; Jaksic, 2002). Accordingly, it is important to assess the nutritional needs of pediatric trauma patients and the role of nutrition support practices in meeting those nutritional needs in order to make improvements.\nLimitations: The retrospective nature of the study poses several limitations. We relied on the availability of nutrition-related documentation which was, in some cases, limited or inconsistent across charts. The lack of consecutive weight measurements made it impossible to use weight change as an outcome in this study.\nConclusions and recommendations: Local feeding practices correspond with recommended principles of early feeding and preferential enteral feeding when possible over parenteral nutrition. There is a need to standardize documentation of nutritional assessments and monitoring. We recommend harmonization of what is currently in paper and electronic charts to ensure prescribed nutritional support is being delivered and nutritional needs are being met. A prospective study with a better-defined care pathway should be considered to ensure stable trauma patients are nutritionally assessed and monitored early in their hospital course to prevent malnutrition and associated complications.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Nutrition plays a key role in the recovery of pediatric trauma patients. A catabolic state in trauma patients may hinder recovery and inadequate nutrition may increase morbidity, mortality and length of hospital stay. The purpose of this paper is to review the current nutrition support practices for pediatric trauma patients at McMaster Children's Hospital (MCH), describe patient demographics and identify areas to improve the quality of patient care.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A retrospective chart review was conducted on pediatric trauma patients (age<18 years) identified through the trauma registry of MCH. Pediatric trauma patients admitted from January 2010 to March 2014 with an Injury Severity Score (ISS)=12 and a hospitalization of =24 hours were included.\nFindings: In total, 130 patients were included in this study, 61.1 percent male, median age ten years (range: 0-17 years) and median ISS of 17 (range: 12-50). Blunt trauma accounted for 97.7 percent of patients admitted and 73.3 percent had trauma team activation. In total, 93 patients (71.5 percent) had ICU stays. The median time to feed was 29 hours (interquartile range: 12.5-43 hours) from the time of admission. An increased hospital length of stay was associated with longer time to initiation of nutrition support, a higher ISS and greater number of surgeries (p<0.05).\nOriginality/value: Local nutritional support practices for pediatric trauma patients correspond with recommended principles of early feeding and preferential enteral nutrition. Harmonization of paper-based and electronic data collection is recommended to ensure that prescribed nutritional support is being delivered and nutritional needs of pediatric trauma patients are being met.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Innovative solutions to increase last-mile delivery efficiency in B2C e-commerce: a literature review
|
[
"Innovation",
"Efficiency",
"B2C e-commerce",
"Last-mile delivery"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Business to consumer (B2C) e-commerce is gaining increasing importance in many countries - in both mature and emerging markets - and online initiatives are proliferating across different industries (Mangiaracina et al., 2016). Globally, B2C e-commerce is a rapid pace growing phenomenon and the online market in 2018 has been worth more than EUR 2,500bn worldwide (B2c e-Commerce observatory, Politecnico di Milano). If compared to offline market, B2C e-commerce opens new challenges for companies, which have to manage additional issues. One of these is the higher complexity of the logistics activities, and the intangibility of online transactions must not lead to underestimate them. In particular, many scholars agree that the most critical logistic process is the last-mile delivery, i.e. the \"last stretch\" of the order fulfilment, aimed at delivering the products ordered online to the final consumer (Lim et al., 2018). As a matter of fact, on the one hand, it is the interface between the merchants and the customer; on the other hand it is very expensive.\nObjectives and methodology: In line with the set objectives, this work addresses the following two questions:\nReview of the literature: Main features of the articles\nGaps and future directions: Although the literature review revealed that many aspects have been investigated about those last-mile delivery solutions that are innovative and efficiency-oriented, some elements should be further analysed, in order to both provide academics with a comprehensive view about the theme and support practitioners in taking decisions in the field. More in detail, three main types of gaps have been identified:\nConclusions: In this study, 75 papers, including both works published in scientific journals and conference papers, were reviewed. After considering their general characteristics - i.e. year, source and country - the contributions were systematically analysed following a two-pronged approach. More in detail, they were categorised based on the research method(s) adopted by the author(s), and then they were classified based on their content. Considering the addressed themes, two main analyses were performed. First, the formula of the last-mile delivery cost per parcel was found, and the different components of this cost were identified. Based on this analysis, a comprehensive view of the main factors - positively and negatively - impacting on the found cost components was provided. Those factors are: the resources consumption and the share of semi-fixed cost of the transport mean, the specialisation of the driver, the degree of automation of both transport and delivery activities, the problems or obstacles met in the delivery tour, the customer density, the probability of failed deliveries and the distance between the delivery point and the home of the customer. Second, the viable innovative last-mile delivery solutions aimed at increasing efficiency - and the way in which they impact on the previously mentioned factors - were identified. These solutions are: reception boxes, parcel lockers, pick-up points, crowdsourcing logistics, drones, trunk delivery, dynamic pricing, mapping the customer behaviour, underground delivery and robots. Finally, stemming from the analysis, some areas for possible further research efforts were identified (e.g. targeting under-investigated solution such as mapping the customer behaviour or addressing the implementation of dynamic pricing to sectors different from e-grocery, such as not-specialised retailers).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to review and classify scientific publications dealing with those innovative solutions aimed at increasing the efficiency of last-mile delivery in business to consumer (B2C) e-commerce; and, second, to outline directions for future research in this field.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The review is based on 75 papers published between 2001 and 2019 in international peer-reviewed journals or proceedings of conferences, retrieved from bibliographic databases and science search engines.\nFindings: Due to its importance in affecting the overall logistics costs and, as a consequence, the economic sustainability of a B2C e-commerce initiative, last-mile delivery process deserves particular attention in order to be optimised. The review highlights that, among the main factors affecting its cost, there are the probability to have failed deliveries, the customer density in the delivery areas and the degree of automation of the process. Innovative and viable last-mile delivery solutions - which may impact the mentioned drivers - include parcel lockers, crowdsourcing logistics, mapping the consumer presence at home and dynamic pricing policies. Eventually, some gaps and areas for further research activities have been identified (e.g. mapping customer behaviour, crowdsourcing logistics).\nOriginality/value: This review offers interesting insights to both academics and practitioners. On the academic side, it analyses and classifies relevant literature about innovative and efficiency-oriented last-mile delivery solutions, proposing directions for future research efforts. On the managerial side, it presents a holistic framework of the main factors affecting last-mile delivery cost and of viable innovative solutions that may be implemented to increase efficiency.\n",
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] |
Behind closed doors: exposing modern slavery on a global scale: An interview with Kevin Bales, Professor Emeritus at Roehampton University, London, and President of Free the Slaves
|
[
"Gender",
"Social systems",
"Working practices",
"Human rights"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy, the book that brought Bales global recognition over a decade ago, reinstated slavery as a key human rights issue on the research agenda for the twenty-first century. It was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, and subsequently translated and published in ten languages. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Patron of WISE, described it as a \"deeply disturbing expose of modern slavery\". Slavery: A Global Investigation, a documentary film based on his work won two Emmy Awards in 2002. In 2006, his work was listed in the top \"100 world-changing discoveries\" by the association of British universities. Bales has advised US, British, Irish, Norwegian, and Nepali governments, as well as the governments of the Economic Community of West African States, on the formulation of policy on slavery and human trafficking. He recently edited an anti-human trafficking toolkit for the United Nations and is now working with the chocolate industry to remove child and slave labour from the product chain. His recent publications include Understanding Global Slavery (2005), New Slavery: A Reference Handbook (2005), Ending Slavery (2007), and Documenting Disposable People: Contemporary Global Slavery with Mark Sealy (2008). In 2009, with Ron Soodalter, he published The Slave Next Door: Human Trafficking and Slavery in America Today; and in the same year Modern Slavery: The Secret World of 27 Million People with Zoe Trodd and Alex Kent Williamson (2009). He is currently writing a book on the relationship of slavery and environmental destruction; and with Jody Sarich, a book exploring forced marriage worldwide. He is currently editing a collection of modern slave narratives, co-writing a book on contemporary slavery in the USA, and completing the first study of the impact of slavery on the environment.\nCG: Professor Bales - as the world's leading academic in contemporary slavery studies you have made a significant contribution to bringing the scale of modern-day slavery to attention of the academic community. You have also been at the centre of efforts on the ground to eliminate slave-like practices around the world. Can you first of all address the issue of why slavery still exists and secondly, why on such a scale?\nKB: Why does it still exist? Slavery has never ceased to exist. For the first 5,000 years of human history slavery was a fact of life. Then suddenly 200 years ago slavery was \"abolished\". But slavery did not disappear in the nineteenth century. It just took other forms, went under other names, and it went underground.Why does it exist on such a scale? We are still getting the measure of the scale of slavery worldwide. Slavery is appearing everywhere. The organisations that could be having a greater impact are hampered by the structures and rules they are working to. The international development associations work under tight structural constraints. This is particularly the case with the UN. This means that agencies cannot respond as quickly and effectively as possible when they find people in slavery. Budgets are another problem - the Special Actions programme is one of the most effective areas of UN activity in this field but its budget is tiny compared with the other agencies - it has less than $20 million a year to work with and well over half of that goes directly to supporting victims of slavery. Another agency doing positive work in this field is UNICEF. They are working against child slavery in many countries and UNICEF has produced some of the best work rehabilitating children after they have been freed from slave conditions.\nCG: You estimate that there are at least 27 million people living as slaves in the world today - many more than at any time in the past - but we know very little about them. We don't know how many are children there are compared to adults, how many are male and how many are female. Is this lack of knowledge just because we are dealing with an activity that's illegal in most parts of the world?\nKB: The fact that it is illegal to keep slaves just about everywhere in the world makes it more difficult to expose slavery. We are dealing with a hidden crime but you can learn to see it. Once gender oppression in our societies was a hidden crime. Now we see it. More research is needed on women in slavery, we are just getting a sense of the gender dimensions of modern slavery. Sex slavery in Europe is really very gendered, it is mostly women and girls being trafficked into slavery and the traffickers are mostly men. There has been a lot of interest in this form of slavery and a lot of people now think that most slavery is sex slavery. Actually only a small fraction of slaves are sex slaves. You can see how research is very ideological.\nCG: The relative absence of research on the gender dimensions of slavery is a case in point and a consequence of a historic blindness to gender oppression in Western cultures that you alluded to. I would argue that the reluctance to acknowledge gender oppression is actually ongoing, and this supports persistent gender narratives that position women in roles of service and servitude in the family. Generally the family is a site of unpaid labour and the distinction between service and servitude can become blurred. Where to place the line between service - which implies an autonomous sense of personal responsibility towards others - and servitude, where responsibility for the well-being of others is imposed and inescapable, is already a difficult issue in the domestic context but then if we add to this the lack of freedom of movement some women will experience as a result of marriage or other cultural practices this brings us even further into the thorny territory of defining the parameters of slavery. The international community endeavoured to place those parameters in its international slavery convention of 1926[1] since when these definitions have, quite rightly, been under review. Indeed how we define slavery has come very much to the fore just recently. In stark contrast to familial servitude, one form of slavery has captured the attention of the media in the twenty-first century. How do you explain the global attention being paid to human trafficking and sex slavery, particularly in Europe?\nKB: You are right to cite the media here, electronic and news media have driven this issue up the agenda over the last decade. In fact this is not a new phenomenon. In past centuries, sex slavery attracted considerable interest particularly from conservative Christian organisations and regularly appeared on the political agenda. In the nineteenth century, for example, there was a focus on abolishing what they called \"white slavery\".\nCG: If we can focus for the moment on present manifestations of this phenomenon, much of the work going on in slavery studies today seems to be focusing on tightening up on legislation to stop human trafficking of young (female) East Europeans into sex slavery in the major Western Europe cities such as London and Rome. Do you think this is the most useful area to focus on?\nKB: Great work is being done in this area, nationally and in the international organisations, but there is a real need for more coordinated efforts in this area. However slavery is far more widespread than this and it takes many forms. If we look at the history of slavery before abolition we'll find many different forms of slavery, in the home, in farms, in factories. It was an immensely important step when the first law to abolish the transatlantic slave trade was adopted here in the UK in 1807 and it was hugely significant when the 13th amendment of the US Constitution ruled slavery illegal in America in 1865. But making something illegal doesn't make it go away and the abolition of plantation slavery blinded people to ongoing slavery. There are closed doors all around the world today that hide domestic slavery, there are farms in countries around the world where the farmworkers are in slavery, there are children working in the industries in slave-like conditions, it happens in remote parts of the world and at home in our own neighbourhoods.\nCG: You mentioned today that we need more quantitative analysis, and you cited some research that's been comparing levels of slavery with a country's position on the human development index ranking[2]. You mention Robert Smith as an example, he has explained differences in human development between countries of similar economic standing in terms of how much slavery is going on there. He suggests that the more slavery a society is tolerating the less human development there is in the society as a whole. These are interesting findings but the quantitative methods he uses and the kind of analysis that focuses on measuring quality of life against numerical indicators, are highly contested methods these days. In a study of the HDI social development indicators in West Africa, I have argued against a reliance on quantitative data in the evaluation of gender as a factor of marginalisation in development. It would be interesting to know what your view is on this academic debate and to know why you are citing this approach so enthusiastically.\nKB: Two reasons mainly: firstly I found the results of Robert Smith's work astounding[3]. Secondly, on the practical side, quantitative findings are really useful on the ground. In international development meetings, when I get to speak to people about contemporary forms of slavery, what they want to hear are numbers. These are politicians and policy-makers and unless you give them quickly digestible facts and figures they mightn't take anything away from what you have said. They want to know first how many slaves are there in the world today. We have an answer to that one - there are at least 27 million (I say at least because we know there are more but as we have discussed earlier, the definitions of slavery are so difficult to pin down). Whatever we think about quantitative analysis as social scientists, it is useful in policy discussions at that level. We can also use economic analysis to show that we have reached a point in human history when ending slavery has become a real possibility. It will not destroy our economies to abolish slavery once and for all, slave workers are not as productive as free workers, they work more slowly, they work less creatively, and they die young. This is a moment when our collective belief in human rights and dignity can bring down this violence against millions of human beings. This can be the tipping point in the extinction of human slavery.\nCG: Given how much time you spend on the frontline, exposing forms of slavery globally and campaigning to release the enslaved, it is heartening you hear you confirm that it is only matter of knowledge and will standing between the persistence of this form of extreme exploitation and its elimination. Thank you for discussing these issues with us today, Professor Bales.Afterword\nNotes: 1. For the purpose of the present Convention, the following definitions are agreed upon:\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Kevin Bales' work on contemporary slavery has brought this under-researched field of social enquiry to the attention not only of the academic world but to a wider global audience through his prolific publishing, his film work and not least his presidency of Free the Slaves, the US anti-slavery organisation. The purpose of this paper is to explore some of his findings and methodologies currently prevailing in this field.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper is based on an interview with Kevin Bales conducted in April 2009 and subsequent discussions with Claire Griffiths.\nFindings: - Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy, the book that brought Bales global recognition over a decade ago, reinstated slavery as a key human rights issue on the research agenda for the twenty-first century. This interview is condensed from a longer discussion between Kevin Bales and Claire Griffiths on researching contemporary slavery. In this conversation they explore the relationship between slavery, trafficking and prostitution, a theme that leads the discussion to the gendered nature of slavery through the centuries. The interview concludes with some indications of where slavery studies research is going in the twenty-first century.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides new insights into the emerging and interdisciplinary field of modern slavery studies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Continued organizational identification following involuntary job loss
|
[
"Job loss",
"Unemployment",
"Organizational identification",
"Social identity",
"Well‐being",
"Quality of life",
"United States of America",
"Professional services",
"Corporate identity"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: For many of today's employees, involuntary employment transitions, such as layoffs and firings, are increasingly commonplace. Millions of people worldwide have been affected by job loss during the period of economic uncertainty beginning in 2008 and described as the most significant recession since the Great Depression (Uchitelle, 2008). As Walter Kirn (2009, p. 13), the author of the popular novel on corporate layoffs, Up in the Air, observed, \"The unemployment rate is an abstraction, an aggregation of bodiless data, but losing a job is a lived experience, written on the nerves.\" Among the central questions raised by the prevalence of these involuntary employment transitions is what will help employees who have lost their jobs to cope with the ensuing change and discontinuity in their work lives.\nContinued organizational identification: Organizational identification is generally considered beneficial for both individuals and organizations (e.g. Ashforth et al., 2008; Ashforth and Mael, 1989; Pratt, 1998). Employees who identify with their employing organizations are more likely to view company successes as personal ones; further, organizational identification is positively related to performance and organizational citizenship behaviors, and negatively related to turnover (Dutton et al., 1994; Pratt, 1998). While organizational identification is valuable for those who are stably employed, less is known about whether maintaining this attachment is advantageous for people who have lost their jobs. Researchers studying the modern organization have considered how employees maintain organizational identification in light of mergers and acquisitions (Bartels et al., 2006; Van Dick et al., 2006; Van Leeuwen et al., 2003), departmental restructurings (Jetten et al., 2002; Ruvolo, 2004), and temporary work (Bartel and Dutton, 2001). However, while these studies examine the challenges that employees face in connecting with a referent organization, they do not consider what happens when that connection is permanently lost. Yet, unfortunately, this situation may all too accurately describe the experiences of people who lose their jobs in organizations.People who are unemployed do not yet have jobs in new organizations; thus, they might remain mentally invested in their former jobs and employers. Research has shown that people remain identified with groups even under challenging circumstances, including organizational failure (Tajfel, 1981) and occupational stigmatization (Ashforth and Kreiner, 1999). Further, identification with a group only requires that people perceive, rather than actually experience, membership in the group (Ashforth and Mael, 1989), and can refer to a group whose existence is tenuous or ephemeral (e.g. Brewer and Kramer, 1986). Those who lose their connections to an organization in some instances will mourn the loss and feel nostalgic about their time there (Harris and Sutton, 1986). The job search process can serve to keep the prior organization salient in job seekers' minds, as they continually reference former employers in resumes and interviews, utilize personal contacts related to the old job, and in some cases, even make explicit use of outplacement services provided by the former employer (Uchitelle, 2006). Anecdotal evidence of people who have been laid off reveals that some people continue to identify with their former organizations long after they have lost their jobs, even once they have accepted and begun new jobs (Sennett, 1998; Uchitelle, 2006). Thus, although this assumption has not been tested empirically, it stands to reason that people who have lost their jobs can continue to identify with their former organizations.However, despite people's tendency to remain identified with their former employers, it is not known what the effects will be on their well-being. Existing theory paints a complex and contradictory picture about whether continued organizational identification is beneficial or detrimental. The hypotheses that follow clarify the conditions under which continued organizational identification will help or hurt employees following job loss.\nHypothesis development: For people who have lost their jobs, maintaining psychological well-being is one of the central challenges to daily existence (Jahoda, 1982; McKee-Ryan et al., 2005). Existing theory suggests that continued organizational identification may provide a valuable source of self-enhancement for those coping with job loss, or that it may provide a disconcerting challenge to self-continuity. Since theory predicts both positive and negative effects of continued organizational identification, I develop competing hypotheses regarding the extent to which identification relates to psychological well-being for those who are unemployed.For those who have been laid off or fired from their jobs, remaining identified with their former employer may confer several distinct benefits. Organizational identification fulfills human needs for self-enhancement, belongingness, and meaning or purpose (Pratt, 1998). Even someone who is not currently a member of an organization might retain these psychological benefits via remaining identified with the organization. People may identify with the selves they wish to be, rather than the selves they currently are, as in possible selves (Markus and Nurius, 1986), provisional selves (Ibarra, 1999), and aspirational selves (Thornborrow and Brown, 2009). For people in a vulnerable state, such subjective identification allows them to maintain a more positive sense of self than their objective reality would suggest.Studies in a variety of contexts have demonstrated that people's default response to negative life events often involves maintaining positive illusions about themselves (Taylor and Brown, 1988). In fact, those who maintain such illusions report higher well-being and better adjustment than those who accept a more accurate reality (Taylor and Armor, 1996; Taylor and Brown, 1988). Maintaining a self-definition based in a former employer might be one of the ways people maintain a positive outlook despite the objectively grim circumstances of being out of work. For example, an unemployed person who identifies with a former organization may feel a sense of belongingness that offsets the feelings of isolation that can accompany job loss (Baumeister and Leary, 1995; Jahoda, 1982). Further, unemployed people may believe that the prestige associated with their former employers is reflected upon them, and may therefore report higher well-being than those who does not retain this identity. In sum, those who remain identified with their former organizations may be better off than those who do not have this identity base. The self-enhancement motive of organizational identification therefore suggests the following hypothesis:H1. Continued organizational identification will positively relate to psychological well-being for those who have lost their jobs.Despite the benefits of remaining identified with a former employer, there are likely to be significant costs as well. There are several reasons why remaining strongly identified with one's former employer might harm one's well-being. First, job loss may be interpreted as an identity threat, defined as an \"experience appraised as indicating potential harm to the value, meanings, or enactment of an identity\" (Petriglieri, 2011, p. 644). Research shows that when a valued identity is threatened, people report lower self-esteem and greater anxiety and depression, because their views of themselves as stable actors in a predictable world becomes destabilized (Breakwell, 1986; Petriglieri, 2011). Second, in the context of involuntary job loss, research has shown that employees whose identities were most invested in their work reported lower well-being during unemployment than those for whom work was not a core part of their identities (McKee-Ryan et al., 2005). The more important the former organization is to an employee's self-definition, the more disruptive challenges to maintaining this identity are likely to be.The theme that unites these two arguments is that remaining invested in a former employer challenges employees' sense of self-continuity; that is, the knowledge that one is the same person today as she was yesterday, and will be tomorrow (Erez and Earley, 1993; Stryker, 1980). Employees struggled to maintain identity continuity when their employing organization changed due to a merger, even when they remained in the same job (Van Leeuwen and Van Knippenberg, 2001; Van Leeuwen et al., 2003). Employees whose jobs have been permanently lost are faced with the objective reality that they are no longer members of the organization, interacting with the physical office space, or doing the tasks that they used to do when they were employed. Thus, the more invested they remain in their former roles, the more discomfort they might feel with not being able to enact those roles. By contrast, those who are not strongly identified with their former organizations may not be as bothered by exiting the organization.While identities that are based in former employers might provide a source of self-enhancement for people during unemployment, this benefit could come at the expense of losing a sense of continuity. In summary, remaining identified with a former organization may have both benefits and costs from a well-being perspective. As this study is an exploratory investigation into this tension, I present the competing hypothesis:H2. Continued organizational identification will negatively relate to psychological well-being for those who have lost their jobs.\nMethod: Participants and procedure\nResults: Descriptive statistics, scale reliabilities, and zero-order correlations for study variables in samples 1 and 2 are reported in Tables I and II, respectively. I tested all hypotheses using multiple regression analysis, controlling for age, gender, self-esteem, need for organizational identification, internal attribution for job loss, unemployment duration, perceived financial strain, and occupational tenure, as noted. Given the small sample size in sample 2, only control variables that were positively correlated with the dependent variables were included in the models.H1 and H2 predicted that the relationship between continued organizational identification and psychological well-being would be positive and negative, respectively. For sample 1, continued organizational identification was positively related to well-being at time 2, controlling for well-being at time 1 (b=0.33, p<0.05). A similar result was found for sample 2. Controlling for organizational identification at time 1, organizational identification at time 2 was positively related to well-being at time 2 (b=0.25, p<0.05). These results therefore support H1 over H2. The results of these analyses are presented for samples 1 and 2 in Tables III and IV, respectively.\nDiscussion: Summary of findings\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Continued identification with a former employer may provide valuable self-enhancement during transition, or it may highlight unsettling self-discontinuity. This study seeks to develop and test competing hypotheses regarding the extent to which continued organizational identification relates to psychological well-being following involuntary job loss.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The author conducted a two-wave survey study spanning six months during the recent financial crisis in 2008 to test these hypotheses. Results are presented for 86 employees in two samples, 45 who were unemployed at the beginning of the study and 41 who lost their jobs during the study.\nFindings: - Continued organizational identification positively related to psychological well-being in both samples. In a post-hoc analysis, this relationship held only for employees who attributed their job loss to themselves, rather than to external factors such as their organizations.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The results are based on a limited sample both in terms of size and scope; accordingly, they are best used to explain the relationships for the sample from which they were drawn, professional employees in the USA with a business education, about half of whom worked in the financial services industry.\nPractical implications: - Being identified with an employing organization is not only beneficial for current employees and their organizations, but also helps employees whose jobs have been terminated. Managers and counselors should advise people to reflect upon, rather than distance themselves from, aspects of their identities based in former employers.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first study to examine the role of organizational identification in individual response to involuntary job loss.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Making the intangible count - counting the intangible: A report on current learning from a UK food retailer
|
[
"Business ethics",
"Risk management",
"Food industry",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nContext: Society's expectations of business behaviour are continually evolving - from modest demands to contribute to community economic development to aspirations for multinationals to resolve the critical issues facing society, whether of global terrorism, international epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, or corruption.A central challenge and opportunity for performance measurement and management systems in the coming decade is to track, respond to and influence these expectations.Recent years have witnessed a small, but expanding, group of companies developing highly sophisticated approaches to non-financial measurement and management. These range from overarching strategic programmes to more modest experimentation. Two approaches that have informed and exemplified this practice follow:1. Human capital and other intangibles have received attention - core methodologies, for example, have been grounded in the Meritum Guidelines for Managing and Reporting on Intangibles (Meritum, 2001), and the range of corporate experimentation was evident at the European conference on intangibles management in 2002, The Transparent Enterprise.2. Strategic management tools such as the balanced scorecard, performance prism and EFQM model have been utilised to encompass a diverse range of issues and to pay greater attention to the critical processes of stakeholder engagement. For example, balanced scorecard author Robert Kaplan was the keynote speaker at an INSEAD conference on Sustainability Balanced Scorecards in 2003, an event which explored a number of experimental methodologies and emerging experience.Approaches to the management and measurement of business risk have also been informed by new governance guidelines, for example the OECD Principles of Corporate Governance (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2004); and the Disclosure Guidelines from the Association of British Insurers (2001) represent an initiative from within the financial services sector that emphasises the importance of transparency on board-level practices for the management of social, ethical and environmental risk.Another relevant ongoing process concerns the UK Government's proposals for the new operating and financial review (OFR). As part of this, the Department of Trade and Industry published a consultation paper on the interpretation of materiality in the summer of 2003 (Department of Trade and Industry, 2003). The guidelines were due to be released in December 2003 and are now expected to be published April 2005. These proposals will have significant impact on the nature of the financial and non-financial issues on which organisations are required to measure and report performance.Underlying these and other techniques and methodologies is an increasing recognition of the importance of forward-looking, risk-focused approaches to business - understanding and reinforcing a company's capacity to identify and handle the opportunities and challenges it will face in the decades to come.This approach is strikingly illustrated by the emergence of sustainability assurance in parallel with the proliferation of social, environment and sustainability reporting. As companies increasingly report on non-financial measures, such assurance can play a critical part in reinforcing risk-management processes and building credibility among stakeholders - providing insight on the quality of governance procedures and the capacity (human and social capital) of an organisation to deliver against its policy commitments and targets and the expectations of its stakeholders.\nCase learning - UK food retailer: Article 13 has worked with a leading UK food retailer to build and support its social, environmental and ethical (SEE) risk management systems to help deliver cost savings and competitive edge. At the heart of this work has been the requirement to better understand the organisation's preparedness to address emerging risks and opportunities, and the development of measurement systems that help to inform this judgement on an ongoing basis.The corporate social responsibility (CSR) programme has involved three main phases:1. development of SEE policies, procedures and targets;2. embedding of SEE systems through the organisation, detailed analysis and remediation of critical issues, and independent review and challenge of its systems and activities; and3. ongoing development of SEE systems, and conduct of second cycle of a sustainability assurance process - currently in progress - leading to the publication of an external assurance statement at the end of the next financial year.Phase one\nConclusions: As the review proceeds, it is clear that the board will be a critical lever in improving the quality of performance management and measurement. Critical issues looking forward for the organisation include: board training and development processes that generate high levels of awareness and understanding of critical business issues and their potential impact on the organisation; and board structures that ensure stakeholder perspectives on company activities and performance are integral to the business decision-making process.Beyond the board, it is imperative that there is further embedding of existing risk management processes, and deepening of CSR knowledge among those responsible for its implementation; that the organisation devotes adequate resource to formulating achievable SEE action plans, and communicating and generating enthusiasm for the plans. It must also further clarify the relationship between its corporate strategy and its CSR policies. As Ittner and Larker (2004) identify successful measures must be linked to strategy, the links must be validated, the right performance targets must be in place and measurement must be performed correctly.The food retailer is still at a relatively early stage in the development of measurement systems in relation to its CSR performance and its management of social, ethical and environmental risk. However, by adopting a clear set of forward-looking targets and action plans in relation to carefully chosen and communicated policies on its critical CSR issues, it has the foundations of an effective measurement system; and by implementing a targeted assurance process it has embraced a robust challenge to the effectiveness of these systems in delivering valuable information to management and, in future, to external stakeholders.\n",
"role": "user"
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"content": "Purpose: - To examine the practical application of two emerging guidelines for the disclosure and assurance of corporate sustainability performance - the ABI Disclosure Guidelines on Socially Responsible Investment and the AA1000 Assurance Standard.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - By reviewing the practical implementation of these two emerging guidelines within a UK retailer. It explores their complementarity, and their potential application for internal learning as well as external credibility.\nFindings: - Emphasises the need for a flexible application of these tools to provide a multi-lensed view of organisational performance, but also emphasises the importance of a unifying analysis that has resonance across an organisation - from boardroom to shop-floor - and with external stakeholders.\nResearch limitations/implications: - It is not an exhaustive list and apart from one UK book all the rest are US publications which perhaps limits its usefulness elsewhere.\nPractical implications: - A very useful source of information and a case study for managers planning to implement reporting of intangibles, linking into corporate governance and corporate social responsibility.\nOriginality/value: - This paper fulfils an identified information/resources need and offers practical help to an individual starting out on this type of programme.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Essentials of total quality management: a meta-analysis
|
[
"Total quality management",
"Implementation",
"Quality healthcare",
"Critical successful factors",
"Healthcare organisations"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Healthcare managers are forced to review their organisational practices to improve quality and productivity. Total Quality Management (TQM), as an organisational strategy, enhances organisational performance by providing high-quality products and services through team work, customer-driven quality and continuously improving inputs and processes (Mosadeghrad, 2006). TQM's success in manufacturing industry has encouraged many healthcare managers to examine whether it can also work in the health sector. Consequently, in the last 30 years, many healthcare organisations implemented TQM to improve service quality and efficiency. Healthcare organisations with mechanistic structure, functional designs, centralised decision making, rigid bureaucracies, strict rules, narrowly defined tasks, chain-of-command orientation and top-down communication are complicated, which may constrain TQM. In reality, several healthcare organisations have fallen short in implementing TQM programmes. Researchers mostly evaluated TQM success in healthcare organisations at a medium or low level (Buciuniene et al., 2006; Huq and Martin, 2000; Lee et al., 2002; Theodorakioglou and Tsiotras, 2000). Bureaucratic and hierarchical structure, professional autonomy, poor leadership, employee resistance to TQM implementation, inappropriate organisational culture, insufficient training and inadequate resources were the major health-sector TQM obstacles (Mosadeghrad, 2013). A TQM model has two components: values and principles (i.e. management support, employee involvement and team working) and techniques and tools (e.g. statistical process control). These are TQM's soft and hard dimensions. There is no consensus among TQM gurus, researchers and consultants about TQM basic principles and critical success factors (CSFs). Various quality gurus included different principles, practices and CSFs in their TQM models. Consequently, managers are confused where to start and what is required to implement TQM.\nAims: This study aims to fill this gap by developing a theoretically sound TQM model by identifying TQM CSFs. Understanding the factors that facilitate TQM implementation enables managers to develop more effective strategies for institutionalising TQM's principles.\nMethod: A systematic review of health sector TQM CSF studies was undertaken. Ten electronic databases were searched, including PubMed, Directory of Open Access Journals, Ebsco research databases, Elsevier science, Emerald, JSTOR, ScienceDirect, Social Science Citation Index, Social Science Research Network and Web of Knowledge. Keywords included \"Total Quality Management\", \"implementation\", \"critical success factors\" and \"healthcare sector\". Selection was restricted to: those written in English; published between 1980 and 2012; examined healthcare TQM implementation; using an empirical approach (quantitative or qualitative); and identified TQM CSFs. The primary literature search identified 954 publications that focused on QM or TQM implementation. The author searched for publications that focused on healthcare organisations. Abstracts were reviewed and 637 publications were excluded. A total of 317 abstracts were reviewed for those studies that identified TQM success factors in healthcare organisations, which excluded 222 publications. Full-text documents for the remaining 95 were reviewed for their methods and findings. Finally, 37 empirical studies reporting TQM CSF in healthcare organisations were reviewed (Appendix). The literature review process is depicted in Figure 1.\nResults: In total, 52 TQM CSFs were derived from the literature review analysis. Leadership, employee involvement, training, process management, top management support, planning and resource allocation were the most commonly extracted TQM CSFs across 37 empirical TQM studies (Table I).\nDiscussion: Although TQM programmes have been implemented systematically in manufacturing companies since 1980, healthcare managers were lagging behind manufacturing companies. The first reported empirical TQM implementation study in healthcare was 1994 (Jennings and Westfall, 1994). Researchers in USA have mainly used the Baldrige criteria as a framework to study quality management in healthcare organisations (Meyer and Collier, 2001; Shortell et al., 1995). The main TQM CSFs identified in this study include:\nConclusions and implications for managers: Healthcare quality management is evolving. This study complemented previous research, which analysed quality management models. This paper uncovered the main TQM CSFs for healthcare organisations. In total, 52 TQM practices were extracted from 37 TQM empirical studies, which were categorised into a TQM framework consisting of 15 constructs. The proposed model constitutes an appropriate framework to implement TQM systematically. Successful TQM arises from leadership and management efforts towards developing and communicating a strategic quality plan, promoting a learning organisation and creating a quality culture to facilitate sustained employee, customer, supplier, resource, information and process management. This TQM model in turn, results in employees, customers, suppliers and society satisfaction and organisational survival. The proposed model can be used as a self-assessment tool.\nLimitations and implications for further research: This literature review examined TQM implementation literature over the last 30 years. One reviewer carried out the review and this may have introduced bias into the search process. The review was limited to articles written in English. Relevant information from books, journals and web sites written in other languages would provide additional valuable information.\n",
"role": "user"
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"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify critical successful factors for Total Quality Management (TQM) implementation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A literature review was conducted to explore the critical successful factors for TQM implementation between 1980 and 2010.\nFindings: A successful TQM implementation need sufficient education and training, supportive leadership, consistent support of top management, customer focus, employee involvement, process management and continuous improvement of processes.\nResearch limitations/implications: The review was limited to articles written in English language during the past 30 years.\nPractical implications: From a practical point of view, the findings of this paper provide managers with a practical understanding of the factors that are likely to facilitate TQM implementation in organisations.\nOriginality/value: Understanding the factors that are likely to promote TQM implementation would enable managers to develop more effective strategies that will enhance the chances of achieving business excellence.\n",
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Picture this: the role of mental imagery in induction of food craving - a theoretical framework based on the elaborated intrusion theory
|
[
"Elaborated intrusion theory",
"Craving intensity",
"Food cravings",
"Imagery stimuli"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Food craving - a cognitive, emotional and motivational state which activates an urge or intense desire driving an individual to search and consume a particular food - is considered to be different from hunger (Richard et al., 2018). Hunger is an internal, natural and instinctive calling for ordinary food choices controlled by the stomach. On the other hand, craving is defined as an external based cue of intense desire for a specific food(Richard et al., 2018; Ronzio, 2003). Moreover, craving is learned and shaped over time through the process of habit formation and is controlled by the brain (Ronzio, 2003). The external based cue of food craving and the specificity of craved food makes it controllable and even manipulatable by researchers. It is important to mention that food cravings precede binge eating (Gendall et al., 1998), particularly in the presence of eating disorders like bulimia nervosa (Waters et al., 2001) and subsequently in obesity (Schlundt et al., 1993). Despite the existence of current food cravings research, the origins of food cravings are still unclear. Some research has focused on biological stimuli including physiological deficiencies (Benton and Donohoe, 1999) and other research on its neurological or psychological underpinnings (Smith and Robbins, 2013). Unlike cravings for substances (e.g. alcohol and drugs), food cravings are not necessarily pathological. It is widely believed that episodic cravings are evoked by situational cues and contexts which will likely elicit an urge to consume that particular substance among the general population without any problem (Baker et al., 1986). Yet major studies suggest environmental cues such as food cues and sensory stimuli (i.e. visual, gustatory, olfactory and auditory) influence food cravings and their underlying origins (Tiggemann and Kemps, 2005). Based on the Elaborated Intrusion theory of craving--which explains how the cognitive process of craving starts with an intrusive thought elaborated by mental imagery--it is logical to deduce that certain sensory stimuli are most likely to form a vivid image of the desired food, including how delicious it looks, how pleasant it tastes and how good it smells (May et al., 2015; Tiggemann and Kemps, 2005). Accordingly, there has been a recent interest in identifying the role of food-related mental imagery and stimuli in consumers' decision-making and their final consumption (Christian et al., 2016). Nevertheless, very few studies in marketing have paid attention to these underpinning stimuli driving food craving and the significant influence of this food craving phenomenon on marketing outcomes.\nLiterature review: Conceptualization of craving has been previously researched extensively. Some scholars define craving as an intense desire to consume a substance (unidimensional conceptualization; Kozlowski et al., 1996; Kozlowski et al., 1989), while others have defined craving as a multidimensional concept based on its origins (Tiffany and Carter, 1998). Recently, researchers have conceptualized craving based on cognitive concepts (such as memory, interpretation, expectancies, and automatic behavior) and have introduced new concepts and models (e.g. nonautomatic cognitive processing and outcome expectancy) in craving research.\nAntecedents of food craving: Presentation mode plays an important role in enhancing vividness and raising the gratification of consuming the alternative in contrast to the symbolic presentation (e.g. photograph or description of alternatives). However, Kemps et al. (2012) and Kemps and Tiggemann (2013) found that not only exposing the participants to the actual food or to a vivid image of the desired food, but also instructing them to imagine having their favorite food, can induce a food craving. Concerning other substances such as alcohol, imagining a drink can be even more successful at inducing cravings in the laboratory than actually showing people a real drink (Litt and Cooney, 1999). The underlying reason is that with the outcomes alike those that accompany actual eating (e.g. salivation and reward), imaginary consumption also provides a body of prospective pleasures (Andrade et al., 2012). Based on EI theory, intrusive thoughts are typically the gateway to intense craving and lengthen it for a while. In addition to forming the image of the desired food, imagery stimuli arouse the sensory and emotional qualities of target acquisition (which makes a person keep thinking of that specific food). In several studies, cravers reported their spontaneous thoughts about the desired target involving visual, olfactory, gustatory, or auditory food imagery (Tiggemann and Kemps, 2005). While visual imagery has been frequently mentioned as the strongest stimulus for craving, (Kemps and Tiggemann, 2015), olfactory and gustatory images are also introduced as the key components of food cravings (May et al., 2012). However, imagery auditory descriptors are not rated as highly (Kemps and Tiggemann, 2015). Thus, we hypothesize that, in addition to situational cues which are already noted as reliable triggers of a craving; visual, gustatory, olfactory and auditory food imagery stimuli also play an important role in the initiation of a food craving in this order:\nModerators (enhancers) of food craving: Overall perception of sensory attributes\nConsequences of food craving: Willingness to pay and price sensitivity\nMethod: A total of 314 U.S. adults (37.6 per cent men and 62.4 per cent women, all 18 years or older) were recruited through a nation-wide database (Amazon MTurk). Participants were randomly assigned to one of eight conditions in a 4 (imagery stimuli: visual (74), olfactory (81), gustatory (83), and auditory (76) x 2 (food type: healthy (153) vs. unhealthy (161)) between-subjects experimental design. The dependent measure was levels of craving intensity after each imagery induction along with other marketing outcomes.\nProcedure: For each condition, participants were provided with a brief explanation of \"food craving\" and then presented with an imagery induction script. This script was tested for food craving in a laboratory setting resulting in a significant increase of craving intensity(Green et al., 2000). In the visual imagery induction condition, participants were asked: \"Try to visualize your favorite(salad vs. cheeseburger) as clearly as you can?\" In the olfactory imagery condition, participants were asked \"Try to imagine the smell of your favorite (salad vs. cheeseburger) as clearly as you can?\" In the gustatory imagery condition, participants were asked: \"Try to imagine the taste of your favorite (salad vs. cheeseburger) as clearly as you can?\" Finally, in the auditory imagery condition, participants were asked: \"Try to imagine the sound of yourself having your favorite (salad vs. cheeseburger) as clearly as you can?\" To measure the healthiness of their imagined food, participants were asked to briefly explain the type of salad or cheeseburger they had imagined. Participants subsequently rated the vividness of the image in their mind and their level of liking their imagined food, all on seven-point scales.\nMaterials: Food craving scale\nResults: Our goal in this study was to test the interaction of imagery stimuli and product types influence on food craving. Therefore, our experiment followed a 4 (imagery stimuli: visual vs. olfactory vs. gustatory vs. auditory imagery stimuli) x 2 (food type: healthy vs. unhealthy) between-subjects experimental design. To test the differences between groups (conditions), ANOVA was used. Different associations among variables were analyzed with Pearson's correlation coefficient in three different levels of low (r <= 0.4), moderate (0.4 < r < 0.7) and high levels (0.7 <= r)(see Table I).\nDiscussion and conclusions: Consistent with the assumption of EI theory and supporting the role of mental imagery at the heart of food craving, instructing participants to visualize their favorite food, to imagine its smell, taste or the sound of them having it, elicited food craving. One of the main contributions of this study (due to the potential to use visual imagery to induce cravings for healthy foods and suppress cravings for unhealthy food and vastly improve consumers' health and overall health of society) was the finding that the visual imagery stimulus-induced the highest food craving intensity and the auditory imagery induced the weakest food craving intensity among participants. Unlike the findings of some existing research, olfactory showed a stronger effect in stimulating food craving versus gustatory stimulus. Above all, sensory imagery is associated with stronger episodes of craving (Kavanagh et al., 2005). Another main contribution of this study was the finding that visual imagery stimuli are characterized not only as the strongest triggers of food cravings, but also the strongest drivers of consumers' willingness to pay and food intake (this behavior can be useful in helping consumers pursue a healthy food diet and suppress cravings for unhealthy foods via the resulting positive impact on willingness to pay and food intake).Confirming the findings of Harvey et al.(2005), vividness ratings of the imagined scripts showed a positive correlation with participants' food craving intensity. Unlike the common assumption that women have more intense food craving than men, our results indicated that men had greater craving intensity for both healthy and unhealthy foods.\nManagerial and theoretical implications: Corroborating and extending existing research, the results of our study have important theoretical and practical implications. According to EI theory, imagery favors temptation over abstinence. In other words, we give into temptations because we can imagine the pleasure of indulging in the food much more vividly than achieving a long-term health-related goal. We empirically contributed to the development of EI theory, in terms of the potential competition among the imagery sensory attributes and their respective importance in food craving. Research into craving shows how weakening or preventing mental imagery can lead to suppression in craving. Future research might further explore the importance of imagery sensory attributes in craving for substances such as alcohol and drugs, and how to suppress it.\nLimitations and future research: First, we used a cheeseburger as an example of unhealthy food and a salad as a healthy food example. It is recommended future studies include other types of unhealthy and healthy foods to make this study's finding more generalizable. Second, the relationship between the concept of craving and physiological and psychological disorders (such as patients' binge eating, anxiety, depression, etc.) should be examined in future studies. Third, to analyze the theoretical relationship between food craving and eating behavior it is necessary to include some behavioral measures besides the analysis of state and trait craving. Fourth, although the main objective of this study was to compare the effect of different imagery stimuli on consumers' food craving, there was no control (no-stimulus) condition. Furthermore, testing imagery stimuli in laboratory experiments is recommended.\n",
"role": "user"
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"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to explore the influence of four types of imagery stimuli (i.e. visual, olfactory, gustatory and auditory) on food craving intensity based on the Elaborated Intrusion theory and the central role of mental imagery in the food craving experience. The roles of overall perception of sensory imagery attributes and perceived availability in moderating this process were also tested. The aim is to extract the positive aspects of food cravings by increasing them and shifting them toward healthy foods.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In an online experiment, 314 participants were randomly primed with each imagery condition. After being exposed to either healthy or unhealthy food pictures, participants completed a questionnaire measuring their craving state, trait food craving, imaging ability, BMI, dietary restraint, hunger and mood. At the end, the impact of food craving intensity on marketing outcomes (i.e. willingness to pay, price sensitivity and food intake) were tested.\nFindings: As predicted, visual imagery was found to be the strongest stimulus inducing food craving followed by olfactory, gustatory and auditory stimuli. Furthermore, the results indicate that perceived availability of food is the only important variable moderating this process. Additionally, the results show that hunger makes consumers more susceptible to food cravings than mood. Moreover, food craving intensity showed significant impact on the two marketing outcomes: willingness to pay and food intake.\nResearch limitations/implications: First, the authors used a cheeseburger as unhealthy food and salad as healthy food, future studies can increase the generalizability of the findings by using other types of food. Second, physiological and psychological disorders should be considered and studied as influential factors on food cravings in future studies. Third, future studies should include some behavioral measures besides the analysis of state and trait craving. Fourth, although the main objective of this study was to compare the effect of different imagery stimuli on consumers' food craving, there was no control (no-stimulus) condition.\nPractical implications: Marketing strategists may benefit from the fact that encouraging consumers to visualize some specific type of food product along with informing them about its availability will elevate their craving for that food product. Hence, using this strategy in shopping environments could be beneficial. In the context of improving people's diet, our results showed that encouraging people to visualize healthy foods (e.g. fruits and vegetables) might be more helpful than priming them with the benefits of eating healthy.\nOriginality/value: There has been a recent enthusiastic interest in identifying the role of food related mental imagery and stimuli in consumers' decision making and their final consumption (Christian et al., 2016). Nevertheless, very few studies in marketing have paid attention to these underpinning stimuli driving food craving and the significant influence of this food craving phenomenon on marketing outcomes.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Examining diversity beliefs and leader performance across cultures
|
[
"Leadership effectiveness",
"Leadership",
"National culture",
"Performance orientation",
"Diversity beliefs"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Managing diversity is a fundamental aspect of leadership and is considered one of the main human resource management challenges facing organizations today (Alcazar et al., 2013). Leaders can overtly strive to manage diversity through their behaviors, decisions, and policies. However, their influence is also felt in more subtle and potentially unintentional ways, such as through the perceptions their employees develop about the way the leader feels about diversity. For example, research that focuses on implicit leadership theory, authentic leadership, charismatic leadership, and transformational leadership all deal in part with the beliefs, assumptions, or relationships employees develop of or with their leaders (Avolio et al., 2009). In many of these situations, perceptions are developed independent of what the leader may be trying to convey.\nResearch on diversity: Even in organizations considered relatively homogeneous, employees vary along demographic characteristics, values, or cultural backgrounds. Although there is a large body of work focusing on demographic diversity (i.e. gender, race/ethnicity/age), the concept applies to a much wider range of characteristics, including nationality, education, work experience/tenure. In addition, changes in the workforce have resulted in diversity in ways that did not previously occur. For example, cross-cultural researchers once drew a distinction between domestic organizations and those that involved multiple cultures (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1989; Sera, 1992). This was most clearly seen for employees working on an expatriate assignment. However, the trend toward globalization has resulted in a mobile and diverse workforce where organizations that consider themselves to be domestic are still likely to find a wide range of cultural backgrounds among their employees. As a result, it becomes increasingly important to understand what type of influence diversity has in the workplace as well as to understand how best to utilize a diverse workforce (Roberge et al., 2011).\nDiversity beliefs: The literature on group diversity is immense, and the topics examined under the umbrella of this general term are as diverse as the subject itself (Qin et al., 2014). Some of the variables examined in the diversity research include race, gender, nationality, age, values, education, and experience (Foleyet al., 2006; Martins et al., 2003; Pelled et al., 1999; Ruderman et al., 1995).\nLeadership and diversity beliefs: While plenty has been written on how to manage a diverse team, research on diversity beliefs at the individual level has largely focused on employees and members of a team (Homan et al., 2007; van Knippenberg et al., 2007). While it is the case that the overall diversity beliefs of a work group depend upon the beliefs of each individual, a leader is uniquely positioned to have an impact on how the group views diversity.\nPerformance orientation (PO): Although we expect there to be a relationship between employee perceptions of a leader's diversity beliefs and the supervisor rating of performance, there are a wide range of factors that could impact this relationship. One broad contextual variable to consider is societal or national culture. The use of cultural dimensions to understand global workplace differences has seen extensive attention (Hofstede, 2001; House et al., 2004; Triandis, 2003). However, little research examines societal culture's relationship with the concept of diversity beliefs, in part due to this being a relatively new concept. Recent work has begun to look at the impact that societal culture can have on concepts related to diversity. For example, Stoermer et al. (2016) proposed a framework that examined the moderating role of Hofstede's culture dimensions on the relationship between diversity/inclusion management and the inclusion climate. This model highlights why each dimension is expected to act as a moderator of the main relationship, strengthening or weakening the expected relationship.\nMethod: Participants and procedures\nResults: The means, standard deviations, and correlations of the Level 1 variables are shown in Table II.\nDiscussion: The purpose of the present research was to test two hypotheses. First, we examined whether employee perceptions of a leader's diversity beliefs would be related to supervisor ratings of the leader's performance. Second, we aimed to assess whether the relationship between a leader's diversity beliefs and his/her performance ratings would be stronger in high PO cultures than in low PO cultures. We found support for both of our hypotheses.\n",
"role": "user"
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"content": "Purpose: The global nature of today's business environment, coupled with technological advances, has resulted in leaders working with an increasingly diverse workforce worldwide. An emerging stream of research examines the beliefs that individuals, groups, and organizations have regarding diversity. The purpose of this paper is to add to this work by looking at subordinate perceptions of a leader's beliefs about diversity and how that relates to a leader's performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using archival data, the authors examine 33,976 leaders (from 36 different countries and more than 4,000 companies). This study includes performance ratings from each leader's supervisor as well as perceptual measures of diversity beliefs from their direct reports and a measure of national culture as a moderator.\nFindings: The research finds that employee perceptions of a leader's diversity beliefs are related to supervisor ratings of the target leader's performance. In addition, the relationship between a leader's diversity beliefs and the target leader's performance rating is stronger in cultures high in performance orientation (PO) than in cultures low in PO.\nResearch limitations/implications: The limitations include the use of an archival data set as well as an assigned country score for our measure of culture.\nOriginality/value: While existing research has examined the impact of self-rated measures of diversity beliefs, there is little empirical research that examines how employee perceptions of a leader's diversity beliefs will impact performance. The authors address this need by examining whether employee-rated perceptions of the leader's diversity beliefs are related to a supervisor-rated measure of leader performance. In addition, the authors examine the moderating influence of societal culture on this relationship.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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Banking crises and Hong Kong: Coordination between regulatory measures and compensation schemes (bailout, deposit insurance and insolvency laws)
|
[
"Deposit insurance",
"Banking crises",
"Bailout",
"Bank insolvency",
"Compensation scheme",
"Regulatory measure"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The collapse of the internationally active bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (\"Lehman Brothers\") was one of the key triggers for a massive financial crisis globally in 2008. The detrimental impacts have been spread internationally through the inter-connected financial markets. Many government actions and policies were ineffective (Krugman, 2008; Mishkin, 2011; Taylor, 2009). This paper suggests that international cooperation among national supervisory authorities and the coordination between ex ante regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes are crucial in response to the global banking crises and to deal with too-big-to-fail issue on trouble banks like Lehman Brothers. Hong Kong is an international city, in which many branches of globally systematically important banks are located. Cooperation with their headquarters in other countries becomes significant in the event of banking crises. This paper not only argues that a comprehensive legal and regulatory framework should be set up in line with international standards but also puts emphasis on the harmonious relationship between the adoption of ex ante regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes. Major types of ex post compensation schemes will be examined - bailout, deposit insurance and insolvency laws.\n2. Literature review: Mishkin (2011) explained that the collapse of Lehman Brothers is one of the key triggers to the recent financial crisis in 2008. The contagious effect of such crisis recognizes how the global financial system is highly interconnected. Krugman (2008) and Taylor (2009) hold the view that many government actions and monetary policy were ineffective during the crisis. The body of literature has pointed out that the national response to a collapse of a globally systematically important bank was not sufficient against banking crises and showed that the significance of international cooperation between supervisory authorities of the affected countries (Arner, 2009; Brummer, 2010; Bryant, 2008; Lord Turner, 2009). The rationale behind such cooperation is illustrated by Katada (2001): the strong economic linkage and the anticipation of getting adequate intangible returns such as financial stability and bilateral trading relationships among countries are the strong motivation to take actions in crisis management and to cooperate with each other to maintain the financial stability.\n3. The readiness of the Hong Kong regulatory structure to face international banking crises: The crises which have happened in Hong Kong are usually triggered by banks in foreign countries, for instance, the Asian financial crisis and the recent 2008 financial crisis. A financial crisis is a complex issue that comprises financial market, government policy and economic conditions. It is even more complex when it gains an international dimension. Therefore, robust regulation and good policy are required to combat the financial crises. After the 2008 financial crisis, it is observed that Hong Kong financial regulatory system has gaps and flaws that contribute to a demand for improvement. The subcommittee (Legislative Council of the HKSAR, 2012) investigated the recent financial crisis and referred to the Review reports from HKMA (Hong Kong Monetary Authority, 2008) and SFC (Securities and Futures Commission, 2008). They highlight the weakness of the Hong Kong financial regulatory system in the face of financial crises originated in other countries.\n4. Ex post compensation schemes - bailout, deposit insurance and insolvency laws: When ex ante regulatory measures cannot afford the proper protection for the investors and depositors against the crises, particularly in an international context, a comprehensive ex post compensation scheme should act as a strong shield in maintaining public confidence in the financial market. However, it has to be kind of harmony between the regulatory measures and the compensation schemes. The common forms of ex post compensation schemes for banking crises are bailout, deposit insurance and bank insolvency laws.\n5. Coordination between ex ante measures and ex post schemes: Excessive and inappropriate use of the compensation measures, i.e. bailout and deposit insurance, creates moral hazard which can consequently encourage the violation of preventive regulatory measures. As the financial failure is compensated for by the public or the government, it makes the existence of ex ante regulatory measures absurd. Unless there is a harmonious coordination between them, through an international arrangement, it would be very difficult to have both regulation and compensation schemes in tune.\n6. Conclusion: In conclusion, understanding the fact that regulatory response towards the recent global financial crisis is national and insufficient; more effort has to be put on international cooperation with other international organizations to conduct regulatory reforms in line with international standards, for instance, the FSB. Peer pressure is beneficial in resolving the financial crises collectively on the basis of mutual benefits they can get from each other, either in the form of private return or building up good international relationships.\n",
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},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to explain the importance of the international cooperation and coordination among supervisory authorities of different countries in event of banking crises. It also suggests that the harmonious relationship has to be attained in the adoption of ex ante financial regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes. In other words, the paper highlights the linkage between ex ante preventive regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes, on the one hand, and cooperation among national regulatory and supervisory authorities in globalized financial markets. Although the paper is relevant to most developed and emerging financial markets, it chooses Hong Kong as a context to examine this proposal. In the current literature, there are no similar approach linking these two paradigms and examining them in an integrated context.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper adopts a conceptual framework after the 2008 global financial crisis and takes Hong Kong, an international financial centre in which numerous branches or subsidiaries of foreign financial institutions locate, as an example to examine how the coordination with foreign supervisory authorities are being conducted and to analyse whether the present regulatory framework in Hong Kong is effective and sufficient against banking crises. Through the review of the literature, the important link between ex ante regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes is found to be significant in adopting proper solutions.\nFindings: Through analysing the Hong Kong financial regulators' reports on the collapse of Lehman Brother, the paper finds out that even though there is some weakness in the cooperation and coordination between regulators after the 2008 financial crisis, Hong Kong is still in the progress of proposing bank special resolution regime. Although there has been some awareness on the issue of coordination between home and host states regulatory measures, there is still a lack of awareness of the connection between regulatory measures and compensation schemes.\nResearch limitations/implications: Conflict of interests could hardly be prevented in the course of cooperation and coordination among home and host regulatory authorities, and the coordination of the important link between ex ante regulatory measures and ex post compensation scheme which involves legal and economic analyses is a challenging task.\nPractical implications: The paper's findings show that there are practical implications for the recent rapid development of special resolution regime for global systematically important financial institutions against future banking crises and for managing the balance between the adoption of financial supervisory laws and special resolution measures.\nOriginality/value: This paper suggests that the harmonious coordination between ex ante regulatory measures and ex post compensation schemes has to be achieved through international context to avoid the absurd situations. This conceptual integrated framework presented in the current paper is not touched upon by the existing literature. This important concept is valuable for future research, and it is significant to financial regulators, legislators and the government in adjusting policy against banking crises in both developed and developing countries.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Multicultural education knowledgebase, attitudes and preparedness for diversity
|
[
"Multicultural societies",
"Teachers",
"Education",
"United States of America"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nBackground: While student enrollments in grade school are becoming increasingly racially and socio-economically diverse, the teaching force is actually becoming increasingly female, white, middle-class (Hodgkinson, 2002). This demographic imbalance has raised the issue of how future teachers of America should be prepared in order to achieve success with children from diverse backgrounds in the classroom, and issues of diversity which could apply to a quarter of student population by the year 2010. Diversity includes aspects of ethnicity, language, socioeconomic class, learning styles, disabilities, sexual orientation, race, and gender while issues include the differentials access to power, privilege, and inequalities in interactions with school culture and structure (Price, 2002).In reviewing literature on the effects of multicultural course work and diverse field experiences on preparing teachers for diversity, Grant and Secada (1990) found that, in general only modest and rarely dramatic changes could be made on teacher attitudes and behaviors. They also found that the \"more intense the exposure and the more time spent learning the content, the more likely learning will be successful\" (Grant and Secada, 1990, p. 148). Gomez (1993) concluded that a single course with and without a brief field experience component produced limited to moderate changes in pre-service teacher's beliefs about diversity. Since then, there have been developments and suggestions for a knowledgebase for multicultural education that is appropriate for pre-service teachers (Smith, 1998). Smith has provided a comprehensive listing of knowledge bases that ought to be included in a modern teacher education program. It is assumed that this knowledgebase could provide pre-service teachers with strong preparation for teaching and addressing the challenges and tremendous inequities that exist in our schools (Nieto, 2003; Sleeter, 2001, Smith, 1998).Aside from the knowledge base, a sense of preparedness was found to be by far the strongest predictor of teacher-efficacy (Darling-Hammond et al., 2002). Teachers who felt poorly prepared were significantly less likely to either say they would choose to become a teacher or say they plan to remain in teaching. Meanwhile, Hodgkinson (2002) argues that schools of education will be held accountable not only for the knowledge and skills of their teacher education graduates but also for the scores of their public school students when they enter teaching. Teacher education programs are therefore caught in the bind of preparing teachers that are predominantly from Caucasian middle-class background to impact achievement of students from diverse backgrounds, and also to be accountable for achievement in public schools.This bind borders on the deep and debilitating confusion about the relationship between means and ends, teacher preparation and K-12, that has always been an impasse of the teaching profession (Lortie, 1975; Sizer, 1992). Up to the mid-1990s, little had really changed in the ways teachers were prepared in the light of changing demographics in K-12 (Grant and Secada, 1990; Ladson-Billings, 1995). And despite the fact that most teacher education programs reported that they had transformed the curriculum to be multicultural, external examination often proved to the contrary (Gollnick, 1995).Currently issues of multicultural education have been heightened by the achievement gap and emphasis on standardized test scores as the indicator of learning. Multicultural education in teacher education programs has been premised on the need to produce culturally responsive teachers. Nieto (2003) has gone further by calling for a deep commitment to social justice and equal access to resources for students of all backgrounds and circumstances. But, most teacher education programs limit multicultural education to a single course. The question that guided this study was: what is the effect of multicultural knowledgebase (Smith, 1998) on multicultural attitudes and feeling prepared to teach children from diverse backgrounds among pre-service teachers?\nTheoretical framework: Cochran-Smith (2003) in developing a conceptual tool related to preparing teachers for diverse populations paused eight key questions: the diversity question, the ideology or social justice question, the knowledge question, the teacher learning question, the practice question, the outcomes question, the recruitment/selection question, and the coherence question. These questions are intended to provide a conceptual structure for interrogating the multiple meanings of multicultural education theory and practice in teacher education programs. Of the eight, one question is pertinent to this study: the knowledge question. The knowledge question asks: what knowledge, interpretive frameworks, beliefs and attitudes are necessary to teach diverse populations effectively, particularly knowledge and beliefs about culture and its role in schooling? The knowledge question delves into what teachers need to know including, culture, attitudes, and beliefs needed to teach diverse groups (Cochram-Smith, 2003; Smith, 1998). Knowledgebase suggested by Smith (1998) was used as the knowledge base in the one semester course in multicultural education. The 13 knowledgebases suggested included foundations of multicultural education; sociocultural contexts; cultural and cognitive learning styles; language, communication and interactional styles of marginalized cultures; essential elements of culture; principles of cultural responsive teaching; effective strategies for teaching minority students; foundations of racism; effects of policy and practice on culture, race and gender; culturally responsive diagnosis, measurement and assessment; sociocultural influences on subject-specific learning; gender and sexual orientation; and experiential knowledge.\nMethod: In this case study of pre-service teachers taking a course of \"Multiculturalism in education\" at a Mid-west university, a variety of data were collected through pre and post-tests. Three classes of pre-service teachers in their senior year of the teacher education program responded to two surveys, Multicultural Questionnaire (MCQ) and Preparedness Survey (PS). Their knowledge was assessed using a Multicultural Content Test-Educational (MCCT-E). Participants were all Caucasian pre-service teachers, the majority (92 percent) of whom were females. The average age of the pre-service teachers was 23 (SD = 1.92).The surveys and the content test were developed at Emporia State University (Seguin et al., 2000). The MCQ is a 30 item, four-point Likert scale created to measure attitudes toward national, international and educational diversity issues. The PS is a ten-item survey designed to have pre-service teachers rate their feelings of preparedness to teach specific populations in a classroom. The MCCT-E contained 60 multiple questions constructed to measure the attainment of essential knowledge in multicultural/diversity education as related to a student's experience in teacher education courses. The surveys and assessment were taken at the beginning (pre-test) and at the end (post-test) of the 500-level course, \"Multiculturalism in education.\"\nFindings: As a caveat, the findings of this study did not demonstrate that the course, \"Multiculturalism in education\" was the only factor influencing attitudes, knowledge and preparedness to teach children of diverse backgrounds. The pre and post-tests were used to quantify growth within the period (one semester) that the course was offered.Descriptive statistics of surveys and assessment\nDiscussions: Gay (2002) suggested that pre-service teacher preparation should include cultural knowledge and skills that will enable them work more effectively with students who are not part of the US ethnic, racial, and cultural mainstream. Cultures strongly influence attitudes that teachers bring to the instructional process (Gay, 2002). Therefore, teacher preparation requires knowledge of specific cultures of diverse groups, how they affect learning behaviors, and how classroom interactions and instruction can embrace these differences (Price, 2002). The question in this study was to establish the nexus among multicultural knowledge, multicultural attitudes and feeling prepared to teach children from diverse backgrounds.In this study, the significant increase in acquisition of knowledge of multiculturalism, coupled with the significant correlations with feelings of preparedness to teach children from diverse backgrounds represent a noteworthy contribution of multicultural education courses. However, the low non-significant correlations between multicultural knowledge and multicultural attitudes and, between multicultural attitudes and feeling prepared to teach raise more questions. Knowledge does not necessarily change attitudes (Sleeter and Grant, 1999). Attitudes do not impact behavior when attitudes are not directly connected to core beliefs. Watts (1984), in reviewing research studies on the impact of persuasive information on attitudes, found that information is most likely to change attitudes when a person is not already committed to the target attitudes or when attitudes are not directly connected to core beliefs. This change would require critical thinking and reconstruction of knowledge, attitudes and self identities as it relates to children from divers backgrounds.It was noted, during class discussions on the results of this study, that pre-service teachers felt they were uncomfortable dealing with same gender parents, but not the children. However, majority of the pre-service teachers felt less prepared to teach children with same gender parents. To many of the pre-service teachers, \"same gender parents\", was a concept that created feelings of uncertainty and should not be discussed. It could be argued that there is a \"disconnect\" between theory and practice in this case. Pre-service teachers did not conceptualize knowledge, attitudes and preparedness as intersecting systems, not simply categories reflecting different and separate spheres of multicultural education.The lack of a nexus between knowledge and attitudes, and between attitudes and preparedness, explained the low non-significant correlations. Other studies have indicated that additional strategies, alternative contexts, personal experiences and sustained interaction with students from diverse backgrounds and issues of diversity are likely to create a stronger impact on pre-service teachers (Gay, 2002; King, 1991; Schoorman, 2002; Watts, 1984). These methods enhanced internalization of concepts, and ability to confront fears, misconceptions and misinformation during teacher preparation. Gay (2002) explained that the lack of sustained interaction with other cultures or multicultural knowledge of other cultures result in fear of stereotyping or/and over generalizing amongst pre-service teachers.To develop a correlation between teacher attitudes and practice with understandings about diversity requires commitment to a long-term process where fears will arise and subsequently contained (Obidah and Teel, 2002). Howey and Zimpher (1990) found that most teachers across the nation have had little experience with sociocultural diversity as they grow up. They compensate for this danger by trying to ignore or deny the existence of cultural influences on students' behavior and their own (Gay, 2002). They often view diversity within a deficit framework, and hardly have the knowledge of the social structures that produce inequality (Ross and Smith, 1992). To impact a change in attitudes and practice requires more than knowledge of multiculturalism.\nConclusion: Many prospective teachers enter teacher education programs lacking the knowledge they need to support students of diverse backgrounds and are ignorant of the manner in which their assumptions contribute to school success or failure for many children (Grant, 1990; Yeo, 1997). Without courses that introduce pre-service teachers to issues of diversity, they may even exit teacher education programs ignorant of, or deny the existence of cultural influences on students' behaviors and their own.This study specified that the increase in multicultural knowledge positively impacted levels of pre-service teacher preparedness to work with students from diverse backgrounds. However, improved knowledge had no correlation to multicultural attitudes. Neither did improved multicultural attitudes correlate with feeling prepared to teach. McDiarmid and Price (1993) found that multicultural presentations had little effect on pre-service teachers' beliefs about the capabilities of labeled learners, use of stereotypes in making teaching decisions, or about providing genuinely equal opportunities to learn challenging and empowering subject matter. This has not changed.This study confirms that the impact of multicultural knowledge on attitudes is minimal and so is the impact of attitudes on the way pre-service teachers view children from diverse backgrounds. As teacher education evolves, there is need to rethink opportunities to learn about teaching children from diverse backgrounds beyond multicultural knowledge and multicultural attitudes to more extensive and well integrated programs-mentorship, direct experience, and observing and working in authentic settings. There is a need for direct and more sustained interaction with issues and resources for diversity with the hope that it would help teachers connect their newly acquired multicultural attitudes to teaching, and feel better prepared to work with students of diverse backgrounds. Direct personal experiences have been found to provide \"teachable moments\". Schoorman (2002) argues that such moments include contextualized understanding of concepts, awareness of biases and experiential gaps, increased critical reflection and an orientation toward action for grater educational and social equity.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The paper aims to investigate the effect of multicultural knowledgebase on attitudes and feelings of preparedness to teach children from diverse backgrounds among pre-service teachers. Currently issues of multicultural education have been heightened by the academic achievement gap and emphasis on standardized test-scores as the indicator of learning.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This descriptive study was conducted using surveys. A variety of data were collected through pre- and post-tests. Questionnaires included Multicultural Content Test-Educational (MCCT-E), Multicultural Questionnaire (MC), and Preparedness Survey (PS). Descriptive statistics were used for data analysis.\nFindings: - Results indicated that a class in multicultural education significantly increased knowledge about diversity, attitudes towards multiculturalism, and levels of preparedness to teach children from diverse backgrounds. There was no correlation between multicultural knowledge and attitudes and between attitudes and preparedness to teach children from diverse backgrounds.\nPractical implications: - As teacher education evolves, there is need to rethink opportunities to learn how to teach children from diverse backgrounds beyond multicultural knowledgebase. More extensive and well integrated methods (direct experiences, mentorship, observing and working in authentic settings) are recommended. These methods enhance internalization of concepts, and ability to confront fears, misconceptions and misinformation during teacher preparation. This study suggested that teacher education programs should provide more sustained interaction with diversity issues and/or children of diverse backgrounds in order to transform the gain in multicultural attitudes into practice.\nOriginality/value: - The study challenges the assumption in teacher preparation programs that knowledge transforms pre-service teachers' attitudes and preparedness to teach children from diverse backgrounds.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
How a felt obligation to mentor impacts mentor performance: The art of giving back fueled by an appetite for reciprocity
|
[
"Mentoring",
"Reciprocity",
"Felt obligation",
"Career progression",
"Mentor performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: In a world of societies where personal and professional development have become more important than ever in contributing positively to career progression, mentoring in business has experienced a rise in popularity over recent years and has become more mainstream. A research paper by Stephanie Maynard-Patrick and Baugh (2019) explores how a felt obligation to mentor, which is a result of prior experience as a protege, influences the mentoring relationship and predictability of mentoring effectiveness. The paper also explores the benefits for mentors and proteges and the costs of mentoring, while the study's model elements focus on generalized reciprocity and specifically an individual's felt obligation to become a mentor. Data were gathered from a larger study on mentoring in a fire department in the USA's south west, where a sample of 88 mentor-protege partnerships was used. The participants included firefighters, employees in administrative positions, and medical personnel from the emergency services.\nFunctions of mentoring and the reciprocity dynamic: Mentoring can be defined as a working relationship between an experienced individual (the mentor) and a less experienced individual (the protege), with the aim of facilitating the personal and professional development of the protege. In the mentoring program example used in this paper, these developmental relationships were fostered to help equip less experienced firefighters to deal with emotionally challenging emergency situations. This psychosocial-focused benefit can be categorized as one of three functions of mentoring. The other two functions are career-orientated development and, more generally, to provide individuals with professional role models.\nMentoring and its benefits: The benefits of having a mentor are widely publicized, and broadly fall into the following categories: career progression and its associated compensation, and personal development capable of inducing greater self-confidence and enhanced job satisfaction. Mentors also enjoy multiple benefits from the experience of mentoring a protege, including helping to upskill the younger generation, recognition from peers as leaders, and even developing or refreshing their own skills. A contingent factor on realizing the benefits of mentoring is the quality of the relationship developed between the mentor and the protege. Furthermore, many of the benefits which result from an effective mentor-protege relationship require that the mentor is effectively engaged in their role and committed to developing the protege, so for this reason the right motivation to mentor is critical. It's important to recognize that mentoring can also be detrimental to the mentor. This is because mentors must invest considerable time in their proteges at their own cost, and their mentoring relationships can come under scrutiny from others.\nUnpacking the survey results: The themes around which the respondents were questioned are the protege's assessment of their mentor's performance, the perceived benefits and costs of being a mentor, and the felt obligation to be a mentor. Proteges were asked, for example, to rate the effectiveness of their mentor by survey prompts such as \"My mentor provided me with meaningful benefits.\" Consequently, the following results were revealed, that:\nAction steps for managers: Analysis of the respondents' responses revealed the following managerial insights, which offer valuable routes to leveraging the advantages of mentoring while balancing its potential pitfalls:\nCommentary: The review is based on \"The role of felt obligation to mentor in mentor performance: An exploration of generalized reciprocity in mentoring\" by Maynard-Patrick and Baugh (2019), published in Career Development International. This research paper concentrates on the extent to which a felt obligation to become a mentor stems from a previous experience of being mentored. The survey results did reveal that experiencing a felt obligation to mentor does mean that a mentor conducts their role in a way that gives their protege a higher level of satisfaction with the mentoring relationship. The authors advocate that companies concentrate on promoting participation in mentoring organically as part of developing the organization's culture, rather than putting pressure on individuals to become mentors and damaging any felt obligation they may have in the process.\n",
"role": "user"
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{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: This research paper concentrates on the extent to which a felt obligation to become a mentor stems from a previous experience of being mentored. The survey results did reveal that experiencing a felt obligation to mentor does mean that a mentor conducts their role in a way that gives their protege a higher level of satisfaction with the mentoring relationship. The authors advocate than companies concentrate on promoting participation in mentoring organically as part of developing the organization's culture, rather than putting pressure on individuals to become mentors and damaging any felt obligation they may have in the process.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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Three perspectives on service management and marketing: rival logics or part of a bigger picture?
|
[
"Relationship marketing",
"Customer service management",
"Continuing development",
"Marketing communications",
"Marketing strategy",
"Marketing theory"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: This is a comparative analysis of three recent texts in the service management and marketing literature. The authors are all well-known and respected as leading contributors to marketing theory and practice. To varying degrees, all three texts bring a service perspective and a relationship perspective to their subject matter. In other words, the authors have chosen to bring both service and relationship perspectives together as one.My interest in this article is to locate the underlying dominant logic of each author based on the evidence of the text. My approach is essentially interpretive I review each text in turn, outline the main features of each, and locate the underlying common logic and points of variance with practical implications in the context of an emerging service dominant marketing theory.The three authors are:1. Berry, Leonard L. (1999).2. Gronroos, Christian (2000).3. Storbacka, Kaj and Lehtinen, Jarmo R. (2001).\n2 Berry (1999), Discovering the Soul of Service: The Nine Drivers of Sustainable Business Success: Len Berry is a distinguished professor in retailing and marketing leadership at the Texas A &M University and a prolific author. He is one of the early and respected pioneers in developing services marketing thought. In this, his latest text (1999), he highlights the importance of humane values in sustaining excellent business performance. His thesis is based on more than 250 in-depth interviews at 14 outstanding service companies. From these, Berry derived nine drivers for sustainable success, which taken together, account for the title of his book, Discovering the Soul of Service.Berry's nine drivers for sustainable success are:1. Values-driven leadership.2. Strategic focus.3. Executional excellence.4. Control of destiny.5. Trust-based relationships.6. Investment in employee success.7. Acting small.8. Brand cultivation.9. Generosity.According to Berry, the greater the involvement of people in creating value for customers, the greater the service challenge becomes to operating effectively, especially when growing rapidly or when markets are competing on price (p. 10). Also there is a very real challenge in retaining the initial entrepreneurial energy of the start up company. Because a service company's success is a function of its past performance and customer perceived reputation, expansion tends to create problems of scale, quality dilemmas, and supervisory complexity. These issues in turn test the strategic focus of the firm and any values-driven leadership that supports it.Berry claims his nine drivers of success in service businesses are interrelated and transcend the particulars of any one kind of business (p. 16). He goes further when he asserts that these \"drivers\" need to be enacted together to sustain any service business over time, and that they impact not only customers but also employees, suppliers and the broader communities in which they are represented. It is through the values represented by these drivers that Berry seeks to discover the \"soul\" of serviceI will briefly discuss each of his nine drivers of sustainable success in turn.2.1 Values-driven leadership\n3 Storbacka and Lehtinen (2001), Customer Relationship Management: Creating Competitive Advantage through Win-win Relationship Strategies: Kaj Storbacka is a past professor at the Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration in Helsinki and Jarmo Lehtinen is an associate professor at the University of Tampere. Together these authors bring a Nordic School sensibility to service management and relationship marketing in their writings, but as also they have extensive practical experience in customer relationship management (CRM), their approach has some unique features.Storbacka and Lehtinen assert that CRM is not a software system but a way of enabling people to work effectively with customers. The task as they see it is to win the hearts, minds, and patronage of customers, and build longevity into relationships. What stands out immediately is that the authors differ in their perspective from many CRM commentators because it is their intention to provoke strategic marketing thinking and innovative practice. They also stand apart from technology-driven \"expert\" providers of CRM systems who confuse the nature of customer relationships with statistical \"relationships\" between data points.The main features of their approach follow.3.1 Relationships as processes\n4 Gronroos (2000), Service Management and Marketing: A Customer Relationship Management Approach: Christian Gronroos is a professor of marketing and chairman of the Centre for Relationship Marketing and Service Management (CERS) at the Hanken Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration in Helsinki.He is the author of many leading-edge texts and articles in service management marketing and one of the earliest influential researchers in relationship marketing.This second edition text (2000) is based in part on an earlier seminal work (1990), and it is easy to see how it might appeal to new readers as a totally \"new book\" (Gronroos claims as much in his preface). On the other hand, it remains grounded in the Nordic School tradition in its emphasis on interactions at the customer interface between the customer's value generating processes and service production/delivery processes. In the first edition this was expressed as \"managing the moments of truth\" and in the second a broader overall framework emerges consistent with the first, but expressed this time as \"customer relationship management\".In my view, the use of the term CRM, or customer relationship management is not especially helpful in conveying the integrated meaning Gronroos intends. This is because technology issues now dominate much of the understanding of CRM. However, for Gronroos, customer relationship management is strategic and aligned with the term relationship marketing. He explains his intended meaning as:...[managing] the whole relationship between a firm and its customers, with all its various contacts, interactive processes and communication elements (Gronroos, 2000, preface, p. viii).Operationally, Gronroos sees managing customer relationships as a triangulation of promises. First there is giving promises (making value propositions to customers), then keeping promises (delivering value in interaction with customers) and also enabling promises (continuous development in operational excellence and internal marketing). In this way, keeping valuable customers becomes as important as getting them in the first place; and the advocacy of existing customers becomes an important source of new business.This is a large, comprehensive book, so I intend to comment on what I see as his key concepts. Then will follow some comments on Gronroos' approach to integrating marketing communications, which I see as the most interesting new development since his first edition.4.1 Six rules of service\n5 Comparative analysis of perspectives: What stands out in a critical reading of these texts is the provocation offered to readers to go beyond the limits of services marketing orthodoxy. Getting to the essence of an effective service business philosophy is the common agenda of each author, but with differing emphasis. I see Berry's work as a treatise on values-based service leadership where relationship development between management and employees becomes part of the means to achieve better customer relationships and service success. What stands out in Storbacka and Lehtinen is the operational emphasis to managing customer relationships which aims to find new ways to connect the value creating processes of both provider and customer. For Gronroos, a broadly based service perspective and customer relationship management go hand in hand, and he would advocate that this applies to manufacturing firms as well as service firms.Berry's executive leaders are exemplars endowed with family-based values. This may well be the source of inspirational leadership. Storbacka and Lehtinen's perspective is more calculative and managerially pragmatic, based as it is on reasoned evidence of the profit profile of various customer relationships. Their view is that value creation must combine the development of relationships with customers with a transfer of competencies to customers. On the other hand, Gronroos takes a democratic managerial stance, calling for sensitivity to changing business contexts as well as an appreciation of the limits of any managerial action that does not carry employee and customer relationships along with it.5.1 Technology-based CRM?\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - To locate the underlying service logic of each of three leading texts and to examine points of variance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A critical review and comparative analysis of the main tenets of each text.\nFindings: - Each text combines a service perspective and a relationship perspective to marketing management. Each author seems to favour a service perspective on some issues but at other times a relationship perspective. This apparent epistemological pluralism is resolvable and a pathway to synthesis suggested.\nPractical implications: - What stands out in a critical reading of these texts is the provocation offered to readers to go beyond the limits of services marketing orthodoxy. In this there are implications for pedagogical development.\nOriginality/value: - Gives insights into the current debate on development of a more broadly based service-dominant logic of marketing.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
A model of pilgrimage tourism: process, interface, people and sequence
|
[
"Tourism",
"Pilgrimage"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Historically, people's religious desire to visit a holy site or destination resemble what is nowadays one of various forms of tourism activity. Specifically, it refers to religious tourism. Rinschede (1992) explains:\nFrame of reference: Since the 1990s, pilgrimage research has focused on the similarities and differences between pilgrims and tourists (Collins-Kreiner, 2010; Timothy and Olsen, 2006; Collins-Kreiner and Kliot, 2000; Digance, 2006, 2003; Ebron, 1999; Frey, 1998; Cohen, 1998; Vukonic, 1996; Cohen, 1992a, 1992b; Smith, 1992). This distinction has been misconceived in that the religious and secular spheres of tourism are rapidly merging. As religious tourism assumes a more prominent market niche in international tourism, pilgrims have become tourists and tourists have become pilgrims.\nEl Camino: El Camino or St. James' Way (Spanish: El Camino de Santiago: French: Chemins de Saint-Jacques-de-Compostelle: German: der Jakobsweg) is a set of trails that lead to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in North Western Spain. The origin of these trails is derived from the belief that the remains of the apostle Saint James are buried in this city.\nMethodology: This study is based on a research team's direct and active participation, observations and conversations with pilgrims, hikers and tourists for 18 hours a day along the trail, as well as interacting with the participants on the trail at intermediary and main stops during several days of El Camino.\nEmpirical findings: This study reports three main aspects of El Camino:\nResearch implications: Through the study, El Camino reveals a number of both interesting and valuable aspects of a (tourist) product that is also a process of (tourism) activities over time and across contexts, with inherent dynamics and complexity of people and interfaces.\nManagerial implications: A number of managerial implications from the empirical findings gained through direct and active participation, observations and conversations with pilgrims, hikers and tourists along the trail to Santiago de Compostela.\nConclusions, limitations and suggestions for future research: The principal contribution of this study is a conceptualized model of PT containing the PT-elements - all of which offer a foundation for structuring and assessing empirical research and providing additional insights and knowledge into the dynamics and complexity involved specifically in a people-based process (e.g. tourism and transports) consisting of interfaces and sequences such as El Camino or similar ones, and with respect to travelling in general.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to examine the elements of the main process of pilgrimage tourism (PT), occurring between pilgrims, hikers and tourists along a trail towards a holy site. PT is defined as a process consisting of three sub-processes over time and across contexts: pre-process, main process and post-process.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Explores the core reasons for PT through active participation and observation.\nFindings: This study reveals different layers, levels, views, approaches and perspectives involved in people-based processes. The study attempts to conceptualize the elements involved between people committed and dedicated to PT.\nResearch limitations/implications: The introduced model of PT stresses the processes and interfaces involved over time and across contexts between people, with the same or different sequences. There is, to the best of the authors' knowledge, no previous research that explores and describes the processes and interaction between pilgrims, hikers and tourists.\nPractical implications: The ultimate experience at an individual level differs, depending upon the outcome of the PT-elements of the model of PT (i.e. processes, interfaces, people and sequences).\nSocial implications: From a social science perspective, the research examines the motives of different traveller types and looks at their different perspectives of being involved with the same physical activity of travel. The study emphasises that we can be involved in the same physical activity, but embrace it with different levels of personal and emotional engagement.\nOriginality/value: A conceptualized model of PT containing four elements (process, interface, people and sequence) - all of which offer a foundation for structuring and assessing empirical research, and provide additional insights and knowledge into the dynamics and complexity involved specifically in a people-based process consisting of interfaces and sequences when travelling.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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Executive pensions, compensation leverage, and firm risk
|
[
"Finance",
"Governance",
"Executive compensation",
"Corporate finance",
"Inside debt"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Between 2000 and 2009, the actuarial present value of CEO pensions at the largest US firms increased 138 percent, while non-CEO executive pensions increased 61 percent. During the same period, average salaries and bonuses for both CEO and non-CEO executives declined. These changes highlight a fundamental shift in the nature of executive compensation: once salary based, then frequently equity based, large firms are now becoming increasingly reliant on debt-like compensation (i.e. pensions and deferred compensation) to attract and retain executive talent.\n2. Literature review: Jensen and Meckling (1976) put forth the hypothesis that the best way to mitigate agency problems is to set managers' pay with a mix of debt and equity that matches the firm's capital structure. If managers receive only equity compensation, the result would be suboptimal for the manager, who would only receive a fraction of the expended effort. On the other hand, too much debt-based compensation may lead to an overly conservative risk-management style. To overcome this \"risk-shifting\" behavior, Jensen and Meckling argue that the optimal compensation mix is mirroring the capital structure of the firm.\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Computing pension data\n4. Data: The 700 largest firms by US market capitalization on December 31, 2009 were examined from a series of hand-collected executive pension values from 2000 to 2009: of these, 300 offered executive pensions (42 percent), while 290 (41 percent) provided values calculable with the methodology in Section 3.1 (above). The sample was further reduced by omitting firms with impartial or unclear compensation data, executive structure, and merging issues related to stock and option data. Company financial data are obtained via Compustat, while stock and market values are determined through the Center for Research and Security Prices. The resulting data set covers the period from 2000 to 2009. It includes 272 firms and 8,965 executive-year data points: consisting of 2,114 CEOs years (23.6 percent) and 6,851 non-CEO executive years (76.4 percent)[11]. Table I provides a substantial overview of the executive compensation data sample.\n5. Results: 5.1 Determinants of executive inside debt holdings\n6. Conclusion: By introducing a unique, hand-collected executive pension data set and a detailed analysis, this paper accomplishes three objectives: it extends the analysis of CEO and non-CEO pensions under the Sundaram and Yermack framework; it shows that the risk level of the firm is significantly dependent on the difference in payment structure between CEOs and non-CEO executives; and it demonstrates that funding pensions can significantly reduce the risk-shifting agency costs associated with pension compensation. Most importantly, through this research, it is determined that non-CEO executive pensions indeed matter.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the structure of both CEO and non-CEO executive compensation affects the overall risk of a firm. The author focuses on the interplay between CEO and non-CEO executive compensation structure.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The author uses a hand-collected pension-database that employs both OLS and two-stage least squares regressions to determine the effects of inside debt on default risk using the distance-to-default framework. The database consists of 8,965 executive-year data points from 272 firms.\nFindings: This paper accomplishes three major objectives: first, the author presents a significant extension of Sundaram and Yermack (2007) by including non-CEO executives; the author demonstrates how the differences in inside debt between CEO and non-CEO executives are directly related to firm risk; and that funding these pensions via a Rabbi Trust eliminates most of the risk-shifting effects. Firms with the lowest compensation leverage gap between CEO and non-CEO executives were most likely to observe the agency costs associated with high executive leverage. When compensation leverage structures were substantially different, or the pension was pre-funded, these effects are neutralized.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the author's knowledge, the first paper addresses the effects of Rabbi Trusts on risk-shifting behavior between both CEOs and non-CEO executives. Further, the author extends Sundaram and Yermack (2007) using a hand-collected database six times larger than the original paper. By focusing on the \"leverage gap\" between CEOs and non-CEO executives, the author presents unique evidence that underlines the risk dynamics between CEOs and their boards.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Examining the role of customer engagement in augmenting referral value: The moderated-mediation of relational and expertise value
|
[
"Customer engagement",
"Relational value",
"Expertise value",
"Referral value"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With the advancement in marketing theory, customer-service firm interaction has become very prominent for building service brands, as value exchange is not only defined by the supplier but also negotiated through the exchange of resources between service providers, users, customers and other co-creators (Tommasetti et al., 2017). Service dominant logic (Vargo and Lusch, 2008) suggests that it is essential for marketers to understand the underlying process of cultivating interactions and relationships with customers so that firms can strengthen their brand through customer referrals (Esch et al., 2006). Katz and Lazarsfeld (1955) alleged that the influence of the word of mouth on brand switching is seven times greater than that of newspapers and magazines, four times greater than the effects of personal selling and twice the impact of radio advertisements (Godes et al., 2005). Thus, in recent years, practices to encourage customer engagement behaviours (CEBs) have gained importance, because researchers and practitioners have associated CEBs with improved service quality and better customer experiences and, thus, better value outcomes for customers (Verleye et al., 2016). Firms are also likely to derive the value from CEBs because these behaviours warrant deeper and more meaningful customer-firm connections (Brodie et al., 2013) as well as productivity and efficiency gains for the firm (Hoyer et al., 2010).\nTheoretical framework: The proposed model of the study intends to explain the relationship between customers' engagement and their referrals on the basis of social exchange theory (Homans, 1958), which posits that when service providers permit customers to engage themselves in the delivery of a service, they are also expecting something in return, that is, referrals from the customer, as interaction has to be beneficial for each party involved in an exchange process. Premised on social exchange theory, individuals engage in a subjective process of cost-benefit evaluation so as to determine the benefits they are likely to derive from entering into a relationship or set of ties (Wikstrom, 1996). Therefore, an interaction has to be rewarding to each participant in the social exchange (Fuller et al., 2006). If a firm is providing up-to-the-mark services but is not interacting with customers and not taking feedback from them on a regular basis, then customers might perceive it as cold, dry and detached, and may not share positive words instead of being satisfied with the core services (Beatty et al., 1996). For example, in the case of tutorials, the core service to be delivered by an institute is expertise sharing and development, but by providing only the core service, it is not certain that students would talk positive about the institute; thus, the core service is merely a foundation for engaging customers.\nResearch methodology: The sample\nAnalysis and results: Outliers and data normality\nHypothesis testing: To test the research model presented in Figure 1, structural equation modelling (SEM) was carried out using the AMOS software (17.0 version; Byrne, 2013). Maximum likelihood estimation of covariance matrices was used in the SEM analyses and model fitness was assessed using three indices: kh2 statistics, RMSEA and GFI. We examined significant relationships among the predictors of referrals (customer engagement, expertise value and relational value). It became evident from the SEM results that engaged customers interact, identify and spread positive words about the service provider on deriving expertise and relational value from that service provider. The results reveal that customer engagement (b=0.40, p=0.000), expertise value (b=0.50, p=0.000) and relational value (b=0.32, p=0.000) are positively and significantly related to customer referrals. Thus, these factors turn out to be significant determinants of customer referrals, leading to the acceptance of H1, H2b and H3a. In addition, customer engagement is significantly related to expertise value (b=0.48, p=0.000), thus providing support for H2a.\nDiscussion and conclusion: It is established that customers interact with and create value for firms in a variety of ways, including lifetime value, referral value and influence value (Kumar et al., 2010) in engaged behaviour. Our study extends the extant literature (Kumar et al., 2010; Gremler et al., 2001) by adopting the additional factors (namely customer engagement, expertise value and relational value) that strongly contribute towards strengthening customer referrals and answering the broad research question:\nImplications: Theoretical implications\nLimitations and future research directions: Several limitations are worth mentioning in order to facilitate future research studies. The study is confined to the students of coaching institutes located in the central areas of the capital city of India, so further research work could be conducted to examine the same relationships in other areas and sectors such as multinational corporations, banking, insurance, hotels and so on.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of a customer engagement-enabling platform on a value captured by the firm and value acquired by the customer. It explores the relevance of relational and expertise value for customers during the engagement process so as to ensure positive referrals about the service provider.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using a sample of 482 students, the study examines the customer engagement efforts of professional institutes that provide training to prepare for the civil service examinations of the Union Public Service Commission. The survey is confined to central areas of New Delhi, India. Statistical techniques including confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling are used to analyse the data, and reliability and validity tests are performed.\nFindings: The findings reveal the indispensable role of service providers as creators of a meaningful effective learning process and of interpersonal relations with customers for generating more business through customer referrals.\nResearch limitations/implications: The study validated the moderating role of relational value between customers' expertise value and their referrals on the basis of motivation theory, which asserts that customers' motivation to contribute to the organisation is driven by the individuals' extrinsic relational need for belongingness, acceptance by like-minded individuals, and feedback, recognition and respect from employees of the organisation.\nOriginality/value: The study contributes to the existing literature by integrating the well-developed social exchange and motivation theory so as to investigate the factors that propel customers' positive word of mouth for the service provider.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Enabling innovative ability: knowledge sharing as a mediator
|
[
"Job satisfaction",
"Service innovation",
"Knowledge sharing",
"Workplace friendship"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In the current stage of global development, Taiwan, like other developing countries, has entered the phase of industrial structural transition. The fast developing technological industry has presented an opportunity where the performance of electronic information industry, has become one of the mainstream industries, playing a critical role in Taiwan's economic and employment growth. The key lies on whether the industry is moving toward the right direction. How organizations grasp the core abilities of the knowledge economy and achieve management innovations as well as value creations have become the most important issues of all (Ho, 2009). These are indispensable elements for sustainable corporate operations.\n2. Literature review and hypotheses building: 2.1 Job satisfaction\n3. Method: 3.1 Research design and samples\n4. Results and discussion: 4.1 Multivariate normal distribution testing\n5. Conclusion, implication and limitation: The present study aims to examine the relationship among job satisfaction, workplace friendship, knowledge sharing and service innovation that existed in the field of electronic information industry. The results show that job satisfaction and workplace friendship demonstrated significant and positive effect on knowledge sharing, which in turn influences organizational service innovation. Additionally, knowledge sharing has a positive and significant influence on service innovation. It also significantly moderates the effect of job satisfaction and workplace friendship on service innovation. In particular, knowledge sharing has demonstrated a stronger moderating effect to influence the relationship between job satisfaction and service innovation than between workplace friendship and service innovation.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships among job satisfaction, workplace friendship, knowledge sharing and service innovation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This is an empirical study that targets electronic information engineers at the science parts located in Taipei, Hsinchu and Tainan (n=851), utilizing a survey questionnaire as the data collection instrument to test the relationship among the four dimensions.\nFindings: The results indicated that: first, both job satisfaction and workplace friendship have demonstrated a significant effect on service innovation; second, knowledge sharing significantly moderates the effect of job satisfaction and workplace friendship on service innovation.\nOriginality/value: The present study adds value by examining the moderating effect of knowledge sharing. The results can contribute to the strategic planning of human resource development in order to enhance the capability of service innovation in the technological industry.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Comparing approaches to economic impact analysis of property redevelopment
|
[
"Redevelopment",
"Economic impact analysis",
"Property development",
"Computable general equilibrium models",
"Input-output models",
"Mixed-use property"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: A computable general equilibrium (CGE) model is an evolution of the input-output (IO) modeling method (Dixon et al., 1992) of Leontief with a social accounting matrix (SAM) of intermediate goods as its core. An IO model describes transactions between industries as well as consumption shares by consumers within the SAM (Leontief, 1986). Given a final demand an IO model \"solves\" for output by industry through the simple matrix equation x*=(I-A)-1d, where x represents output, A a matrix of inputs, d final demand and I the identity matrix (Chiang, 1984). The model solves for industry employment in a similar fashion. Multiplier effects for changes in final demand are determined through the A matrix and used to predict impacts of shocks to final demand (Leontief, 1986). A CGE model modifies the strict IO assumptions to allow price changes, substitution between factors and goods and imperfectly elastic supply (Menezes et al., 2006). Flexibility allows a CGE model to estimate impacts of that an IO model cannot, such as supply-side shocks or tax changes (Frechtling and Smeral, 2010). Any CGE model can be converted into an IO model by setting substitution elasticities in the constant elasticity of substitution (CES) production and utility functions to zero and making factor supply elasticities infinite.\nLiterature: CGE models consist of two parts: a SAM based on data for a region and a system of equations representing actions by firms and consumers. A CGE model is an optimization model describing an economy through households and firms that maximize utility or profits given endowments and. Prices and quantities are determined endogenously (West, 1995) which allows a CGE model to evaluate projects that affect the supply side of the economy, which an IO model cannot (Partridge and Rickman, 1998). Endogenous prices allow inclusion of supply-side constraints, though which economic impacts are affected due to shortages of specialized factors. The appeal of CGE relative to IO depends on the importance of supply-side constraints (West, 1995).\nSimulations and results: A typical impact analysis includes impacts of construction of a new development, taken as an exogenous shock to construction sector demand. To this would be added an estimate of the impact of continuing operations of the new development once occupied, as an exogenous shock to demand for the industries occupying the property (Musil, 2011). To contrast the results from IO and CGE models two simulations are run using a static version of the Colorado Real Estate (CO-RE) model. The CO-RE model is a relatively standard regional model built upon Social Accounting Matrix of data compiled for the State of Colorado and a system of equations defined and calibrated using GAMS/MPSGE software. Application of the technique by practitioners in other regions requires compilation of a new regional SAM and choice of appropriate parameters for equations. The structure and logic of the CO-RE model can be found in the Appendix. These simulations are run under IO model assumptions of perfectly elastic factor supply and no substitution then under the more realistic CO-RE CGE model assumptions. We simulate the impacts of the construction, then continuing operations of a $100 million mixed-use office/residential development. This is assumed to include a $50 million office complex and 500 condominium units with a total construction cost of $50 million.\nConclusion: An impact analysis practitioner prefers accuracy and credibility of results, but might particularly wish to avoid understatement of impacts as incentives are at stake. In choosing a method, these goals must be weighed against cost in time and money. Commonly used IO models are simpler and therefore less costly. They will be preferred for small projects where cost is paramount, where factor supply elasticities are believed to be very high and if stakeholders prefer a standardized off-the-shelf method. CGE-based impact estimates will tend to be more accurate, particularly when factor supply elasticities are smaller. Impacts of construction will be smaller, but the more important impacts of continuing operations may be larger. This is particularly true for mixed-use developments with a substantial housing component. In such cases, provided the project is large and stakeholders are open to a less-standardized method, the CGE method will be strongly preferred to improve accuracy while avoiding a downward bias.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the value of computable general equilibrium (CGE) modeling for impact analysis of real estate developments and redevelopments.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Uses a model constructed for Colorado to compare estimates of economic impact of a hypothetical mixed-use development from a CGE model with an input-output (IO) model similar to those commonly used in applied economic impact analysis.\nFindings: Economic impact estimates of construction activity are demonstrated to be lower when using a CGE approach as compared to an IO approach while impact estimates of continuing operations of a property are demonstrated to be more accurate and potentially higher using a CGE approach.\nPractical implications: A CGE approach as opposed to an IO approach will be particularly useful for practitioners in particular cases where IO models are ill suited to provide meaningful estimates concerning impact of continuing operations. This is especially likely where commercial tenants are unknown or when the development includes a residential component.\nSocial implications: More complete and accurate assessments of economic impact may positively affect views on property development and redevelopment by the public and government.\nOriginality/value: This paper adds to the existing literature concerning economic impact analysis of real estate and is the first paper in the field, to the authors' knowledge; to compare estimates from the standard IO approach to those derived using more sophisticated modeling techniques.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Teleological sales and purchase approaches in complex business relationships - customers' expectations before and perceptions after purchase
|
[
"B2B",
"Perceptions",
"Customer expectations",
"Teleological actions",
"Complex services",
"Mixed-method approach"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The service offer is characterized as intangible, inseparable, heterogeneous and perishable (Gallouj, 1997; Zeithaml and Bitner, 1996). The importance of service encounters is widely and increasingly recognized in service industries. Service encounters become an integral part of the image that the existing and potential customers have of the firm and, in turn, play an influential role in determining success of service companies (Bitner et al., 1990). The service offer is also often people-based and dependent upon the actions and interactions taking place between the service provider and the customer (Vargo and Lusch, 2004).\n2. Framing teleological actions in complex business relationships: The relevance of the teleological framework lies in that it considers the past, present and future actions and interactions involved between a service provider (service seller) and its customers (service buyers) in complex business relationships. Several studies conducted on final consumers have found that time plays a significant role in shaping service consumption experiences (Arnould, 2005; Woermann and Rokks, 2015). In the B2B context \"[...] time is the first and probably most important issue when analyzing interaction [...]\" (Ford and Hakansson, 2006, p. 7). Still, in business networks \"[...] a more pronounced understanding of time is clearly needed [...]\" (Halinen et al., 2012; p. 2015); because otherwise \"[...] studies might misinterpret the beginning and end of processes [...]\" (Quintens and Matthyssens, 2010, p. 97). In their conceptual work, Halinen and Tornroos (1995) defined time as a sequential horizontal process and also as a subjective experience. Peters et al. (2012) further developed the temporal modes and relational aspects of time. Mason and Leek (2012) empirically examined how different temporal modes (vertical, horizontal, standardized and planned) influence communication practices in a B2B relationship. Tidstrom and Hagberg-Andersson (2012) analyzed critical events in time to explain the process of change leading from cooperation to competition in dyadic business relationships. Medlin (2004) writes that business relationships form through past perceptions, present interactions as well as future expectations that can only be understood as a series of actions:\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Research context and process\n4. Empirical results and discussion of findings: In what follows, we report quantitative findings from the online survey based on 57 customers of a service provider of a complex software solution. These results are also validated through the content analysis of relevant documents, observations of buyer-seller interactions and qualitative information from follow-up interviews with different key informants from the service provider of the software solution and three of its customers.\n5. Research implications: This study contributes to the literature in several ways. First, this is, to the best of our knowledge, the first study to apply the teleological framework in a B2B service context. As such, it contributes to a different understanding of how customer expectations before purchase and their perceptions after purchasing a complex service solution in the B2B context are developed. This finding contributes particularly to the service literature because \"very few research papers explicitly consider business customer experiences\", as recently argued by Zolkiewski et al. (2017).\n6. Managerial implications: Several managerial implications can be derived from our results. One of the findings reported is that the salesperson is too positive and accommodating when it comes to the information provided to each customer. A managerial implication based on this finding is that the providers of complex services should develop formal cross-functional teams (e.g. consisting of salespeople and service technicians). The involvement of technical staff members in the stage of preparation of the software solution offer before purchase is crucial. By doing so, technical staff may be able to balance the positive and simplified information offered by the salesperson to the customer organization. Further, before a service provider presents a business proposal to the customer organization, they should make sure that they are able fulfill their promises.\n7. Limitations and future research guidelines: Despite the limitations of a case study as a test of theory with respect to external validity and limited generalizability of findings, this approach is particularly suitable for comprehensively investigating phenomena of interest. The quantitative analysis of this study was restricted to exploring customer expectations and perceptions of a service provider. We approached the person (either the CEO or the IT Manager) responsible for the relationship with the service provider in each buying company. Future studies in other services context not as complex as health software may benefit from getting data from multiple respondents within the buying companies surveyed (e.g. CEO and purchasing managers). Also, future studies could consider the point of view of the service provider in these situations.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the actions and interactions that take place before and after purchase between a service provider (service seller) and its customers (service buyers) in complex business relationships. Specifically, it is to examine customers' expectations of the service provider's service offer before purchase and the same customers' perceptions of the service solution offered after purchase in a business-to-business (B2B) context.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study adopted a mixed methods design, which combined data generated through in-depth interviews (both with service buyers and key informants from the service company), an online customer survey, analysis of textual documents and structured observations of buyer-seller interactions and actions. Both objective and subjective points of view at different stages of the investigation were collected.\nFindings: The authors' results show that, contrary to previous evidence in B2C service research, the customers' perceptions of the service performance were not significantly related to their previous expectations. In this context, characterized by dynamic and constantly evolving processes and many parties (both from the buyer and the seller company) involved in the implementation process, service complexity may cause a lack of well-formed expectations regarding how the service will perform and its relevant performance attributes.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study suggests that the service models traditionally used to describe and explain customer service expectations and perceptions in relatively simple service contexts with final consumers are difficult to apply in B2B complex business relationships. Rather, scholars need to take a holistic, continuously evolving and adapted perspective when examining the formation of customer service expectations and their perceptions in B2B complex services.\nPractical implications: There should be a teleological balance between sales and purchase approaches in B2B contexts to optimize the outcome of complex business relationships between service providers and service receivers. The authors suggest several recommendations to service providers to ensure that their salespeople do not create unrealistic and unachievable expectations in the minds of the service receivers. Service providers are also encouraged to develop formal cross functional teams (e.g. consisting of salespeople, service technicians and service support) based on mutual understanding and information sharing.\nOriginality/value: This study provides an alternative time-oriented understanding of the way customer expectations before purchase and their perceptions after purchasing a complex software solution in industrial markets formed through the lens of teleological framework. As such, this is the first empirical inquiry with this specific framework in B2B contexts making a relevant contribution to literature.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Modeling Deming's quality principles to improve performance using interpretive structural modeling and MICMAC analysis
|
[
"Total Quality Management (TQM)",
"Interpretive Structural Modelling (ISM)",
"MICMAC analysis",
"Edwards Deming"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In the twenty-first century, companies are struggling for improvements in their supply chains. The key success factor is not only to improve a company's supply chain but how fast it can implement changes compared to its competitors. As a result, competition is not between companies, but between supply chains. Hence, a good leader will drive their team forward to manage changes in all aspects of business, and improve the efficiency of the organization. As per Delavigne and Robertson (1994), in this world there are three types of changes: evolutionary change, revolutionary change and change in the process of evolution. These types of changes have been studied by Shewhart and later by Deming.\n2. Theoretical background: The influence that the late W. Edwards Deming and his management methods (Deming, 1982b, 1986; Walton, 1986) had on TQM practices in industry has been significant. Therefore, it is not surprising to learn that even after his passing, Deming and his contribution to industry is still highly visible which include (Rungtusanatham et al., 2003):\n3. ISM and model development: ISM is an interactive learning process where a set of directly related variables are structured as a comprehensive, systemic hierarchical model known as structural model (Warfield, 1974; Sage, 1977). It was proposed by Warfield (1976) in order to analyze complex socioeconomic systems, and since then ISM has been used in various fields to convert complex relationships into a structural model. This technique helps to impose order and direction onto a complex relationship among the variables of a system, as discussed by Agarwal et al. (2007), Jharkharia and Shankar (2004) and Ramesh et al. (2010). The dependency on statistical data to get results makes structural equation modeling (SEM) ambiguous (Wisner, 2003), but ISM allows researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the relationships among key issues. Saxena and Vrat (1992) examined energy conservation in the Indian cement industry by applying the ISM methodology, and it has since been used by several other researchers in different fields (Mandal and Deshmukh, 1994; Jharkharia and Shankar, 2004, 2005; Ravi and Shankar, 2005) to develop a better understanding of the systems under consideration.\n4. MICMAC analysis: MICMAC refers to the Matrice d'Impacts Croises Multiplication Appliquee a un Classement (Hussain, 2011). MICMAC analysis works on the principle of the multiplication properties of matrices (Diabat and Govindan, 2011; Kannan et al., 2009), and one of the key objectives of this analysis is to examine and categorize variables of interest in terms of driving power and dependence power (Mandal and Deshmukh, 1994), wherein all the variables are classified into four specified clusters (Hussain, 2011) with the following characteristics (full details in Table XII):\n5. Results: The ISM model reveals that if firms \"eliminate slogans, exhortations and targets for the work force\" (A10) and \"take action to accomplish the transformation\" (A14), variables are significant for the initiation of implementing quality principles in manufacturing and service organization. As it appears at the base of the ISM hierarchy, lack of top management commitment and coordination between departments are the most potent barriers, possessing high driving power and low dependence power (Muruganantham et al., 2018). As such, effective top management will play a significant role in the successful implementation of TQM in organization (Dubey and Singh, 2015; Thakkar et al., 2008; Dewangan et al., 2015; Goyal et al., 2017; Keshaorao Digalwar et al., 2015; Singh and Sushil, 2013). Studies revealed that it is significant for the top management to take a leadership role and show strong commitment during the implementation of TQM to inspire employees toward improved quality standards (Rivers and Bae, 1999; Lee and Asllani, 1997). This can help the top management in deciding on the priority and focus on those variables which lead to the desired results in the form of outcome variables.\n6. Discussion: The main objective of this research work was to rank the quality principle of Deming in order to analyze the interactions among variables which support the successful implementation of TQM in a service and manufacturing organization. To achieve these objectives, MICMAC analysis of the driving power and dependence power of variables were classified into four clusters, as shown in Figure 4, and ISM-based model was developed, as shown in Figure 3. This was completed in order to fully understand the interactions among different variables so that the management of an organization may focus on those variables which are more influential for TQM implementation. This practice can increase both an organization's productivity and performance, and will thus help in improving customer satisfaction, thereby increasing market share. The MICMAC analysis helps to classify and collate variables in terms of driving power and dependence power. It is seen from Figure 4 that there are no autonomous variables, which shows that all Deming quality variables play a significant role in the implementation of TQM program.\n7. Conclusion: In this research investigation an ISM-based model has been developed for the successful implementation of TQM programs in service and manufacturing organization for improving customer satisfaction, efficiency and increasing market share. In this paper, Deming's 14 quality principles have been used to find interactions among variables to implement TQM. Although a large amount of literature is available on TQM enablers, no study has been undertaken to understand the interactions among Deming's 14 quality principles. The major contribution of this research work is the development of contextual relationships among variables through a systematic framework which can be used for any service and manufacturing organization. A major finding of this research work is that the \"role of top management,\" \"institute training,\" \"encourage education to employees\" and \"institute leadership\" are significant variables for successful implementation of TQM in service and manufacturing organizations. These variables have the strongest driving power and the weakest dependence power and lie at the bottom of the ISM model.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study the 14 principles of Edwards Deming and create significant relationships between them. No research has been reported on the implementation of Total Quality Management (TQM) using Deming's 14 principles. To fill this gap, Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) and MICMAC analysis have been developed to understand mutual interactions among variables and find both the dependence and driving power of these variables.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The research paper discusses a blend of practical applications and introduces a theoretical framework. An ISM-based methodology is used to study and examine interactions between identified variables, while MICMAC analysis is used to identify the dependence and driving power.\nFindings: This research utilizes Deming's 14 quality principles, with experts from academia and industry consulted to identify contextual relationships among variables. The result shows that the stated principles \"take action to accomplish the transformation,\" \"institute training,\" \"encourage education to employees\" and \"institute leadership\" are strategic requirements, while \"drive out fear,\" \"break down barrier between staff areas\" and \"eliminate numerical quotas\" are tactical requirements. \"Adopt the new philosophy,\" \"create constancy in improvement of product and service\" and \"cease dependence on mass inspections\" are operational requirements for TQM applications.\nOriginality/value: An ISM-based quality framework, dependence power and driving power of variables using MICMAC analysis have been recommended to the service and manufacturing industry as a new focus area in the implementation of TQM.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Accessibility of online resources cited in scholarly LIS journals: A study of Emerald ISI-ranked journals
|
[
"Online resources",
"Library and information science journals",
"Publishers",
"Accessibility",
"URL decay",
"Link rot",
"Serials",
"Online access"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The use of the internet for identifying valuable and timely information has become inevitable for most scientists and the public with access to the world wide web. Scientific and other work is created and added in digital format on the internet every day (Falagas et al., 2008). In fact, the use of web links or citations is common in journal papers, conference articles and other scholarly publications (Goh and Ng, 2007), which mean that due to the web the citing behavior of researchers has been influenced by the web and this has influenced the growth of web citations (Isfandyari-Moghaddam et al., 2010). On the other hand, with the exponential growth of information resources in the era of Web 2.0 and e-Science (Yang et al., 2010), the accessibility and persistence of online resources is a critical issue that is growing in importance. Reconstruction, terminating, merging, redirecting and expanding web sites can mean an inconsistency in web URLs. This phenomenon has been studied as web site persistence and decay (Dimitrova and Bugeja, 2007a), web site constancy and permanence (Tyler and McNeil, 2003), and web site accessibility and persistence of URLs. Meanwhile, citations are also important supports for scientific research. So we see the growth of online resources and web citations. In this paper we present findings from research investigating the accessibility of online resources cited in Emerald scholarly library and information science journals.The web has eased the accessibility of information resources and citations. However the web sites linking to online citations have been found to disappear at increasing rates over time (Dimitrova and Bugeja, 2007a). Missing online citations linked web sites is a controversial issue for researchers and web managers. Rumsey (2002), and Tyler and McNeil (2003) state that one-third of online citations vanish from original web locations for several reasons. This phenomenon is known as \"broken links\", \"ephemeral nature of WWW hyperlinks\", or \"link rot\" by Markwell and Brooks (2002, 2003), \"missing web-cites\" by Sellitto (2004), and \"going 404\" (so named after the \"404 not found\") by Wren (2008).This phenomenon of missing web-cites exists because the uniform recourse locator (URL) is a standard string of characters which defines the location of a file or web site. When a client requests access to an online citation, for example, by clicking related URL, HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) status code is returned by the server to the client to determine the outcome of that request (For more information and a detailed list of HTTP status-codes see: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/943891/). Traditionally, unsuccessful content retrieval is called \"error codes\". For example, error of \"404: Not Found\" means that the server has not found anything matching the Request-URI. This famous error may appear in more than a half or more webpages (Dimitrova and Bugeja, 2007b) in a sample daily web exploration.Citation accuracy and access availability of online references, such as digitized journals, public and proprietary databases and web search engine content, are fundamental elements of reliable academic research. Yet, it is generally accepted that the uncertain nature of the web is of concern to researchers and authors alike, and the decay and annihilation of citations can hinder the accessibility of online academic materials. This is a major problem that needs to be further investigated. The study reported in this paper seeks to extend our understanding of the accessibility of web documents by examining the accessibility and decay of online resources to library and information science articles appearing in four ISI-ranked journals available in the Emerald database.\nLiterature review: Web citations decay\nResearch aims and questions: Research aims\nResearch design: Citation analysis\nResults: Q1: What is the distribution of articles, citations and web citations?\nDiscussion: The study reported in this paper investigated the state of online resources cited in scholarly LIS journals which are ranked in ISI and available in the Emerald database in terms of accessibility and decay. This study contributes to the fields of bibliometrics, citations analysis, and Webometrics particularly as our study is one of the newest studies in relation to LIS. In other words, a study which examines the accessibility and decay of web citations used by authors of articles published in ISI-ranked LIS journals available in the Emerald database has not been previously conducted. Our study can also contribute to the quality of such literature for web content providers and publishers, authors and researchers.Investigation through the URL top domains showed that the.org has received more citations than other domains. This finding was in agreement with Dimitrova and Bugeja (2007a) and McCown et al. (2005). RTF and PPT with 100 percent accessibility and the PDF with 97 percent were the most stable file formats. This result did not agree with McCown et al. (2005) who reported HTML files as the most stable format. The 404 error was the most prevalent error. This means that in this study, the majority of errors (61 percent) were client based errors that occurred for several reasons such as filtering, connection failure status, explorer malfunctioning due to the used proxies, and intrusion of alphanumeric characters.According to Sullivan (1999; quoted in Wu, 2009, p. 482), link rot [decay] is on the rise and over 20 percent of web page resources are affected by link rot. In the present study, the online resources decay rate was 36 percent, while in the previous studies, the online resources decay was: 50 percent (Germain, 2000), 13 percent (Dellavalle et al., 2003), 45.4 percent (Casserly and Bird, 2003), 39 percent (Dimitrova and Bugeja, 2007a), 49.3 percent (Wagner et al., 2009), and 55.8 percent (Wu, 2009). The decay rate was decreased to 5 percent by adopting various strategies such as Google and Wayback Machine search, URL path reduction or truncation, and manual editing.The main strategies which revived more dead URLs were using the Wayback Machine (17 percent) and Google (12 percent). Nonetheless, we found some limitations in their services. For example, the Wayback Machine works just for HTML based URLs. Therefore, we could not search the Wayback Machine for the FTP (file transport protocol) based URLs. Also, this reputable web archive had some limitations in archiving dynamic pages and pages containing Java Scripts. The Wayback Machine did not archive the pages which had not external links to other web sites.Google was unable to crawl the pages including active contents and pages using robots.txt codes. Using heuristic rules were rather tedious. The user is not always patient enough for manual editing of URL strings. Therefore, the URL decay should be considered as a critical issue for scholarly online publishing. We could not compare the Wayback Machine with the Google as they have different primary functions and carry different types of content. Dimitrova and Bugeja (2007b) showed that the Wayback Machine performance in reviving unavailable URLs was largely better than using Google. They showed that 64 percent of citations retrieved through Google were also found in the Wayback Machine and only 36 percent of citations were uniquely available through Google. In contrast, 67 percent of the citations found in the Wayback Machine did not overlap and 33 percent overlapped with Google.Ultimately, we were faced with 5 percent absolutely unavailable online citations even with employing useful services such as Google, the Wayback Machine or the heuristic strategies. Nonetheless, the original accessibility was 64 percent. This should be considered as an issue of using online resources.Limitations\nConclusion and further research: URL decay happens for several reasons, among them the reorganization of web sites and likely changes in adopted domains. Based on researchers' reliance on online resources in a specific field, the decay rate differs. The decay increases with the increase in researchers' reliance on online resources. This issue is critical to those fields, including LIS, which are specific and have a limited number of online resources. Checking the availability of online resources prior to publishing submitted manuscripts could improve the availability status, since the authors are likely more informed of their used online resources and easily can modify the URL strings' errors or replace decayed URLs with live alternatives.Spinellis's (2003, p. 77) suggest that:[...] the web has revolutionized on a global scale the way we distribute, disseminate, and access information and, as a consequence, is creating a disruptive paradigm shift in the way human scientific knowledge builds upon and references existing work. In the past, libraries could provide reliable archival services for books and other printed publications; the emergence of the web is marginalizing their role. In the short term none of the approaches toward solving the general problem of dangling URL references is likely to be a panacea. It is therefore important to appreciate the importance of web citations and invest in research, technical infrastructures, and social processes that will lead toward a more stable scientific publication paradigm.It is hoped that editors and their colleagues will provide more clearly defined expectations in journal guidelines. Librarians can also play a role in developing such guidelines. To overcome the problem of URL decay a multi-lateral collaboration is necessary between article producers (i.e. researchers and authors) and article distributors (i.e. journals, their editorial team, and publishers).As for future research, we need to replicate our study long-term and at a large-scale including more LIS journals so more generalizable results can be attained. Moreover, doing a comparative study investigating the accessibility and decay of web citations used in the articles of ISI-ranked and non-ISI-ranked would also be important.\n",
"role": "user"
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"content": "Purpose: - This research aims to study the state of online resources cited in scholarly library and information science (LIS) journals which are ranked in ISI and available in the Emerald database in terms of accessibility and decay.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Four LIS journals published by Emerald were selected from Thomson Reuters' JCR. The journals' issues from 2005 to 2008 were downloaded directly from the publisher web site and checked in terms of decay and availability of individual cited URLs.\nFindings: - Original accessibility of studied online resources was 64 percent, which improved to 95 percent. The main adopted strategies that returned more results were using the Wayback Machine and Google, which revived online resources by 17 percent and 12 percent respectively.\nPractical implications: - To increase the rate of web citations accessibility, some recommendations, including avoiding long URLs, citing documents found in digital collections availability on the web, working through systematic checking of the web citations before publication, getting backup of cited information, using the more stable file formats and domains, and utilizing tools like WebCite(r)-enhanced reference and a digital object identifier (DOI(r)) system are suggested.\nOriginality/value: - A study which examines the accessibility and decay of web citations used by authors of articles published in ISI-ranked LIS journals available in the Emerald database has not been already done. This paper can thus contribute to the knowledge of this field as well as quality of such literature for web content providers and publishers, authors and researchers.\n",
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Clinical effectiveness: a structured teaching approach for junior doctors
|
[
"Clinical audit",
"Clinical governance",
"Teaching",
"Doctors"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nAim: The A&E departments at the Royal London and Homerton Hospitals employ 24 Senior House Officers (SHOs) in every six-month period. A&E SHOs have usually progressed directly from pre-registration house officer posts and frequently have little or no understanding of the clinical effectiveness process and its importance in modern clinical practice. Primarily for their educational benefit, the A&E SHOs receive teaching sessions on clinical effectiveness and are encouraged to undertake a clinical audit project within their six months of employment. The purpose of this study is to formulate and implement a teaching programme for junior doctors that provides foundation training in the principles of clinical effectiveness so that they are able to utilise this information later in their careers. The intention is to demonstrate that, with the appropriate guidance and support, junior doctors are not only able to undertake a clinical audit project in the relatively short period of employment inherent to junior doctor rotational training, but are also able to gain a good understanding of the principles and importance of the process. If successful, the structured teaching approach could be considered as a template that other institutions may wish to adopt to educate their own juniors. An important secondary aim is to improve clinical practice in the area under study.\nMethod: The teaching programme consisted of five three-hour teaching sessions at approximately six-weekly intervals within the six-month period, each with its own teaching objectives. The programme was developed by the lead A&E Consultant for departmental audit in conjunction with the Trust's Clinical Effectiveness Unit using the experiences from previous cohorts of junior doctors. The A&E SHOs were divided into two groups of 12, and each group performed a clinical audit project.Session one: general introduction and selection of an area of interest\nResults: The results may be best considered in terms of each session's objectives. The results from one group of SHOs will be discussed in this paper.Session one: general introduction and selection of an area of interest\nStatistical analysis: Statistical analysis of all eight criteria between the pre- and post-intervention phases was performed using the t-test (t-value -2.92; p-value (one-tailed) 0.01, p-value (two-tailed) 0.02). This demonstrates that, based on assessment with the audit tool, there was a statistically significant improvement in the documented management of patients attending the A&E department with foreign-body eye injuries following intervention.\nDiscussion: Clinical effectiveness has become entrenched in modern clinical practice and it is incumbent upon all practitioners to both monitor and improve their own practice according to established guidelines. The process of clinical audit has been at the cornerstone of this drive to improve medical practice. Traditionally, clinical audit has been an exercise in monitoring departmental morbidity and mortality figures. However, the process of audit has become much more extensive over the past few years and any project remains incomplete without \"closing of the loop\". The process should involve assessing current practice against established guidelines, implementing means of improving that practice in areas where it is deficient and then subsequently reassessing practice to verify that it has been improved. This should be an ongoing process of assessment and intervention phases so that current practice is up to date. It should be appreciated that gold standards may also change as the outcome of medical research and clinical trials constantly impacts upon best practice.Previous studies have demonstrated that clinical audit projects often fail to complete the loop and become a waste of resources (Gnanalingham et al., 2001). Furthermore, other studies demonstrate that there are significant barriers to the clinical effectiveness process (Johnston et al., 2000). One such barrier may be the constant movement of junior doctors as they embark on rotational training. For example, in hospital practice many consultants are reliant upon their junior staff to take part in the clinical effectiveness process. However, with junior doctors moving on to new posts every six months, does this allow sufficient time for a complete audit project closing the loop to be performed? It is also important for junior doctors to fully understand the clinical effectiveness process, as it will be an essential part of the rest of their working lives. This has taken on an even greater importance in the last few months as an understanding of clinical effectiveness and active participation in clinical audit forms an essential part of the General Medical Council's revalidation process.This study demonstrates that with a structured teaching programme junior doctors may be educated in the principles of clinical effectiveness and its importance in modern clinical practice, as demonstrated by their ability to perform and present their findings as outlined above. Furthermore, with the appropriate support, junior doctors are able to perform meaningful clinical effectiveness exercises at an early stage in their careers and within the constraints of short periods of employment. This not only introduces the juniors to the processes involved but also demonstrates that these projects improve their own practice and ability to manage patients. Short periods of employment, such as six months, should not act as a hurdle to undertaking clinical audit projects and juniors should be encouraged to objectively assess clinical practice at an early stage in their careers.By encouraging juniors to complete the audit loop when performing such projects, repetition from one cohort to the next can be avoided and ultimately a waste of resources can be prevented. Furthermore, as these juniors progress their learning experiences may be imparted to others.\nConclusions: * A structured teaching approach allows junior doctors to be educated in the principles of clinical effectiveness and its importance in modern clinical practice.* With appropriate guidance and support, junior doctors are able to perform meaningful clinical audit projects in the short period of employment inherent to rotational training.* Following intervention in this particular study there was a statistically significant improvement in the management of patients with foreign-body eye injuries attending the A&E department at the Royal London Hospital.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - To formulate an effective teaching prog ramme in the principles of clinical effectiveness for junior doctors, with simultaneous participation in a clinical audit project during their six-month period of employment.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Accident and Emergency (A&E) Senior House Officers (SHOs) were educated in the principles of clinical effectiveness through a structured five-session approach whilst they concurrently performed their clinical audit project. Throughout the process the A&E SHOs were supported by the Clinical Effectiveness Unit and the A&E Consultant overseeing departmental audit.\nFindings: - The structured teaching programme resulted in a good understanding of the clinical effectiveness process amongst the A&E SHOs, as demonstrated by their ability to perform a clinical audit project which ultimately improved practice.\nResearch limitations/implications: - This study has involved the construction and assessment of a teaching framework for junior doctors. The conclusions have been drawn on the basis of objective measures such as the completion of a clinical audit project which successfully improved practice. Thus, the publications of the findings may be considered in the category of a research paper. However, the authors accept that the assessment of a teaching programme's success and its portability to other departments or institutions can be highly subjective.\nPractical implications: - With appropriate guidance and support, junior doctors are able to perform meaningful clinical effectiveness exercises at an early stage in their careers and within the constraints of short periods of employment. The structured teaching approach could be considered as a template which other institutions may wish to adopt to educate their own juniors.\nOriginality/value: - Despite the increasing importance of clinical audit in modern practice, the authors are not aware of any published teaching programmes which provide junior doctors with the necessary understanding of and skills required to take part in the clinical effectiveness process.\n",
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The impacts of relationship marketing on cognitive dissonance, satisfaction, and loyalty: The mediating role of trust and cognitive dissonance
|
[
"Trust",
"Customer satisfaction",
"Communication",
"Cognitive dissonance",
"Attitudinal loyalty",
"Behavioural loyalty"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Business practitioners have mainly been advised to strengthen ties between their firms and the customers. More specifically, this relationship was encouraged in marketing perspectives. When relationship marketing first emerged, some people considered it as a new fad (Palmer, 1996). Berry (1983) was a pioneer in defining the term \"relationship marketing\". This author regarded relationship marketing as \"attracting, maintaining, and enhancing customer relationships\". Lancaster and Massingham (2011) quoting from Athanasopoulou (2009) stated that our understanding on the concepts of relationship marketing is immature. They also mentioned that the concept is \"complex\" and there is no set of rules as to clarify when a relationship marketing approach is necessary. However, researchers started developing papers on relationship marketing and outlined the constructs (Baker et al., 1998; Yau et al., 2000; Chiu et al., 2005; Ndubisi, 2007; Palmatier et al., 2007). By definition, relationship marketing is building long-term and profitable customer relationships (Kotler, 2001; Kotler, 2003; Lancaster and Massingham, 2011). Kotler (2001) stated that the aim of relationship marketing is to build long-term mutually satisfying relations with key parties - including customers, suppliers, and distributers - as to earn and retain their long-term preference, resulting in economic, technical, social ties among the parties. On the basis of the definition and the aim of relationship marketing, we know that the relationship mainly starts when the purchase takes place.\nTheoretical background and literature review: Relationship marketing\nMethodology: Product selection\nData analysis and results: Measurement, reliability, and validity\nDiscussion: Our data support majority of the proposed hypotheses. However, there is an exception. Communication, as a construct of relationship marketing, did not have a meaningful impact on cognitive dissonance (b=-0.153, t=-0.976, p=0.329). As a result, the communications of the brands involved in our study could not reduce cognitive dissonance among the population of the study. We must notice the correlation between trust and communication, as H6 proposed. Trust is considered as the heart of constructs of relationship marketing (Yau et al., 2000). Thus, regarding the meaningful correlation between trust and communication in the study, we can infer that trust could have affected the impact of communication on cognitive dissonance, and, consequently, the impact of communication is not meaningful. Another point to consider is the indirect influence of trust on customer satisfaction, behavioural and attitudinal loyalty. Similarly, the hypothesis testing proved the mediating role of cognitive dissonance on behavioural and attitudinal loyalty.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study how relationship marketing can reduce cognitive dissonance in post-purchase stage and, thereby, increase customer satisfaction and encourage loyalty under mediating roles of trust and cognitive dissonance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on a survey on consumers of cell phones, the authors tested the effects of relationship marketing on cognitive dissonance and then customer satisfaction, behavioural, and attitudinal loyalty, using structural equation modelling.\nFindings: The results indicate that, thanks to relationship marketing, consumers undertook less cognitive dissonance in post-purchase stage. Thus, as consumers faced less cognitive dissonance, they represented more satisfaction and thereby behavioural and attitudinal loyalty. Additionally, the study confirmed the mediating role of trust and cognitive dissonance.\nPractical implications: The results show that when brands and retailers make their ties with their customers stronger and encourage trust, they can discourage cognitive dissonance in post-purchase stage and thereby encourage customer satisfaction and behavioural and attitudinal loyalty.\nOriginality/value: Literature on post-purchase behaviour and cognitive dissonance shows how cognitive dissonance can reduce post-purchase satisfaction. Our research adds to the literature of both relationship marketing and post-purchase behaviour.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Social media brand engagement: dimensions, drivers and consequences
|
[
"Social media",
"Social media engagement",
"Brand engagement",
"Brand equity",
"Dimensions",
"Drivers",
"Gen Y",
"Consequences",
"Social media brand engagement"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Social media (SM) networks involve a massive inflow and sharing of information on brands and products (Stojanovic et al., 2018). Being an interactive platform, SM motivate customers to interact and engage with others and brands during multiple stages of the consumption process, including information search, decision-making, word-of-mouth and the acquisition, use and disposal of products and services (Filo et al., 2015: Wirtz et al., 2019a). The ways in which information is delivered and used in customer-brand interactions and engagement activities on this interactive media (Mangold and Faulds, 2009; Chahal and Rani, 2017) are essential in understanding the concept of customers' SM engagement. Customers' SM engagement with brands is considered as a preferred brand performance indicator and an increasingly important promotional strategy by companies.\nLiterature review and hypotheses development: Conceptualization of social media brand engagement\nSocial media brand engagement and brand equity: Enhancing brand equity is critical to a company's growth and development (Keller, 2009). Recent trends in consumer behavior research show that customers are seeking more involved roles in the consumption process, which in turn are related to brand identity and equity (Doorn et al., 2010; Calder and Malthouse, 2005). In a similar vein, customer engagement has been shown to be an important driver of brand equity. Specifically, the more engaged customers are, the higher are the resulting levels of brand satisfaction, involvement, awareness, image and loyalty Brodie et al. (2011). Here, we argue that to offer value and to create brand equity, it is vital for companies to make their customers' engage in different channels and levels. Although scholars have remarked on the growing significance of SM engagement for building brand equity, the relationship is fairly unexplored (Cal and Adams, 2014; Jahn and Kunz, 2012; Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite, 2012; Wirtz et al., 2013).\nResearch methodology: Survey approach and sample\nMeasurement models: Social media brand engagement\nHypotheses testing: We used structural equation modeling (SEM) to test H2 to H5. Second-order constructs with summated means of the respective factors for all constructs, excluding firm-generated information, were used in the SEM model (Figure 3). As firm-generated information included measured indicators, we used them directly. The indices reflected a moderate model fit with CMIN/df = 2.27, GFI = 0.88, IFI = 0.72, CFI = 0.72, NFI = 0.62, TLI = 0.68 and RMSEA = 0.06.\nDiscussion and implications: This study is the first to provide a comprehensive examination of the dimensions, drivers and consequences of SMBE. Specifically, we examined the dimensionality of SMBE and found that SMBE is a three-dimensional construct comprising utilitarian, hedonic and social dimensions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to advance the current understanding of social media (SM) brand engagement. Specifically, it validates the dimensionality of SM brand engagement, examines its drivers and explores the impact of SM brand engagement on brand equity.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A survey was conducted with 433 Generation Y (Gen Y) SM users.\nFindings: The study results validate SM brand engagement as a multidimensional construct comprising utilitarian, hedonic and social dimensions. Three categories of SM engagement antecedents were identified: social factors (social identity and tie-strength), user-based factors (service, product and price information, hedonic motives and prior experience with SM) and firm-generated information (personalized advertising, mass advertising, promotional offers and price information). Finally, SM brand engagement was positively related to brand equity.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study focused on Gen Y SM users in India. This study should be replicated in other contexts to establish the generalizability of the findings.\nPractical implications: A better understanding of the dimensionality and drivers of SM brand engagement can help managers to enhance their SM strategies to build brand equity.\nOriginality/value: This is the first study to provide a comprehensive examination of the dimensions, drivers and consequences of SM brand engagement.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Crime and harassment in Jamaica: consequences for sustainability of the tourism industry
|
[
"Jamaica",
"Crimes",
"Violent crime",
"Harassment",
"Tourism",
"Sustainable development"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Jamaica's relatively high rates of violent crime and harassment have impacted on the level of foreign investment and tourist arrivals to the island. Today, crime is not only a pervasive and distressing phenomenon, it is a problem with no lack of people willing to provide incomplete, contradictory, and incorrect explanations for this phenomenon (Fisch, 2000). The following selection of headlines from two Jamaican newspapers - The Gleaner and The Observer - illustrate the problem:* \"Five dead in city shootout\";* \"Elderly couple murdered\";* \"Twelve murdered so far this week\";* \"Female tourist kidnapped from hotel\";* \"Wave of violence sweeps over Jamaica\";* \"River of blood: women, children at risk\"; and* \"Family of four incinerated\".Some of these problems are reported internationally, which has given Jamaica a reputation as a relatively unsafe country, so that many now consider Jamaica to be the murder capital of the world. In practice, however, most of the serious crimes are in Kingston, the capital city of Jamaica, whereas most of the tourists are on the north coast, which is located on the other side of the island. In addition, the majority of these crimes are either domestic, or motivated by drugs or politics. Very few involve tourists. Nonetheless, the perception of risk has clearly had some impact on Jamaica's prosperity and development.While this paper is an extract from research conducted in Ocho Rios and Montego Bay, Jamaica, in 2000 on the impacts of crimes and harassment on tourism, there may have been changes in the issues raised in this paper since then. However, most of the issues discussed in this paper are still evident in Jamaica.Charles (2003, cited in Clayton and McDavid, 2004) observes that some 90 per cent of business managers in Jamaica now see crime as the major obstacle to investment. This is supported by Robotham (2003, cited in Clayton and McDavid, 2004), who states that the level of concern about crime can deter both domestic and foreign investment, retard business development and erode social capital.\nMaking sense of violent crimes, harassment and tourism in Jamaica: During the 1960s and at the beginning of the 1970s, Jamaica became an increasingly popular tourist destination, as prosperity in the countries of the West and the fall in long-haul airfares made intercontinental journeys possible (Bayer, 1993). With an influx of visitors from the USA, Canada and Europe in the 1970s, tourism became the second largest source of income after bauxite. However, the period of economic growth did not bring about any reduction in social problems; partly because of the growth in population, the level of unemployment remained very high, and in spite of the broadening of its base the economy remained vulnerable (Bayer, 1993).Since the 1970s, Jamaica has had to deal with an astronomical increase in the number of crimes of violence. In the period between 1974 and 1990 the number of cases of reported rape, mugging and robbery increased. This trend has continued in the subsequent years. Recently, both children and women have also become subjects of attack by criminal elements, and this wave of attacks has continued to spread to other parts of the island. With all these reported in both the local and foreign news, the tourism industry in Jamaica has not only suffered from bad publicity but also from the perception of Jamaica as a dangerous destination. The introduction by the government of uniformed armed military personnel in resort areas is a confirmation that not even the tourist is cut off from the wave of crimes. The disappearance of a female travel writer from her hotel room in 2000 is a practical example.Jones (1993) argues that crime exists in societies of all kinds and, despite all efforts to remove it, it has tended to increase over time. While tourism can play a vital role in terms of its employment generating capacity and as a catalyst to stimulate socio-economic change within communities, it can also lead to increased crime (Jones, 1993). This trend is particularly common in Jamaica where there is an exodus of people to resort centres in the hope of securing jobs in tourism-related businesses. The increased numbers of unemployed and illegal settlers in and around resort centres in Jamaica have contributed to the increased number of violent crimes and incidences of harassment.\"Crime\" in the context of this study is considered as any action perpetrated against a tourist that is contrary to and punishable under Jamaican written and case laws. In this study the term \"violence\" is also used specifically in terms of crimes involving an act of inflicting injury on a tourist that is punishable under Jamaican law.Ryan (1993, p. 174) defines crime in relation to tourism as \"an action which is contrary to written or case law in either the tourist-generating or tourist-receiving country\". In his study of crime, violence, terrorism and tourism, Ryan (1993) offers a useful tourism and crime typology that identifies five types of scenario, four of which are significant in making sense out of crime and tourism in Jamaica. The first sees the tourist as an accidental victim who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and is specifically targeted because he is seen as an easy mark. The second sees the tourist location as a \"crimogenic\" venue, with its high life, hedonistic culture and myriad potential victims, many high on drugs. The third sees tourism as the provider of victims. This occurs because tourists are much more prone to take risks on vacation and less likely to observe security measures. As such, there is a tendency by criminal elements to rob and assault tourists. Ryan's fourth typology sees tourists as an imported demand for deviant activities, in which visitors escape for a few days or weeks and indulge in anti-social and self-corrupting or destructive behaviour such as drug-taking and soliciting prostitutes. In this scenario, criminal activities become more organised to meet these types of tourist demands. The upsurge in commercial sex activity in Jamaica, especially in Montego Bay, Ocho Rios and Negril, which in early 2001 prompted business entrepreneur Howard Hamilton to propose the introduction of red light districts in these areas - fits well into this category. However, this initiative was resented and rejected by the citizens of Jamaica, as it was perceived as a move towards encouraging and legalising prostitution.\"Crime and violence in Jamaica can be traced back to Jamaica's political troubles and urban violence which made headline news during the 1980s\" (Economist Intelligence Unit, 1994, p. 76). Despite occasional reports of tourists being involved in isolated incidents, Jamaica's progress as a tourist destination was very strong within the overall performance of the Caribbean region. The report further stresses that one of the most successful components of tourism in Jamaica has been the development of the all-inclusive resort. The all-inclusive concept has gained in popularity, and one reason for its success has been the perceived need to cut tourists off from the risk of crime and violence of any kind. However, critics of the all-inclusive concept have argued the lack of its inclusiveness on the economy of local artisans and other tourism spin-offs. In this context, rather than establishing all-inclusive properties in Jamaica in an attempt to protect the tourist from incidental crimes, the onus should be on the hotel operators and other tourism-related businesses to work together along with the government in combating crime on the island.In his study of negative publicity about the tourist destination of Florida, Brayshaw (1995, p. 63) asserts that petty crime against tourists has long been a feature of established tourism resorts. Tourists carry luggage, cameras, cash and passports, and provide conspicuous targets, easily disposable pickings and, should the criminals be caught, little risk of legal action since most tourists do not stay long in the destination. While this is similar to what happens in Jamaica, the identification wristband worn by tourists at all-inclusive resorts is yet another way by which criminal elements can easily identify tourists.\nHarassment or salesmanship?: While a large number of tourists may escape being victims of crime and violence in Jamaica, only a few escape harassment. Beach boys, street vendors, art and craft vendors, taxi operators and beggars have contact with tourists and they do sometimes harass them. Harassment of tourists in Jamaica is not a new phenomenon. Evidence was presented in a television documentary on Jamaica and Florida entitled Dark Side of the Sun (Yorkshire Television, 1995). In this documentary, tourists in Jamaica were seriously warned about the level of crimes and harassment on the island, and if possible, were advised to avoid downtown Kingston, which is considered to be highly prone to various forms of crime. This suggests that almost everyone visiting Jamaica is approached many times by a variety of characters, including beach and street vendors, Rastafarians (members of a religious group in Jamaica that believe in the use of hemp as herbs), usually selling aloe vera or ganja (a common name in Jamaica denoting hemp), and even beach boys looking for white girlfriends. Practical examples of these are the beach boys of Barbados and the \"rent a dread\" concept in Jamaica.This approach has made many locals try to make a living by entrepreneurial interaction with tourists on the beach and in the street, and rather than seeing this behaviour as unworthy, the perpetrators often see their approaches as simply those of hopeful salesmen/women looking for business. The statistics obtained from police data from Negril as taken from the Dunn and Dunn (2002) report (see Tables I and II) suggests the level and degree of tourist harassment in Jamaica. These statistics relate to patterns of arrest for harassment.However, one factor missing from the statistics is that they do not show repeat offenders. Also, in the case of \"offering services\", the nature of the services offered and how these constitute harassment is not specified. Likewise, it is not clear how exposing goods for sale constitutes harassment. These factors therefore become critical in making sense of crime and harassment. It is equally not clear whether the cultural orientations of the Jamaican people were considered in determining what constitutes harassment.Boxill (1995, p. 3), in a study of tourism and crime in Jamaica, made reference to a survey conducted in 1992 by the Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB). In that survey, Boxill observed that only 2 per cent of the tourists surveyed regarded crime as a major problem in coming to Jamaica. The largest numbers of responses were in relation to harassment and poor physical infrastructure as the most serious problem they see in Jamaica as a destination. Boxill (1995) went on to argue that where crime is seriously linked to tourism, it is not through increased crime per se but through adverse publicity about various types of crimes. In other words, it is quite plausible for a reduction in the crime rate to be accompanied by a decline in visitor arrivals due to adverse overseas press coverage about a specific incident or incidents.\nDiscussion: The causes of crime, violence and harassment against tourists are as significant as the results they produce, but these tend not to gain much attention. From the indicators given by the different stakeholders, the root causes of unemployment, poverty, lack of education and laziness probably took their roots from break-up of family units, the irresponsibility and absence of fathers and the hard drug crisis. Also a factor is the lack of management at every level in the government and private sector.From the local stakeholders' point of view, crime in Jamaica has degenerated from what was only domestic and political to a level that now has a serious bearing on the tourism industry.This study shows that lack of employment, economic depression, lack of education and the roving vendors who disturb tourists actually cause problems. It was also discovered that certain practices such as the issue of stickers to buses and taxis to carry tourists to designated plazas and the uncontrolled number of businesses have a significant impact. Of more significance is the perception of Jamaica as a dangerous destination; this has caused many tourists to remain within the confines of their hotels, in most cases all-inclusive properties and cruise ships.\nConclusion: The fact remains that many districts of the island - and more specifically the North coast resorts - were fairly safe and in fact less dangerous than cities such as Miami and Orlando, where special police patrols have been instituted for the purpose of ensuring tourist safety. While it may be difficult to differentiate between crimes against tourists and those against local people, it may be argued that even with poverty on the increase in Jamaica, and the fact that the government is yet to find a prescription for curbing crime on the island, tourists are more and more likely to be victims of crime. Crime rates are likely to rise with tourist density if there is no quick intervention; and the fact remains that any act of crime that occurs in Jamaica and publicised abroad, whether involving tourists or local residents, will continue to affect tourism demand adversely.Even though crimes in Jamaica have been highly publicised abroad, many tourists are unaware of these except when informed. However, harassment of visitors by unsavoury vendors of drugs and other services has contributed to Jamaica's poor image both at home and abroad. Partly because of crime and harassment of visitors, the concept of all-inclusive resorts has become particularly important in Jamaica, and due to the level of crime and harassment, a large number of tourists never leave their hotels except on an organised tour or to return to the airport. It is important to state that there is a need for immediate radical changes in attitudes, values and practices of the business community, the government, the media as well as gaining the cooperation of local residents in order to ensure future sustainability of the tourism industry in Jamaica.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The aims of this paper are to examine how violent crimes and harassment have impacted the tourism and hospitality industry in Jamaica, and to evaluate the approaches that the government has employed in reducing the level of crimes and harassment against tourists on the island.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A qualitative approach was employed as the focus for this study. Surveys of residents, business entrepreneurs, and tourists at two resort areas in Jamaica were sources of data for this paper.\nFindings: - The findings suggest that moving towards sustainability of the tourism industry in Jamaica requires immediate, radical changes in attitudes, values and practices of the business community, the government and the media, as well as cooperation from local residents.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The city of Kingston, which is considered to be highly prone to violent crimes, was not considered in this study. The time frame of the study did not allow for this, and so the research focus was more on resort areas.\nPractical implications: - With the problems of crime and harassment being reported in both the local and foreign news, the tourism industry in Jamaica has suffered not only from bad publicity but also from the perception of Jamaica as a dangerous destination.\nOriginality/value: - The paper concludes that, while the tourism industry has been impacted negatively as a result of the increase in the number of violent crimes and harassment, less attention has been paid to both the immediate and remote causes of these problems.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Sustainable supply chain performance, its practice and impact on barriers to collaboration
|
[
"Supply chain management",
"Social",
"Barriers",
"Environment",
"Sustainable performance",
"Higher-order model"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: With increasing penetration of globalization and technology, firms have access to same materials, suppliers and even labor force. It is also possible to create same set of values from different sets of resources. Hence, it is becoming difficult to get competitive advantages from resources. Government and public policy are increasingly pressurizing firms to also look and do beyond its boundaries. In this complex and competitive scenario, how can firms position itself apart from others and get competitive advantage? Sustainable supply chain (SSC) provides one such opportunity (D'Agostini et al., 2017; Markley and Davis, 2007) for firms to excel in business arena by enhancing performance, earning customers' goodwill, loyalty and trust. It makes measurement and understanding of sustainable supply chain performance (SSCP) vital from both theoretical and practical perspectives.\n2. Literature review and conceptualization: Traditionally, critical role of supply chain on profit making has been emphasized. With the realization of increasing global warming, managing supply chain in harmony with environment as strategic decision has been gaining attention, especially from late 1980s and early 1990s (Fahimnia et al., 2015). Since then both practitioners and researchers have been putting efforts to understand various aspects of its implementation issues, and it has become one of the most important research topics in SC and an area of concern globally. A recent practical evidence comes from United Nations Global Compact sustainability survey which emphasizes importance of supply chain sustainability to drive corporate sustainability (United Nation, 2016). The survey finds that 97 percent CEOs believe sustainability is important to the future success of their business, and 67 percent of CEOs believe that business is making sufficient efforts to address global challenge. Introduction of environmental aspect in SCM gave birth to GSCM. The GSCM implies environment friendly, pollution free and recycling operation (Sarkis et al., 2011). In addition to environment concerns, social issues have equally become important component of SCM (Varsei et al., 2014). Finally, GSCM culminated into sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) (Seuring and Muller, 2008), and subsequently three aspects - economic, environment and social - for firms, has become aspiration to achieve, and for researchers, it is unearthing the underlying phenomena and formulating mechanism for effective implementation.\n3. Methods: We tested our model empirically using primary data collected from industries. To measure constructs, multi-item scales were adapted from the existing literature and from discussions with experts of operations and SCM. To make item fit in collaboration based sustainability, few items were modified to suit the context. A five-point Likert scale was used ranging from \"strongly disagree\" (1) to \"strongly agree\" (5). Table II shows constructs, their underlying measurement items and other quality measures discussed in subsequent sections. Designed questionnaire was reviewed by experts for ambiguity, readability and clarity. Measurement items of SCP are mainly taken from Barratt (2004), Kumar et al. (2016), Kumar and Banerjee (2012) and Youn et al. (2012); environment performance from Large and Thomsen (2011); social performance from Carroll (1979), Carter and Rogers (2008) and Gimenez and Tachizawa (2012). We considered three important specific environment activities, namely, waste reduction, recycling and compliance with laws. As we explicitly did not consider other important environmental activities, such as saving energy, natural resources, water, reducing carbon emission, etc., we considered overall perception of environmental performance as the fourth item. As most items come from the literature and refined by experts, we have sufficient content validity.\n4. Results: 4.1 Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)\n5. Discussion: This study corroborates and advances the existing sustainable SC literature which has perceived TBL in realizing sustainability. We conceptualized SSCP as a second-order formative construct that is created from three first-order reflective constructs - environmental, economical and societal. To validate the model and keeping limitations of methods in mind, we employed both exploratory, PLS and confirmatory, CB-SEM method. Validation process in two steps was adapted to purify and validate measurement model. In the first step, at the first-order level, we observed that measurement model of first-order constructs display an excellent fit indicating these three constructs are indeed distinct from each other. Measurement model was also tested for both service and manufacturing industry, and we found that our model withstands an invariance multi-group test conveying our model is applicable for both types of industry. In the second step, causal relationships of first-order constructs to second-order construct were tested using both PLS and CB-SEM method. In PLS we employed technique of repeated indicators and in CFA-SEM we employed MIMIC technique (Diamantopoulos and Winklhofer, 2001) to test the higher-order construct, SSCP. In both methods, we observed excellent model fit and adequate nomological validity explaining 19-53 percent of variances with CB-SEM method and 19-50 percent of variances with PLS method. In view of continuing debate that whether or not weights of linkages between first-order and second-order construct of MIMIC model should be pre-defined or constrained, this study compared free as well as constrained model and pushes view further that these linkages should be subject to hypothesis testing, rather than leaving completely on researcher's interpretation and discretion. Mostly, we observed a consistent results and outcomes in both methods, strengthening our claim of conceptual and theoretical validity of our model.\n6. Conclusions, limitations and research directions: This study contributes to the existing literature of sustainability and SC (Albort-Morant et al., 2016; Beske and Seuring, 2014; Mariadoss et al., 2016; Nishant et al., 2016; Seuring and Muller, 2008; Varsei et al., 2014) by structuring sustainability and its underlying activities, validating them empirically and putting them in different perspective for practice. On the backdrop of criticism to TBL for limiting emerging economy, this study presents an important perspective from one of the fastest-growing economies. Specifically, SSCP has been conceptualized as three dimensional second-order formative construct which is combined effect of three first-order reflective constructs - social, economic and environmental performance. Although these three aspects are well acknowledged in the literature, most studies are focused only on economic and environmental facets. Incorporating social aspect, identifying a cohesive structure to link them to achieve sustainability, and building theory to explain their management is missing in the literature. This study, therefore, contributes to a systematic conceptualization of sustainability in SC context. Conceptualization of sustainability is about cohesive effects of the three components, rather than understanding their interplay where the literature (Carter and Jennings, 2002; Mariadoss et al., 2016) is mostly focused.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Sustainable supply chain (SSC) provides one opportunity to achieve competitive advantage. To achieve SSC through triple bottom line (TBL) - economic, environment and social - is extensively discussed. Most literature in dealing with environmental issues undermine social dimension even though its potential to bring outstanding results by earning customers loyalty and commitment is immense. Local orientation and different context motivate firms to prioritize sustainability dimensions differently. The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize SSC performance as three dimensional second-order formative construct which is caused by three first-order reflective constructs. Further, the authors examined effect of sustainable performance on barriers to sustainability through collaboration.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The model is validated by data collected from industries in India using both partial least squares and covariance based structural equation modeling. The authors find the model is valid for both manufacturing and service sectors.\nFindings: In Indian context, social dimension is most and environmental dimension is least important differentiating it from developed economy. The authors find sustainable performance subsequently mitigates barriers and risks to sustainability, thereby reducing its impact over time.\nOriginality/value: This study conceptualizes SSC performance as three dimensional second-order formative construct which is caused by three first-order reflective constructs. Given criticisms to TBL for being western-centric, this study unearths insightful phenomena having implications for both developing and developed world. Further, the authors find sustainable performance reduces effects of barriers to collaboration necessary to achieve SSC. This study contributes to both theory and practice by modeling sustainability performance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
How do features of social media influence knowledge sharing? An ambient awareness perspective
|
[
"Knowledge sharing",
"Social media",
"Knowledge economy",
"Ambient awareness"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Mankind has shifted more than 80 per cent of its workforce to the knowledge-based service industry in the knowledge economy era. As the basis of a company's competitive advantage (Grant, 1999), knowledge management has been considered as a key factor for companies to remain competitive (Spender and Grant, 2015). In knowledge management process, knowledge sharing is a determinant (Wasko and Faraj, 2005). Effective knowledge sharing enables organizations to take advantage of their knowledge resources to improve innovation performance (Wang and Noe, 2010).\n2. Literature review: We conducted a systematic literature review to sort out research gaps and elicit out topic. First, we made related literature review about knowledge sharing, social media and ambient awareness. Then, we reviewed CVT (Leonardi, 2014) which is the main theoretical guidance in this paper.\n3. Hypotheses: 3.1 Social media and ambient awareness\n4. Methodology: 4.1 Research design\n5. Results: 5.1 Model fit\n6. Conclusion and discussion: Knowledge sharing is considered as the key stone and most difficult part among all the knowledge management practice in knowledge work (Babcock, 2004). Regardless of scholars or practitioners, more and more people are examining the effect of the social media on knowledge sharing. In this paper, we discuss whether features of social media, including analysis, tracking and communication can affect knowledge sharing under the mediating of ambient awareness. To verify our hypothesis, we build a research model.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to verify the relationship between the features of social media and knowledge sharing, and to examine how ambient awareness mediates this relationship.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An experiment is designed to stimulate the knowledge work in a famous Chinese business college and 156 valid samples were obtained. AMOS was used in this paper to examine the theoretical model.\nFindings: There is a correlation among features of social media, ambient awareness and knowledge sharing. Surprisingly, network translucence, which indicates individuals' meta-knowledge of others' connections, has no influence on knowledge sharing. Although this is inconsistent with conjecture of the existing literature, it can be well explained by the phenomenon in real life, such as privacy setting in social media.\nPractical implications: For employees who use social media to promote knowledge sharing within organizations, this study reminds them of the importance of ambient awareness. For managers, this study can give them some suggestions to make employees take full advantage of social media to achieve optimal benefits of knowledge sharing, thus improving organizational performance and innovation. For social media designers, they can make social media more useful in knowledge work by improving its specific features.\nOriginality/value: This paper proposes that ambient awareness is the mediator of the effect path between communication and knowledge sharing. And the status perception of coworkers' exchanging information is closely related to knowledge sharing.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
United States paid parental leave and infant mortality
|
[
"USA",
"Parental leave",
"Maternity leave",
"Infant mortality rates",
"Paid parental leave policy"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) collects and analyzes data to assist governments in implementing policies to better the lives of their citizens by fostering prosperity and fighting poverty \"through economic growth and financial stability\" (OECD, 2018). There are 36 countries that are part of the OECD. The USA is the only nation belonging to the OECD that does not have a national policy regulating paid parental leave (Raub et al., 2018). Instead, the USA has left individual states to decide whether they want to legislate paid parental leave. Currently, the only states regulating paid parental leave are California, New Jersey, Rhode Island and New York (Brainerd, 2017). Washington state passed a paid family leave law in 2007, but it was never fully implemented due to lack of funding and was re-evaluated in 2017 and reset to start at the beginning of 2020 (Brainerd, 2017). The District of Columbia is set to implement a bill for paid family leave in July of 2020 (Brainerd, 2017).\nBackground: In 1993, the USA passed the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which is a national labor law requiring employers of 50 or more employees to provide eligible employees with 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave for specific family and medical reasons (US Department of Labor, n.d.). Eligibility requirements include employment of a minimum of 12 months, with a minimum of 1,250 h of employment within the past 12 months, and employment at a location within 75 miles of the employing company (US Department of Labor, n.d.). In 2012, approximately 60 percent of employees qualified for FMLA in the USA and 46 percent of those employees who had an unmet need for leave report not taking it due to inability to afford to take unpaid leave (Klerman et al., 2012).\nTheoretical framework: The theoretical framework for the study of infant mortality and how factors may or may not affect infant mortality is grounded in Mosley and Chen's (1984) analytical framework for the study of child survival in developing countries. This analytical framework is a model that shows how five groups of independent variables, called proximate determinants, influence child survival rates. These five independent variables include maternal factors such as age or parity, environmental contamination, nutrient deficiency, accidental or intentional injuries, and personal illness control such as preventive measures or medical treatment (Mosley and Chen, 1984). The analytical framework was intended to improve child survival by advancing research on social policy and medical interventions (Mosley and Chen, 1984).\nMethods: A comprehensive, electronic review of the titles and abstracts of related literature was performed by the author. The literature was searched using PubMed, CINAHL and OneSearch electronic databases. Criteria for inclusion were original quantitative or qualitative research, articles that included the key terms \"parental leave\" and \"infant mortality\" and \"United States\" in various combinations (including maternity leave, paternity leave and family leave) that were written in English and published from January 2000 through January 2019. Systematic reviews, opinion papers and duplicates were excluded, as well as studies that were not focused in the USA The total number of research studies included in this systematic review was originally nine, with all but three being excluded due to being cross-national studies. A final review of the three remaining studies performed in the USA were chosen for this synthesis. The Cochrane Handbook and the risk of bias tool were used to evaluate the quality of the studies used in this review. Figure A1 demonstrates the PRISMA flow diagram used to obtain the studies for synthesis.\nResults: Sample and characteristics\nDiscussion/conclusions: Limitations\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to synthesize findings on the effects of existing paid parental leave programs on infant mortality rates (IMR) in the USA as an attempt to aid in efforts for the development of a national paid parental leave policy.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Three articles were reviewed to analyze findings on the effects of existing parental leave programs on IMR in the USA.\nFindings: The results from the three studies analyzed indicate that unpaid parental leave and parental leave with partial wage replacement can reduce IMR in households with college educated, working mothers.\nResearch limitations/implications: This review is limited due to only having three studies available to synthesize that pertained to the USA. Implications for future research are to examine the effects of fully paid parental leave programs offered by individual organizations on IMR in the USA.\nSocial implications: Providing a needs-based income replacement policy to mothers who wish to take parental leave after the birth of a child may be the best policy to decrease IMR for infants from all socioeconomic backgrounds.\nOriginality/value: The findings in this review will aid in the ongoing efforts to develop a national paid parental leave policy in the USA.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
The impact of lifestyle and ethnocentrism on consumers' purchase intentions of fresh fruit in China
|
[
"Lifestyles",
"Ethnocentrism",
"Fresh fruit",
"China"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nBackground: Consumption of fruit in China\nLiterature review and hypotheses development: Attitude towards purchase of fruit\nMethod: Data collection\nAnalysis and results: Reliability\nDiscussion and managerial implications: The primary objective of this research was to investigate the relationship of the three identifiable lifestyle groups on the purchase attitudes and purchase intention of both domestic (Chinese) and imported (US) fresh fruit. These three lifestyle groups in China are Risk takers (persons who are individual centred, spontaneous, self indulgent and who strive for success), Experiencers (those who seek variety and novelty, take risks and face new challenges) and finally Traditionalists (those who are conforming, conventional, less experimental and more traditional) (Yang, 2004). Our findings revealed that all these three lifestyle groups did not in anyway impact on the sensory and non-sensory purchase attitudes of both domestic and imported fruit. The sensory attributes included taste, fragrance, safety and freshness of the fruit, whereas the non-sensory attributes were essentially the price and brand of the fruit. The consistency of this finding across both domestic and imported fruit may be of interest to fruit importers in China.Interestingly, there were statistically significant relationships between Risk takers and Traditionalists in relation to the purchase intention of imported (US) fruit as depicted in Figure 3. This finding will certainly be of interest to exporters of fruit to China and marketing strategies to enhance and capitalise on this aspect can be developed. For example, these two lifestyle groups could effectively be used to promote positive word-of-mouth towards consumption of imported fruit to others including the Experiencers.The impact of consumer ethnocentrism was statistically significant only towards the purchase attitudes of domestic fruit as shown in Figure 2. In the segmentation analysis we also discovered that respondents who were older than 25 years and those who possessed a lower than Bachelor's degree academic qualification were the main contributors towards this significant relationship. This finding is in stark contrast to the findings of previous studies, whereby Chinese people tend to perceive imported products as superior to domestic (Wang et al., 2000). However most of those studies were performed in relation to the purchase of convenience and durable goods, and were unrelated to the purchase of consumable agricultural products like fruit. It has been noted that the observed relation between ethnocentrism and perceived product quality is weaker in developing countries than developed countries (Klein, 2002). This means that in a developing country like China, consumers with strong ethnocentric tendencies may not necessarily perceive domestic products as being of higher quality than imports, even though they reject foreign products on moral grounds. Our findings relating to consumers' purchase attitudes of fruit seem to be quite the contrary. Again, this phenomenon is possible owing to the nature of the consumer product, i.e. fruits and their associated sensory and non-sensory attributes. Another plausible reason could be the empathy of consumers towards domestic farmers and a concern for their livelihood.Finally the findings reveal a strong significant relationship between consumers' purchase attitudes and their purchase intentions for both domestic and imported fruit as shown in Figures 2 and 3. The contributors in this relationship were the sensory as well as non-sensory attributes of fresh fruits.The findings of this research will have important managerial implications for current and potential exporters of fresh fruit to China, where the imported fruit business is now booming owing to a burgeoning demand. Some researchers have suggested that if all other attributes are more or less the same, imports should be priced slightly lower than domestic products (Lantz and Loeb, 1996). The findings of our research clearly indicate that price is not an issue for Chinese consumers' purchase intentions of imported fruit. As long as the imported fruits possess quality sensory attributes like taste, fragrance, safety and freshness consumers are willing to give it a go. Also consumers' ethnocentrism tendencies do not adversely impact on their purchase behaviour of imported fruit. Marketers of imported fruit in China should endeavour to convert the lifestyle group of Experiencers, and this can effectively be achieved by capitalising on the positive behavioural intentions of both Risk takers and Traditionalists.\nLimitations and future research: This research was conducted in the city of Wuhan whose population rightfully represents the urban population of entire China. However, it might be worthwhile to explore consumers' purchase behaviour of fresh fruit in other major cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Although our research investigated both the sensory and non-sensory purchase attributes of fruits, it failed to shed light on the intended use of imported fruits, e.g. for gifts, self consumption, children, aged parents and ill patients. Additionally, the values underlying purchase intentions, e.g. symbolism, concern for health, meeting basic needs and hedonism, should be investigated.While the present study investigated the impact of lifestyle variables and consumer ethnocentrism on the purchase attitudes and intentions of domestic and imported (US) fruit in China, it may also give rise to further research that is more product and country specific. For example, imported products from different countries will be rated differently in terms of quality and brand image (Li et al., 1997). Additionally, it has been found that the impact of ethnocentrism on Chinese consumers' attitudes towards imported products from countries like Japan is different owing to the animosity involved (Klein et al., 1998).\nConcluding comments: In summary, it is evident that Chinese consumers' purchase intention of imported fresh fruit is influenced by lifestyle groups, namely Risk takers and Traditionalists. Also consumers' ethnocentrism tendencies play an important role in shaping their purchase attitudes towards domestic fresh fruit. Marketers should ensure that both sensory and non-sensory purchase attributes of fresh fruit are given due importance, as this will snowball into positive purchase intentions, customer satisfaction and overall profitability for firms.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to examine how variables related to lifestyle and ethnocentrism influence Chinese consumers' attitudes and intentions towards the purchase of domestic and imported fresh fruit.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A survey instrument was developed using established scales and focus groups. Data were collected in the city of Wuhan through structured intercept interviews with consumers at major supermarkets and fruit stores. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data.\nFindings: - Chinese consumers' purchase intention of imported fresh fruit is influenced by lifestyle groups, namely risk takers and traditionalists. Also consumers' ethnocentrism tendencies play an important role in shaping their purchase attitudes towards domestic fresh fruit.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Although the research investigated both the sensory and non-sensory purchase attributes of fruits, it failed to shed light on the intended use of imported fruits, e.g. for gifts, self consumption, children, aged parents and ill patients. Additionally, future research should be conducted that is more product and country specific.\nPractical implications: - Marketers should ensure that both sensory and non-sensory purchase attributes of fresh fruit are given due importance, as this will snowball into positive purchase intentions, customer satisfaction and overall profitability for firms.\nOriginality/value: - Despite its potential importance, relatively little is known about consumers' buying behaviour of fresh produce in China. Findings of this study would thus be beneficial to practitioners and policy makers to formulate effective strategies designed to market fresh produce in China.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Information privacy compliance in the healthcare industry
|
[
"Privacy",
"Health services sector",
"Legislation",
"Communications technologies",
"United States of America"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Within the past decade, many gains have been made in the area of information privacy. Once a mere afterthought of client relations or an unintentional byproduct of computer security, information privacy is now frequently mandated by legislative acts imposing strict regulations on how client information is protected. Additionally, it appears that nearly every industry and sector of the economy is affected by emerging privacy legislation. For instance, within the financial sector, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 sets strict guidelines and incentives for financial services firms to protect their clients' personal financial information. California's Security Breach Notification Act, the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act are just a few other examples of privacy legislation in the USA, and similar laws are emerging in Europe and Asia. So, it should come as no surprise that the healthcare industry is also undergoing a transformation of processes used to collect, transfer, process, store, and disseminate the personal information of their patients.Few legislative events have revolutionized the healthcare industry like the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Originally signed by President Clinton in 1996, HIPAA is US regulation designed to protect the privacy and confidentiality of medical patients. This legislation includes both security and privacy provisions (Fedorowicz and Ray, 2004; Robinson, 2005; Dantu et al., 2007). Whereas the security component of HIPAA is intended to stipulate those mechanisms necessary to protect patient information, the privacy element addresses the issues of limitations, responsibility, and access and control.The privacy provisions, the focus of our investigation, took effect on April 14, 2003, a time at which all payers and providers were expected to be compliant. The HIPAA privacy provisions require covered entities to protect protected health information (PHI), also defined as individually identifiable health information. Although HIPAA pertains to all forms of PHI (verbal, paper, and electronic), currently only the electronic formats are addressed in the Security Standards Final Rule published in February 2003 (Mercuri, 2004). These provisions result in managerial and behavioral modifications that transcend mere technical controls - they impact the day-to-day routine of every US healthcare organization. In fact, the changes required in business processes may exceed the technical challenges associated with HIPAA's standards. The implications of the provisions are that all healthcare employees must alter the processes they have employed to create, handle, store, manipulate, and convey all data about patients. Unfortunately, the dynamics of the healthcare industry make such a progression a challenging one.The global healthcare industry is rapidly growing; and as western economies experience demographic maturity, the industry is expected to continue its steady growth. By 2010, the healthcare industry is predicted to account for $2.6 trillion of the United States' gross domestic product (Wilson and Lankton, 2004). But, the healthcare industry is often viewed as a laggard in terms of technology adoption (Kaplan, 1987; Connell and Young, 2007). Information systems (IS) were not widely adopted in the healthcare community until the late 1980s (Kilroy, 2000). However, faced with HIPAA's privacy mandates, some companies embrace the use of IS to control their electronic records. Others, however, either procrastinate or simply ignore the legislation as evident by the reporting of violations and privacy-related problems at numerous healthcare provider facilities in the USA (Mercuri, 2004; Thomas, 2005). In fact, surveys conducted by Phoenix Health Systems and Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society indicate that a little more than 80 percent of healthcare facilities have implemented the necessary technology and processes to comply with HIPAA (Fogarty, 2006). The remaining 20 percent remain non-compliant due to issues ranging from regulation misinterpretation to employee competence with the appropriate information technology.As is the case with most regulatory compliance issues, the onus of responsibility often falls on the individual to reform his or her practices to be consistent with the goals and objectives of his or her employer. Yet, this movement toward compliance does not occur in a vacuum and, as such, is influenced by characteristics of both the environment (organization) and the individual (healthcare professional). This study seeks to illuminate these characteristics and their relevant influence on compliance behavior by leveraging theories from the domains of social psychology, management, and IS. What follows is a description of the conceptual framework for this study and the research hypotheses to be tested. Next, the methods used for testing the hypotheses are discussed. This discussion includes a description of the study's context, data sample, and construct operationalization. Finally, the results are discussed and conclusions of this research are presented for both the academic and professional communities.\nConceptual background and hypotheses: The conceptual framework for this research is formed from an amalgamation of several research foundations, including the theory of planned behavior, the technology acceptance model, the unified theory of the acceptance and use of technology, models of self-efficacy (SE), and perceived organizational support (POS) literature. The primary dependent variables of interest are POS, SE and behavioral intent (BI). These outcomes are the focus of numerous previous research efforts (as indicated below); however, when considered within the context of legislative requirements to protect information privacy, a unique perspective is warranted. POS measures employees' beliefs \"concerning the extent to which the organization values their contributions and cares about their well-being\" (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002, p. 701). POS is also viewed as \"assurance that aid will be available from the organization ... to carry out one's job effectively\" (Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002, p. 698). SE expectations (Bandura, 1977) refer to one's beliefs in one's capabilities to successfully perform an explicit area of behavior (or attitude). BI to perform some specific behavior (Ajzen, 1980) is partially determined by attitude toward performing the behavior, which is influenced by beliefs and motivations. And BI has been shown to be an antecedent of actual behavior, given the right facilitating conditions (Ajzen, 1985).Shown in Figure 1, this theoretical framework, based on existing literature, suggests that an organization's status and size directly impact an individual employee's POS and SE regarding his or her interaction with IS under the auspices of HIPAA privacy regulations. Occupational type effects SE and POS; and SE, in turn, impacts the user's BI to engage in system use behavior consistent with HIPAA privacy requirements (referred to as \"HIPAA compliance behavior\"). Further, POS, SE, and BI are posited to be antecedents of HIPAA compliance behavior. This study does not include a direct measure of actual HIPAA compliance behavior; rather, the authors attempt to relate the influence of perceptions of a firm's status, size, and an employee's occupational type on those antecedents of compliance behavior.The unit of analysis for this research project is the individual employee of a healthcare organization, termed a \"healthcare professional,\" who may interact with patients or patient data. Such individuals include nearly all staff (employees) of organizations that provide healthcare services to individuals (patients). They may include medical personnel (physicians, physician's assistants, nurses, lab technicians, specialists, and other medical personnel) and administrative (non-medical) staff members (managers, clerks, insurance specialists, administrative assistants, and other non-medical personnel).Organizational status\nMethodology: The following section describes the research methodology involved in this study, including the sampling procedure, the development of our constructs and scales, and the two-stage analytical procedure.Study context and sample\nConclusions: Limitations\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is US legislation aimed at protecting patient information privacy, but it imposes a significant burden on healthcare employees, especially since the privacy provisions are still evolving and healthcare organizations are still struggling to meet compliance criteria. This study seeks to illuminate characteristics of both the environment (organization) and the individual (healthcare professional) and their relevant influence on compliance intentions by leveraging theories from the domains of social psychology, management, and information systems.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A study of 208 healthcare professionals located at healthcare facilities throughout the USA were surveyed as to their perceptions regarding HIPAA compliance and the underlying organizational and individual factors that influence said compliance.\nFindings: - The findings indicate that perceptions of organizational support and self-efficacy (SE) leading to HIPAA compliance vary based on organizational and occupational characteristics. Furthermore, these perceptions of organizational support and SE explain some of the differences in their intent to comply with this legislation.\nResearch limitations/implications: - For healthcare managers, the findings of this research may serve to validate HIPAA compliance initiatives. Through increased attention and resources dedicated to providing a supportive environment for HIPAA compliance, healthcare managers can increase the likelihood of compliance success by improving employee SE.\nOriginality/value: - This paper represents the first empirical study to account for environmental factors and their influence on individual intentions to comply with HIPAA.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Selection criteria of Lebanese consumers in the global snack food industry: country of origin perceptions
|
[
"Fast food",
"Food industry",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Globalization",
"Country of origin",
"Middle East"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nIntroduction: Globalization has become the name of the game in the snack food industry making the importance of understanding the effects of country of origin (COO) on snack products in new markets a crucial step and a major ingredient in the recipe for success. Globally snack food sales are projected to outpace total packaged food growth. In developing and emerging markets the growth rate is mixed, however given the higher package food growth rates snack food growth rates in many of these markets will exceed that of developed markets (Bernstien Research). The worldwide snack rate growth is projected to grow at an annual rate of 3-4 percent with international markets performing about 1 percent higher. The global snack food market is projected to total close to US$300 billion by 2010. This continued growth despite projected declines has been attributed to creation of healthier snacks for developed markets and the targeting of developing markets (Agri-Food Canada, 2008). This paper aims to study COO perceptions on Lebanese consumers while purchasing potato chips, the correlation involved between country of manufacture and consumer behavior; purchase intent; and product quality.\nCOO definition: As global companies pursue lower costs for materials, higher quality components and finished goods at competitive prices, defining COO has become complex (Clarke et al., 2000). Various definitions for COO exist (Wang and Lamb, 1983; Johansson et al., 1985; White, 1979; Bilkey and Nes, 1982; Cattin et al., 1982; Han and Terpstra, 1988; Papadopoulos, 1993; Lee and Schaninger, 1996). In this paper, we will adopt the \"Made in _\" definition, as a simple and consumer relevant identification for COO (Bannister and Saunders, 1978; Chasin and Jaffe, 1979; Nagashima, 1970, 1977). The \"Made in _\" approach ensures consistency across brands, as it is a legal requirement by the Lebanese government (Lebanese Government, 2004).\nCOO literature review relevant to the global snack food market: Schooler (1965) published the first research paper on \"Country of origin\" beginning a productive research area that continues in today's global economy. Dornoff et al. (1974) investigated the correlation between demographic variables and \"made in\" label of a product; and did not find a correlation. Heslop and Wall (1985) focused on the differences that exist between the genders and found that females usually gave higher quality ratings. Gender has been found to impact the selection of food (Canadian Grocer, 2001) and in respect to snack consumption of children in Mauritius (Oogarah-Pratap and Heerah-Booluck, 2005).Other studies have shown support for the COO hypothesis that that the source country affects the attitudes of consumers (Darling and Kraft, 1977), and that it is a determining factor in the purchase intention of consumers (Yaprak, 1978). Ozretic-Dosen (2007) studied COO perceptions in relation to the purchase of chocolate and found that COO has a role in purchase but that brand and price had a great influence.Becker (1986) indicated that both a \"halo effect\" and nationalism play important roles in the consumer perception of any specific product. Darling (1987) concluded that country perceptions differ not only across borders but also from one city to another within the same country. He found price and quality play a superior role in affecting consumer choice.Al-Hammad (1988) published a study on Saudi Arabian market, and found that both consumers and retailers consider price and quality to be more important in a product evaluation than their COO perceptions. Han and Terpstra (1988) considered the effect of a multi-staged manufacturing process on consumer perceptions of COO. They found that whether uni-national or bi-national product sourcing plays a more important role in consumer evaluation of a particular good than brand name. Hong and Wyer (1989) investigated the activities used by consumers to obtain various pieces of information such as COO, how they process it, and form an idea about the product, its quality, and finally its source country. They found that COO is sufficient information to affect the consumer evaluation.Khachaturian and Morganosky (1990) researched the apparel industry and found that when a country is perceived to be more \"industrialized\", its products are viewed to be of higher quality. Han (1990) found that a country's image is based on the relative status of the country with the consumer's home country in terms of economic, political, and cultural characteristics.Roth and Romeo (1992) studied the relationship of certain cues and product evaluation, and found that it was product category specific. Olsen et al. (1993) also found that consumers tend to prefer \"home-country\" products as part of their nationalistic tendencies. Leclerc et al. (1994) and Thakor and Pacheco (1997) found that that consumers associate brand names with countries and this eventually affects their evaluation of the product. The end of the twentieth century saw in increasing number of health conscious consumers, Tse (1999) found that consumer evaluation of a product includes traditional elements such as price, brand name, and COO as well as the reputation of the endorsing organization. Knight (1999) concluded that COO ranks higher in the purchase decision tree of consumers than the name of the manufacturing company. Kaynak et al. (2000) studied consumers in less developed countries and found that COO perceptions can be a powerful competitive advantage in respect to locally manufacture red products. In 2008, Chattalas et al. (2008) returned to the subject of national stereotypes (Obermiller and Spangenberg, 1989; Heslop and Papadopoulos, 1993; Martin and Erogle, 1993; Verlegh and Steenkamp, 1999) and the impact of COO perceptions. Bhaskaran and Sukumaran (2007) reviewed 96 published studies and concluded that COO cannot be treated as a self-contained marketing communication strategy, but must take into account other effects.\nResearch hypothesis and model: A series of four hypotheses were developed based on the literature (see Figure 1). The first hypothesis concerned the quality perceptions of potato chip brands sourced from different countries based on demographic variables (Dornoff et al., 1974; Heslop and Wall, 1985). The second hypothesis stated that purchase intention of potato chips sourced from different countries will vary (Nagashima, 1970, 1977; Darling and Kraft, 1977; Yaprak, 1978; Khachaturian and Morganosky, 1990); while the third research hypothesis stated that evaluation of specific attributes differs based on difference in the COO of a specific potato chip brand (Roth and Romeo, 1992). The fourth hypothesis stated the evaluation of the overall quality of potato chip differed based on difference in the COO of the brand (Darling and Kraft, 1977; Becker, 1986; Han and Terpstra, 1988; Knight, 1999).\nThe Lebanese market: In 2004, the International Monetary Fund estimated the country's population to be around 3.5 million people, out of which 30 percent reside in Beirut, and this percentage rises to 49 percent if one considers the number of people living within the macro areas of Beirut (Williams and Hania, 2005). Population count is a very sensitive issue in Lebanon, because it threatens the sectarian balances of the country, thus no concrete numbers are available. The last official census in Lebanon was conducted in 1932.Lebanon's population is youthful, with an overall median age of 25 years, and a population average age of 28 years. Females are slightly older with an average age of 29 years (vs 27 years for males) and a life expectancy of 74 years (vs 69 years for males). Around 70 percent of the total population is less than 35 years of age, with a higher proportion of males (73 percent) belonging to this age bracket than females (67 percent) (Williams and Hania, 2005, 2006; CIA World Factbook, 2008).Savory snack consumption in Lebanon\nMethodology: To understand the real COO perceptions among Lebanese consumers, a research methodology was designed concentrating on savory snacks segment, using potato chips because of their global popularity. The research was created in three phases. First, a questionnaire was prepared by identifying the key attributes involved in potato chip purchase decisions, second, a data collection phase was launched, and finally, the data were prepared for analysis and hypothesis testing.Qualitative data were collected via 18 one-to-one interviews with Lebanese consumers. Despite the small sample size, the subjects represented various demographic characteristics in terms of age, gender, and socioeconomic. Gender was split 12 females and six male and age ranged from 18 to 55 years.These one-to-one interviews were designed to explore the factors that the consumer take into account when making the purchase decision. Each interview was divided into two stages; first, the subjects were asked: \"If you are buying potato chips, what do you look at when making your final purchase decision?\" and then each subject was asked the reasons behind their choice based on the attributes he or she had mentioned.The most commonly mentioned attributes were: flavor (18); ingredients (ten); brand name (eight); package size (six); price (five) and package form (four). However, other attributes were also mentioned, such as country of production; expiration date; specific variants; mother company name, and shape.Although the overall list is similar to those of consumers in other parts of the world, it was evident from the beginning that the priorities of Lebanese consumers differ from those of Eastern European consumers (Baron and Mueller, 1995). For example, the Lebanese gave higher importance to flavor and ingredients in contrast to Bulgarian and Czech consumers who prioritized brand and packaging (Baron and Mueller, 1995).In Lebanon, the difference in the involvement level of the genders is significant.The list of attributes named by males did not exceed three, while females included an average of four attributes, with some listing as many as eight key attributes they look at while buying potato chips. Both genders mentioned \"flavor\" as a key attribute for chips. However, 50 percent of males were interested in size and pricing, while more females focused on product ingredients (58 percent), packaging (58 percent), and brand name (50 percent). Surprisingly there were no major differences in \"health consciousness\" across age groups. Younger consumers mentioned brand name more frequently than older consumers. The results of these interviews were used to develop final version of the questionnaire.The next phase in the research was creating a detailed questionnaire (see the Appendix, Figure A1) aimed to explore the effect of COO in relation to the purchase of potato chips by the Lebanese consumers. The questionnaire was divided into four key sections: demographics, general knowledge, brand specific questions, and comparison of shopping habits.Upon the completion of the draft questionnaire, a pilot test was administered to 20 individuals. Based on the results of the pilot, and in order to optimize the actual data collection phase, two key change were made: the survey language and format was simplified, so it could be self-administered, and to widen the respondent base it was translated into Arabic as well. Both questionnaires have similar formats, and the Arabic translation captures the true value of each question and does not compromise the essence of the original English questions.\nProfile of respondents: A random sample of 326 subjects were contacted and requested to complete the questionnaire. The majority of the sample was contacted while shopping. 308 were returned; 26 were rejected due to incomplete answers giving a response rate of 85.6 percent.Demographic variables of respondents\nResults and analysis of data: Results\nConclusion: Marketing implications\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to study country of origin perceptions of Lebanese consumers with respect to potato chips, the correlation involved between country of manufacture and consumer behavior; purchase intent; and product quality.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Four hypotheses in respect to country of origin perceptions on potato chip purchases were tested. The research was conducted in three phases: qualitative research was done to determine key attributes in potato chip selection, these findings were used to create a questionnaire, and a sample from 326 Lebanese consumers was collected.\nFindings: - The paper finds that there are demographic differences in the evaluation of potation chips. The evaluation of specific attributes did not vary by country of origin and there were no differences in overall quality perceptions by country of origin. Snack food purchases appear to be low involvement purchases based on experiential qualities. Brand awareness and purchase appear not to be linked.\nResearch limitations/implications: - It appears that country of origin is of secondary importance; yet, it is important to note the limited number of countries tested in this study. Given the tainted food scandals involving China country or origin may play a larger role in studies testing a wider variety of countries. Future research should include products not currently available in the market.\nOriginality/value: - Given the potential for high growth in the snack food market in developing countries, this study provided valuable insight into one such market. The results indicate that more study is warranted in this area.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Corporate social responsibility in sport: critical issues and future possibilities
|
[
"Development",
"Sport",
"Corporate social responsibility",
"Critique"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In recent years, there has been considerable interest in the broader social role of sport. This field has explored how sport might contribute, for example, to peace-building, development, crime reduction, education and training, health promotion, gender empowerment, community building and assisting people with disabilities (Coalter, 2007). One major impetus for the growing focus on sport's wider social role has been provided by the \"sport for development and peace\" movement, which has mushroomed internationally since the early 2000s and is especially active in developing nations (Schulenkorf and Adair, 2014). However, there is also, of course, a very long association of sport with the pursuit of non-sporting social goals in developed nations. For example, sport has been regularly viewed and used as a \"diversionary\" activity for identified \"problem\" groups, notably young working-class males, with the aim of reducing crime and delinquency (Robins, 1990).\nPositioning CSR within sport: In earlier work, I have argued that sport-based social interventions feature a vast array of diverse policies, discourses, projects, interventions and campaigns which have been pursued by different stakeholders (Giulianotti, 2011). We may organize these diverse phenomena into four broad categories. As I detail here, each category is associated within a specific set of policies, discourses and stakeholders, and one of these categories is centred on CSR:\nCSR in sport: contemporary issues: Contemporary CSR in sport is faced with several key issues. These points, in the main, are not exclusive to CSR in sport but typically apply to other areas of CSR activity and sport-based intervention.\nCSR: future possibilities: In my view, the constructive and effective development of CSR in sport should occur at three main levels. These levels centre on technical, dialogical and critical issues and questions; thus, the levels broadly reflect the \"cognitive interests\" identified by Habermas (1986), with reference to different kinds of knowledge and their associated methods of inquiry.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to advance a critical analysis of corporate social responsibility (CSR) within sport. First, the author locates CSR within the wider field of sport-related social activities. Second, the author identifies key issues that confront CSR in sport. Third, while referring to papers elsewhere in this issue of the journal, the author sets out future possibilities for the pursuit of CSR within sport with regards to its technical, dialogical and critical dimensions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The approach taken here is a critical one, advocating CSR work and research which identifies strengths and limitations in, and explores future arrangements for, the CSR sector.\nFindings: The paper finds that the CSR sector in sport should pursue a dialogical and critical practice within and through its work.\nOriginality/value: The originality and value of the paper lie in how the paper advances critical understanding of CSR in sport.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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MITIE puts tomorrow's top talent on course for success: Most promising managers get lessons in the art of leadership
|
[
"Management development",
"Business schools",
"Outsourcing",
"Team working",
"Senior management"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Strategic outsourcing and energy-services company MITIE has teamed up with the UK's Cranfield School of Management to provide its most promising senior operational managers with strategic business education.\nMain principles of the program: The main principles on which the program is based emerged from discussions with MITIE Group chief executive Ruby McGregor-Smith or were drawn down from strategic priorities identified by the company's executive committee.The main areas of the program are:* account development and retention built on service enhancement;* financial management, particularly in relation to the development of margins; and* leadership.Running through these three areas of focus are two core strands - strategy and mission, and vision and values. The program seeks to develop a facilities-management mindset and wider awareness of collaborative business opportunities, while fostering a \"one MITIE\" mindset.\"The most cost-effective means of delivery was considered. Some remote learning was acceptable but the program also needed to include face-to-face workshops,\" explained Katherine Thomas, HR director for MITIE Group plc. \"We wanted it to have academic input, but it also needed a practical MITIE feel.\"The solution devised was a program designed to run over a period of up to six months, at a level of challenge broadly equivalent to that of an MBA, but MITIE-specific and with a strong practical focus.The program is structured around two, two-day workshops, with several \"virtual\" modules in between, run over a period of up to six months. The virtual modules are a mixture of individual and team-based projects designed, in part, to expose candidates to areas of MITIE activity with which they are not familiar.\nStrengthen networks across the company: Project teams are pan-divisional, to enable participants to strengthen their networks across the company. Cranfield executives manage the project activity and provide feedback to individual candidates, but MITIE businesses identify the project opportunities in the first place. Executive-committee members act as project sponsors and receive presentations from candidates on the results of their projects.Inputs are sought from executive-committee members - particularly Ruby McGregor-Smith and group finance director Suzanne Baxter - at the start of each new program, and from other executive-committee members as appropriate. This, and the project feedback, offers an opportunity for executive-committee members to get to know members of MITIE's high-potential group with whom they may not yet be acquainted.Each intake includes around 24 people. Program dates are flexible to take account of the pressures experienced at times such as holiday periods and year-end.\"Looking forward, it is expected that sufficient new talent will be identified each year, following completion of the initial five programs, for at least one program to be run annually,\" said Katherine Thomas. \"Content of future programs may change to reflect MITIE's evolving strategy and business priorities.\"Following completion of the program in March 2013, it is likely that there will be a need to support further development for the initial cadre of 100 managers. This will probably be individually focused, but to the extent that there is a collective need, it will be defined during the course of 2011-13 program delivery.\"Katherine Thomas continued: \"We are confident that the program offers a key group of people across MITIE the opportunity to further their development, with the support of a globally renowned business school.\"\nIncrease the capability of leaders: Bill Wilson, executive-development director at Cranfield's Center for Customised Executive Development, said: \"As MITIE continues to grow, it has a requirement to increase the capability of its leaders. This program enhances the company's ability to deliver its current business objectives as well as preparing key employees for their future expanded roles.\"MITIE works with clients in three ways: strategy and consultancy; facilities and energy management; and service delivery. Some use the complete range of services while others may only need one or two aspects of what the company offers.\"Our strategic input can add value by helping clients to manage their assets, while our practical management expertise can save customers money and reduce their carbon emissions,\" said Ruby McGregor-Smith. \"We work with a vast number of clients in every industry across both the public and private sectors and deliver the broadest range of services that can be found in one place - from integrated facilities management to engineering maintenance to lifecycle energy management and much more.\"\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to describe how strategic outsourcing and energy-services company MITIE has teamed up with the UK's Cranfield School of Management to provide its most promising senior operational managers with strategic business education.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper explains the reasons for the program, the form it takes and the results it is achieving.\nFindings: - The paper reveals that the main areas the program covers are: account development and retention built on service enhancement; financial management, particularly in relation to the development of margins; and leadership. It explains that the program seeks to develop a facilities-management mindset and wider awareness of collaborative business opportunities, while fostering a \"one MITIE\" mindset.\nPractical implications: - The paper demonstrates that the program enhances the company's ability to deliver its current business objectives as well as prepare key employees for their future expanded roles.\nSocial implications: - The paper highlights how the program targets MITIE's most promising senior managers who have not previously received formal, postgraduate business education.\nOriginality/value: - The paper details a successful collaboration between a FTSE 250 company and Cranfield School of Management.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Construction and initial validation of the E-Work Life Scale to measure remote e-working
|
[
"Well-being",
"Work-life balance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: E-working remotely from the main organisational base using communications and computer technology has increased rapidly in recent years across many sectors. A wide variety of terms can be used to describe this phenomenon, for example, teleworking, telecommuting, remote working and more recently \"agile working\", and, therefore, statistics worldwide refer to these different terms. In a recent report, covering ten European countries and five non-European countries, 17 per cent of employees were engaged with using mobile technology, information communication technologies (ICTs) and teleworking off site for work (Eurofound and the International Labour Office, 2017). The countries with the highest incidence of ICT usage outside of work included Japan, USA and Sweden. The UK were found to be medium users along with France and Belgium, whilst Germany, Italy and Spain were amongst the lowest (Eurofound and the International Labour Office, 2017).\nThe development of the EWL Scale: The main aim of the present study is to develop and provide an initial validation of a new scale that measures e-working experience. The process for scale development and item generation is described, and the results presented from a study on a sample of e-workers to test the internal and construct validity of the scale.\nMethod: Participants\nResults: The descriptive statistics for the items are presented in Table II. Skewness and kurtosis were greater than 1 for at least some of the items, suggesting a non-normal distribution. Given this, exploratory factor analysis was implemented using maximum likelihood estimation with robust standard errors (MLR) estimator. Although 3-, 4- and 5-factor solutions were explored, for the sake of simplicity only the 4-factor solution is presented and discussed here, since it was considered to be the optimal one in terms of theoretical and methodological interpretability of the results (data are available upon request). The 3-factor solution was not theoretical, clear and interpretable, and the 5-factor model had a very low number of indicators, hence the 4-factor model was selected.\nDiscussion: The research presented has initially validated a new scale to assess theoretically relevant aspects of remote e-working, this is rooted in previous literature by Grant et al. (2011) and Grant et al. (2013). The rationale for developing the EWL Scale was to support organisations, individuals, and their supervisors to aid e-workers to develop strategies to support their well-being when working remotely. The EWL scale meets a gap in research in that no current scale exists to specifically measure employees' experience of their e-working, despite the increasing occurrence of these working practices worldwide. Eight theoretical dimensions were postulated corresponding to four main research areas: job effectiveness, relationship with the organisation, e-well-being and work-life balance (see Grant et al., 2013 and previously for mapping). In total, 28 items were initially included in the EWL scale with findings providing support for a 17-item reduced version of the measure, assessing four factors named: Effectiveness/Productivity (four items), Organisational Trust (three items), Work-Related Flexibility (three items) and Work-Life Interference (seven items). The first two factors correspond to the expected areas of job effectiveness and relationship with the organisation, specifically characterised in terms of trust; the third factor of Work-Related Flexibility combined items originally referred to the same areas but characterised by the reference to flexible work arrangements, an additional asset of e-working practices. Finally, the items developed within the areas of e-well-being and work-life balance collapsed into a unique fourth factor of Work-Life Interference.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to develop and provide initial validation for the new E-Work Life (EWL) Scale. This measure assesses a range of theoretically relevant aspects of the e-working experience related to four main areas: job effectiveness, relationship with the organisation, well-being and work-life balance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study presents structured item development. Internal validity and reliability were tested on a sample of 260 e-workers (65 per cent female, age range 25-74). Correlations of the EWL scale with a measure of general health were tested on a subsample of 119 workers to provide initial evidence of construct validity.\nFindings: Exploratory factor analysis supported a 17-item scale assessing four factors: work-life interference, productivity, organisational trust and flexibility. Individual well-being was measured and a pattern of significant correlations against four factors as indicators of general health were found, including mental health and vitality.\nResearch limitations/implications: A new sample would confirm the strength of the EWL scale alongside further tests of validity. Coping strategies related to the scale would aid mapping of individual competencies for remote e-working to promote e-workers' self-management, management style and organisational policy.\nPractical implications: The EWL scale helps organisations to evaluate and support the well-being of remote e-workers. It provides measurement on three levels: individual, supervisory and organisational, whereby practical strategies for improvement can be linked to the scale.\nOriginality/value: The EWL scale completes a gap in the research by providing a measure aiding organisations to evaluate and support remote e-worker well-being.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Service as value co-production: reframing the service design process
|
[
"Services",
"Production processes",
"Customers"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: A very fast change in global economies and consequently in industrial systems is challenging the development model of industrialised countries.Such a change concerns several aspects, from market saturation in western countries to the opening of new markets, from the relocation of production activities to the complexification of demand patterns. These are global changes that transcend local economic and social conditions. Nevertheless, the competitive game is often based on the capability of companies to work at the local level, possibly developing context-specific skills and knowledge that can be used across different local contexts (Becattini, 2004).By shifting the focus from global to local socio-cultural contexts, a new perspective becomes relevant: while markets and production system are globalising, the system of needs they are meant to address are still highly related to cultural, social and economic conditions that are typically local and highly individualised. That means that globalised industrial production will be challenged to develop the capability to differentiate the final product beyond the present models of market segmentations, whose development started back in the 1970s and eventuated in mass customisation (Lindsay and Rocchi, 2003).The effort required for industrial companies to achieve this level of differentiation is possibly a challenge to the logical infrastructure of economic and industrial systems.1.1 The challenge\n2 Changing the logic of industrial production: Once industrial production and individual solutions represented a contradiction in terms, nowadays, thanks to modern communication technologies, this is possible, but it would not make sense without a deep revision of the role of business companies. Normann (2001) observes that the new role of business companies is now to organise value creation, in the perspective of considering customers no longer as the end of pipe of the production process (i.e. as consumer, and therefore destroyers of the value created by the chain of production and distribution processes), but as co-producers of value. This new role extends business companies' interest far beyond their formal boundaries, out in the logical and physical space in which the value is co-produced. In such a place business companies should act as organisers or facilitators among other actors, including local services providers, local institutions and customers[1].Although something is already changing in industrial logics, the change Norman emphasises represents in fact a radical change in the genetic code of industrial production, because it affects the core function of business companies: value production. According to this scenario, business companies would leave their prominent position in the value creation process and become part of a networked process of change.The cultural and genetic shift suggested by Norman has relevant implications in the way industry, society and institutions will possibly cooperate, especially at the local level. The success of globalised companies will possibly be decided in the space and time of the interaction between companies and customers (the moment of truth as defined by Normann (2000). The relevance of such interaction is critical, because this is the moment in which the process of value-coproduction is spatially and chronologically placed. This moment, that represents the point of contact between service providers and customers, has been analysed in its complexity by several authors: Solomon et al. (1985), introduces the term service encounter to describe a dyadic interaction between two actors; each of those actors brings his own experience, expectations and culture in the service encounter, each of them plays a role and proposes his/her own behaviour. Sangiorgi (2004) goes on describing the service encounter within a framework derived from the activity theory, thus proposing the service encounter as a complex interaction between different human, behavioural, mechanical and institutional factors. Sangiorgi proposes the picture of an analytical unit (Figure 1) to analyse an activity on the basis of its subjects (different points of view), objects (goals), artefacts (tools, competences and information), communities (groups of people directly or indirectly involved in the service), (implicit and explicit) rules that shape the service encounter and the implicit and explicit division of labour (roles and tasks) between the actors involved in the interaction. The author proposes that the description of the structure of the service be based on the articulation and chronological sequences of service encounters, described in this way.The definition of the service encounter as an interaction geographically and chronologically placed stresses the importance of refocusing on the local dimension. The growing emphasis on enabling and individual solutions accentuates the need for a more consistent organisation of local networks of actors, often including final customers. This implies the development of a new planning and design approach, which has several analogies but also fundamental differences from the logic of industrial production.The present change should in fact generate industrial solutions starting from individualised and highly context-dependent needs. For this to be possible, local knowledge and individual experiences and cultures should be \"disassembled and re-assembled\" in a system of interactions, with a clear identification of actors, division of roles and behavioural/economic rules. Services previously performed in the informal sphere, such as education, child care, elderly care, require a clear indication of who is providing the services, what are the rules for accessing the service, what are users and providers required to do, etc. All those rules were not written in the informal economy (the family was providing the service without written rules) but need to be appropriately specified in the formal economy, in order to create the conditions for re-producing service qualities (e.g. trust and familiarity) that would otherwise disappear in the formal economy.This logic is analogue to the logic that brought about the first industrialisation process. At that time, the craftsman's work was the result of implicit knowledge and a sequence of actions and events which were not written, though clearly defined in the craftsman's mind. The industrialisation process, in that case, consisted in disassembling the production process in its simple components that could later be re-assembled into a new production system. While the craftsman's production was based on implicit knowledge, the industrialisation process made such knowledge explicit and clearly transmittable between different places and different time spots. This allowed new actors, namely the industrial manufacturers, to organise processes based on economy of scale, optimisation of resources and a clear subdivision of roles.The analogy with the earliest industrialisation process clearly explains an aspect of the present challenge for designers; however, it cannot be used beyond a general understanding of the problem, because of some critical differences between early industrialisation and the present industrialisation of services. Such differences would not allow for an uncritical re-use of industrial production logic into services. Services, in fact, are not processes that can be totally described and controlled through codified solutions. While manufacturing was based on mechanical processes, services are based on social interaction; they are systemic in their nature and, as seen above, imply the concurrence of heterogeneous factors. Any prescriptive description of a service could be easily demolished by the arbitrary or unplanned interference of individual behaviour. Services are based on people, rather than machines. Instead of rigid and prescriptive norms, a system of open rules, norms and values should generate the infrastructure for services. The mechanistic taylorist process, based on rigid rules, should give space to organic forms, which according to Pugh and Morley (1988) are the most adequate when the design space is characterised by turbulence, diversity and randomness. The result of a development process for a service is never perfectly defined, but it should rather be a system of components (or modules) that can be joined together in different configurations. Such an open structure, which could be defined as a modular platform, would allow the actors involved in the service encounter to choose the most adequate solution and to develop the most appropriate service configuration.\n3 Towards an operative paradigm: The previous considerations provide a framework for a methodological approach to operate in the new industrial paradigm. On the basis of this approach methods and tools can be used, which are familiar to designers (because of their knowledge of production processes and industrial organisations), but, at the same time new techniques can be borrowed and adapted from other disciplinary contexts. The process of incorporating existing techniques into a methodological approach has been defined as methodical procedure (Arbnor and Bjerke, 1997). Only when a methodical procedure is applied, an existing technique can be seen as a method, in relation to a specific methodological approach. The same authors also define a methodic as the application of such a method into a concrete problem. Methodical procedures and methodics represent the elements of what Arbnor and Bjerke (1997) define as an operative paradigm, i.e. a toolbox that is needed to take action on a concrete problem, on the basis of a certain methodological approach.In considering design as a collective decision-making process, Pugh and Morley (1988) propose a model inspired to Mintzberg et al. (1976), which consists of three phases: identification (of problems), development (of solutions) and selection (of policies). This trichotomy is a revised version of Simon's (1965) phases of Intelligence, design and choice. To those phases, Pugh and Morley add a phase of policy implementation, to be carried out by other people, out of the decision-making process. Pugh and Morley suggest such a process as part of a systemic view of the design activity that covers products as well as organisations. The structure proposed by those authors can therefore inspire the definition of an operative paradigm for designing services in the new industrial logic. All those authors refer to a first phase of analysis and investigation, a second phase of concept development and a third phase of choice/selection, when specific solutions are identified.The open structure needed in the perspective of value co-production, though, would require semi-finished solutions or open platforms that move the third phase (choice or selection) from the design phase to the service encounter. The actors involved in the service encounter are an integral part of the design process. They are responsible for specifying the most appropriate solution in any local context or for any individual needs. It is very important that the designer support all the actors with an adequate level of information and with appropriate representation and communication strategies. Service design indeed involves actors with very different backgrounds (technical people as well as elderly people or children) and the communication within the system cannot use the same tools designers are used to work with when dealing with the traditional production system.For this reason, this paper focuses on the methodological tools for the first two phases and on the communication/representation strategies to support the third choice/selection phase:1. the analysis and interpretation of the context;2. the development of the system; and3. the representation and communication techniques that facilitate interaction in the service encounter.3.1 Analysis and interpretation of the context: methods from social sciences and ethnography\n4 Conclusive remarks: This paper outlines methods and techniques that can be used in the design of highly customized services. Those methods are often borrowed from other disciplines (marketing and ethnographic studies) and adequately adapted by the author to the task of service design. Some of the cases illustrated in this paper are part of the design activity of the author, however, given the wide perspective proposed in this paper, different cases and studies have been used to illustrate and exemplify methods and tools outlined in the paper.Such methods and techniques address new issues in service design that are related to a new paradigmatic framework for industrial production. For this reason, it is hard to compare those techniques with existing methods: the new methods are neither better nor worse than the existing ones; they belong to different methodological approaches. The perspective of highly customized solutions requires that the existing techniques, which mainly address quantitative or functional aspects of the design process, be complemented with new tools, such as the ones proposed in this paper.The perspective of highly customized solutions changes several core factors in designers' activity: from global to local systems, from material production to value co-production and interaction among different actors. This opens a wide perspective of change that this paper outlined. It is worth remarking that the categorization of new and existing methods for service design, inspired to the work of Pugh and Morley (1988) and Simon (1965) should not be interpreted as a rigid framework for action (from analysis to design and to representation) but rather an operative paradigm, as suggested by Arbnor and Bjerke (1997), that designers are supposed to use when working on service design.The tools outlined in this paper are meant to be used in a multidisciplinary context, in which designers are supposed to collaborate with experts from other disciplines. Furthermore, they generally target problems and conditions that cannot be clearly defined in all their details or present a high level of uncertainty and unpredictable factors. The typical working tools engineering designers have worked in the past may not be sufficient for navigating in this context, which requires less linear thinking, less mechanistic structures and more subjective participation in the definition of direction for innovation processes.It is typical of the design activity to follow non-linear pathways between analytical, design and representation phases. This approach, which could be seen as confusing in a normal scientific context, may prove to be particularly useful when working on highly individualized and context-related services. The complexity of such solutions suggest an approach that may not cover the whole range of occurrences in service design, but is particularly useful for a deep dive into critical issues and, above all, to capture qualitative and subjective characteristics of the service. The design process for those services should consist in a continuous mediation between problems and solutions. Concepts developed in the design phase, for instance, can open new investigations, in which the same concepts can be used as a support to the interpretation of analytical data. In this sense, designers' role in the development of new local services becomes essential to facilitate collective and cooperative innovation processes.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to propose a methodological approach to design product service systems based on an active participation of customers to the value production process. Furthermore, the paper aims to present methods and techniques that can be used to understand local context and highly individualized needs, and to integrate local actors, including users in the value production process.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Methods and tools presented in this paper are structured into three main categories: analytical tools, development tools and representation techniques. Such tools will be illustrated through examples from case studies.\nFindings: - Methods and techniques presented in this paper are borrowed from other disciplines and adapted to the task of service design. The new methods relate to a new paradigmatic framework and are not easy to compare with existing methods, they are rather complementary to existing knowledge on service design.\nPractical implications: - The new methodological approach implies a shift in the role of industrial companies that are supposed to leave their prominent role in value creation and become facilitators of a process of value co-production.\nOriginality/value: - This paper considers a fundamental change in the role for customers and industrial companies in the value-creation process. Consequently, it presents a methodological approach to support such change.\n",
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] |
Interest accumulates in bank's health and well-being program: Award-winning scheme benefits employees and the wider community
|
[
"Banks",
"Employees",
"Benefits",
"Health care",
"Human resource management",
"Employee well‐being",
"Awards",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: A major international bank has seen a significant drop in the number of employees absent for mental-health reasons following the introduction of an award-winning health and well-being program.\nAll stakeholders work closely together: Internal and external stakeholders were consulted on how to initiate, run and develop the program from day one. A quarterly forum that all partners could attend was created, known as the integrated health-care panel. This has helped to ensure that all stakeholders work closely together to maximize the benefits of the program. Six-monthly performance updates are given to the bank's Best Place to Work forum, which the UK bank leadership team attends.Bupa, the bank's health-care partner, was initially asked to bring the program partners together as part of a strategy to reduce the cost of claims. Bupa is responsible for the company's cash plan, health-care and health assessments. It also provides on-site general-practitioner and dental services. The bank spends PS20 million a year on employee (and family) health care and PS4 million on managerial health assessments.Health-charity Nuffield is responsible for the bank's gyms, on-site events, competitions and literature on topics such as how to stop smoking or manage stress. Nuffield also runs the bank's micro-site, which provides information in areas such as nutrition and reducing obesity. Nuffield regularly visits the bank's offices across the UK without gyms or formalized programs, to promote health in the workplace. The bank grants Nuffield PS200,000 a year to employ two staff to carry out these functions.Sodexo, the bank's on-site caterer, has teamed up with the bank to create a customer charter. This represents their joint commitment to provide employees with a healthier eating and lifestyle choice.Managed Occupational Health is a private-sector partner that provides all the bank's occupational-health services. These include co-ordinating health-care partners, to ensure that employees absent from work through ill health get the right help to support their recovery or put in place any lifestyle changes or support they may need.Posturite furnishes workstation assessments and advises about ergonomics. Swiss Re is the bank's group income-protection insurance partner, while the bank's sports and social clubs are managed by Interserve and Sodexo.The bank's internal stakeholders are HR - which leads the health and well-being program in conjunction with the company's corporate-sustainability team - and business heads.\nAll employees encouraged to take part: Employees are encouraged to take part in the program through a monthly newsletter and the micro-site. Champions and ambassadors promote the program, while line managers know what services are available to employees who suffer ill health. The bank's deputy chief executive is a major sponsor of the program and his well-read blog has a health and sport section.The bank has 24 sport clubs and 17 sporting events were held across the UK last year, from sailing to softball. Two family fun days are held annually. Maintaining the bank's sports and social clubs and rowing club costs around PS1.8 million a year. Events held at one or both of the sports and social clubs include the annual family fun day and a firework night.Employees can start their own club or organize their own event through one monthly PS250 \"start something\" grant, if there is nothing on offer that appeals to them. Walking clubs, running clubs, five-a-side football tournaments and bowling competitions have been initiated in this way.Last year, two employees organized a football and badminton tournament that involved more than 40 of their colleagues. An employee used the PS250 to help to organize a golf tournament for 20 employees. And another employee used the money to help to set up a park run that will benefit employees and the local community, too.Employees who take part in fund-raising events can benefit from a scheme in which the bank matches the employee's fundraising up to a maximum of PS500 per employee per annum.Employees can take one day's paid volunteering leave to participate in charitable activities that may involve events with a health benefit.Flexible benefits that support health and well-being include health assessments, health-care plans and a cycle-to-work scheme. The bank also offers reduced-cost gym membership and discounts on sports kit and equipment.Many benefits are available to employees' immediate families. For example, they can enjoy cut-price membership of Nuffield gyms and discounts on sportswear. They are also encouraged to get involved in the two annual family fun days, firework display and a number of organized sporting events.\nThe program's targets and results: The program's targets were developed for:* promoting wellness and educating employees on being healthy;* improving employees' work-life balance and engagement;* increasing participation levels in the employee-selected elements of the program;* reducing the business costs of employees' ill health; and* helping employees to get well if they have become unwell or need support.A year after the program began, more and more employees are taking part and those attending events overwhelmingly report a positive experience.Employee-engagement scores have improved significantly. On the basis of employees' answers to the following questions - I rarely consider leaving the bank for another company; overall I am extremely satisfied with the bank as a place to work; I rarely think about looking for a new job with another company; I am proud to work for the bank and I would recommend it as a great place to work - the company saw its employee-engagement score rise from 68 percent in 2010 to 72 percent in 2011. In 2011, 69 percent of employees agreed or strongly agreed that the bank is a great place to work, against a target of 65 percent. More than 70 percent of employees agreed or strongly agreed that they had a good work-life balance, against a target of 65 percent.Scores in managerial health assessments have improved and there has been a reduction in the costs associated with employees' ill health. In addition, there have been numerous examples of employees contributing to their communities by combining fund-raising with physical activity.\nNote: David Pollitt, Human Resource Management International Digest editor, wrote this article.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to describe a major bank's health and well-being program, which has won a Business in the Community award for being among the best examples of business as a force for good.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Provides the reasons for the program, the form it takes and the benefits it has brought to both the bank and its employees.\nFindings: - Explains that the benefits of the scheme include grater employee engagement, better managerial health assessments, improved work-life balance and a reduction in the costs associated with employees' ill health - particularly mental health. In addition, there have been numerous examples of employees contributing to their communities by combining fund-raising with physical activity.\nPractical implications: - Reveals that internal and external stakeholders have been closely involved in the program from day one, that several internal-communication mechanisms have played an important part in generating interest in the scheme, and that the bank's deputy chief executive is a major sponsor of the program, which has helped to increase perceptions of its importance.\nSocial implications: - The paper details the many social benefits of the health and well-being program, including those that flow from employees becoming involved in community projects.\nOriginality/value: - The paper demonstrates that responsible enterprise can have a positive impact on society and people without losing focus on the business.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Consumer perceptions of online banking in Spain using netnography: a positioning story
|
[
"Commercial banks",
"Internet banking",
"Consumer perception",
"Netnography",
"Digital consumer banking"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Since the first online banking services based on the internet were provided by Stanford Federal Credit Union in October 1994, online banking has spread rapidly in all countries around the world. This is due to its convenience and ease in conducting transactions quickly and the access it provides customers to unique service benefits (Yoon, 2010). In effect, the incorporation of the internet has transformed the distribution of banking services directly (Torres and Vasquez-Parraga, 2005). Internet (online) banking is defined as the use of internet as a remote delivery channel of banking system services via the World Wide Web (Nasri and Charfeddine, 2012).\n2. The concept of positioning and consumer perceptions of online banking: The term positioning has become one of the key factors for present-day marketing. The term is attributed to authors Al Ries and Jack Trout in an article published in Advertising Age magazine in 1972 (Ries and Trout, 1981). For these authors, positioning is not creating something new and different, it is manipulating something already in the mind, that is, reordering already existing connections. Dubois and Rovira (1998) stress that in positioning the effort of conceiving a product and selling it have to be understood in order to give it a particular place in consumers' minds. For Zineldin (1996), the concept of positioning is a process of establishing and maintaining a distinctive place and image in the market for an organisation and/or its individual product offerings so that the target market/prospect understands and appreciates what the organisation stands for in relation to its competitors. For Munuera and Rodriguez (2007, p. 84), \"the term positioning may refer to: 1) the location of the product based on its physical features; and 2) the position occupied by the product according to consumer perception\". Although the first meaning refers to objective positioning, this is not useful because many products with identical physical features are perceived as being different, and vice versa. Lastly, Serralvo and Tadeu (2005, p. 10), after carrying out a research study of the literature on the concept, define it as \"a process of study, definition and implementation of a differentiated product offer whose attributes provide a brand with a sustainable advantageous position compared to the competition in a particular category, from the point of view of the perception of a target audience\".\n3. Netnography: concept, method, advantages and disadvantages: Changes brought about by the internet \"bring about the need for research methods that enable developments to be determined in different online environments and the different virtual communities found therein, in terms of what, how, who, when, and where\" (Turpo, 2008, p. 83). In view of this, a theoretical framework is needed and it is from this need that netnography emerges as a kind of online ethnography that provides a guide to adjusting participant observation techniques - planning field work, cultural intervention in this work, data collection, ensuring effective and quality interpretation of data, and ensuring the strictest adherence to ethical standards - in line with the singularities and contingencies of online community culture, through computer-mediated communication (Kozinets, 2002). In other words, netnography enables needs to be identified and understood on the basis of online consumer groups. Nevertheless, and as indicated by Fresno (2011, p. 66), \"the decision as to whether the observation is participant or not in the online social context is one of the possibilities that netnography offers the researcher\". Thus, non-participant observation requires presence, but not necessarily intervention, with the main advantage being the absence of alterations to or interferences with individuals' behaviour. The analysis is thus based on spontaneous opinions held by consumers. Having said this, the use of participant observation may or may not be combined with other tools such as, for example, online interviews using messages, thus facilitating the interactive nature of the internet (Xun and Reynolds, 2010). For Hidalgo (2009), netnography is the branch of sociology used to analyse the free behaviour of individuals on the internet. On the same lines, Fox and Roberts (1999) define netnography or cyber-ethnography as the sociology of virtual social spaces and online community interactions.\n4. Methodology: In the study of user perceptions of online banking, normally techniques such as surveys, case studies or interviews have tended to be used (Hoehle et al., 2012). Nevertheless, these same authors indicate that researchers could learn much more about electronic banking by applying methodological approaches that have been under-utilised up to now, as is the case with netnography. Furthermore, netnography was used in this study since consumers are increasingly using online communities to access more objective information than that provided by companies (Kozinets, 2002, p. 61). On the other hand, the data collection process is much more economical, short, simple and realistic (Braunsberger and Buckler, 2011). This study therefore represents a methodological contribution to the literature. In fact, the netnographic approach enables the existing perceptions of online consumer-bank relations to be identified, without the need to ask questions, as is the case with other data collection methods already used.\n5. Results: The kh2 statistical analysis, which enables brands to be grouped together (Bendixen, 1995), and with a data matrix to the order of 14x4 (see Table III), helped to obtain dendrograms for attributes and banks (Figures 1 and 2, respectively), and the kh2 distances in the unions in the case of online banks (Table IV). As a result of this, two types or groups of variables can be identified through the dendrogram of the attributes used to assess the online banks (Figure 1): the first includes practically all the positive aspects perceived by consumers as easy to use (3), the effective operability of the website (5), perceived security (1), wide range of products (7), good customer service (9), and low commission charges (14), together with two negative aspects: product range could be improved (8) and low profitability (12). On the other hand, the second group of attributes comprises a positive attribute for online bank users - high profitability (11) - alongside other negative aspects: customer attention could be improved (10), website operability could be improved (6) perceived as not secure (2), difficult to use (4) and high commission charges (13). Similarly, with the dendrogram of online banks in Spain (see Figure 2), two groups of companies can be distinguished: on the one hand, ING Direct (A) together with OpenBank (B), and, on the other, Uno-e (C) and i-Banesto (D).\n6. Discussion, limitations and future studies: Bearing in mind the information obtained through the kh2 statistical analysis, the positioning of online banking in Spain is characterised by the existence of two groups of competitors with two types of attributes. The dendrogram shown above (Figure 2) indicates that ING Direct (A) and OpenBank (B) are perceived as similar, as opposed to Uno-e (C) and i-Banesto (D). This result is also partially reflected in the factorial analysis of correspondences, in which ING Direct and i-Banesto are perceived as opposites in axis 1. It is worth noting that ING Direct is the main online operator in Spain, with a market share of 70 per cent; and that OpenBank - the online bank of the Santander Group, which is the most successful financial entity in Spain - stands in second place after ING Direct, with a share of 18.5 per cent (Suarez, 2013). By contrast, the other group includes the two online banks with a smaller presence in the market. In other words, consumers perceive online banks as competitors according to their size. The specialised literature does in fact point out the impact that the size of the bank - whether larger or smaller - has on their competitiveness within certain markets (Bikker and Haaf, 2000). The following comments also reflect this competitiveness in line with clients' perceptions of online banking: \"I split my money between ING and OpenBank, even though my salary is paid into OpenBank. Recently, I've passed everything to ING due to a bad experience with Openbank\"; \"But apart from that[2], it's really similar to use to ING, and therefore it's not bad\".\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to determine the current positioning of online banking in Spain.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Netnography, a new technique for obtaining information.\nFindings: The collection and analysis of 261 valid messages from two online consumer portals enables us to observe the existence of two competitor groups and two types of attributes. On the one hand, consumers perceive online banking as competitors depending on their size; and on the other hand, negative (or positive) aspects are compensated (or accepted) as a result of greater (or lesser) profitability. This means that different forms of value creation are offered with online banking clients.\nOriginality/value: The methodology used represents an innovative way to determine the positioning of online banking and could be extended to other digital products.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Evaluating the effectiveness of corporate boards
|
[
"Codes",
"Board of directors",
"Boardroom effectiveness",
"Corporate governance",
"Boardroom performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. \"Where was the board?\": After each of the many corporate collapses over the past quarter of a century, policymakers, practitioners and scholars alike have asked the question: Where was the board? That question begs others: What does it take to make a board effective? Indeed, what does it mean to say a board is effective? And how could we - policymakers, practitioners, scholars, or even directors themselves - evaluate whether it was effective?\n2. Board effectiveness: The work of boards involves complex interactions of individuals in which independence of mind fosters both benefits and threats to effectiveness (Van den Berghe and Baelden, 2005). In theorizing board cognition and effectiveness, Forbes and Milliken (1999) write that boards differ from conventional groups in that they are \"large, elite, and episodic decision-making groups that face complex tasks pertaining to strategic-issue processing\". But they are large (typically a dozen or more); the presence of outside, or \"non-executive\" directors, who serve the company only part-time may mean less than full commitment; and their elite make-up holds the promise and threat of strong individuality. Moreover, boards perform two distinct and at times contradictory roles (Krause et al., 2013): service (providing advice), and control (supervising and disciplining).\n3. Evaluating boards: The nascent literature on board evaluation is dominated by practitioner experiences and process prescription to inform policy for board evaluation (Cutting and Kouzmin, 2002; Nicholson and Kiel, 2004a). Heracleous and Lan (2002) offer a 20-question tool to evaluate directors, focusing on their knowledge and skills, that is, inputs to board work, but not their behavior or performance. Aly and Mansour (2017) reconstruct the balanced scorecard in Kaplan and Norton (1992) to take into account customer-oriented metrics to the work of boards.\n4. A framework for board evaluation: The preceding discussion leads us to identify certain pressure points in board evaluation (Figure 1). By that we mean the factors and relationships between them where in-person evaluation, and more specifically evaluation through external facilitation, are likely to be most beneficial. Our model builds on Forbes and Milliken (1999) with its crucial inverted U between cohesiveness and performance.\n5. Conclusions: Board evaluation is firmly on the agenda of corporations, policymakers and academics. This paper makes some tentative steps towards theorizing board evaluation and its potential for impact on the elusive problems associated with understanding how director characteristics and board processes and structures contribute to effective deliberations. In highlighting the internal- and external-facing purposes of evaluations and the differences made through the two main contrasting methods of evaluating, it points to a research agenda of academic interest but also of importance to corporations and policy in corporate governance.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to examine how board evaluations have emerged as an important tool in public policy and corporate practice for enhancing board effectiveness.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors review the extensive literature on effectiveness and the emerging literature on board evaluation to identify ways to assess the current policy direction for external evaluation of corporate boards.\nFindings: The paper develops an integrated framework of effectiveness that can be used as a tool for board evaluation, in particular for externally facilitated exercises.\nResearch limitations/implications: Through its integration of prior conceptual work this paper advances our theoretical understanding of this emerging part of policy and practice, with to-date lack much empirical basis.\nPractical implications: The framework that is developed shows ways to focus how the practice is conducted by boards and external evaluators alike.\nSocial implications: It can also help policy formation by pointing out the limitations as well as benefits of various policy options.\nOriginality/value: In pointing to ways to develop study of the field through empirical research, it provides direction for future academic research. It also identifies a need for and direction toward the professionalization of practice.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
TORS for OSA: a practice, pitfalls and literature review
|
[
"Evidence-based practice",
"Continuous quality improvement",
"Clinical governance",
"Care pathways",
"Clinical guidelines",
"Trans-oral robotic surgery (TORS)",
"Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA)",
"Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) is characterised by upper airway intermittent or partial collapse during sleep with a resultant interruption in breathing. This can be apnoea, total breathing cessation or hypopnea, a greater than 50 per cent decrease in airflow. Either event must last ten seconds or more. Events per hour are measured through polysomnography to calculate the apnoea-hypopnoea index (AHI), which forms the objective OSA severity physiological assessment basis (Fleetham et al., 2006).\nMethodology: Surgical intervention\nEthical considerations: Ethical approval was sought from Imperial Healthcare NHS Trust, who deemed it unnecessary.\nResults: Among 12 patients who were initially considered for TORS, four fulfilled all required criteria and were studied in more detail. The four patients selected for this study, based on the criteria outlined above, were all male. Average age was 54.5 years (range: 29-70 years). Average BMI was 27.6 kg/m2 (range: 26.3-29 kg/m2). The MRI volumetric assessment results showed that at around four months post-operatively, all four patients showed a decrease in pharyngeal airway volume, contrary to expected findings, particularly all patients showed an improvement in AHI, compatible with cure. Overall, MRI findings correlated with AHIs, though this did not appear to follow a linear relationship (Table I).\nDiscussion: Findings and pitfalls\nConclusion and recommendations: Objective MRI assessment following TORS for OSA shows a quantifiable volumetric change within the pharynx. Lacking linear correlation with AHI outcome may be attributable to the altered tissue characteristics at the tongue base post-operatively, amongst other factors. A new protocol for the pharyngeal airway volumetric assessment should include a standardized head position both pre- and post-operatively. Using set MRI parameters is likely to result in a more accurate pharyngeal volumetric analysis following TORS for OSA, whilst keeping scan acquisition times low and maintaining both definition and soft tissue discrimination. This could provide directly comparable data between scans and studies, thereby providing data for a larger dataset for this surgical intervention. Together, these may show a correlation between tongue base volumetric changes and AHI after comparing subsequent and historical studies. Long-term prospective evaluation in a large patient cohort is necessary to validate our findings.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Trans-oral robotic surgery (TORS) is increasingly employed in obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) management. Objective outcomes are generally assessed through polysomnography. Pre-operative magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can be a useful adjunct in objective upper airway assessment, in particular the tongue base, providing useful information for surgical planning and outcome assessment, though care must be taken in patient positioning during surgery. The purpose of this paper is to identify pitfalls in this process and suggest a protocol for pre-operative MRI scanning in OSA.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study is a four-patient prospective case-series and literature review. Outcome measures include pre- and post-operative volumetric changes in the pharynx as measured on MRI and apnoea-hypopnea indices (AHI), with cure being OSA resolution or a 50 per cent reduction in AHI.\nFindings: All patients achieved AHI reduction and/or OSA cure following TORS, despite a decrease in pharyngeal volume measurements at the tongue base level. This study and others lacked standardisation in the MRI scanning protocol, which resulted in an inability to effectively compare pre- and post-operative scans. Pitfalls were related to variation in head/tongue position, soft-tissue marker usage and assessed area boundary limits.\nPractical implications: TORS appears to be effective in OSA management. A new protocol for patient positioning and anatomical landmarks is suggested.\nOriginality/value: The findings could provide directly comparable data between scans and may allow correlation between tongue base volumetric changes and AHI through subsequent and historical study meta-analysis.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Performance of government linked companies and private owned companies in Malaysia
|
[
"Government linked companies",
"Performance",
"Private owned companies"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Malaysia is a vibrant economy with gross domestic product (GDP) of US$312 billion, growing at 4.7 per cent per annum in 2013[1], per capita income of GDP US$10,400 with a growth rate of 3.9 per cent per annum and a population of 29 million people growing at the rate of 1.8 per cent per annum in 2012[2]. The Malaysian Government launched a national development policy in 1991 to promote both the private and public sector to compete with each other. The economy was also opened in 1991 to attract foreign investments in the country to boost economic growth as also to create an opportunity for local businesses and to raise capital in the capital market. Malaysia had an industry sector that contributed 40.7 per cent of GDP and grew at the rate of 7.3 per cent, the service sector contributed 47.3 per cent of GDP and grew at the rate of 6 per cent and the agricultural sector contributed 12 per cent of GDP and grew at the rate of 7.1 per cent in 2013[3]. The economy had become a hub for high-technology manufacturing exports. Malaysia has successfully transformed its manufacturing sector from state-controlled to market-oriented through price deregulation, ownership reform of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), private sector development, foreign direct inflow (foreign direct investment, FDI) and trade liberalization. The FDI together with growth of local businesses led to the development of infrastructure like highways, power generation, telecommunications, etc. in the country. Malaysia has attracted $9.7 billion in 2012[4]. In 2005, fixed exchange rate regime was abandoned and a floating regime was declared to reduce vulnerability of the currency and to expose the export sector to a greater competition and enhance productivity in a capital-intensive industry. The industry sector growth has resulted in overall high growth of the economy. The high industry growth has also resulted in high FDI inflow, as FDI is normally attracted to the industry sector (Bhatt, 2008). Manufacturing is the engine of growth, as industrial goods have a higher-income elasticity of demand (Kaldor, 1967). The Malaysian Government pursued a dynamic industrial policy to encourage industries through trade and investment.\n2. A survey of literature: The objective of SOEs in any developing countries is social welfare and inclusive development. Many developing countries, including Malaysia, have given major thrust to the public sector to make capital investment in sectors of basic necessities of the people to improve their living condition. In developing countries, public sectors have been given to play a significant role in promoting even regional development, production of wage goods and employment generation in rural areas. However, managers of public sector units are controlled by government bureaucrats and politicians and hence these public sector units perform sub-optimally. Malaysia has adopted many elements of professional management practices to improve and transform the public sector into an efficient entity. There are many studies available on debate on merits and demerits of SOEs and private companies. Megginson et al. (1994) analysed 61 firms in 32 industries in 18 industrialized countries during the period 1961-1990 and found that firms provided better results on profitability, technical efficiency, capital expenditure, employment, revenue and dividend in post-privatization. Galal et al. (1994) found that there was improvement in net welfare gains in terms of efficiency, market share, capital and employment in post-privatization in 11 out of 12 companies of four countries, Chile, Malaysia, Mexico and the UK. Boubakri and Cosset (1998) had studied the effect of privatization of 79 companies of 21 countries over the period 1980-1992 and found that there was significant improvement with privatization in the areas of profitability, productivity, capital investment spending, output and dividends. D'Souza and Megginson (1999) also got similar results on a larger data set covering 1990-1996 for 85 companies in 28 countries. La Porta and Lopez-de-Silanes (1999) in their study on privatization of 218 Mexican firms over the period 1983-1991 found that there was significant increase of profitability after privatization. Shirley and Walsh (2001) summarized 52 empirical research studies from 1971 to 2000 on ownership and performance of the firm and found that 32 studies showed superior performance of private and privatized firms compared to public firms. Only five studies supported better performance of publically owned firm than private firms. Demsetz and Villalonga (2001) found from their study of 223 firms on US economy that there was no statistically significant relationship between ownership structure and firm performance. Sun and Tong (2002) in their study conducted for 24 \"share issued to privatize\" (SIP) companies in Malaysia during 1983-1997 found that profitability, output levels and dividend payouts improved significantly after privatization and leverage had fallen after privatization. They also found that privatization had worked better for firms that were fully owned by the government before privatization. Feng et al. (2004) studied the relationship between the SIP and performance in Singapore with a sample of 30 GLCs over the period 1964-1998. They found that there was no evidence that the GLCs in Singapore were less profitable than a selected group of non-GLCs that match by size and industry. They also found that GLCs were comparable to private-owned companies (POCs) in terms of efficiency and productivity. Ang and Ding (2006) in their study of 15 GLCs and 144 non-GLCs of Singapore over a period of 11 years from 1990-2000 found that, on average, GLCs showed superior performance in terms of ROE and asset as also highly valued in terms of good governance practices and plan implementation, compared to non-GLCs. In their study on 17 GLCs and 92 private enterprises in three sectors of manufacturing; transport, storage and communications; and multi-industry of Singapore's corporate sector covering 1994-1998, Ramirez and Tan (2003) found that both GLCs and their counterpart private sector in Singapore were on the same level-playing field in terms of competing for their finances. They also found that the Singaporean capital market perception was higher in the case of GLCs than non-GLCs. Dewenter and Malatesta (2001) found from a heterogeneous group of very large firms doing business around the world that government-owned firms are significantly less profitable than privately owned firms to the extent of profitability and efficiency. It was also found that government firms had high leverage compared to private firms. Gupta (2005) found that there was significant increase of profitability, productivity and efficiency in partially privatized firms in India during 1991-1998. He also found that performance on managerial efficiency had increased post-privatization. Omran (2004) had compared performance of private companies and SOEs of Egypt during the period of 1994-1998 and found that there was no significant difference in performance between private firms and SOEs. Chong and Lopez-de-Silanes (2003) showed that privatization yielded robust performance improvements in Latin American companies. In another study, Boubakri et al. (2004) studied privatization of 50 companies spread over ten Asian countries over the period of 1980-1999 and found that there was less significant effect of post-privatization compared to other developing countries in terms of profitability, efficiency and output. Boubakri et al. (2008) reiterated their result of an earlier study from a larger sample of 230 companies spread over 32 developing countries and found that privatization had improved performance. Lin et al. (2001) suggested that corporate governance could be improved even with the government control. Aivazian et al. (2005) based on their study on 308 SOEs for the period from 1993 to 1998 found that corporatization without privatization could have a positive impact on firm performance. Chen et al. (2009) had grouped China's listed companies into four groups, namely, companies controlled by state asset management bureaus (SAMBs), SOEs affiliated to central government (SOECGs), SOEs affiliated to local government (SOELGs) and private investors. They covered the period 1999-2004 with a sample consisting of 6,113 firm-year observations, out of which 3,065 observations pertained to SOELGs, 1,241observations to private investors, 968 observations to SAMBs and 839 observations to SOECGs. They found in their study that SOECGs performed the best, followed by SOELGs. The private controlled listed firms and the bureaucratic SAMBs had performed the worst, among all the four groups. In another study on China, Wang (2009) found that the SOE group had made significant performance even with the monitoring of the group by the government. Lau and Tong (2008) conducted a study of 15 GLCs over six years from 2000 to 2005 and found that government ownership in Malaysian GLCs had a significant and positive relationship with firm value. Razak et al. (2008) in their study of 210 companies listed in main board in Bursa Malaysia during 1995-2005 found that GLCs performed better than non-GLCs when an accounting measure such as ROE or return on assets (ROA) was used. Koe (2014) measured performance of GLCs in Malaysia in terms of entrepreneurial orientation (EO), which was conceptualized by Lumkin and Dess (1996). Based on the sample of 153 subsidiaries and branches of G20, Koe found that all five dimensions of EO significantly and positively influenced the performance of GLCs. He found that GLCs in Malaysia were more entrepreneurial in managing their organization to achieve high performance. Based on the review of main empirical studies, Parker and Kirkpatrik (2005) suggested that privatization would succeed if it was complemented by policies that promoted economic efficiency, administrative competency and built institutions to cope up with privatization.\n3. Hypotheses and methodology of study: In this study, the following two hypotheses were constructed to understand the performance level of GLCs and POCs:\n4. Analysis of results: The model was estimated by the generalized least-squares method with Swamy and Arora estimator of component variances. The Hausman test was used to select the appropriate model of estimation. It was found that the Hausman test was insignificant, and hence, a random-effect model as an alternative to a fixed-effect model was selected for estimation. The result of the model is given in Table I. It was found that the dummy variable (DUM) was insignificant in all the three models mentioned above, and hence, the H1 that there was no difference in performance between GLCs and POCs was accepted. This indicated that there was no significance difference in performance level between GLCs and POCs. The results corroborated the findings of Lau and Tong (2008), Razak et al. (2008) and Koe (2014). The results were highly consistent with the results of Ang and Ding (2006) and Feng et al. (2004). Sales-asset ratio is positive and significant in all three models. Leverage is negative and significant in all the three models. The average rate of ROE, assets, invested capital; sales, revenue and leverage separately for GLCs and POCs during 1996-2013 are given in Table II. It can be seen from the table that the average ROE for GLC was higher than that of POC for eight years and was less than in the remaining years during 1996-2013. Similarly, ROA and RIC were higher for GLC than that of POC for five years and eight years, respectively, during the same period. However, asset, sales and leverage were higher in the case of GLCs than that of POCs for all years during the same period. This is because GLCs are corporates having many subsidiaries and hence higher asset and sale. High leverage of GLCs is due to active government support and hence do not find any difficulty to get loans from lenders. Normality test statistic for all variables is given in Table III. DUMT was significant in all the three models mentioned above and hence H2 was rejected. That is, there was significant improvement in performance of GLCs after Malaysian Government's initiatives to transform the GLCs to high-performance companies. The GLCs' transformation programme was designed with dual objectives of enhancing economic performance and to develop benefits for all stakeholders to accelerate the nation's social and economic development (Putrajaya Committee on GLC High Performance Transformation, 2010). Both GLICs and GLCs had been entrusted with the role of accelerating national economic development by spearheading the creation of special economic development regions. GLCs were becoming critical drivers in stimulating economic activities across Malaysia to address uneven levels of development, eradicate poverty, raise standards of living, stimulate priority sectors and develop world-class cities (Putrajaya Committee on GLC High Performance Transformation, 2010). Thus, the findings contribute to the understanding that GLCs performed at par with POCs and performance of GLCs improved significantly after the initiation of the GLC transformation programme.\n5. Conclusion: GLCs and GLICs formed an integral part of the economic structure of Malaysia. GLC companies accounted for 41 per cent of the market capitalization of Bursa Malaysia. GLCs formed the backbone of the economic structure of the Malaysian economy; GLCs represented 4 per cent of total listed companies with market capitalization of 49 per cent of Kuala Lumpur Composite index. The main objective of the programme was to create sustainable corporations with good management practices and governance. It was found that there was no significant difference in performance level between GLCs and POCs. It was also found that that performance level of GLC had improved significantly after the initiation of the GLC transformation programme.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study was to find whether there was any significant difference in performance between government-linked companies (GLCs) and private-owned companies (POCs) and there was any significant improvement in performance of GLCs after Malaysian Government\nDesign/methodology/approach: Panel data estimation techniques were used to run the regression in this study.\nFindings: It was found that there was no significant difference in performance level between GLCs and POCs. It was also found that the performance level of GLCs had improved significantly after the initiation of GLCs\nOriginality/value: The implication of the results of this study is that state-owned enterprises in developing countries like Malaysia can be relevant and important to take care of social responsibilities and needs, as also they can perform at par with private companies. There is no need for privatization of government-owned enterprises; rather, it needs corporatization. Government-owned enterprises can play an important role to drive national development.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Exploring the relationship between student mobile information security awareness and behavioural intent
|
[
"Information security",
"Computer security",
"Computer users"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The field of information security management for organisations is pervaded with policies, standards and frameworks. However, for application to the student mobile phone user context, this paper adopts the definition of information security management suggested by Parakkattu and Kunnathur (2010, p. 318) which simply states that information security management is concerned with \"ensuring the security of information through the proactive management of information security risks, threats and vulnerabilities\". Although the information security environment of private mobile phone users is not regulated by standards, mobile phone users as owners of a technological asset (phone) which contains or is used to transmit information (asset) should be concerned with ensuring the security of this information. Humans have been repeatedly identified as the most important factor to be considered in the securing of information assets. People use technology in one of two environments: the workplace and home (Talib et al., 2010). The mobile phone user considered in this study falls into the latter group of technology users. A unique attribute of these students is that they are registered in a newly restructured South African educational entity referred to in this study as a \"developmental university\".\n2. The Kruger and Kearney approach for measuring awareness: Awareness campaigns are aimed at improving user knowledge, attitude and behaviour towards information security and were used as the interventions in this action research study. Kruger and Kearney (2006) acknowledge the importance of assessing the impact of an awareness campaign. While they refer to organisational benefits, such as return on investment or re-directing of security campaigns, their proposed measuring instrument will be applied in this study to measure the pre- and post-intervention awareness levels of the student mobile phone users. The adopted definition of awareness used in this study relies on the comprehensive information security awareness understanding (Kruger and Kearney, 2006) which includes student mobile phone user knowledge, attitude and behaviour. In their quest to determine a global awareness level for the organisation, they identified a set of aspects related to what users know (knowledge), think (attitude) and do (behaviour). Kruger and Kearney (2006, p. 291) state that \"Each dimension was then divided into six focus areas\".\n3. Using the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) to understand behavioural intent: The poor information security awareness of mobile phone users has a direct impact on their information security behaviour. To gain a better understanding of mobile phone user information security behaviour, this study relied on the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) formulated by Ajzen (1991). The TPB, which was formulated based on the theory of reasoned action (TRA), is preferred over its predecessor, as it takes into account the possibility that not all action is voluntary. The TRA outlined the interaction between a person's attitude or subjective norms and their behavioural intentions (BIs). The TRA posited that an individual's behaviour is determined by the person's intention to perform that behaviour and that intention is a function of their attitude and the subjective norms which are important to the individual. Attitude looks at the individual's negative or positive feelings about performing the behaviour, and it is determined by assessing one's beliefs regarding the consequences arising from behaviour and gauging desirability of these consequences. Ajzen (1991) suggests that people are inclined to have a positive attitude towards behaviours they believe will have desirable consequences, while a negative attitude will be present where the consequences are believed to be negative. He describes subjective norms as the individual's perception about whether people important to the individual think the behaviour should be performed. Formulated in 1980 by Ajzen and Fishbein to analyse the relationship between attitude and behaviour, the TRA presupposes that behaviour is planned and intentional with the user having complete control over any internal or external barriers to carrying out the behaviour (Todd and Mulla, 2011). In 1991, the TRA was transformed into the TPB when perceived behavioural control was added to the model.\n4. Relationship between awareness and behavioural intent: This paper suggests that there is a relationship between the student mobile phone user information security awareness levels and their levels of information security behavioural intent. While studies have been undertaken to assess levels of awareness in an organisation, the field of information security behavioural intent is rarely researched with most of the focus being on actual behaviour. While interventions like awareness campaigns result in an observable change in levels of what people \"know\", sometimes a difference exists between what people \"know\" and what they \"do\". Using the TPB, this paper acknowledges that BI is a predecessor to actual behaviour which is used as a proxy measure of actual behaviour for the purposes of this study. The following similarities and overlaps exist between the factors used to calculate LA and those used to calculate behavioural intent:\n5. Findings: The main focus during analysis of the study findings remained on observing any changes to constructs awareness and behavioural intent. Correlation analysis tests were conducted to determine whether relationships existed between the different factors. The correlation coefficients give an indication of whether the relationship is a positive relationship (changes to constructs increase or decrease in the same direction) or a negative relationship (constructs respond in opposite directions). This section concludes by analysing the relationship between overall awareness and behavioural intent. Level of awareness is presented below.\n6. Discussion and concluding remarks: Due to their usage of mobile phones and more specifically mobile phone applications, students in a South African developmental university are faced with the same threats as students in a better developed university. However, compared to their global counterparts from more developed countries, they are more vulnerable to threats because of the developmental university environment where students have limited access to sources of information (e.g. Internet) that could help improve their awareness. Thus, the findings of this study are important by providing better insight on the awareness and behavioural intent-related factors which must be considered to influence a change in South African students' mobile phone information security behaviour.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper was to analyse existing theories from the social sciences to gain a better understanding of factors which contribute to student mobile phone users' poor information security behaviour. Two key aspects associated with information security behaviour were considered, namely, awareness and behavioural intent. This paper proposes that the knowing-and-doing gap can possibly be reduced by addressing both awareness and behavioural intent. This research paper explores the relationship between student mobile phone user information security awareness and behavioural intent in a developmental university in South Africa.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Information security awareness interventions were implemented in this action research study, and student information security behavioural intent was observed after each cycle.\nFindings: The poor security behaviour exhibited by student mobile phone users, which was confirmed by the findings of this study, is of particular interest in the university context, as most undergraduate students are offered a computer-related course which covers certain information security-related principles. Existing researchers in the field of information security still grapple with the \"knowing-and-doing\" gap, where user information security knowledge/awareness sometimes does not result in safer behavioural practises.\nOriginality/value: Zhang et al. (2009) suggest that understanding human behaviour is important when dealing with the problems caused by human errors. Harnesk and Lindstrom (2011) expressed a concern that existing research does not address the interlinked relationship between anticipated security behaviour and the enactment of security procedures. This study acknowledges Choi et al. (2008) contribution in their discussions on the \"knowing-and-doing gap\" suggests a link between awareness and actual behaviour that is confirmed by the findings of this study.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Perceptions and pathways of resilience in Addis Ababa
|
[
"Qualitative research",
"Ethiopia",
"Urban resilience",
"Expert interviews",
"Provincializing"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Understanding urban resilience is important to achieve social-ecological sustainability and make-wise urban management decisions (e.g. Wu and Wu, 2013; Tierney, 2014). This paper adopts the standpoint of general, social-ecological resilience, which can be defined as the capacity of \"any and all parts of a system to absorb all kinds of shocks\" (Folke et al., 2010, p. 2) while retaining the same basic function and identity. The extant literature speaks of certain pathways to resilience (Meerow et al., 2016): persistence, transition and transformation, which will be discussed further in this paper. The question that motivates this paper is whether such definitions are universal?\n2. Background: Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa is not just Africa's political centre but also one of its fastest growing cities. According to UN-HABITAT (2017), the city increased from 1.3m in 1979 to nearly 4m in 2017 due to rapid population growth and rural-urban migration. Surprisingly, the historical neighbourhoods of the city have suffered little loss of functionality and identity in this process of urban expansion and densification albeit their physical deterioration (Yitbarek, 2012). For the authors of this paper, this observation suggests a strong general urban resilience within the historical neighbourhoods of Addis Ababa, which is the starting point of this study. Before discussing the study in detail, the authors will provide a brief overview of the research context and the relevance of this study.\n3. Literature review: resilience concepts guiding this research: Without the concept of resilience, sustainability goals cannot be achieved in cities because sustainability alone lacks the change factor (Folke et al., 2002). By understanding social-ecological systems (SES) such as cities as complex and adaptive systems, resilience can incorporate the change factor (Folke et al., 2002). Therefore, by integrating the principles of resilience into planning and urban practice, sustainable urban development can be reached. Folke et al. (2002) offer a strikingly clear-cut definition of resilience: \"[...] resilient social-ecological systems are able to absorb larger shocks without changing in fundamental ways. When massive transformation is inevitable, resilient systems contain the components needed for renewal and reorganisation. In other words, they can cope, adapt, or reorganise without sacrificing the provision of [basic] services\" (p. 438). As Meerow et al. (2016) demonstrate in their review paper, authors contributing research to urban resilience theory frequently employ a wide variety of keywords but fail to elucidate their meaning, giving rise to confusion and miscommunication. Hence, the authors of this paper will clarify their stance on equilibrium and adaptability as well as review the mechanisms of change that will create the background against which the data from Addis Ababa can be compared.\n4. Method: To achieve this goal, the authors of this paper choose a qualitative and inductive research design. Due to the under-documented Ethiopian research context (Baron and Donath, 2016) and the existing hegemony of western knowledge in the African context (Adichie, 2010; Watson, 2014; Parnell and Robinson, 2018), an explorative and theory-generating approach is sensible. This approach entails the exploration of new knowledge and the identification of areas for future research (Mason, 2002). The method selected by the team is an expert interview study because, on the one hand, as Mason (2002, p. 66) underlines, the data are \"not feasibly [...] available in any other form\". On the other hand, an expert interview can generate highly relevant knowledge because these specific informants are very powerful, and as Bogner et al. (2009, p. 7) emphasise, can \"actually put their interpretations into practice\".\n5. Findings: In this section, the authors focus on two sub-themes of resilience within the urban expert community in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: the conceptions of urban resilience that are developed through an etymological analysis, and perceived pathways to resilience.\n6. Discussion: The qualitative analysis of interviews with 12 Ethiopian urban experts reveals that they perceive and understand urban resilience. The authors are able to identify five nuanced conceptualisations of urban resilience based on an etymological analysis and five pathways to resilience as perceived by the interviewees. At first sight, these conceptions and pathways could be assigned to the definitions and pathways to urban resilience, as identified by international literature. However, as a more detailed comparison below shows, there are some significant differences that should be acknowledged by decision makers when designing and implementing an urban resilience strategy in Addis Ababa. In this section of the paper, the two sub-themes - conceptualizations and perceived pathways - are associated with each other and with existing resilience theory. This allows the authors to identify gaps in current urban resilience theory to make suggestions on how to improve resilience strategies in Ethiopia and to identify future research areas.\n7. Conclusion: This study shows conceptions of urban resilience and perceived pathways to urban resilience in the urban expert community of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The findings of this study generally support the definitions and pathways to urban resilience that were developed by western academia. However, the study also highlights that the definitions and strategies developed in the west are not universal but local. Several important differences are revealed by the study regarding the perception of and pathways to resilience that need to be incorporated when in the Ethiopian context.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Resilience has recently attracted widespread interest in the field of urban planning and theory. However, the research that has been conducted on urban resilience in Africa has major theoretical and methodological gaps. This can lead to problems when designing and implementing resilience strategies there. Understanding African perspectives can be a way of tackling these. The paper aims to discuss these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using the example of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, this paper analyses expert interviews based on a grounded theory approach. The goal is to explore locally specific perceptions of and pathways to urban resilience. By comparing these findings to those reported in the existing literature, differences and overlaps are identified.\nFindings: This study provides evidence for the existence of locally specific perceptions of and pathways to urban resilience. Furthermore, it identifies urban development pathways such as complete urban makeover (tabula rasa) and complete negation of change (resistance).\nResearch limitations/implications: Because this study uses Addis Ababa as a singular case and expert interviews as method, it rather represents an initial attempt at exploring a new research field than claiming generalisability. Its quality and significance lie in its discursive approach and theory formation.\nPractical implications: This exemplary study from Ethiopia demonstrates that a regionally specific understanding of urban resilience is valuable for the design and implementation of urban resilience strategies.\nOriginality/value: This study offers unique insights into urban resilience from an African perspective and into the manifestation of urban resilience in Addis Ababa.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
HR analytics: A study into the current state of HR analytics and predictions for its future
|
[
"Managers",
"Change management",
"HR analytics",
"Workforce",
"People"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The term Human Resource (HR) analytics means using data, analysis, and systematic reasoning in relation to people involved in and related to an organization. Traditional HR applications were used administratively for payroll and record keeping. There is much more to HR analytics than simple descriptive data collection and reporting. It tracks HR investments and outcomes and it uses statistics and analysis to look at causal relationships. As such, HR analytics is a process and not simply an HR tool. It goes beyond the concept of metrics as it involves an insight into what has happened, explains it, and aims to predict what might happen in the future. Its aim is to involve good data gathering combined with rigorous analysis to support and inform business decision-making.\nResults: HR analytics in 2015\nConclusion: The research shows that the future of HR analytics depends heavily on data integration. Future emphasis is on overarching business disciplines, centralizing data for combined analysis. From a managerial perspective, there needs to be a strong investment into IT systems, updating systems, and building a solid infrastructure not only for data collection but also for analysis and prediction. They would also need to decide whether to invest in an HR analytical team based within the HR function, or, more cost-effectively, to set up a centralized analytics team covering all disciplines. Currently analytics is carried out within separate areas of a company, but the future suggests a central analytics function covering all disciplines to improve business performance. In such a view, the future of HR analytics means it could potentially even cease to exist as an individual discipline.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.\nFindings: It was suggested that the future of HR analytics depends on integration within a company. There needs to be an updated and inclusive IT infrastructure for centralized data storing. HR analytics will move from simple statistical reporting to evidence-based predictive decision-making. It was also found that the future of HR analytics might mean it ceases to exist as a separate function, if it is subsumed in a centralized analytics function, overarching all business disciplines.\nPractical implications: The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.\nOriginality/value: The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Expatriate academics: job factors and work outcomes
|
[
"Expatriates",
"Academic staff",
"Jobs",
"Globalization",
"Multinational companies"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The fast growth and increased numbers of multinational companies and their enhanced needs to manage their world-wide expatriate staff effectively has contributed to a marked emphasis in academic research on business expatriates. However, other types of organisations than business firms also make use of expatriates. Universities are increasingly joining the global job market in search of new academic talent and more and more academics expatriate (cf. Altbach, 2004). Furthermore, the expatriates in the academic sector have often initiated their foreign jobs themselves (Richardson and McKenna, 2002). Despite the rapidly growing literature on business expatriates in recent years (cf. Bhaskar-Shrinivas et al., 2005; Hechanova et al., 2003), research on expatriate academics is scarce (Richardson and McKenna, 2000). Universities present a different organisational environment with different work tasks than business firms. Academics lecture, undertake research, and perform course administration besides making applications for research grants and engage themselves in consultancy work (Barry et al., 2003). Hence, it is not unlikely that the work situation as well the socio- and psycho-cultural situation may be different for expatriate academics than for business expatriates and more research is needed to uncover such potential differences. Furthermore, the increasing numbers of expatriate academics have led to that more universities have an international faculty representing different national cultures (Altbach, 1996). Hence, human resource management of university staff becomes more problematic as expatriate academics present growing challenges for institutions of higher education (Richardson and McKenna, 2000) that is likely to be even more acute in the future. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the specific work situation of expatriate academics. More specifically, this investigation will study the relationship between job factors and work outcomes for this group of academics.This is an important study for several reasons. First, the study will make a contribution to the scant literature on expatriate academics. They have previously been investigated by Julia Richardson and associates through a small-scale, qualitative study of 30 British respondents (cf. Richardson and McKenna, 2000, 2002). As far as is known, the current investigation is the first large-scale quantitative survey of expatriate academics. Secondly, with the exception of the study mentioned above, there do not appear to be any previous studies touching on the work situation of expatriate academics. Thirdly, although there could be some general similarities between the work of business expatriates and expatriate academics as both groups may have to communicate and work with host nationals and learn how to operate effectively in a culturally new work environment (Richardson and McKenna, 2000), there may also be great differences, especially regarding the nature of work. Academic work uniquely involves teaching and scholarship to a large degree (Welch, 1997). Last, but not least, the increasing number of expatriate academics has led to that more universities have an international faculty representing different cultures (Altbach, 1996). Hence, the human resource management of staff becomes more problematic as expatriate academics present growing challenges for institutions of higher education (Richardson and McKenna, 2000). This study is likely to contribute to a better understanding of the work situation of this group of expatriates informing universities of unique peculiarities of their multicultural academic staff facilitating its management.The remainder of this paper will first deal with a literature review of the conceptual parts of this investigation succeeded by generation of the hypotheses to be tested. The methods section delineates the target group, sample and measures applied. Results are displayed and subsequently discussed in terms of main findings, limitations and implications. Finally, the conclusions of the study are drawn.\n2. Conceptualisations and hypotheses: 2.1 Expatriate work outcomes\n3. Method: 3.1 Target population\n4. Results: Sample means, standard deviations and zero-order Pearson correlations of all variables are provided in Table II. The significant positive associations between time in current location and all of the dependent variables; work adjustment (r=0.17, p<0.001), work performance (r=0.18, p<0.001), work effectiveness (r=0.13, p<0.01), job satisfaction (r=0.11, p<0.05) and time to proficiency (r=0.10, p<0.05); confirm the need to use time in current location as a control variable.The hypotheses were formally tested by way of hierarchical multiple regression (Table III). The control variable, time in current location, was entered in step 1. As seen in Table III, there was a significant positive association with two of the five criterion variables. The control variable had a positive relationship with work performance (beta=0.10, p<0.05) and time to proficiency (beta=0.15, p<0.01). In step 2, the five predictor variables were entered. Displayed by Table III, this also produced significant effects on the criterion variables, explaining between 14 and 47 percent of the variance of these individual variables. There were significant relationships between job clarity and all of the five criterion variables. There were positive associations between job clarity and work adjustment (beta=0.35, p<0.001), work performance (beta=0.44, p<0.001), work effectiveness (beta=0.42, p<0.001) and job satisfaction (beta=0.46, p<0.001), as well as a negative relationship between job clarity and time to proficiency (beta=-0.23, p<0.001). Job conflict had a negative association with work effectiveness (beta=-0.11, p<0.05) and job satisfaction (beta=-0.16, p<0.001) as well as a positive relationship with time to proficiency (beta=0.17, p<0.01). Job freedom had a positive association with work adjustment (beta=0.15, p<0.01) and job satisfaction (beta=0.27, p<0.001). This provides support for H2a-e, H3c-e, as well as H4a and H4d. The remaining hypotheses were not supported. All F values for the work outcome variables were statistically significant, indicating a proper fit between the regression model and the data.\n5. Discussion: 5.1 Main findings\n6. Conclusions: This is the first known large-scale quantitative study examining the work situation of expatriate academics. As such, it represents a fundamental attempt to highlight the work situation of this under-researched group of expatriates and hence it contributes to the literature. The findings of previous small-scale qualitative investigations on the work situation of expatriate academics may not be valid for expatriate academics in general. While both job clarity and job freedom may have similar effects, with the former having a more marked impact on work outcomes for expatriate academics than for business expatriates, the findings regarding role conflict may constitute a more discrepant outcome for the two groups. In case of the job factors work load and job novelty and their presumed relationships with work outcome variables, although theoretically justified, the results of the current investigation were not inconsistent with findings from studies on business expatriates.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The literature on business expatriates has been increasing rapidly, but research on expatriate academics has remained scant, despite the apparent increasing globalisation of the academic world. Therefore, more research is needed on the latter group of expatriates. This paper aims to fill some of the gaps.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A questionnaire was directed electronically towards expatriate academics occupying regular positions in science faculty departments in universities in northern Europe.\nFindings: - Results showed that job clarity was the dominating job factor with strong relationships with all of the five investigated work outcome variables, work adjustment, work performance, work effectiveness, job satisfaction, and time to proficiency. Job conflict and job freedom had an association with some of the work outcome variables but not with all of them. Neither workload nor job novelty had a relationship with any of the work outcome variables of the expatriate academics.\nOriginality/value: - The paper shows that the findings are only partly consistent with previous research results concerning business expatriates, suggesting that the work situation for expatriate academics could have both similarities and discrepancies as compared to that of business expatriates.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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Impact of social media strategies on stock price: the case of Twitter
|
[
"Interaction",
"Social media",
"Twitter",
"Market reaction",
"Messaging"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: One bad Twitter \"tweet\" can lose companies as many as 30 customers (Sarah Shannon - November 25, 2009, Bloomberg).\nTheoretical framework: We develop a theoretical framework by integrating seven different streams of literature: the social representation theory (SRT), the social exchange theory (SET), the social network analysis (SNA), the social identity theory (SIT), the impression management theory (IMT), the signaling theory (ST) and the efficient market hypothesis (EMH). These theories are discussed briefly.\nDatabase and methodology: To test our hypotheses related to the effect of social media platforms on firm value, we use the event history analysis (EHA), also known as event study, usually designed to examine the impact of a historical phenomenon (Homburg et al., 2014; Srinivasan and Hanssens, 2009) for the US Fortune 500 firms that developed a Twitter platform. Twitter was founded in 2006, and is currently one of the leading social media platforms with 330 million monthly active users at the end of 2017 (https://twitter.com/). Twitter provides a way to broadcast brief posts, with a maximum of 140 characters, where originators tweet, i.e. post original messages in their Twitter accounts, and have the possibility to retweet and maintain a continuous interaction (or reciprocation) with their followers. An increasing number of firms, for example, Dell, Starbucks, Pizza Hut and Southwest Airlines, are currently using the Twitter application in sales, customer service and branding (Miller, 2009; Reisner, 2009), and many firms have teams to monitor comments posted on Twitter. Looking at the online sources on the webpages or Twitter pages of the firms in our sample, we found that 355 firms launched their Twitter platforms till the end of 2013, which represents 71 per cent of Fortune 500 firms[2]. We were able to identify the launching date of Twitter platform for 350 firms. We focus on the first date at which a firm opens and uses a Twitter account regardless of whether the communication is addressed to customers, potential customers, investors or any other stakeholders[3]. Looking at the nature of the tweets, a large number of companies tweeted general company news or products and few firms started with financial tweets, and we thus looked at firms communicating using a Twitter platform regardless of whether this is about the firm or a specific product. Focussing on the day of the launching of a Twitter platform, we classify a firm as following a one-way messaging when it only posts financial news, company news, product advertisements, etc. and does not reply to customers' retweets or is not looking to interact with the customers. Firms are classified as having two-way communication if they actually ask for customer opinion, provide basic customer support or they talk to their customers via tweets, retweets or favorites, during the first tweets following the launching of their Twitter platform[4].\nEmpirical results: Cumulative abnormal return statistics\nFurther investigations: As an alternative to the Heckman model, we used a 3SLS regression system with a two-way interaction as a first-stage regression and performance (CAR) as a second-stage regression. The results were similar to those obtained with the Heckman model enhancing our confidence in the findings. So far, we argue that investors observe the launching event of a social media platform, and respond to the choice of one-way messaging versus two-way interaction strategy within the first days of the use of Twitter. In further investigations, we investigate the effect of the launching of Twitter on market liquidity using the number of trades and the average size per trade, used as proxies for market liquidity, for the entire sample and for both contaminated and uncontaminated subsamples. Our results indicate that the choice of interactive social networks is likely to attract investors and promote trading activities. Thus, investors pay attention to the launching of Twitter, which provides support for our basic assumption and corroborates our study of the market reaction. These results are not provided owing to space constraints but are available on request.\nDiscussion: Using the example of Twitter, the present research shows that investor reaction is not significant around the launching of a Twitter platform for the overall sample, but the effect is positive and significant in the case of the uncontaminated subsample that is of interest. Moreover, there is evidence of a positive and significant association between the market reaction and the endogenous choice of using a Twitter social media platform. Empirical results also suggest that firms with positive market momentum (higher historical market performance and lower standard-deviation than the market portfolio) are more likely to use a two-way interaction strategy, and this is also higher in the case of firms announcing positive corporate earnings around the launching of their Twitter platforms, i.e. within the contaminated subsample[14].\nManagerial implications: This research helps firms understand the value relevance of social media strategies and the role played by two-way interaction and reciprocity rather than one-way messaging in marketing and community building. Firms that are planning to launch a social media strategy can benefit from our findings: They should interact and reciprocate when communicating with the community, as this increases social interaction, which in turn results in a higher market reaction, i.e. firm value. Our results indicate a positive and significant average market reaction of 2.1 per cent during the 10-day period around the launching of a Twitter platform for firms with a two-way interaction, which is significantly higher than that of firms with one-way messaging (-0.6 per cent, on average).\nLimitations and directions for future research: In terms of limitations, the present paper refers to the EMH and considers that investors are able to predict the effect of the launching of a Twitter platform on future cash flows of the firm and firm value. However, the adoption of a new marketing strategy by a firm is more likely to affect its intangible assets, i.e. brand equity and customer loyalty, which might result in long-term value creation. Moreover, all investors are not experts in marketing developments and in social media strategies. As such, they may not perfectly and accurately evaluate the association between launching a social media platform and future cash flows (Srinivasan and Hanssens, 2009). Also, investors might be subject to hyping and as a result exhibit irrational behavior or exaggerated reaction in response to specific marketing developments (Sirri and Tufano, 1998). Thus, future work should examine the long-term association between social media activities and both operating and market performance.\nContributions: Recently, there have been several articles in marketing and finance journals that have investigated stock market reaction and the effect on stock prices of overall marketing and specific marketing activities. Specific aspects of marketing that have been investigated include the roles of advertising (Xiong and Bharadwaj, 2013), brand acquisition, quality and rating (Luo et al., 2013), product innovation (Srinivasan et al., 2009), channel expansion (Homburg et al., 2014) and customer equity and customer satisfaction (Merrin et al., 2013). However, our research is different than published research on this topic in that it examines the impact on stock prices of the introduction of a specific social media platform, i.e. Twitter.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Social media have recently become an important strategic marketing tool to increase firm value. Based on an integrated theoretical framework, this study aims to examine the market reaction at the time of the creation of a Twitter platform for 312 firms from the Fortune 500 firms.\nDesign/methodology/approach: To test the hypotheses related to the effect of social media platforms on firm value, the event history analysis (EHA) was used, also known as event study, usually designed to examine the impact of a historical phenomenon for the US Fortune 500 firms that developed a Twitter platform.\nFindings: A significant market reaction was found around the starting date of Twitter activities for the subsample of firms that are not contaminated by any other corporate announcements, but not for the overall sample. The market reaction is higher for firms with two-way interaction strategies rather than one-way messaging in both the uncontaminated subsample and the overall sample. It is higher in smaller firms, firms with losses and those with a family and/or a dominant shareholder. Further, firms in the contaminated subsample are likely to follow a two-way strategy after a positive revision of their earnings per share. We have run several robustness checks, including cross-validation on a holdout sample, and these findings remain consistent.\nResearch limitations/implications: The integrated theoretical framework is another significant contribution. To our knowledge, this is the first study across disciplines that integrates the social exchange theory (SET), social representation theory (SRT), social network analysis (SNA), social identity theory (SIT), signaling theory (ST) and the impression management theory (IMT) into one framework that is built around information as a resource and social interaction.\nPractical implications: The results suggest that Twitter can be used to add value if firms interact and reciprocate with the various stakeholders.\nSocial implications: Firms using social media must interact and reciprocate with the various stakeholders.\nOriginality/value: This research is different than the published research on this topic in that it examines the impact on stock prices of the introduction of a specific social media platform, i.e. Twitter. The present results of the paper add to the prior research on database marketing and show that marketing \"with\" the customer is adding more value than marketing \"to\" the customer. The use of the net extends the scope of database marketing into a certain form of interaction marketing with \"face-to-face\" interaction within the relationships between the firm and its customers. Finally, the conditions under which social media platforms are used in an interactive manner are shown, and depicts that firms are more likely to use a two-way interactive strategy following a one-year period of positive momentum.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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Why do borrowers default on online loans? An inquiry of their psychology mechanism
|
[
"Default intention",
"Microloan",
"Credit assessment",
"Psychology",
"Negative affects",
"General strain theory"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Online microloans are rapidly expanding financial services that hinge on risk assessment as their core competitive strength. However, microloan lenders face a higher credit risk (i.e. default risk) due to the lack of borrower's official credit history and feasible debt-collection practices for small loans (Luo et al., 2017). In the United States, the default risk of microloans is 2.279 times higher than that of traditional loans (Serrano-Cinca et al., 2015). Therefore, the ability to evaluate the credit risk of borrowers is key to the viability of the burgeoning microloan market (Iyer et al., 2015).Researchers have made great strides in credit risk prediction. Many studies have proposed various factors to predict borrowers' default behavior. Most of these factors are non-psychological predictors. Specifically, loan characteristics like loan size and interest rate (Everett, 2015), borrowers' hard characteristics such as credit history and demographic information (Iyer et al., 2015; Lin et al., 2013), and their soft characteristics such as social capital (Lin et al., 2013) and external macroeconomic factors (Bellotti and Crook, 2009), have all been used in previous credit-assessment models to screen borrowers.However, we believe the psychological mechanisms of default behavior is understudied in previous research. Most prior research adopted a data-driven approach without a theoretical underpinning (e.g. Huang, 2011; Lin et al., 2013) and was predictive rather than explanatory in nature. Identifying the underlying psychological mechanisms can offer a theoretical explanation of deviant credit behavior. An exceptional study by Tokunaga (1993) proposed that self-efficacy, attitude toward money and sensation-seeking can explain consumer credit behavior. Lea et al. (1995) suggested that social support and social comparison also affect one's credit use. Unfortunately, a theory-based and systematic exploration of the psychological mechanism in deviant risk behavior is lacking.In sociology and criminology, deviant behavior is \"any behavior or physical appearance that is socially challenged and condemned due to its departure from the norms and expectations of a group\" (Ferrante, 1992). In the microloan context, when a borrower's repayment for an installment is overdue for 90 days or more (Schuermann, 2004), it is regarded as a default behavior (Lin, 2009). A default behavior violates not only the social norm that one shall repay a debt but also the legal contract between a lender and a borrower (Macionis and Gerber, 2010; McCaghy et al., 2016). Therefore, default on a loan is a typical deviant credit behavior.This study suggests that the general strain theory (GST; Agnew, 1992) in criminology offers an adequate theoretical lens to explain the default behavior in the microloan context. It encompasses the psychological factors identified in the prior literature. It also offers a more comprehensive and staged psychological mechanism of deviant behavior by identifying the strains (i.e. stress factors), consequent affective reactions (i.e. negative affects) and constraint factors (Agnew, 2001, 2010). Based on the general framework of the GST and relevant credit behavior literature, this study attempts to investigate the following research question: \"How do stress factors, negative affects, and constraint factors work together to explain borrowers' default behaviors in the microloan context?\"We collected and analyzed data from an online survey of 713 valid subjects. A two-stage structural equation model was proposed to test the research model. The results suggest that borrowers' economic and social strains lead to negative affects including life dissatisfaction, perceived unfairness, inferiority feeling and loneliness. These strains and negative affects have a considerable effect on default behavior. In addition, moral norm plays a moderating role in the relationship between strains, negative affects and default behavior, whereas perceived deterrence only shows a strong main effect. This study is among the first to provide an integrated theoretical model to explain the psychological mechanism of borrowers' deviant credit behavior. Practitioners might collect strain factors, negative affects and constraint factors of borrowers to inform their credit decision. They can also design a communication mechanism based on moral norm and perceived deterrence identified by this study to reduce default.The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 reviews the relevant literature. Section 3 introduces our research model and hypotheses. Section 4 explains the research design and empirical results of our online survey. Section 5 summarizes the findings and discusses the implications and limitations of this study.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Factors for default behavior\n3. Research model and hypotheses: 3.1 Research model\n4. Research method and data analysis: 4.1 Instrument development\n5. Implications and conclusion: This study seeks to investigate the psychological mechanism of the default behavior of online microloan borrowers. Based on the GST framework and the literature on credit behavior, this study identifies economic pressure and socialization difficulty as two main stress factors, life dissatisfaction, perceived unfairness, inferiority feeling and loneliness as negative affects and moral norm and perceived deterrence as constraint factors. This study also proposes a contextualized two-stage model to specify the relationship among these factors.The online survey of microloan adopters and potential adopters largely supported the psychological mechanisms of borrowers' default intention. In the first stage of the model, the results demonstrated that the two strains, economic pressure and socialization difficulty, affect four negative affects (i.e. life dissatisfaction, perceived unfairness, inferiority feeling and loneliness) with the exception of the relationship between socialization difficulty and perceived unfairness. In the second stage of the model, these negative affects have a significant effect on default intention. The moderating role of the moral norm is confirmed, whereas perceived deterrence has a significant main effect but not a moderator effect. We summarize our findings in Table 9.The theoretical contributions of this study are multifold. First, this study introduces GST from sociology and criminology to information systems research to explain default behavior in the microloan industry. This study contextualizes the GST framework with the most relevant strains, negative affects and constraints in the microloan context. Many factors such as socialization difficulty, life dissatisfaction, perceived unfairness and loneliness have been alluded to in prior literature without proper conceptualization. The contextualized model offers a comprehensive and staged psychological mechanism to explain deviant behavior. Second, in prior studies, the predictive models in credit assessment have focused on objective measures of loans and borrowers, but overlooked the psychological mechanism. Although a few studies on credit behavior have explored some psychological factors such as the perceived financial strain (e.g. Perez-McCluskey, 2002), they are not systematic. This study integrates and expands the relevant psychological factors identified in previous credit behavior literature. Finally, our results also reveal the intricate relationship among these factors, hence offers a nuanced explanation of the psychological mechanism to default intention. The result supports a two-staged path from strain factors to negative affects and then to default intention. It also reveals the moderating role of moral norm. These causal mechanisms have not been tested in prior literature.This study bears critical implications for the current practice. First, practitioners may use the stress factors and negative affects identified by this study to improve borrowers' credit assessment. There are two ways to utilize these factors. Before a loan application, a loan platform may collect potential borrowers' response and construct a risk score. If potential borrowers' response is not expected to be truthful, an independent third-party may offer such an assessment service within legal constraints. Second, the study also suggests that practitioners could appeal to moral norm to mitigate default behavior. While legal deterrence is well-adopted in communication with borrowers, the appeal of the moral norm is much less practiced. This study offers a new communication perspective.The findings of this study should be interpreted alongside its limitations. First, although the indirect questioning technique is a reasonable choice in data collection (Simon and Simon, 1974), it can only mitigate but not eliminate social desirability bias. Future research may consider the design of a field experiment to verify the validity of our findings. Second, in a microloan setting, borrowers usually lack a credit history. The effect of stress factors and negative affects is more salient when the credit history data is unavailable. With the presence of a borrower's credit history, the added value of these factors needs to be further verified. Third, if stress factors and negative affects were to be constructed from borrowers' online user traces such as blogs and online posts, machine learning methods would be needed and the prediction value of the algorithm-induced psychological factors needs to be verified.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: In the online microloan market, the ability to evaluate the credit risk of borrowers is key to business success. Based on the general strain theory, this study proposes a contextualized two-stage model with stress factors, negative affects and constraint factors to explain the psychological mechanism of borrowers' default behaviors.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An online survey is conducted to test the hypotheses. We collect and analyze 713 valid responses through a structural equation model.\nFindings: (1) Economic and social strains experienced by borrowers can cause four types of negative affects: life dissatisfaction, perceived unfairness, inferiority feeling and loneliness; (2) Both strains and negative affects have a considerable effect on borrowers' default intention; (3) Moral norm plays a negative moderating role in the relationship between strains, negative affects and default behavior, whereas perceived deterrence shows a strong main effect.\nOriginality/value: (1) This study introduces the GST from sociology and criminology, and contextualizes it in the microloan context to explain default behavior; (2) This study provides a comprehensive and staged psychological mechanism to explain deviant behavior; (3) This study bears critical implications for the current practice in credit assessment and default prevention.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
The destructive forces of human resources - turning people management and development initiatives into positive impactors
|
[
"Human resource management",
"Governance",
"Organizational design"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Over the past ten years we have seen a growth in human resource (HR) mini functions, where related responsibilities have grown in individual significance, independent of each other. A lack of coordinated people related support, defensiveness and self justification, lack of consequence management, lack of collaboration to maximize the impact of people related activity, HR talking to HR, and the following of fads and fashions, have all contributed to a reduction in credibility and contribution. As HR seeks a seat at the top table it may have, through the attempted establishment of its own importance, lost the right to be there. The significance of individual departments within the HR function have increased, however not in the context of the potential and power of a total contribution-and in doing so may have even reduced the overall impact of HR.\nWhat can be done?: Specialists must not be too precious. However, if they are truly business focused, have a depth of knowledge that demands respect, measures that demonstrate genuine business value, a managed communication framework, and a desire to succeed as part of the team, then the concept of a truly coordinated HR function can realize its value. Such a team would see a business partner playing in central midfield-collecting, using, and distributing the ball, simplifying play with the trust to let go and let others perform their specialist roles. In sport, people are usually in either attack or defense and specialists. This is similar within business HR, where the two distinguishing roles would be:1. Performance, engagement and capability development.2. People support and employee relations.Tom Peters noted that the world has a surplus of similar companies, employing similar people, with similar educational backgrounds, working in similar jobs, coming up with similar ideas, producing similar things, with similar prices and similar quality - people are and will be the difference. They often have potential capability we may never see!To realize that potential we have to create a climate in which it may grow. Much of this is behavioral but it will be affected by the environment. Part of the environment is organization. There is logic in functions that support people being organized to enable a leveraged contribution of each and that they are fully equipped with specialists who can enable differentiation through people for the organization.As an example:*Recruitment, learning and development (including responsibility for graduate development, executive development, management and leadership development, succession management and talent development, corporate universities or similar, learning resource centers), performance management and reward.*Shared services - policy, administration, people related data management, technology infrastructure for people, diversity, employee relations, legislation application, wellness.The exact split will be determined by the needs of the individual organization, their level of people management maturity, the flexibility of interaction and the point at which business and support functions meet.Individual functions that identify, recruit, develop, and support people need to be clear on their purpose, understand their performance imperatives, and be comfortable wherever there is overlap.\nWhat are we trying to do?: I would suggest a working definition I have found useful over the past few years - through people, the organization will seek differentiation with improved productivity and performance, enhanced engagement of employees (and subsequently customers), better than the competition levels of capability - now and in the future. We are here to help them do so by creating a working environment and climate that encourages our people to contribute in the best possible way they can - every day (e.g. learning and development - create a learning culture and provide opportunities to learn the right things as easily as possible and relate those opportunities to performance, engagement and capability development). Policy - create working policies and practices that encourage greater engagement, ease of management, sense of belonging and purpose. These are two examples of how at a high level definition we can clarify our purpose.For the individual departments and for the wider functions we have also developed a checklist to ensure that their view of purpose is in line with that of the business as a whole. The checklist considers:*alignment;*integration;*governance;*efficiency;*effectiveness; and*sustainability.As we review this checklist we consider processes, overlaps, handovers, quality of decision making, culture and co-ordination to establish the strength of the proposition and to identify what can be done to take contribution forward. This will include how to organize to maximize impact across teams and implementation approaches.At the heart of my own view of the underlying mindset required to ensure HR succeed in the implementation of initiatives is a statement given to me by Frank Dick OBE, the former Head Coach of British Athletics:The concept of personal responsibility can only be related when everyone is first accountable for their actions, behaviors and relationships to the mission or purpose and not the agenda of others (or themselves).It is my belief that if we are in HR then we should enjoy other peoples' success and encourage such a desire to achieve with others. For this to happen we have to work with honesty, trust and a sense of fairness when credit is being celebrated.HR is in danger of killing itself as it strives to justify itself. As it does so we see failed initiatives and disengagement all around. The confusion, and resultant inefficiency, that has led many to refer to HR as \"human remains\" will only be alleviated when those of us within HR are comfortable with simplicity. Simplicity is hard to achieve. It requires a depth of knowledge and comfort with the subject to accept the hidden logic.Thus we have to take responsibility for our own performance and to ensure that we recognize that such a performance may be enhanced with help from specialists. We have to enable specialists to be close to the business and to allow them to contribute. We need to identify where true specialists are able to lead strategy together rather than to compete and create the climate within HR that role models its own contribution so that others can see how it might work for them. This is the first step in turning people management and development initiatives into positive impactors.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this article is to provide consideration for debate with respect to the role of specialists in HR and people support and development roles, their current dilemma and potential solutions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Based upon experience from working at senior levels within FTSE 100 companies over the past 20 years, wider experience gained from benchmark groups and association and institute roles. The paper is a reflection on the HR journey in the past ten years, its struggle to justify and its need to contribute.\nFindings: - The intent behind a number of people related initiatives have had variable impact on organization performance, employee engagement and capability levels. The direct contribution of specialists has not always been helped through organization design. The need for depth of knowledge, genuine business application, managed communication frameworks and collaboration across related functions is paramount to taking a grip of HR contribution and maximizing the potential of component roles.\nPractical implications: - Review of HR in terms of alignment, integration, governance, efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability. Additionally a shift in mindset from justifying to contributing through teamwork and collaboration.\nOriginality/value: - The AIGEES framework of review and the consequences in terms of organizing people related functions within organizations to maximize contribution. For anyone working within and having responsibility for HR/ Development functions\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The privacy dyad: Antecedents of promotion- and prevention-focused online privacy behaviors and the mediating role of trust and privacy concern
|
[
"Privacy concern",
"Reputation",
"Business communication",
"Consumer trust"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The internet marketing environment has embraced both customer self-service (e.g., electronic billing and statements, updating of account data, etc.) and customization of services (e.g., customized trading screens, portfolio information and watch lists of online brokers), as well as upselling and cross selling of products and services, all of which rely on an intimate knowledge of customers and their behaviors. Online businesses are using increasingly sophisticated customer relationship management (CRM) tools to drive these strategies and forge lasting relational bonds with their customers to ultimately improve profitability. Online marketers in particular rely on customer willingness to share personal details and behavior information (Peltier et al., 2009; Phelps and Milne, 2009). However, the targeting and customization of marketing messages is often at odds with customer privacy (Caravella, 2007). The marketing literature has long acknowledged this tension between customized interactions enabled through in-depth knowledge of customers and their behaviors, with recent literature considering contemporary issues such as \"data fusion\" of multiple sources of big data and implications for consumer privacy (Lazar, 2015). Consumers have been found to weigh the tradeoff of their privacy with the conveniences and benefits that follow the sharing of information with online entities (Wirtz et al., 2007), a behavior known as the \"privacy paradox\" (KPMG, 2010).\n2. Theoretical framework and hypotheses: RFT examines the different ways that people approach pleasure and avoid pain. According to Higgins (1997), \"The critical characteristic of self-regulation is its approach motivation, the attempt to reduce discrepancies between current states and desired end-states [...] regulatory focus proposes that there are different ways of approaching different types of desired end-states,\" (p. 1281). Those desired end-states fall into two categories: aspirations/accomplishments, which are promotion-focused (i.e. they approach pleasure), and responsibilities/safety, which are prevention-focused (i.e. they avoid pain) (Higgins, 1997).\n3. Method: The hypotheses were tested using a 2 (firm reputation: strong/weak)x3 (communication quality: high/neutral/low)x2 (data sensitivity: high/low) between-subjects factorial design. A questionnaire was administered to undergraduate students of a large research university in Singapore who received course credit in exchange for their participation. Each respondent was randomly assigned to one of the 12 scenarios.\n4. Analysis and results: 4.1. Confirmatory factor analysis and scale reliability\n5. Discussion and conclusions: 5.1. Summary of findings\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the business communication-related variables of reputation, communication quality and information sensitivity are mediated by trust and privacy concern to influence the privacy dyad (i.e. promotion- and prevention-focused privacy behaviors).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Regulatory focus theory (RFT) is used to build a framework to examine antecedents of promotion- and prevention-focused privacy behaviors as well as mediators of these relationships. Hypotheses were tested using a 2 (firm reputation: strong/weak)x3 (communication quality: high/neutral/low)x2 (data sensitivity: high/low) between-subjects factorial design.\nFindings: The findings support the proposed model. Specifically, high reputation and communication quality increased promotion-focused behaviors and were mediated by trust. In contrast, low communication quality and high data sensitivity increased prevention-focused behaviors and were mediated by privacy concern. Consistent with RFT, higher trust led to promotion-focused behaviors such as willingness to invest in the relationship (e.g., by providing information to the service provider and investing time and energy) and loyalty behaviors. Furthermore, higher privacy concerns led to prevention-focused behaviors such as deflective (e.g., using privacy protection measures such as disguising one's IP address and disabling cookies) and defensive behaviors (e.g., taking action to have one's name removed from mailing lists).\nOriginality/value: This study contributes to the literature on customer relationship management, RFT and trust and privacy in an online context.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Expected and experienced quality as predictors of intention to purchase four new processed beef products
|
[
"Purchase intention",
"Beef quality perception",
"Prototypes testing"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The increasingly sophisticated demands of consumers have prompted meat producers to pay more attention to the development of new products. New product development is generally recognised as the basis for profitability and growth in the food sector (Grunert et al., 1997; Schnaars, 1994). In the beef sector, new product development is linked to different production and processing practices which can change the flavour, tenderness and texture of beef cuts. The increasing availability of processed and packaged beef products has added to the general growth in people's interest in these products.\n2. The Total Food Quality Model: Consumer evaluation of food quality is one of the more problematic areas in the study of consumer behaviour (Grunert, 1997). The Total Food Quality Model (TFQM) (see Figure 1) is an attempt to provide an integrative framework that encompasses diverse approaches to analyzing quality perception such as means-end chain theory (Gutman, 1982), multi-attribute theory (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975), the economics of information approach (Darby and Karni, 1973), and the explanation of purchase intention and consumer satisfaction as a discrepancy between expected and experienced quality (Oliver, 1980, 1993). It is considered as a useful framework for the analysis of perceived food quality and of implications for the design of new products by the food industry in order to satisfy the demands and expectations of the consumer (Grunert, 2005). The model proposes two major dimensions along which we can analyse food quality perception. The first dimension is a time dimension: it distinguishes quality perception before and after purchase. The second dimension deals with inference-making. It deals with how consumers infer quality from a variety of signals or cues, and with how consumers find out which properties of a food product are desirable by linking them to basic motivators of human behaviour (Grunert, 2005). According to the TFQM, quality is not an aim in itself, but is desired because it helps to satisfy purchase motives or values.\n3. Previous studies and conceptual framework: A considerable body of research has dealt with consumer perception of the quality of beef. We will here only mention studies that have used the TFQM or similar approaches as a framework.\n4. Materials and methods: 4.1 Products\n5. Analysis and results: Data were analysed by structural equation modelling, involving three steps. First, principal component analyses were applied to explore underlying factor structures within each construct in Figure 2 (using SPSS, Varimax rotation with Kaiser normalisation). The theoretical constructs in Figure 2 are usually multi-dimensional, and several underlying factors were expected for each construct. Based on the exploratory factor analyses, measurement models were estimated (using LISREL 8.7), with the measured variables as indicators of latent constructs for all the four products. These measurement models were estimated in order to confirm and validate the set of latent constructs (factors) obtained in the exploratory factor analysis and to enable further study on the relationship among the latent constructs. The following indices were used to measure the overall model fit: the goodness of fit index (GFI), the comparative fit index (CFI) which is equal to the discrepancy function adjusted for sample size, and the root-mean-square error of approximation (RMSEA). GFI should be close to one (Joreskog and Sorbom, 1993). CFI ranges from 0 to 1 with a larger value indicating better model fit. Acceptable model fit is indicated by a CFI value of 0.90 or higher (Hu and Bentler, 1999). Values of RMSEA=0.05 are typically considered \"close fit\"; values from 0.05 to 0.08 are considered \"reasonable\", 0.08-0.10 are \"mediocre\", and values greater than 0.10 are indications of a \"poor\" fit. Finally, structural models were estimated for the relationships among the latent constructs.\n6. Discussion and conclusion: The purpose of this study was to apply insights from the quality perception literature to an analysis of determinants of purchase intention for new processed beef products. To this end, we have measured cue evaluation, expected quality, expected purchase motive fulfilment and purchase intention before product trial, and then again cue evaluation, experienced quality, experienced purchase motive fulfilment and purchase intention after taste trial.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to explore consumers' perception of quality of new processed beef products and the role of expected and experienced quality in the formation of consumer's purchase intentions. Based on the Total Food Quality Model, a conceptual framework is developed that relates cue evaluation, expected quality, experienced quality, purchase motive fulfilment and purchase intention.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Structural equation modeling is used to test the framework with data from a sample of 201 respondents, involving three steps. First, principal component analyses were applied to explore underlying factor structures within each construct. Based on the exploratory factor analyses, measurement models were estimated, with the measured variables as indicators of latent constructs for all the four products. Finally, structural models were estimated for the relationships among the latent constructs.\nFindings: Results show that cue evaluations, expected/experienced quality and purchase motive fulfilment are all predictors of purchase intention, but that their weight and causal structure differ between purchase intentions before and after trial.\nPractical implications: Implications for the introduction of new beef products are discussed.\nOriginality/value: This paper is an attempt to quantitatively estimate the relationships between quality cues, expected and experienced quality, and purchase motives as determinants of purchase intention for new products using structural equation modeling.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Understanding the basics of SFAS 109
|
[
"Accounting",
"Accounting standards",
"Liability",
"Taxes"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The Statement of Financial Accounting Standards (SFAS) 109, Accounting for Income Taxes, serves as the bridge between financial and income tax accounting. With numerous tax laws and their almost continuous revisions and updates, calculating and reporting an annual income tax provision has never been more challenging. SFAS 109 establishes the financial accounting and reporting standards for the effects of federal, state and foreign income taxes. This results from a business' activities.\nOverview of FIN 48: FIN 48 was issued July 13, 2006, and is effective for all entities - taxable as well as tax-exempt - that issue GAAP financial statements for fiscal years beginning after December 15, 2006. SEC registrants, however, must disclose the effect of FIN 48 earlier due to SEC's Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 74. Returns that have been filed, or should have been filed, in all jurisdictions in which a company has a taxable presence are subject to FIN 48 rules. FIN 48 is now incorporated into FASB Accounting Standard Codification 740. Prior to the changes in the accountant standards numbering system a financial interpretation clarify, explain or elaborate on what was previously known as FASB statements.FIN 48 is expected to increase transparency in financial statements with respect to tax matters. That transparency should enhance relevance and comparability in financial reporting. FIN 48 accomplishes its goal through several steps:*recognition;*measurement;*disclosures; and*presentation.\nRecognition: FIN 48 identifies the \"tax position\" in an income tax return and provides guidance on determining the unit of account. Preparers of financial statements should consider the level at which an entity accumulates tax return information and the level at which an entity expects tax authorities to address tax issues upon exam. Sometimes the unit of account may be determined at a consolidated group, other times the unit of account may be determined at an individual company level. Since this determination is a facts-and-circumstances-driven decision, good documentation of the facts and conclusions is important.The second step in recognition is the identification of a tax position. A tax position refers to a position taken in a previously filed tax return or a position expected to be taken in a future tax return that is reflected in measuring current or deferred income tax assets and liabilities for interim and annual periods. FIN 48 indicates that a tax position also includes, but is not limited to, the following:*decisions not to file tax returns;*allocations or shifts of income between tax jurisdictions;*characterizations of income;*decisions to exclude types of income from tax returns; and*decisions to classify transactions, entities, or other positions as tax-exempt.This broad definition of a tax position necessitates a system of data gathering, analysis, and verification that may be above and beyond the systems currently in place.Initial recognition of the financial statement effects of a tax position occurs when the identified tax position has a \"more-likely-than-not\" probability - a more than 50 percent chance - of being sustained on examination. The concept of \"being sustained\" means making it through to the final level of appeal or litigation on the tax position's technical merits, assuming the examining jurisdictions has full knowledge of all facts and circumstances.Tax positions contained in filed returns must be considered until all of the respective statutes of limitations have closed with respect to that return. In many jurisdictions, the statutes of limitation do not apply if a return has not been filed. Therefore, there may be no limit to the number of open years in which a tax position must be evaluated.\nMeasurement: Should a tax position meet the more-likely-than-not threshold, it is subsequently measured as the largest amount of tax benefit that is greater than 50 percent likely of being realized upon settlement. Measurement includes a consideration of different probabilities and outcomes, using the best information available as of the reporting date. The reporting date is the date of the entity's most recent statement of financial position. Appendix A of FIN 48 illustrates the charting methodology of the \"cumulative probability of occurring.\" That framework identifies the possible outcomes, the probability of each possible outcome, and the cumulative probability of the outcomes.Subsequent recognition, derecognition, and measurement of unresolved tax positions must occur at each balance sheet date. Considerations include the factors initially underlying the sustainability assertion and the measured amounts of the recognized tax benefit. Subsequent developments in relevant sources of authorities should be considered. A different assessment must be supported by changed law or circumstances.A new area of consideration is interest and penalties. FIN 48 requires the accrual of interest and penalties that would be assessed under relevant tax law if the uncertain tax position is not sustained. Interest will start to accrue for financial statement purposes in the period it would begin to accrue under applicable tax law. The interest expense recognized is the amount determined by applying the applicable interest rate under law to the difference between the tax positions recognized in the financial statements and the amounts previously taken, or expected to be taken, in a future tax return.Keep in mind, there is a difference between tax positions that can be taken on a return and those contemplated in FIN 48. Thus, there is a FIN 48 gap. Treasury Circular 230 and AICPA Statements on Standards for Tax Services No. 1 establish a one-in-three likelihood of a tax position being sustained on its merits for the purpose of signing a return. That 33.3 percent confidence level is different than the 50 percent-plus confidence level for financial statement recognition under FIN 48. That gap is one of the circumstances to which the interest and penalties provisions of FIN 48 apply. A lower level of confidence in a tax position is possible, however, if appropriate disclosure is made with the return.\nDisclosures: FIN 48 adds a number of qualitative and quantitative disclosures. One item that FIN 48 requires to be disclosed is an entity's policy on classification of interest and penalties accrued within the income statement. Total penalties included in the statement of operations for the period also must be disclosed, as well as interest and penalties recognized in the statement of financial position.Another required disclosure is a tabular presentation that reconciles the total amounts of unrecognized tax benefits at the beginning of the period and the end of a period. That table must include the following:*gross amounts of changes in unrecognized tax benefits as a result of tax positions taken in prior periods;*gross amounts of changes in unrecognized tax benefits as a result of tax positions taken in the current period;*amounts arising from decreases in unrecognized tax benefits due to settlements with tax authorities; and*reductions in the amount of unrecognized tax benefits as a result of the lapse in applicable statutes of limitations.In addition, an entity must disclose the total amount of unrecognized tax benefits that would affect the effective tax rate if the benefits were recognized. A description of the tax years that remain open by major tax jurisdictions must also be disclosed.The last detailed disclosure required is of positions for which there is a reasonable possibility that the total amounts of unrecognized tax benefits will significantly increase or decrease within 12 months of the reporting date. Details should include the following:*nature of the uncertainty;*nature of the event that could occur; and*an estimate of the range of the possible change or a statement to the effect that a range cannot be estimated.\nPresentation: FIN 48 provides direction on the proper classification of recognized and unrecognized tax benefits. There will be differences between the tax position amounts taken on an entity's tax return and those taken in the financial statements. A financial statement liability is expected from the unrecognized tax benefits, interest, and penalties. If that liability is expected to be paid within one operating cycle, it should be classified as a current liability. Otherwise, it might be classified as a long-term liability. Liabilities arising from unrecognized tax benefits cannot be commingled with deferred tax balances.Some of the unrecognized tax benefits may affect the tax bases of assets and liabilities included in deferred taxes. FIN 48 can create or modify the temporary differences that form the basis of the deferred tax balance. Interest arising from unrecognized tax benefits may be reported as interest expense or as a component of income tax expense in the statement of operations. Penalties arising from unrecognized tax benefits may be classified as income tax expense or another appropriate expense account. As previously noted, the policy regarding those classifications must be disclosed.\nThe federal and international tax perspective: One of the most intimidating federal tax concerns with FIN 48 is IRS access to tax work papers. The regulation, for all intents and purposes, imposes a documentation standard that provides a blueprint to each entity's uncertain tax positions, effectively structuring an audit plan for the agency. The IRS has the right to request and receive tax accrual work papers, but current policy is to only ask for work papers in select circumstances involving tax positions regarded as tax shelters or certain listed transactions. There has been some discussion at the IRS about changing that policy. Some experts argue the level of transparency established in FIN 48 effectively shifts a significant portion of the burden and cost of IRS income tax examinations to the taxpayer. There is also the fear that the threshold for tax return positions will effectively become the 50 percent level instead of the 33.3 percent threshold detailed in Circular 230 SS10.34(a).FIN 48 also has created some debate about the nature and extent to which tax professionals can provide an entity with tax advice concerning uncertain tax positions. Internal entity employees are excluded from the application of Circular 230 by SS10.35(b)(2)(ii)(D), but external tax practitioners must consider how the Circular 230 rules apply to their activity with respect to client tax provisions. For external tax practitioners, a properly worded engagement letter - as encouraged by Circular 230 SS10.33 - steers the nature and extent of advice away from a \"covered opinion,\" as described in Circular 230 SS10.35(a)(2). There are a few carve-outs under Circular 230 that effectively limit the applicability of the covered opinion rules to advice rendered in connection with uncertain tax position recognition and measurement matters as described in FIN 48.Another difficulty is auditor involvement in FIN 48 determinations. Auditor independence expectations may limit the extent to which an auditor can provide assistance in the determination of the tax provision. There are a number of process and control considerations, too. Sarbanes-Oxley imposed significant internal control expectations on SEC registrants; AICPA's Statement on Standards for Tax Services No. 9 will require systems of quality control over internal tax functions and external tax practices when finalized; and the IRS is expected to strengthen Circular 230 rules for tax practitioners. There is a clear trend toward enhanced transparency, reporting, and control over tax matters. FIN 48 provides an incentive to develop best practices with respect to tax provisions and to get the systems in place to make the process efficient and auditable.In a recent development, the US Internal Revenue Service has created a draft schedule known as uncertain tax positions (UTP), which ask about tax positions that affect US federal income tax liabilities of certain corporations and related parties with more than or equal to 10 million dollars in assets and the issuance of audited financial statements.The reserve created or not created by the financial accountants could be recorded in the financial statements as either a temporary or permanent difference on the financial statement. This schedule properly completed, along with the signing of tax returns under the penalty of perjury could give the Internal Revenue Service a roadmap of where the tax authority could audit the tax return.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to describe the SFAS 109/Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) Accounting Standards Codification 740.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper is an overview of a topic.\nFindings: - SFAS 109 establishes the financial accounting and reporting standards for the effects of federal, state and foreign income taxes.\nOriginality/value: - The paper is a good discussion for non-tax financial executives. It is a valuable read for anyone looking for an introductory paper on the subject.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Governance of systemic risks for disaster prevention and mitigation
|
[
"Risk communication",
"Disaster risk",
"Complex systems",
"Stakeholder engagement",
"Risk governance",
"Public involvement",
"Systemic risks"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Against the backdrop of natural hazards and disaster risks, the Sendai Framework articulates the need for improved understanding of disaster risk in all its dimensions of exposure, vulnerability and hazard characteristics as well as the strengthening of disaster risk governance (UNISDR, 2015). The perspective of systemic risks contributes to these desiderata by providing a comprehensive view of disaster risks. Furthermore, the proposed concept of inclusive governance of systemic risks can improve disaster risk governance. By definition, natural hazards are natural phenomena that have negative effects on humans or the environment (cf. Burton et al., 1993). Natural hazards encompass geophysical and biological activities. Many disasters are temporally and causally related. This is not only the case regarding geophysical hazards, i.e. earthquakes as the precursors of tsunamis, but also regarding biological hazards, i.e. climate change as contributing factor to the spread of diseases. Importantly, disasters can be provoked or affected by anthropogenic processes. While hazards are natural, disasters are not. \"Social processes generate unequal exposure to risk by making some people more prone to disaster than others\" (Hilhorst and Bankoff, 2004, p. 2).\nThe concept of systemic risks: In the understanding of this paper, \"risk\" is a situation or event where something of human value is at stake and where the outcome is uncertain (Rosa, 1998, 2008). The concept of \"systemic risk\" bridges the gap between risk research and complexity science. It denotes properties of risk that gain momentum against the backdrop of a systems perspective. The phrase \"systemic risk\" is used in various scientific disciplines. Its origins stem from economics. From an economic perspective, systemic risk is defined as \"the risk that (i) an economic shock triggers through panic or otherwise either the failure of a chain of markets or institutions or a chain of significant losses to financial institutions, (ii) resulting in increases in the cost of capital or decreases in its availability, often evidences by substantial financial-market volatility\" (Schwarcz, 2008, p. 204). The concept assumes a systems perspective, postulating connections between elements of the system. Failure in one sub-unit or cluster of the system will lead to cascading events in other system units. These cascading events may lead to major disturbance or even complete failure of the whole system. Cascading events are caused by \"trigger events\". Depending on the specific system, these triggers assume different forms, e.g. an economic shock, that will lead to systemic failure (Schwarcz, 2008, p. 198). Systemic risks therefore occur, when a hazard will not only lead to negative effects in parts of the system, but also to failure of the system as a whole (Kaufmann and Scott, 2003, p. 372). On the basis of these assumptions, the OECD Report Emerging Systemic Risks in the twenty-first century, released in 2003, present an interdisciplinary and coherent concept of systemic risks. The report assumes that a risk becomes systemic when a society's essential systems, e.g. telecommunications, infrastructures, health care, are potentially threatened (OECD, 2003, p. 30). This perspective focuses on the perpetuation of society and implies that contextual factors originating in the domains of demography, ecology, technology and socio-economic structures have a significant influence on systemic risks. Furthermore, these contributing factors are often related with each other, leading to interdependencies and increased complexity. These interdependencies impede comprehensive risk analysis and, consequentially, pose a major stumbling block for risk management.\nInclusive risk governance of natural hazards: a systemic perspective: Governance of natural hazards needs to pay close attention to the interactions between human-induced and natural hazards. The five characteristics of systemic risks do not only challenge scientific investigation, but also, and foremost, society as a whole. Consequentially, the stakes for governance of natural hazards as triggers for systemic risks are high and inclusive strategies of governance are called for. Inclusive risk governance puts the paradigm of inclusive governance into practice for decision-making processes relating to risks. Inclusive risk governance incorporates expert, stakeholder and public involvement as a core feature. Inclusive risk governance goes beyond traditional risk analysis to include the involvement and participation of various stakeholders as well as considerations of the broader legal, political, economic and social contexts in which a risk is evaluated and managed (Klinke and Renn, 2010). Inclusive risk governance is based on the assumption that all stakeholders have something to contribute to the process of risk governance and that mutual communication and exchange of ideas, assessments and evaluations improve the final decisions rather than impeding the decision-making process or compromising the quality of scientific input and the legitimacy of legal requirements (Renn and Schweizer, 2009, p. 175). It is assumed that evidence-based risk analysis provides a nearly complete picture of all the scientific facts needed for risk characterisation and risk management. Inclusion of stakeholders and civil society is expected to make available a normative yardstick for evaluating risk characterisations and management options. In simple terms, the task of inclusive risk governance is to reconcile facts with values.\nPre-assessment: The first part of pre-assessment consists of framing the risk issue. Problem framing analyses the reasons why a phenomenon is labelled as a risk and which concepts and images of the risks and benefits are introduced into the debate by the various actors involved. Usually major societal actors, such as governments, the scientific community, the industry and civil society, frame risks differently. Pre-assessment therefore aims at capturing \"the various perspectives on the risk, its associated opportunities, and potential strategies for addressing it\" (IRGC, 2017, p. 11). Pre-assessment of natural hazards needs to take into account the various interrelationships between these hazards and other kinds of risks. Problem framing in this context already requires an understanding of the intricate interdependencies that in combination constitute the systemic character of these risks. In short, the phase of pre-assessment conceptualises the dimensions and the context in which the respective risk is embedded considering various framings. Most importantly, in the case of natural hazards such as a tsunami, pre-assessment focuses on the establishment of mechanisms for detecting early warning signals and for determining the scope as well as extension of the destructive forces, and scientific conventions for interpreting their impact.\nAppraisal: risk assessment and concern assessment: Risk appraisal includes two major components, i.e. risk assessment and concern assessment. Risk assessment establishes the scientific link between risk agent(s) and consequence(s). The final output of risk assessment is the estimation of a risk with regard to probability distributions of modelled consequences. In order to achieve this goal, three core components have to be assessed: the identification and estimation of hazard, the appraisal of exposure and vulnerability, and the estimation of risk.\nCharacterisation and evaluation: This phase of the governance process consists of knowledge characterisation and risk evaluation. In this phase, the decision has to be made whether a risk is acceptable, tolerable or intolerable. This judgment is made on the basis of the characterisation and evaluation of risk. Acceptable activities offer benefits with negligible risks. Risk reduction is therefore unnecessary. Tolerable activities are pursued for their benefits yet require additional risk reduction efforts. Intolerable activities are prohibited or substituted. This judgement on the tolerability, acceptability and the need for risk reduction measures are based on knowledge characterisation. Knowledge characterisation is an essential element of the governance process. During the whole governance process, and especially during the appraisal phase, much knowledge on the risk issue in question is accumulated. The knowledge characterisation phase entails a close examination of all acquired knowledge. Furthermore, this phase identifies the main characteristics and challenges for the governance of specific natural hazard with regard to complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity. In this context, complexity refers to the difficulties policy makers or risk managers encounter when identifying and quantifying the causal links between a multitude of potential causes and specific adverse effects. Uncertainty prevails if the strength of confidence that the risk assessor can ascribe to the proposed cause and effect chain under consideration is challenged. Put another way, uncertainty increases when complexity cannot be resolved by scientific methods. Ambiguity denotes the variability of (legitimate) interpretations and normative implications based on identical observations or data assessments. In the case of systemic risks, the phase of knowledge characterisation is an especially challenging task due to the systemic interrelations and interdependencies that distinguish these risks from other, epistemologically less puzzling risks.\nManagement: All the information gathered in previous phases is combined in the management sphere. Especially the results of characterisation and evaluation are the basis for designing appropriate risk management strategies. Risk management aims at the design and implementation of actions and remedies required to avoid, retain, reduce or transfer the risk. This phase consists of decision making and implementation. Decision making includes option identification and generation, option assessment, as well as option evaluation and selection. Option identification and generation discovers potential management options for risk reduction. Option assessment investigates the future impact of each management option on economic, technical, social, political and cultural dimensions. Option evaluation then assesses these options by means of multi-criteria analysis. Based on the results of option evaluation, the best management option is selected. The second major part of the risk management phase deals with the implementation of the previously selected risk management option. Therefore, risk management implementation deals with option realisation, monitoring and control, as well as feedback from real-world risk management practice.\nCommunication: Risk communication is a necessary and desirable activity, which is partly mandated by governmental laws and regulations, and partly required by stakeholder demand and public pressure. In the light of new activism by consumer and environmental groups, private companies as well as governmental agencies feel obliged to provide more information and guidelines for policy makers, interested parties, the media and the public at large. This approach is embedded in the legal and political paradigm that enforces openness and the \"right to know\" policy framework.\nPolicy implications: In the spirit of the Sendai agreement and informed by the literature on systemic risks, we would like to put forth the following recommendations for dealing with natural hazards which exhibit the characteristics of systemic risks:\nConclusions: The threat of systemic natural risks is growing worldwide, despite all efforts to mitigate effects. Society needs more appropriate methods to cope with such natural risks. New approaches are necessary to monitor risks, assess them across disciplines, and manage them in an effective and efficient manner. The IRGC framework proposed in this paper presents a pragmatic solution to this challenge. Due to the integrative and adaptive nature of the framework, managers can accomplish response systems that meet the criteria of an effective, efficient and sustainable disaster response.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Systemic risks originate in tightly coupled systems. They are characterised by complexity, transboundary cascading effects, non-linear stochastic developments, tipping points, and lag in perception and regulation. Disasters need to be analysed in the context of vulnerabilities of infrastructure, industrial activities, structural developments and behavioural patterns which amplify or attenuate the impact of hazards. In particular, disasters are triggered by chains of events that often amplify and also multiply damages. The paper aims to discuss these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper applies the concept of systemic risks to disasters more precisely to the combination of natural and human-induced disasters. The paper refers to the International Risk Governance Council's Risk Governance Framework and applies this framework to the systemic aspects of disaster risks.\nFindings: The paper maps out strategies for inclusive governance of systemic risks for disaster prevention and mitigation. Furthermore, the paper highlights policy implications of these strategies and calls out for an integrated, inclusive and adaptive management approach for the systemic aspects of disaster risks.\nOriginality/value: The paper fulfils the identified need to analyse disaster risks in the context of vulnerabilities of infrastructure, industrial activities, structural developments and behavioural patterns which amplify or attenuate the impact of hazards.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Market orientation, learning orientation, and the performance of nonprofit organisations (NPOs)
|
[
"Ghana",
"Non‐profit organizations",
"Market orientation",
"Organizational performance",
"Learning orientation",
"Organizational learning"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Marketing scholars accept that market-oriented organisational change is an important way of achieving a competitive advantage (Narver and Slater, 1990). From this perspective, organisations that are market oriented are expected to experience superior performance measured in terms of return-on-assets, employee satisfaction, and customer satisfaction (see Narver and Slater, 1990; Jaworski and Kohli, 1993), among others. Yet other scholars posit that market orientation is insufficient to gain a competitive advantage (e.g. Day, 1994a; Slater and Narver, 1995; Baker and Sinkula, 1999). Specifically, it is stipulated that market orientation only enhances performance when it is coupled with learning orientation (Slater and Narver, 1995). Researchers have searched vigorously for empirical evidence to test the interrelationship between market orientation, learning orientation, and organisational performance (see e.g. Sinkula et al., 1997; Farrell, 2000; Keskin, 2006; Lee and Tsai, 2005; Ferrell et al., 2008). Although the various authors concur in pointing out the necessary relationship between market and learning orientations in for-profit organisations, this relation is scantly evidenced in the nonprofit sector (Hurley and Hult, 1998).Nonprofit organisations (NPOs) are witnessing constant changes (see Balabanis et al., 1997; Brooks, 2003; Trautmann et al., 2007), with the implication that managers must \"think more strategically, transform insights into effective strategies, and develop rationales paramount to the adoption and implementation of selected strategies [...]\" (Prugsamatz, 2010, p. 244). With these trends, the adoption of market and learning orientations could be crucial for successfully managing the impact of changes in the nonprofit sector. Previous NPO studies have examined, among other things antecedents and consequences of market orientation (e.g. Wood et al., 2000; Cervera et al., 2001; Vazguez et al., 2002; Shoham et al., 2006; Carmen and Jose, 2008), organisational learning (e.g. Prugsamatz, 2010; Barrett, 2000; Ebrahim, 2005), innovation (e.g. Hurley and Hult, 1998; Damanpour et al., 2009), and performance measurement (e.g. Kaplan, 2001; Ritchie and Kolodinsky, 2003). This stream of research has contributed a great deal of insight. Nevertheless, the research question \"how does market orientation dovetail with learning orientation for organisational effectiveness in the nonprofit sector?\" remains unresolved. Indeed, Hurley and Hult (1998, p. 53) urgently call for research \"that pertains to market and learning orientations among nonprofit organisations\".We respond to this call by investigating the mediating role of learning orientation in the market orientation-performance causal linkage utilising a sample of NPOs operating in Ghana. We examine this relationship by recognising that measuring performance in the nonprofit sector does not end on the economic criteria (Barrett, 2000, p. 38), and that non-economic indicators are required for a nuanced understanding of NPO performance. Although some marketing studies have addressed the direct impact of market or learning orientation on both economic and non-economic performance indicators (e.g. Carmen and Jose, 2008; Hishamuddin and Roland, 2009), the mediating role of non-economic indicators in these relations has been ignored. The marketing concept signifies that non-economic performance is a prerequisite for economic performance (Agarwal et al., 2003, p. 78). This would mean that NPOs can attract more financial resources by developing expertise (e.g. market and learning orientations) that allow them to execute their mission-base tasks.Drawing on several theoretical bases, we explicitly theorise this role and support our theoretisation with empirical evidence that improvement in the non-economic performance indicators represents part of the underlying mechanism through which the financial (economic) assurances of market and learning orientations can be capitalised by NPOs. In particular, we highlight that success can be achieved by an NPO through developing a market-oriented change, with a learning orientation, to give the organisation cohesion and focus on its mission-base tasks, thereby, leading to superior financial outcomes.The remainder of the paper proceeds as follows: first, a theoretical explication of the concept of performance measurement in NPOs, market orientation, and learning orientation; second, a review of the link between the constructs of market and learning orientations and NPO performance to develop some hypotheses for subsequent empirical testing; third, a discussion of the relevant methodological approaches; and then a presentation of the study's findings, implications, and suggestions for future research.\nTheoretical background: NPOs and performance measurement\nHypotheses development: It is argued that market orientation alone may be insufficient for organisational success (Day, 1994a; Slater and Narver, 1995; Baker and Sinkula, 1999). The resource-base view of the firm and the industrial organisation theory seem to provide some explanations to this reasoning. The resource-base view analyses the various resources possessed by the organisation and argues that complementary resources lead to superior performance (see Wernerfelt, 1984; Barney, 1991). Industrial organisation theory (e.g. Aldrich, 1979) also suggests that a tighter fit between firm strategies and firm environments enhances performance. From these theoretical bases, it seems that organisations would manage their relationship with the environment by developing and using behaviours associated with various strategic orientations to increase performance (Celuch et al., 2002; Ferrell et al., 2008).We propose (see Figure 1) that the relationship between market and learning orientations and NPO economic performance is better understood by the mediating link of non-economic performance. Scholars (e.g. Slater and Narver, 1995; Farrell, 2000; Keskin, 2006) have established the positive relationship between market and learning orientations in for-profits. Building on this literature, we put forward that market orientation would affect NPO performance (both economic and non-economic) because of the underlying process through learning orientation. Additionally, drawing on literature in areas such as performance measurement (e.g. Kaplan and Norton, 1996), relationship marketing (e.g. Rust et al., 2004; McMillan et al., 2005), and resource-base view (e.g. Prahalad and Hamel, 1990), we conjecture that learning orientation would affect NPO economic performance through its impact on non-economic performance.Market orientation and performance\nMethodology: Measures\nResults: Demographic characteristics of the sample\nDiscussions: How does market orientation dovetail with learning orientation for organisational effectiveness? and what role does non-economic performance plays in the context of the interrelationship between market and learning orientations and economic performance? According to the present study's results, the impact of market orientation on performance, both economic and non-economic, is better understood through the mediational role of learning orientation. In addition, non-economic performance is the underlying mechanism through which the economic promises of learning orientation can be realised by organisations. Before detailing the study's theoretical and practical implications, it is important to caution that the following limitations may affect the implications of the results: the use of convenience sampling method; the restriction of the study's scope to only the Ghanaian capital; and the reliance on managers' intuitive measures of the research variables, including performance. However, with respect to the latter, we take consolation in the fact that past studies document that managers' intuitive measures of performance approximate objective measures, based on documented facts (see also Dawes, 1999; Bennett, 2005). Additionally, the results of Herman's (1967) one-factor test suggest that these intuitive measures utilised in this study are not associated with common method variance.Another limitation is that the use of ordinary least squares regression to estimate the mediational framework did not allow us to account for the effect of measurement errors. As noted by Baron and Kenny (1986, p. 1177), because they are psychological variables, mediators are likely to be measured with errors. The presence of measurement error in the mediator tends to produce an underestimate of the effect of the mediator and an overestimate of the effect of the independent variables on the dependent variable when all coefficients are positive, as in this study. This caveat can be addressed by a future research that employs a more rigorous approach to data analysis, like SEM, to simultaneously test causal pathways, compare different rival models, and account for measurement errors. In this regard, it is suggested that the study be replicated with larger samples. Further study is also needed to establish the degree to which self-report data about market orientation, organisational learning practices, and performance is consistent with observation or feedback from other sources (e.g. donors, beneficiaries/users, and secondary data sets). A comparative study could be carried out within the same sector, focusing on different business types (see Table I). Furthermore, future research could possibly study other mediator and moderator effects, such as innovation, relationship marketing, and total quality management. Finally, a longitudinal research would be crucial in strengthening causal relationships that have been confirmed in this cross-sectional research.Implications for marketing theory\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Nonprofit organisations (NPOs) are challenged with continuous change, which provides the impetus for adopting organisational change models. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the adoption of market and learning orientations on NPO performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The authors draw on extant management literature to theorise the interrelationship between market orientation, learning orientation, and economic and non-economic NPO performance. Using a survey design, the authors draw a convenience sample of 118 NPOs in Ghana to test their theoretisation.\nFindings: - Evidence is found that although the relationship between market orientation and NPO performance is significant (on both economic and non-economic indicators), what best accounts for enhanced performance is learning orientation. Additionally, non-economic performance mediates the relationship between learning orientation and economic performance.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Replicating the study with larger samples, using objective performance data, and applying more rigorous approach to data analysis, among other things, could significantly improve the generalisability of the results.\nPractical implications: - NPO managers are reminded that non-economic performance (e.g. service or program effectiveness) represents part of the underlying mechanism through which the financial assurances of market and learning orientations can be exploited.\nOriginality/value: - The paper builds on the market orientation literature by theorising and demonstrating empirically a route through which market orientation is related to the firm's financial performance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A systematic literature review of the factors affecting smartphone user threat avoidance behaviour
|
[
"Smartphones",
"Mobile threat",
"Smartphone user behaviour",
"Threat avoidance behaviour",
"Structured literature review"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Background: Mobile phones' processing power and capabilities have developed over time to become \"smartphones\" (Jeon et al., 2011), that provide a rich computing environment. This has made functionality previously limited to personal computers and laptops also available on mobile platforms (Abawajy et al., 2018), which contributes to the increased use of smartphones worldwide.\n2. Research problem: Smartphone security is a \"relatively new domain\" (Das and Ullah Khan, 2016, p. 130). As smartphone users are more exposed to risks than users of traditional mobile phones and computers, there is a need for research within the smartphone context (Williams et al., 2017). Unsafe smartphone user behaviour increases vulnerability to mobile threats and its associated negative consequences (Abdullah et al., 2018). Understanding smartphone user behaviour is therefore increasingly crucial for overall information security (IS) (Zhang et al., 2017) as it is to a great extent dependent on the individual users' behaviour (Nowrin and Bawden, 2018).\n3. Research objective and question: The primary objective of this study is to investigate smartphone user threat avoidance behaviour and answer the following research question:\n4. Research methodology: As the research problem plays a significant role in the determination of a suitable research methodology for pragmatists (Saunders et al., 2019), this study employed a systematic literature review (SLR) to answer the research question. Okoli and Schabram (2010, p. 1) define a SLR as \"a systematic, explicit, comprehensive, and reproducible method for identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing the existing body of completed and recorded work produced by researchers, scholars, and practitioners\". SLRs are secondary studies, dependent on primary research on the topic under review having previously been conducted (Okoli and Schabram, 2010). It contributes to the body of knowledge \"in its dual approach of synthesizing the available material and offering a scholarly critique of theory\" (Okoli and Schabram, 2010, p. 4).\n5. Results and discussion: On analysis it became clear that both factors that influence smartphone users' threat avoidance behaviour positively (drivers) and negatively (challenges) were present. Two separate code groups, namely drivers and challenges, were consequently used for coding purposes. Driver was used for aspects indicated to influence user behaviour positively - i.e. result in more secure behaviour, while Challenge was used where possible justification why smartphone users do not apply proper threat avoidance behaviour was indicated. While the search did not include searching for the words \"driver\" and \"challenge\" specifically, the documents included were read thoroughly and coded for aspects that were indicated to influence smartphone users' behaviour. Table 5 presents the codes that emerged in the coding process as drivers and challenges.\n6. Conclusion and recommendations: This study answers a need for behavioural research into smartphone user behaviour as called for by numerous researchers. The factors that affect smartphone users' threat avoidance behaviour, as identified in this study, can be useful to both researchers and practitioners within the smartphone environment and can serve as a first step to improve unsafe smartphone user behaviour. Understanding the underlying factors that affect smartphone users' behaviour represents an essential step in identify appropriate strategies, measures and tools to mitigate mobile threats (Sombatruang et al., 2019).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: There is a need for behavioural research within the smartphone context to better understand users' behaviour, as it is one of the reasons for the proliferation of mobile threats. This study aims to identify the human factors that affect smartphone users' threat avoidance behaviour.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A structured literature review (SLR) was applied to answer the research question. A total of 27 sources were analysed, from which 16 codes emerged. After synthesis, six themes transpired.\nFindings: Six factors were identified as drivers and/or challenges of smartphone users' threat avoidance behaviour, namely, knowledge and awareness, misconceptions and trust, cost and benefit considerations, carelessness, perceived measure effectiveness and the user's perceived skills and efficacy.\nResearch limitations/implications: The results can encourage and provide a starting point for further research on human behaviour to improve smartphone user behaviour.\nPractical implications: The mobile industry should focus on eradicating common misconceptions and undue trust in mobile security that is prevalent among smartphone users and make cost effective and usable interventions available. Training and awareness programs should be updated to include the factors that were identified in this study to affect smartphone users' threat avoidance behaviour. In addition to improving users' declarative knowledge concerning available smartphone measures and tools, procedural knowledge should also be improved to ensure proper use of available protective measures. Users should realise the importance of staying updated with evolving smartphone technology and associated threats.\nOriginality/value: This study acknowledges and supports the notion that addressing human behaviour is crucial in the fight against mobile threats. It addresses the need for behavioural research to analyse the factors that drive smartphone user behaviour. Furthermore, it uses and documents the use of a SLR, a research technique often unfamiliar among information security researchers.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Executive ethical decisions initiating organizational culture and values
|
[
"Ethical decision",
"Moral philosophy",
"Organizational values",
"Decision assessment",
"Executive decision"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Ethics come into play when decisions determine which entities benefit, and which suffer (Abela and Murphy, 2008; Doh and Quigley, 2014; Micewski and Troy, 2007; Rest, 1986). Entities that may be affected in organizational ethical decisions include individuals, groups (e.g. employees, or members of a market segment), an entire potential market, or even society as a whole. Such decisions are of greatest interest when resources are scarce and cannot be allocated in such a way that everyone benefits. They also hold greater importance in services than in manufacturing industries, because there is a \"need to provide a consistent high-quality customer experience across all the brand-customer interactions and touch-points\" (Sierra et al., 2017, p. 661). Furthermore, according to Sierra et al. (2017), there is a dearth of research regarding ethical decisions in services as compared to goods industries. The goal of the present research is to explore how high-ranking executives in service organizations make ethical decisions that drive culture and values within the organization, and to develop testable propositions based on the findings.\nConceptual development: Layers of ethical decision making\nMethod: The goal of this research was to enhance understanding of how service executives make ethical decisions that impact employees directly and customers indirectly, thereby defining organizational culture and values. Because this topic is exploratory, it was necessary to utilize a qualitative methodology (McDaniel and Gates, 1998). A grounded theory approach was selected because it is appropriate for developing new theory in a natural setting, through open-ended interviews that focus on participants' perspectives. As noted by Bryman (2012, p. 387), \"grounded theory is not a theory - it is an approach to generation of theory out of data\" from the field. The data that are gathered are the verbatim statements of the respondents' views; according to Strauss and Corbin (1990, p. 23), \"a grounded theory is one that is inductively derived [...] one begins with an area of study and what is relevant to that area is allowed to emerge.\" Using analysis methods that include inductive and deductive logic, involving reflective and interpretive thought, \"the research findings constitute a theoretical formulation of the reality under investigation\" (Strauss and Corbin, 1990, p. 24). Thus, in the present research, new theory was generated through studying process, action, and/or interaction in the views of respondents, and the findings are presented in a series of testable propositions.\nResults: This section begins by discussing issues related to sample size, reliability, validity and generalizability, which emerged as the research was conducted. Afterward, it describes details of coding outcomes, starting with themes that resulted from open coding, in which major categories of information were identified. It then presents the results of axial coding, in which relationships began to emerge between the constructs that were identified, through careful memos and thoughtful diagrams. Finally, it sets the stage for the outcome of selective coding, through which the findings of the research were identified in terms of testable propositions to be further examined in future research.\nDiscussion: This section begins by detailing the research propositions that are the outcome of the study. After doing this, it links the layers of ethical decisions described in the conceptual development (see Figure 1) and the research findings.\nConclusion: The present research develops understanding of how successful service executives consider and use different types of information and evaluative processes to make decisions that initiate organizational culture and values. Based on the findings from in-depth interviews with twelve high-level service executives, personal moral philosophy is a core phenomenon; other influences on ethical decisions include both individual and organizational cultures and values. Six propositions for future research are developed in this grounded theory research. Briefly, the research propositions suggest that personal moral philosophies drive selection of decision inputs and use of information, influence outcome assessment, and affect both organizational culture and its impact on ethical decisions. (The Research Propositions are presented verbally in the discussion section, and described visually in Figure 2.)\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Ethical decisions determine which individuals and/or groups benefit, and which suffer. Such decisions by executives impact front-line providers directly and customers indirectly; they are important because repercussions in service interactions feel personal. The purpose of this paper is to fill an important gap in the service literature by exploring how high-level executives make ethical decisions, creating values and culture within an organization; the results include testable propositions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The research used a grounded theory approach, wherein high-level executives in successful service organizations responded through in-depth interviews. Complete interview transcripts were analyzed using standard qualitative methodology, including open coding to better understand and categorize the data, axial coding to seek out crucial relationships between concepts, and selective coding to develop research propositions.\nFindings: Data analysis revealed two groups of interviewees, one more outcome-oriented in decision making and the other more process-oriented. The organizations led by more outcome-oriented executives have strong family-like (or paternalistic) cultures, whereas the organizations led by more process-oriented executives value adaptability and diversity.\nResearch limitations/implications: The executives interviewed are quite successful; therefore, it is not possible to make inferences about unsuccessful executives or those leading poorly performing organizations. Propositions developed relate that process-oriented executives use both analytical measures and intuition in decision making, whereas outcome-oriented respondents rely more heavily on analytical measures.\nPractical implications: Service executives apparently make ethical decisions while focusing either on processes or on outcomes; members of these two groups use different evaluative criteria to identify a successful decision. Decisions relating to people within the organization are perceived by the executives to be especially salient, apparently owing to interpersonal interaction in services.\nSocial implications: There are inherent social implications when ethical decisions are made, because these decisions determine which individuals or groups benefit, and which suffer.\nOriginality/value: This research is among the first to interview high-level service executives about their ethical decision making when their choices define culture and values within their organizations. Findings offer a new look at how differences between executives that focus on processes and those that focus on outcomes may shape organizational cultures and lead to consideration of different criteria in making and evaluating decisions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The digital divide and social inclusion among refugee migrants: A case in regional Australia
|
[
"Social inclusion",
"Digital divide",
"Cross-cultural issues",
"Australia",
"Information",
"Refugee migrants"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: There has been an increased adoption of digital technology in Australia over the last two decades. It is anticipated that most of the information needs of refugee migrants[1] relating to services such as settlement, housing, employment opportunities, health and education will be met through the ongoing rollout of the high-speed National Broadband Network[2] (Broadbent and Papadopoulos, 2013a; Lloyd et al., 2013; Khoir et al., 2014). The ability to access and use broadband internet is therefore becoming a critical aspect of social inclusion.\nLiterature review: The rapid advances in ICT have resulted in a new social order that is having a profound effect on the daily activities of individuals, organisations and society (Warschauer and Matuchniak, 2010). However, there are gaps that separate individuals and societies into those who are able to take advantage of the ICT opportunities and those who are not (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2000). The issues of access to and use of digital technology have given rise to the concept of a \"digital divide\". Digital divide was initially referred to as the gap between those who did and those who did not have physical access to digital technology (initially personal computers and the internet) (Van Dijk, 2006a). Academic and policy debates in the 1990s focused attention on this first-level digital divide between haves and have-nots in terms of material access. With the fast development of ICT, the rapid uptake of networked ICT and a decline in the price of digital technology, the first level of digital divide has significantly narrowed in recent years and has contributed to a significant growth of internet access (Lu et al., 2013; Pedrozo, 2013).\nConceptual framework: The issue of circumventing social exclusion and establishing a more inclusive society through the use of digital technology now forms a basis of academic discourse in social research (Mervyn et al., 2014; Park, 2012; Selwyn, 2004). There is no specific theory underpinning the concept of digital divide. However, the literature has begun to acknowledge the connection of digital divide to the concept of social exclusion (Clayton and McDonald, 2013; Selwyn, 2004), social capital, cognitive and communicative ecology and social stratification theories (Ragnedda and Muschert, 2013; Powell et al., 2010; Van Dijk and Hacker, 2003).\nMethodology: The research was conducted in the regional town of Toowoomba in the state of Queensland, Australia. Toowoomba is located 127 km of west of Queensland's capital city, Brisbane, with a district population of 157,699 in 2012, 10.4 per cent of whom were born overseas. Toowoomba has been nominated as a preferred place for regional refugee migrant settlement. Toowoomba's refugee migrant population is relatively modest, but has been growing rapidly in recent years with arrivals coming from diverse ethnic backgrounds. The city has recently become one of the three local council areas in Queensland to be declared a \"Refugee Welcome Zone\".\nResults: This section reports the findings of four focus group discussions conducted with refugee migrant groups in Toowoomba. The demographic characteristics of the study participants are summarised in Table II. Over 60 per cent of the participants were between the ages of 18 and 34 years. Only about 11 per cent of the respondents were over 55. Nearly 40 per cent of the participants had a certificate or diploma and 14 per cent had attained primary education only. A vast majority of the participants (88.46 per cent) were in the low-income group with household average weekly income of less than $600.\nDiscussion: The results suggest that opportunities to use digital technology can support the social inclusion of refugee migrant groups as most of the research participants viewed broadband internet as an effective means of communication, information exchange, interaction and assimilation in the wider community. Contrary to research that suggests a lack of interest among some people in acquiring internet access (Dutton et al., 2009; Horrigan, 2009), the participants expressed a pressing need for online connectivity. These findings were similar to those in research conducted by Powell et al. (2010) on digital exclusion in low-income American communities. Despite their motivation to adopt the technology, the findings show the main reasons for not using ICT were cost, language and skills. The results suggest that the main barriers in using ICT were mainly social, economic and technical and less a behavioural issue. The research also implies that use of broadband internet can help refugee migrants immensely in applying for jobs, gaining an education, getting access to e-services, social networking and cultural connectivity, the things that form an integral part of the social inclusion process as suggested in other studies (McIver and Prokosch, 2002; Powell et al., 2010).\nConclusion: This study revealed that digital inclusion and social inclusion are interlinked as refugee migrants' information needs influenced their social inclusion in their host community. Refugee migrants viewed digital technology as a vital tool for learning, assimilating with the wider community, accessing education and job opportunities, and contact with family and friends. The research also revealed that socio-economic inequalities and the technology itself were barriers to accessing and using ICT. The results indicated that digital exclusion or digital divide among refugee migrant groups was based on inequalities in material access to ICT, in the literacy skills necessary to use ICT effectively and in the capacity to pay for the services.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors which influence refugee migrants' adoption of digital technology and its relevance to their social inclusion in Australia.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This research developed a conceptual framework keeping the \"use\" of digital technology as the centre-piece of the digital divide. The empirical data were derived from a series of focus group discussions with refugee migrants in an Australian regional city, Toowoomba in Queensland.\nFindings: There is a digital divide among refugee migrant groups and it is based on inequalities in physical access to and use of digital technology, the skills necessary to use the different technologies effectively and the ability to pay for the services. The opportunities to use digital technology could support the social inclusion of refugee migrant groups in the broader Australian community.\nResearch limitations/implications: Further research is required to examine whether this digital divide is unique in the regional context or common to Australian society and to confirm factors that might contribute significantly to refugee migrants' social inclusion.\nOriginality/value: This paper determined the role digital technology can play in building social capital and hence social inclusion among refugee migrant groups. Many of the factors identified as influencing refugee migrants' use of digital technology can inform the Australian government and the information and communication technology industry in devising supportive policies and plans to reduce the risk of social exclusion, alienation and marginalisation among refugee migrant groups.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Prevalence of antibiotic-resistant Salmonella in retail organic chicken
|
[
"Salmonella",
"Organic chicken",
"Antibiotic resistance",
"Class 1 integrons",
"Turkey"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Non-typhoidal Salmonella is a leading bacterial cause of acute gastroenteritis worldwide with around 79 million of salmonellosis and 60,000 deaths (Havelaar et al., 2015). The development and spread of antimicrobial resistance are a major public concern especially for multidrug-resistant pathogenic bacteria such as Salmonella. Infections caused by antimicrobial-resistant bacteria can lead to treatment complications, prolonged hospitalization, and death (Levy and Marshall, 2004; Hampton, 2013; Ventola, 2015). Poultry products continue to be a significant source for antimicrobial-resistant Salmonella and nonresistant Salmonella infections in humans (Wang et al., 2017; United States Food and Drug Administration, 2011; Antunes et al., 2016).Organically produced poultry is a growing market worldwide (Fanatico et al., 2009; Maciorowski et al., 1999; Sayan and Comert Acar, 2019). This growth has been linked to consumer concern with the way conventional poultry is produced as well as the consumer belief that organic poultry is healthier and safer for consumption compared to conventionally produced poultry (Crandall et al., 2009). Moreover, consumers perceive the presence of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in poultry meat is mainly due to indiscriminate use of antibiotics in conventional poultry farms (van den Bogaard and Stobberingh, 2000; Rajashekara et al., 2000; Ford et al., 1981). In Turkey, organic agriculture including organic poultry production is regulated by the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (Sayan and Comert Acar, 2019). Therefore, organic broiler chicken production and sale are certified by the Turkish government authorities (Sayan and Comert Acar, 2019).There are few studies that have evaluated the prevalence and distribution of antimicrobial resistant Salmonella in organic and/or free-range raw chicken meat sold at the retail level. Most of these studies have been conducted in the United States (US). (Lestari et al., 2009; Cui et al., 2005; Melendez et al., 2010). In comparison, more studies on Salmonella and antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes in conventional retail raw chicken meat in different countries worldwide have been conducted (Loo et al., 2012; Donado-Godoy et al., 2014; Jarquin et al., 2015; Qiao et al., 2018; Ta et al., 2014; Yang et al., 2014; M'Ikanatha N et al., 2010; Medeiros et al., 2011). In Turkey, Salmonella prevalence and antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes in conventional raw chicken meat collected from retail markets in different cities/provinces have been reported (Ozbey and Ertas, 2006; Telli et al., 2018; Bilge et al., 2018; Goncagul et al., 2005). According to these reports, the prevalence in conventional retail chicken meat ranged between 18 percent and 51 percent, depending on the type of chicken parts used, sample size, sampling scheme, and isolation and characterization methods. Moreover, it was reported that Salmonella isolates, in general, were highly resistance to trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole, tetracycline, streptomycin, and nalidixic acid. There are limited data available on Salmonella and antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes in organic chicken meat at the retail level in Turkey. Therefore, the objective of this study was to determine Salmonella prevalence, antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes, and their genetic relatedness in frozen organic chicken meat collected from a central retail hypermarket in Diyarbakir (Southeast Anatolia, Turkey) and an online retailer in Turkey.\nMaterials and methods: Study design and sample collection\nResults: Prevalence of Salmonella in chicken samples\nDiscussion: The study addressed Salmonella and their antimicrobial resistance characteristics associated with organic chicken meat at the retail level in Turkey. Based on our findings, the overall prevalence in the organic frozen chicken samples (n=348) was 6.3 percent. Although limited data on Salmonella presence in frozen organic raw chicken meat exist worldwide, multiple studies have determined the prevalence in chilled organic and/or free-range raw chicken meat at the retail level (Bailey and Cosby, 2005; Cui et al., 2005; Lestari et al., 2009). Authors reported in one study that 31 percent (n = 135) of chilled free-range and 25 percent (n = 53) of \"natural\" chicken raw meat samples were Salmonella-positive (Bailey and Cosby, 2005). In another study, Salmonella was isolated from 20.8 percent (n = 53) of organically produced raw retail chicken (Lestari et al., 2009), whereas Cui et al. (2005) found that 61 percent (n = 198) of organically produced raw chicken meat were Salmonella-positive. Salmonella prevalence in frozen chicken meat is generally lower than that in fresh or chilled meat at retail as reported in previous studies (Donado-Godoy et al., 2012; Alali et al., 2012; Yang et al., 2011). In Turkey, while there is no published study that addressed the safety of organic chicken meat, Salmonella presence in conventional raw retail chicken meat has been assessed. Authors reported Salmonella-positive prevalence at 12 percent (n = 250 chicken carcasses) in a study conducted in Elazig province in Turkey (Ozbey and Ertas, 2006); whereas, authors of another study reported 45 percent (n = 20 chicken wing samples) in Konya city, Turkey (Telli et al., 2018). Moreover, Salmonella prevalence in chicken wings in two different Turkish studies was 51 percent (n = 200) (Bilge et al., 2018) and 18.1 percent (n = 315) (Goncagul et al., 2005).When stratifying the data by chicken parts, Salmonella prevalence was the same in chicken breast and drumsticks (10.4 percent) but lower in the leg quarter (2.1 percent) and whole carcass (0 percent). Guran et al. (2017) found that 41 percent (n = 105) of skin-on drumsticks and 12.3 percent (n = 105) of skin-off breast meat were contaminated with Salmonella. Moreover, 33 percent of 187 skin-on chicken breasts were Salmonella-positive as reported elsewhere (Cook et al., 2012). Other studies have shown that whole carcass samples often have substantially lower Salmonella prevalence compared to chicken parts (Khan et al., 2018; USDA, 2012; Ratto Reiter et al., 2007). This is usually due to the cross-contamination and alterations occurring to the whole carcass during the process of cutting up the chicken into parts. Other studies showed the prevalence in chicken parts only.The largest difference in Salmonella prevalence was associated with the retail store type (hypermarket vs. online store). This online store buys large amounts of frozen chickens (whole and parts) and keeps them frozen until they sell, whereas the hypermarket buys frozen chickens in relatively smaller amounts and sells them faster (within a week or two) (personal communication with the retail stores). Moreover, although the samples originated from the same two chicken brands (companies) that supplied the organic chicken samples to both the hypermarket and the online store, the difference in prevalence might be linked to differences in chicken production lots including production date, lot number, and sell-by date. The pairing of chicken packs in this study was conducted within the retail store and not between the retail stores. Other studies have shown that Salmonella prevalence in conventional chicken samples differs significantly by retail store type (Alali et al., 2012; Jarquin et al., 2015), while in other reports, the difference was not significant (Donado-Godoy et al., 2012; Yang et al., 2011; Ta et al., 2012).Although the chickens were produced and processed organically according to the Turkish standards, the prevalence of multidrug-resistant isolates was high (86.3 percent). The most frequent multi drug-resistant Salmonella pattern was to four and five antibiotics. Furthermore, the most common antibiotic-resistant phenotype was amikacin-ciprofloxacin-gentamicin- netilmicin. Nevertheless, all isolates were pan-susceptible to six antibiotics belonging mostly to cephalosporins and carbapenems drug families. The multidrug findings are comparable to other studies that reported antimicrobial-resistant Salmonella isolates from organic chicken (Cui et al., 2005; Lestari et al., 2009) and from conventional retail chicken meat in Turkey (Kasimoglu Dogru et al., 2010; Ata et al., 2015; Telli et al., 2018). The high resistance (100 percent) to ciprofloxacin (drug of choice to treat salmonellosis in human) in this study is a major public health concern.All the isolates were serotype Infantis, genetically indistinguishable (i.e. highly clonal), and 68.2 percent harbored class I integron. Salmonella Infantis is not uncommon in poultry farms and poultry products in Turkey. One study reported that 72.2 percent of Salmonella isolates (n = 267 isolates) collected from broiler farms were serotype Infantis (Sahan Yapicier, 2016). Moreover, multiple studies have addressed the presence and importance of this serotype in poultry production in Turkey (Sahan Yapicier, 2016; Mustak et al., 2017; Karacan Sever and Akan, 2019; Acar et al., 2017). The PFGE genotyping findings suggested a highly clonal pattern (i.e. similarity) of Salmonella isolated from the organic chickens in this study. Given that all the isolates were the same serotype, it is not surprising that they were highly clonal. Furthermore, this might suggest that less diverse population of Salmonella serotypes existed within the organic chicken production of our samples. Interestingly, S. Infantis has been frequently detected in food, animals, and humans in Europe (Gymoese et al., 2019). For instance, in Serbia, authors concluded that S. Infantis isolates from chicken sources (processing plants and farms) were closely related based on their PFGE typing analysis (Velhner et al., 2014). In another study, Pate et al. (2019) in Slovenia showed that the majority of S. Infantis isolates (86.2 percent) of broiler farm source had >90 percent PFGE profile similarity. Moreover, other studies showed high clonality among S. Infantis isolates of broiler farm sources in Iran (Rahmani et al., 2013; Peighambari et al., 2018) and Hungary (Nogrady et al., 2007). Other studies revealed the clonal dissemination of S. Infantis among poultry farms, meat, and human cases (Hauser et al., 2012; Franco et al., 2016).A strong relationship between the presence of integrons and increased resistance to numerous antibiotics has been reported (Canal et al., 2016). Class 1 integron in particular has been found to be the most important contributor to multidrug-resistance in Gram-negative enteric bacteria and plays a major role in disseminating antimicrobial resistance genes (Krauland et al., 2009). Likewise, class 1 integrons are very frequently present in multidrug-resistant Salmonella (Khemtong and Chuanchuen, 2008). Because organic flocks have access to the outdoors, effective biosecurity is much more difficult to achieve, with a higher likelihood of contact with insects, wild birds, and animals. It has been shown that wild birds and animals can become reservoirs of resistant genes through contact with contaminated environmental sources, and in fact, migratory birds, especially waterfowl, may become exposed to antimicrobial resistance from a variety of aquatic environments and may potentially carry resistance genes over great distances (Allen et al., 2010).This study has some limitations: (1) A single central hypermarket store was sampled, which might have limited the representation of other smaller retail store type (e.g. smaller market stores). However, most of the organic chicken meat was not available at smaller stores during the study period. (2) Conducting the chicken sampling in one city (i.e. Diyarbakir in Turkey). However, Diyarbakir is the largest city of Southeast Anatolia Region in Turkey; hence, it gave a good representation of the organic chicken sold there. Due to the study budget limitation, the study was focused on that area. Importantly, the online retailer (another important source of organic chicken meat) was added to enhance the representation of organic chicken meat market in Turkey. (3) The low Salmonella prevalence in frozen organic raw chicken meat has limited exploring the possible serotypes and genetic diversity among the isolates. However, the antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes were diverse and might indicated the dissemination of resistant organisms and traits in the organic chicken production system in Turkey.In conclusion, the overall Salmonella prevalence in frozen organic chicken meat at retail level in Turkey was low. However, the prevalence was highest in the breast and drumstick samples compared to leg quarter and whole carcass samples. Although the prevalence was low, and the chicken meat was organic, the percentage of single and multidrug-resistant Salmonella to some antibiotics was high, particularly to ciprofloxacin (drug of choice to treat salmonellosis in human). The isolates were highly clonal and belonged to one serotype (Infantis), which may indicate low diversity in Salmonella isolates associated with organic chicken meat in Turkey. Our findings may indicate that frozen organic meat sold at retail and through the online retailer was contaminated with Salmonella isolates that expressed high antimicrobial resistance toward a group of medically important antibiotics. Although organic poultry has been viewed by some consumers as a safer option for consumption due to the absence of antibiotic use and animal welfare issues, studies including this research have shown that food safety risk to public health still exists due to the presence of Salmonella and the multidrug-resistant traits it poses.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The objective of this study was to determine Salmonella prevalence, antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes, and their genetic relatedness in frozen organic chicken collected at retail level in Turkey.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Retail packs (n = 348) of cut-up chicken parts (breast, leg quarter and drumstick) and whole chicken carcasses were purchased from a central hypermarket in Diyarbakir (Southeast Anatolia Region in Turkey) and from a large online retailer in Turkey. The retail packs were paired by part type, brand, production date, and sell-by date. The chicken samples were analyzed for the presence of Salmonella spp., and then isolates were screened for antibiotic susceptibility, class I integron, and genetic similarity.\nFindings: Salmonella prevalence in retail frozen organic chicken samples was 6.3 percent; however, the prevalence by parts, leg quarter, drumstick, breast, and whole chicken was 2.1 percent, 10.4 percent, 10.4 percent, and 0 percent, respectively. Salmonella prevalence was significantly higher in samples obtained from the hypermarket (9.2 percent) compared to online retailer (3.8 percent). All the isolates were serotype Infantis, genetically similar (highly clonal), and 68.2 percent harbored class I integron. All isolates were resistant to ciprofloxacin (drug of choice to treat salmonellosis in human), and 86.3 percent of the isolates were multidrug-resistant.\nOriginality/value: Salmonella prevalence in organic chicken meat, regardless of the retail market source in Turkey, may pose a health risk to consumers especially with the high prevalence of multi-drug resistant phenotypes. Findings inform researchers and the public about the safety of organically produced chicken and the potential health risk to consumers.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Getting a low-paid job in French and UK supermarkets: from walk-in to online application?
|
[
"Labour market",
"Recruitment",
"Communication technologies",
"Employees",
"Case studies"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Despite the current recession, the retail sector remains one of the largest sources of employment in European countries. The centrality of retailing to understanding the changes in employment patterns and working conditions is widely accepted, but retail work needs to be explored further (Bozkurt and Grugulis, 2011). A closer look at recruitment practices is especially needed, and this contribution investigates and compares the methods used to fill low-paid positions in large food stores in France and in the UK.\nLiterature background: Institutional factors to explain differences in employment patterns\nMethodology: The cases studied concern two different retail food companies with similar characteristics. The two companies (one in each country) are present on the stock exchange, and both are one of the three largest retail food chains in their respective countries. According to data drawn from the companies' annual reports in 2012, the UK company had more than 1,000 stores and employed 152,000 employees. Two in three were part-time employees. In 2012, approximately 100,000 employees worked in one of the 1,100 stores belonging to the French company. One in four employees was part-time. In both companies, a centralised process was implemented during the second half of the 2000s to fill all of the shop-floor positions in all of the superstores, supermarkets and convenience stores.\nResearch findings: \"Part-time: salary of PS6.71 per hour\"/\"full-time: 13 months paid\"\nDiscussion and conclusions: This paper reveals several findings. On the one hand, it highlights the respective influence of the characteristics of the sector, the employment patterns and labour market institutions on the firm-based recruitment decisions. On the other hand, it questions the recruitment practices - and the shift from the reliance on the walk-in to the online application - for labour market functioning and exclusion.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to compare the recruitment practices of the French and UK retail industry. It analyses the influence of specific business constraints, labour market institutions and employment patterns on recruitment practices. It devotes attention to incidences of the shift from classic to web-based hiring methods.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The cases of two leading food retail chains are explored. This research draws on a mixed approach using semi-structured interviews, the analysis of online job-advertisement content and web sites.\nFindings: According to the literature, local and informal hiring channels (walk-in application, word-of-mouth, in-store adverts) are mainly used to fill low-paid vacancies in food retail chains. They are congruent with the key screening criteria as they allow face-to-face selection and provide candidates from the surrounding area. However, the food retail chains in this research have implemented a centralised and at-a-distance process which contrasts with the classic methods. Based on an \"Internet-only scheme\" and online testing, it is especially selective in the UK.\nResearch limitations/implications: The number of semi-structured interviews is limited. Additional investigations are needed to evaluate whether the at-a-distance processes are isolated or whether they reflect growing practices.\nPractical implications: Retail food employers have to maintain a diversity of local hiring channels and not to indiscriminately embrace the at-a-distance scheme, which is not adapted to evaluate the key requirements.\nSocial implications: A centralised and at-a-distance recruitment process decreases unfair face-to-face discrimination in selection but at the same time introduces indirect discrimination. This process may be interpreted as a way to target students; there is a risk that it exacerbates inequalities in low-wage labour markets.\nOriginality/value: The topic is poorly explored. There is a need to understand web-based recruitment.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Fashion/clothing research: an analysis of three journals
|
[
"Consumer behaviour",
"Research",
"Undergraduates",
"Participants",
"Content analyses",
"Fashion/clothing research"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Periodically scholars reflect on work that has been published in scholarly publications to assess the state of the art in the discipline (Davis, 1984; Hutton, 1984) and to suggest future directions in the field (Lennon and Davis, 1989a, b). This work might focus on a particular research topic (e.g. Fiore et al., 1996; Johnson et al., 2008; Reeves-DeArmond et al., 2011) or be general (e.g. Lennon et al., 1995, 2001; Oliver and Mahoney, 1991). For example, Fiore et al. (1996) focussed exclusively on aesthetics, Reeves-DeArmond and her colleagues focussed on historic dress and textiles, while others (Davis, 1984; Hutton, 1984; Johnson et al., 2008; Lennon and Davis, 1989a, b) focussed on social psychological aspects of dress content.\nSubject matter content: Over time there have been shifts in research foci of fashion/clothing researchers. Chowdhary and Meacham (1983-1984) content analyzed all articles dealing with either textiles or clothing that were published in the Journal of Home Economics (JHE) from 1911 to 1980 and HERJ, the predecessor of FCSRJ, from 1972 to 1980. In addition to research articles, they analyzed general articles, \"research briefs,\" and abstracts. Content focussed on textile science (51.4 percent) followed by consumer issues (22.1 percent), historical textiles and costume (9.8 percent), sociological and psychological aspects of dress (8.6 percent), and clothing construction (8.1 percent).\nResearch strategies: Research strategies structure what is known (Lennon and Burns, 2000) and affect the development of empirical knowledge in any discipline (Sybers and Roach, 1962). Using only one research strategy or approach may be inadequate (Hamilton, 1993) as research strategy dictates the data that can be collected, the possible analyses, and the nature of the implications that can be drawn (Lennon et al., 2001). Thus, in any discipline if one strategy is used to the exclusion of others, researchers' narrow what is known and even what can be known.\nProbability sampling and external validity: Given the finding that survey methodology is the dominant research strategy and when this research strategy is used, it is rare for researchers to recruit an entire population of individuals as participants, it is important to ascertain sampling procedures. A probability sample is a sample in which each member of a designated population has an equal and known probability of being selected. Therefore, probability sampling is more likely than nonprobability sampling to provide a sample that is representative of a population (Touliatos and Compton, 1988) and one that forms the basis for generalization to that population. Because there is great variation between people, this type of representativeness is important in research with human participants.\nUse of UGs as participants: UGs are a convenient group for academics to recruit for research and participation in research is commonly an optional course activity. The use of UGs as research participants can be justified by suggesting that participation assists UGs in achieving an educational goal (i.e. learn about research, get a good grade). When participation in research is a course activity, UGs are not randomly selected and so constitute a nonprobability sample. Hence, an issue that has been debated by social science researchers (e.g. psychology, marketing, economics) is the issue of the external validity of findings based on UG responses (Henrich et al., 2010). For example, Wintre et al. (2001) summarized research that they claim showed that UGs are not representative of adults, adolescents, or even a university population. However, they did not statistically test for differences between UGs, adults, adolescents, or a university population. They also reported that only 2.25 percent of the articles they coded based on responses from UGs contained statements that limited the generalizability of the results.\nComparisons of results: UGs vs nonstudent participants: Several researchers have reported that results based on responses from UGs are significantly different from results based on nonstudent participants (Burnett and Dunne, 1986; Henry, 2008; James and Sonner, 2001). In an extensive review and content analysis of psychology literature, Sears (1986) argued that UGs were different from adults on several fronts, but did not actually test for differences empirically. In other research, Peterson (2001) examined effect sizes derived from meta-analyses to evaluate the generalizability of consumer behavior research results from UGs as compared to those from a nonstudent population. As compared to nonstudent respondents, responses from UGs were more homogeneous and tended to produce larger effect sizes. Of greater concern than these differences, however, was the finding that the directionality of relationships investigated differed 19 percent of the time in data drawn from UGs as compared to nonstudents. Unfortunately, no information was presented about whether or not the UG samples or the nonstudent samples were probability samples.\nUse of incentives and UG research participants: Findings about the use of incentives are mixed; some research results indicate that incentives motivate participation by all types of UGs and other results suggest that incentives primarily reward good UGs. For example, Ferrari and McGowan (2002) compared 590 UGs who received a bonus incentive for participation in research early in the term to 480 UGs who were not offered a bonus. Both groups were nonprobability samples of UGs taking introductory psychology classes. UGs in the bonus incentive condition were more likely to finish their requirement early and completed more course requirements overall than UGs in the nonincentive condition. Thus, incentives may motivate UGs to complete course requirements.\nMethod: To address our research questions we content analyzed fashion/clothing research articles from issues of three journals spanning 1996-2013. CTRJ, FCSRJ, and JFMM were selected because an inspection of a range of journals featuring any fashion/clothing content revealed that these three journals regularly report research content on fashion/clothing. Both CTRJ and FCSRJ have a history as publication outlets for fashion/clothing researchers and are inclusive sites for the publication of such research. FCSRJ began publication in 1972 as HERJ and was renamed in 1994. When Goldsmith (1983) analyzed articles published in HERJ, she found more articles focussed on fashion/clothing-related content than any other home economics topic. Furthermore, she found that three of the top four most prolific authors publishing in HERJ published in the fashion/clothing-related area. Laughlin and Kean (1996) reported that HERJ was the second most frequent publication site for fashion/clothing researchers. Hence, HERJ, now FCSRJ is an important publication outlet for fashion/clothing researchers.\nResults and discussion: Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. A total of 963 articles were coded. Initial intercoder reliability averaged 0.78. Disagreements were negotiated between coders until consensus was achieved. There were more articles coded from JFMM (51 percent) than CTRJ (41 percent) or FCSRJ (8 percent). The research analyzed included human participants in 557 studies (57.8 percent). In studies with humans, 206 involved a majority of Euro-American participants (37 percent), 33 involved nearly equal representation of ethnicities (3.4 percent), 117 involved a majority of non-Euro-Americans (12.1 percent), and in 201 studies there was no mention of ethnicity of participants (20.9 percent).\nSubject matter content (topical areas): Across all articles, consumer behavior (33.1 percent) was the topic of research reported most often followed by retail/production/trade (28.2 percent), aesthetics/design (12.1 percent), social psychological aspects of dress (7.8 percent), professional development and general (5.5 percent), historical (4.4 percent), education (4.0 percent), cultural (2.6 percent), and textile science (2.2 percent). These results reveal a shift in research attention from answering questions relative to the social psychology of dress and aesthetics/design to increased research interest in consumer behavior and retail/production/trade. One explanation for the shift could be due to the availability of external funding. It is possible that funding is available for research questions that fall into these topics (i.e. consumer behavior, retail) where it is scarce or unavailable for other areas of research. Another possible explanation is simply due to the preferences of editors and reviewers. In the time span examined, interests may have shifted and the gatekeepers may be less interested in recommending for publication some subject matter areas of fashion/clothing research. It is also possible that shifts in topic areas reflect shifts in researchers' interests. As program composition changes over time, there may simply be more researchers interested in the top two content areas than previously. Finally, changes in production of design research articles may be as a result of designers being able to participate in creative scholarship (i.e. produce designs) as a component of their scholarly activity rather than only being rewarded for traditional research efforts.\nResearch strategies: In the empirical research articles (n=557), the dominant research strategy reported was survey methodology (84.2 percent). Of these, 57.3 percent were descriptive and 26.9 percent were analytic surveys. Following survey methodology was experimentation (13.1 percent), fieldwork (2 percent), and nonreactive (0.7 percent). Of the eight projects that employed a nonreactive research strategy, it was always in conjunction with at least one other strategy which involved human participants. There was a slight trend for researchers to use mixed methods as some researchers reported utilizing two research strategies (5.3 percent), three research strategies (1.1 percent), or four research strategies (0.2 percent) to meet their research objectives.\nNonprobability sampling and external validity: There were 557 articles that reported research with human participants. In 22.3 percent of these articles, the researcher(s) used a sampling procedure that resulted in a probability sample and 74 percent reported a sampling procedure that resulted in nonprobability samples. In the remainder of the articles (f=21), the sampling technique was not specified. It is important to always include this information so that researchers are able to evaluate the research.\nUse of UGs as participants: Of the 557 articles with human participants, 211 had UG participants. Studies utilizing UGs were located in CTRJ (47.4 percent), JFMM (41.7 percent), and FCSRJ (10.9 percent), respectively. The use of UGs in these articles by subject matter area was as follows: consumer behavior research (58.3 percent) followed by social psychology of dress (14.7 percent), education (10.9 percent), aesthetic/design (5.7 percent), retail/production/trade (5.7 percent), professional development (2.8 percent), cultural (2.4 percent), and textile science (0.5 percent). In over half of these studies (57.3 percent), a rationale for the use of UGs was provided.\nSuggestions for future research: We recommend that researchers continue to monitor the type, quality, and content of research publications in the field. Periodic journal analyses serve to chart research directions. We also suggest that future researchers consider using content analysis in their own research. For example, content analysis of university programs of study related to fashion could provide useful information to sister units at other universities and point to gaps in offerings. This type of analysis is often necessary to convince administration of the need for new UG and graduate programs. Finally, content analysis of web sites of small town apparel retailers could be the basis for a useful type of outreach to local communities and offers opportunities for involvement of graduate students in applied research.\nConclusions: This analysis shows that researchers publishing in the three journals examined could do a better job in providing information describing their samples, their sampling procedures, and the use of incentives. In addition, authors have been negligent in providing a rationale for their choice of sample and in generalizing when it is not warranted. Based on these results, we suggest that journals develop or revise their reviewer/author guidelines to include providing: first, an appropriate rationale for the study sample for all samples, but particularly for samples of UGs; second, descriptive population statistics (e.g. age, gender, ethnicity, education); third, statements limiting generalization of results from nonprobability samples; fourth, information describing the sampling technique; and fifth, information on the use of incentives. Also when authors have UGs and nonstudent adults as participants it would advance the field to analyze for significant differences between the two groups. Such analyses would provide evidence to document the extent to which responses from UGs can be used as proxies for responses from members of the general population. Finally, authors and reviewers should be reminded to guard against inappropriate generalizations.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: entailed assessing directions in subject matter content and the types of research strategy employed. In research using human participants, the purposes were to assess: sampling strategy, statements limiting generalizability, incentive use, and the use of undergraduates (UGs) as participants. Finally, with studies utilizing UG participants, the purpose of this paper was to assess: directions in subject matter content, research strategy, sampling strategy, justification of participants, statements limiting generalizability, and incentive use.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A content analysis of fashion/clothing research articles (n=963) appearing in three scholarly journals between 1996 and 2013.\nFindings: Consumer behavior was the most frequent research topic and survey methodology dominated the research strategy employed. Majority of samples were nonprobability, slightly over half of the authors provided statements limiting generalizability of their findings, use of incentives was routinely not reported, and a little over a third used UGs as participants. Of researchers using UGs, consumer behavior was the most frequent topic, UGs were justified as participants, and when both UGs and nonstudents were included as participants, comparisons in responses were typically not made.\nResearch limitations/implications: Articles included were limited to those published in three journals.\nPractical implications: Author/reviewer guidelines should suggest providing: an appropriate rationale for UG use; descriptive population statistics; statements limiting generalization; information describing the sampling technique; and information on the use of incentives. Also when authors have UGs and nonstudent adults as participants it would be useful to analyze for significant differences between the two groups.\nOriginality/value: First investigation of use of UGs as participants in clothing/fashion research.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Nurse led discharge: improving efficiency, safely
|
[
"Effectiveness",
"Clinical governance",
"Health care quality",
"Nursing",
"Teamwork",
"Surgery"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nBackground: Establishing efficient flow of patients through hospital systems is integral to maximising the use of limited hospital resources and maintaining patient satisfaction. Inefficient patient flow causes delays and cancellations, increases length of stay and fundamentally detracts from the quality of care delivered as healthcare professionals spend a disproportionate amount of time struggling to manage the mismatch between demand for beds and capacity. Audit of patient flow through hospital systems commonly identifies delay in discharge as an important source of impaired patient flow (Flower, 2005).\nMethod: NLD protocol design\nResults: Before introducing the protocol 100 per cent of simple discharges from the short stay ward were being delayed due to the wait for doctor review, an average of 38 patients each month. Length of delay ranged from the few hours it took for a clinic or theatre list to finish or doctors to arrive in the morning, to on occasion unnecessary overnight stays.\nDiscussion: Introducing NLD has empowered our nursing team to more effectively manage patient flow. Providing the independence and flexibility to precisely time discharges has helped to reduce mismatch between demand for beds and capacity by enabling the nursing team to plan discharges before admissions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that nurse led discharge (NLD) could improve the efficiency of simple discharges from a short stay surgical ward without compromising patient safety.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A protocol for NLD was designed and implemented. Introduction of the protocol was audited and re-audited prospectively.\nFindings: Introduction of the nurse led discharge protocol significantly reduced the rate of delayed discharge (p>0.001). The protocol successfully identified all patients for whom a NLD would be inappropriate and no patients discharged by the nursing team were re-admitted.\nResearch limitations/implications: No formal measure of staff and patient satisfaction with the new protocol was performed.\nPractical implications: The nursing team are now able to more effectively manage patient flow through the short stay surgical ward. Mismatch between demand for beds and capacity has reduced.\nSocial implications: Patient experience has been improved by the release of time to care for our nurses and the elimination of unnecessary delay in discharge.\nOriginality/value: Formal protocol driven NLD can be a safe way of improving efficiency in patient flow. This pattern of discharge could be applied in many hospital systems.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Marketing design elements of mobile fashion retail apps
|
[
"Mobile communications",
"Mobile commerce",
"Mobile design",
"Mobile applications",
"Fashion",
"Marketing",
"Visual elements",
"Stimulus‐organism‐response",
"Visual design",
"Online marketing",
"Consumer behaviour"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: There are now twice as many mobile broadband subscriptions worldwide than fixed broadband (ITU World Telecommunication, 2011). That in theory suggests that twice as many people can potentially access the mobile internet, than utilise their home computer to access the World Wide Web. With such a rise in mobile internet acceptance, growing 45 per cent over the last four years (ITU World Telecommunication, 2011), retailers are in a position to choose from a variety of successful retail channels to access and market directly to their consumers.Of all of the retail marketing outlets, the internet is the most accessible and global. Within the 70 per cent of the global population that have access to the internet, 90 per cent are choosing to purchase (Mintel, 2010b). The internet allows consumers to purchase frequently, at any time and unobserved (Kukar-Kinney et al., 2009), characteristics that have enabled the online market to grow by 150 per cent since 2005 (Mintel, 2010a). However, it is the expanding growth of the mobile internet that is of greatest current concern, with global smartphone sales growth figures of 74 per cent in the second quarter of 2011 (Gartner, Inc., 2011), and mobile internet users now reaching 1.2 billion (ITU World Telecommunication, 2011). It is therefore vital that retail marketers manage and design a mobile marketing strategy that can successfully take advantage of the rapid expansion of the ubiquitous selling channel.However, although many academics have explored the online environment in terms of the effects of marketing, stimuli, design, information, and consumer motivations and emotions (e.g. Kim et al., 2011; Park and Lennon, 2009), none have yet published research concerning the effects of mobile application (app) marketing design. It is necessary for practitioners and academics alike to understand how mobile and online consumers may differ, in order to select and research the most appropriate marketing tools for either channel. Agreeably, Bauer et al. (2005) suggest that the implications of mobile commerce (m-commerce) have yet to be comprehended and research into m-commerce is essential as to gain an insight into how to utilise the technology most successfully. Due to the differences in mobile and laptop screen sizes, internet speed issues or even location usage, it cannot be assumed that the mobile consumer will encompass the same motivations, expectations and behaviours as the online consumer.This article identifies the marketing design elements or stimuli within the mobile app environment, offering a holistic framework that can be utilised by practitioners and academics for empirical research or consultation. Literature is gathered primarily from an online perspective for two reasons. First, m-commerce design literature is in its infancy and will therefore not provide enough information to develop a thorough framework of design elements. Second, a retailer's online environment and design elements can be transferred to a mobile format, therefore making the majority of marketing design elements exploitable for mobile usage. Yet, which design elements should be utilised for mobile and for what reason? In order to answer such an issue, it is paramount to recognise each of the marketing design elements before empirical testing can commence (Eroglu et al., 2001). Alike to Ha et al. (2007) whom developed a taxonomy of online visual merchandising display methods for testing, this article develops a framework of online/mobile marketing design tools whose effects can be studied empirically.\n2. Relevant literature: 2.1 Online marketing\n3. Products and services m-marketing design framework: The online environment offers retailers a perfect opportunity to utilise interactive and personalised marketing tools (Cyr et al., 2008). Businesses utilise marketing processes to create and maintain value, expectations and relationships with consumers via their products and services, in a way that benefits their organisation (Boone and Kurtz, 2011). Yet, what product and services marketing processes or \"elements\" are available to the organisation to influence their mobile consumer and which should be used for mobile?The visual design and layout of a web site often consists solely of visual imagery and textual content (Cyr and Trevor-Smith, 2004); visual and written information (Mikhailitchenko et al., 2009). In fact, our brains are wired to process visuals, text and audio: what we see, read or hear simultaneously (Cisco, 2008). Due to this, marketers are able to utilise visuals and text concurrently to design a more persuasive marketing message. However, if used individually, it is the purpose of the imagery or text that is of importance to its marketing objective.Through the acknowledgement of online literature regarding product and services marketing elements, it became apparent that four areas were of particular significance: multimedia product viewing, informative content, product promotions and consumer-led interactions.3.1 Multimedia product viewing\n4. Multimedia product viewing: Multimedia creates an interactive and sensory experience, transferring information to the consumer and providing satisfaction, enjoyment, information and entertainment (Gulliver and Ghinea, 2010). It can additionally improve the discovery process, inform or persuade consumers and encourage higher levels of web site involvement (Simmons, 2007). Three key multimedia elements have been identified: videos, graphics and image interactivity technology (IIT).4.1 Video\n5. Informative content: Informative content regards any copy found on the app, written for the purpose of informing the user. Five design elements have been identified from the literature, all of which are utilised online for the purpose of informing the consumer regarding products and services: practical product information, practical services information, trend information, style advice and social media content.5.1 Practical product information\n6. Product promotions: Sales promotion has been singled out due to its relevance to e/m-store design and merchandising. Agreeably, sales promotion has been listed as one of four critical elements of mobile marketing by Megadadi and Nusair (2011). Six product promotion techniques have been identified as appropriate for mobile apps: vouchers, incentives, rewards, discounts, competitions and social media promotion.6.1 Vouchers (coupons)\n7. Consumer-led interactions: The internet enables direct marketer-direct consumer interactions (Evans et al., 2001). Buyer-seller interactions and relationships comprise of faster and more relevant exchanges of information (Varadarajan and Yadav, 2002), greater user control (Dholakia and Zhao, 2009) and can additionally create experiences that utilise virtual and digital imagery (Klein, 2003). Therefore, the design category of consumer-led interactions is suggested in this literature to surround three elements: personalisation (relevancy), customisation (user control) and augmented reality (product experiences).7.1 Personalisation\n8. Research implications and future research: In the same way that Rowley (2004) published her perception of the elements of branding design, this paper pieces together a variety of marketing literature to deliver a holistic framework of mobile marketing design elements. Eroglu et al. (2001) additionally stated the importance of taxonomy development as the first step of theory building and analysis. With such a framework, academics and practitioners will be equipped to conduct mobile-related studies regarding individual design elements.Product viewing, informative content, product promotions and consumer-led interactions are assigned as four framework categories that contain a number of design elements apparent in the mobile and online retail environments. Academics may utilise the framework to empirically test the elements as stimuli in either a qualitative or quantitative format. A variety of online retailing papers have utilised the S-O-R paradigm (Mehrabian and Russell, 1974) to examine the consumer's emotional and behavioural reactions towards online environmental cues. Such a framework could be utilised for mobile studies due to the technological similarities of mobile and online services and the robustness of the theoretical paradigm.Researchers may choose to empirically test one, some or all elements as stimuli or an entire stimulus category to examine the consumer's behavioural and emotional reactions. Analysis might identify the consumer effects of each stimuli, connections between them or in fact connections between categories, whereby one category might produce the same or alternative outcomes as another. By conducting open and exploratory research, insights would be gathered as to whether certain stimuli lead to relationships, repatronage intentions or intent to repatronise the brand's brick and mortar stores as examples. Research may also imply the importance or unimportance of particular stimuli, leading retailers to implement, enhance or dismiss the stimuli from their app. A fashion retailer that employs a mobile app for transactional purposes may hope to benefit from increased purchase intentions and trust, whereas an app built as a Lookbook may hope to benefit from browsing intentions and brand satisfaction. Empirical research would equip the retailer with information as to which stimuli could provoke such responses, leading to the designing of powerful and influential mobile channels.Additionally, although the framework has been developed and aided by literature, other academics may justify why they believe particular stimuli should reside in other categories, or indeed that further categories could be added depending on the academic's individual approach. Such implementations would be welcomed and interesting to examine.Whether the mobile consumer is in fact different to that of the online consumer will come to light via empirical data and suggest that any prior assumptions of online and mobile consumer likeness are correct or are in fact false.\n9. Conclusion: This article identifies the product and services m-marketing design elements that retailers and marketers can utilise in order to promote and sell their products via mobile. The research framework contributes to both academic and managerial research in the mobile and online field and creates vast opportunities for further empirical research into the effects of the individual design stimuli. Mobile apps could soon become a retailer's most important sales channels, justifying the requirement for immediate analysis of the consumer's perceptions.Practitioners and academics are invited to utilise the holistic framework to form their own studies regarding m-commerce design. Empirical academic knowledge of the consumer's behavioural and emotional responses towards mobile app design would facilitate designers with vital design information. Such knowledge would advise and guide fashion retailers as to which design elements might increase and encourage particular consumer emotions and behaviours, especially those that will benefit their business (Boone and Kurtz, 2011).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Whilst some may argue that e-commerce design literature can be applied to the designing of mobile commerce channels, it is an assumption that may come at the expense of the retailer. The purpose of this paper is to identify which marketing design elements could be integrated within a retailer's mobile strategy and suggest the importance of empirical testing. An academic or practitioner must primarily understand the abundance of marketing tools that can be integrated into a mobile strategy before they can begin to investigate the consumer effects.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A literature review of online and mobile design elements is undertaken, in order to develop and illustrate a holistic framework of stimuli for commercial and academic appreciation. Although literature regarding the variety of marketing design elements online is profuse, a holistic framework currently does not exist, an absence that this paper fulfils.\nFindings: - The paper collates and identifies 18 individual marketing design stimuli classified within four stimulus categories relating to their purpose and form.\nOriginality/value: - Literature concerning e-commerce design and strategy is currently prevalent; however, due to the immaturity of mobile commerce, literature is deficient concerning the strategic design and implications of mobile applications. Although PS68.2 billion was spent online in 2011, mobile commerce sales represented less than 5 per cent, highlighting an immediate requirement for research into how such sales could be improved.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A signature pedagogy for entrepreneurship education
|
[
"Entrepreneurship education",
"Andragogy",
"Academagogy",
"Heutagogy",
"Signature pedagogy"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In this present day, entrepreneurship education (EE) globally could easily be described as collective of initiatives operating in universities, community colleges, vocational (or trade) schools, high schools and elementary (or primary) schools, that are held together by a common desire to develop in students a greater capacity for entrepreneurial agency. Increasingly the growing academic literature highlights the diversity of approaches in our domain, often preventing us from seeing those aspects of our practice that unite us. The possibility of unification is the aim of this conceptual paper. Through using a simple philosophical approach to develop a modest philosophy of EE, a signature pedagogy for EE is developed from modest philosophical foundations. Imagine a world in which EE, its underlying aims, modes of teaching and learning and desirable outcomes are universally compatible. That is the challenge this paper accepts. The contextual backdrop for this discussion is deliberately broad, any education system (universities, community colleges, vocational or trade schools, high schools and elementary or primary schools) that collectively educates individuals to shape their futures.\nDeveloping a simple philosophy: Not shying away from the likelihood of being provocative, this paper is based on the following philosophical argument:\nThe components of a simple philosophy: There are three fundamental components of a philosophy of EE that give rise to the ontological, axiological and epistemological questions that unite those base levels of practice that all EE educators experience to some degree. For example, ontologically, we can imagine several factors that are extremely common in students of enterprise and entrepreneurship, such as our students having naive assumptions, facing unknown futures, experiencing a delayed progression towards being an entrepreneur, and having different educational needs. Axiologically, there is widespread agreement that students need to learn about, for and through enterprise/entrepreneurship (Jamieson, 1984; Gibb, 2002; Jones, 2011; Pittaway and Edwards, 2012; Neck and Corbett, 2018; QAA, 2018), although see Aadland and Aaboen (2018) for an alternative view. Finally, epistemologically, in terms of developing deep knowledge of enterprise/entrepreneurship; we tend to agree our students gain first-hand knowledge using experiential forms of learning and deep reflection supportive of transformative learning outcomes (Mezirow, 1978).\nThe purpose of EE: Before we contemplate the development of a signature pedagogy for EE, we must explain the outcomes, in terms of purpose vis-a-vis the philosophical arguments developed above. Here, authentic EE (in terms of minimalism) is defined as a process of education that develops an increased capacity for self-negotiated action. The argument being made is that there could be few other definitions of EE that capture the nuances of both enterprise education and EE and that are broad enough to accommodate the enormous variance of practice found globally in EE. In this sense, EE is more of a method of agency than it is a subject area. Hopefully by now I have made the case that any such method of agency must tie individual action to deeper reflection than what is typically observed in everyday life. This is a great challenge for our educators; moving students from not being overly reflective, and therefore relatively thoughtless in their lives, to being increasingly conscious of their assumptions, dispositions and surrounds.\nA signature pedagogy of EE: The idea of signature pedagogies was developed by Shulman (2005a, b) to highlight the characteristic forms of teaching that are distinctly associated with various professions. We accept that the education of physicians, engineers, lawyers, nurses, artists and social workers is achieved through the use of distinctive pedagogical approaches vis-a-vis the nature of educator and student behaviour, the architectural requirements and, any given community's expectations of such education. In this sense, EE pedagogy is not merely teaching methods, the curriculum or the individual process of design and/or assessment; it is the unique combinations of their usage in ways that are distinctive to EE; including the incorporation of andragogy and heutagogy (i.e. self-directed and self-determined learning). A signature pedagogy of EE, if useful, should accommodate the 44 forms of pedagogy practice used to teach enterprise/entrepreneurship already identified by Gibb and Price (2007). We can now return to the connections (in Table I) between the abovementioned epistemological, ontological and axiological assumptions proposed to relate to EE and the three specific structures (i.e. surface, implicit and deep) that Shulman (2005a) uses to define the uniqueness of any signature pedagogy.\nA signature pedagogy of EE as SoTL: The proposed signature pedagogy for EE also represents a vehicle for the SoTL in our domain. There are issues here related to the development of teaching practice and the process of academagogy, or scholarly leading. There are also issues directly related to enhancing the student learning experience. Finally, there are also issues related to how we might assess the relative improvement of our students' ability to gain freedom over their surrounds. All of these issues are at the heart of the SoTL given that our collective focus is upon enriching, rather restricting the quality of education (see Healey, 2000).\nConclusion: This paper has attempted to offer a simplified philosophy of EE, deliberately seeking to use philosophy (rather than science) to comprehend those ultimate principles that govern conduct in the domain of EE. No attempt has been made to seek generality, totality or completeness in the arguments developed. The identification of entrepreneurial agency as the primary focus, or minimal outcome for EE rests more on the use of common sense than it does science. As previously noted, for Dewey (1916), philosophy should be used to reduce the complexity of life into a single inclusive whole, outlining those related ultimate principles that underpin the phenomena under consideration. As such, the idea of agency, in the context of EE is identified as the logical primary area of focus.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to address the increasing demand for entrepreneurship education (EE) across all levels of education globally. Specifically, the need to identify a signature pedagogy for entrepreneurship that can be used in all teaching and learning contexts associated with all forms of EE.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This conceptual paper draws upon the seminal work of Lee Shulman to contemplate and propose a signature pedagogy for EE. Contemporary ideas from the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) literature are also used to develop a sound pedagogical foundation for the approach advocated.\nFindings: This paper proposes an innovative solution that addresses the challenge of defining what minimally speaking, is EE? The development of a signature pedagogy for EE provides clarity around the challenge of developing a standard minimalist approach to teaching entrepreneurship.\nPractical implications: There are important implications that arise from this paper for all educators of entrepreneurship. Most importantly being that we can all share a SoTL regardless of the context of the author's teaching.\nOriginality/value: This paper presents new thinking that has the potential to fundamentally reshape how we conceive the process of designing and delivering EE. Importantly, this paper contributes to the future development of SoTL in EE.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
A hierarchical model for quality management systems in global organizations
|
[
"Globalization",
"Complexity",
"Quality management system",
"Strategic management",
"Mergers and acquisitions",
"Diversification",
"Complex systems",
"Multinational organizations",
"Strategic/operational/marketing relatedness",
"Glocal value"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Globalization processes change the operational environmental structure and create a system of processes and products that cross borders and states. Global expansion beyond the local system to other geographical sites gives rise to an international operational system - diverse operational units located at various sites (e.g. a number of production and development sites, subsidiaries) and an array of products and processes at disparate sites that exhibit varying dependence relations. Different operational units may exist for joint or separate customers, just as supplier-customer relations may exist within the distinctive characteristics of an international company. Varied relatedness and mutual relational levels develop between the operational units or the different businesses.\n2. Literature review: Businesses in the twenty-first century operate in an increasingly complex global environment. This literature review considers current research and scenarios relating to quality management in businesses operating in this complex world. This literature review focuses on the global reality and its defining characteristics, and highlights the need to change the way quality management is perceived and implemented given the increasing complexity and the large number of mutual relationships between the production, product, services and network processes (Srinivasan and Kurey, 2014). Sitnikov and Giurca Vasilescu (2008) note that in international companies, management processes shift from focusing on internal factors to a focus on external factors.\n3. Methodology: The topic of quality management in global organizations belongs in the field of nascent theory - i.e. themes and phenomena about which little or no previous theories exist in current scholarship. These themes relate primarily to new phenomena whose understanding is still in the initial stages of theory development (Edmonson and McManus, 2007).\n4. Results: 4.1 The developmental scale of global quality systems\n5. Discussion: In light of the fact that GQM still lacks an unambiguous definition and has yet to be studied systematically, the chief contribution of this paper lies in its construction of a preliminary body of knowledge that presents, in a broad and integrative fashion, the levels of development and management challenges facing the global QMS. As such, the GHM defined in this paper makes a great practical/management contribution. First and foremost, it shows that the requirements of a quality system are a function of its globalization level. As a management tool, the GHM facilitates the following:\n6. Conclusion and directions for future research: The study's findings highlight the development process of multinational companies and the formation of a hierarchy of globalization levels in the development of a global quality system. This hierarchy can be used to identify the diverse requirements of the quality system, requirements that must be met via the creation of an appropriate quality strategy.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze the operations of the quality management systems (QMS) in multinational companies, and develop a framework for classifying the QMS features based on the global operational and marketing structures arising from their expansion process. This paper is based on doctoral research conducted at the Department of Statistics, University of Haifa, Israel in 2007-2015.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study used the innovative approach of adopting a systems perspective in analyzing the operation of a global QMS. In total 18 multinational companies at different levels of global expansion were studied in depth using observations, longitudinal studies, content analyses and depth interviews.\nFindings: The result of this study is the global hierarchical model (GHM) that presents a classification of representative global operational and marketing structures deriving from the expansion process of multinational companies, and the extrapolated features of the respective global QMS.\nPractical implications: This classification serves as a diagnostic tool for identifying the proper globalization level of a QMS, thereby helping plan global quality strategy and identifying the steps necessary for its effective implementation.\nOriginality/value: This research seeks to fill a lacuna in the field of global quality system development with regard to modes of competition and challenge. Integration of strategic, operational and marketing rationales into the QMS's processes augments the functional level of management and supports the development of a strategy for global quality management that is derived from and supports the company's global strategy.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Posting purchases on social media increases happiness: the mediating roles of purchases' impact on self and interpersonal relationships
|
[
"Happiness",
"Social media",
"Impact of purchase on interpersonal relationships",
"Impact of purchase on self",
"Posting purchases"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Social media have become an integral part of our daily life. Behaviors of consumers are also being influenced greatly by social media. Hutton (2012) pointed out that social media have transformed users from passive to active consumers who create content about products and consumption experiences. For instance, there have been more than 22 million pictures about Nike and over 9 million pictures about Starbucks posted by consumers on Instagram (O'Connor, 2014). In fact, user-generated content (UGC) about brands is increasingly dominating the internet. In the search results for the world's 20 largest brands, 25 per cent represent UGC (Smith, 2014).\nLiterature review and hypotheses: The influence of purchases on self and interpersonal relationships\nMethodology: Study 1\nGeneral discussions: Across three studies, this research reveals that posting purchases on social media, as a new type of conspicuous consumption and WOM, increases consumers' happiness through the mediating roles of purchases' impact on self and interpersonal relationships. Study 1 was an experiment assigning a particular purchase (cruise) to all the participants to imagine and randomly distributing them to a social media and offline purchase communication channel. The result showed that posting purchases on social media has a direct positive impact on consumers' happiness as a consumption emotion. Study 2 was a survey asking participants to report their actual purchases and posting behaviors. The results showed posting has an indirect effect on consumers' happiness as perceived positive life quality through the mediating roles of purchase impact on self and interpersonal relationships. Study 3 replicated the findings of Study 2 using an Amazon MTurk sample and controlling purchase type as a covariate in the mediation analyses. In Study 2 and 3, prices of purchases were not a confounding variable in the effects. The results of all the three studies supported our hypotheses that posing purchases on social media positively influences happiness through purchases' impact on self and interpersonal relationships.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of the present research is to investigate how consumers' purchase posting behavior on social media influences their own happiness.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper presents three studies. Study 1 was an experiment that manipulated purchase and posting behavior. Studies 2 and 3 utilized surveys which asked participants to report their actual purchases and posting behaviors. Data were examined using regression and bootstrap mediation analysis.\nFindings: Posting purchases on social media has a positive influence on consumers' happiness through the mediating roles of perceived impact of purchases on self and interpersonal relationships.\nResearch limitations/implications: This paper contributes to the research on social media by demonstrating that because of its remarkable characteristics, posting purchases on social media significantly increases consumers' happiness. It fills the research gap of how word-of-mouth and conspicuous consumption influences the storyteller's happiness. It is also the first research which suggests that user-generated content of purchases actually can be a new carrier of conspicuous consumption. The findings shed light on the substantial influences of posting purchases on the use/consumption stage of consumer behavior.\nPractical implications: Because posting purchases on social media increases consumers' happiness, marketers can develop strategies to encourage consumers to post about their purchases more.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this research is the first to demonstrate the positive effect of social media purchase posting on consumers' happiness and identify the mechanism under which this effect occurs.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
ICT and older workers: no unwrinkled relationship
|
[
"Performance levels",
"Older workers",
"Productivity rate"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The new information and communication technology has caught on rapidly in economic life. In 2001, 65 per cent of the Dutch working population made use of computers in their job (De Haan, 2003). In the early nineties this was only a small percentage. At the same time this development has called up the fear for a digital divide. The computerization of the economy may create more inequality by benefiting those who already have a good position and have easy access to ICT. According to this reasoning the disadvantaged have less access to ICT and will fall behind further (Steijn, 2001). Older workers are among the disadvantaged groups mentioned. Their computer literacy is relatively low. This paper focuses completely on this group.In the Netherlands older workers are a vulnerable group on the labour market for already some time. Their participation rate is low. Of the group between 50 and 65 years of age, only 40 per cent is still working. The ageing of the population implies that a permanently low participation rate of the elderly has a negative impact on the size of the labour force, which endangers economic prosperity. If the increasing use of computers were to decrease the employability of older workers further, this would re-enforce the impact of the ageing process on the economy. An American study (Friedberg, 2001) shows that there is reason for this fear. The study shows that older workers who do not use computers in their job are more likely to leave the labour market before retirement age. This result is obtained after correcting for other intervening variables such as education.In this paper we try to find answers to three main questions. The first question is: do older workers have more problems in using ICT? If the answer is affirmative, this causes a serious problem for older workers if ICT-skills are important for the overall performance of workers. But do ICT skills really contribute significantly to overall performance (question 2)? Not so long ago many economists were convinced that the new computer and communication technologies have a strong effect on productivity. In a short period of time these high expectations turned into a very pessimistic view on the role of ICT owing to the low profitability of ICT-activities and the sharp decrease in stock market prices for companies in the ICT sector. However, these expectations, perceptions and stock market developments may only partly reflect the real impact of ICT. It may well be, for instance, that the higher growth rates of US productivity compared to Europe that can be observed over the last years, have to do with a higher and more effective use of ICT. Therefore, ICT may indeed affect productivity. Supposing that ICT matters, what can be done to improve the situation for older workers? This is the third question that we deal with in the paper.Our analyses are based on data on individual workers in two industries, the printing industry and the wholesale trade. The limitation of using data on the individual level is that we can take account of factors on the firm level only to a limited degree. It may well be the case that ICT has a profound impact on the firm's output markets and internal organisation. Then it could have an indirect effect on older workers who have more difficulties in coping with changes in general. This effect may even occur when there is no direct effect of computer use on productivity on the individual level.The paper is structured as follows. We first work out a number of theoretical notions around the general subject of ICT and older workers (section 2). In section 3 we deal with the data collection, present some descriptive results and discuss the models to be used. Section 4 presents the estimation results. The paper ends up with a number of conclusions (section 5).\nAge, performance and ICT: What can we say on theoretical grounds about the implications of ICT for older workers? Generally speaking one could argue that the application of ICT leads to a change in job requirements. Thus, workers have to learn new skills. Or to put it differently: they have to invest in human capital. Therefore, we will first look more closely at this theory, which makes predictions about the relationship between a person's performance or productivity on the one hand, and age on the other hand. Human capital is the productive knowledge people acquire by both formal and informal learning. The higher the stock of human capital embodied in a person is, the higher the person's productivity and pay are. Since Becker (1964) a distinction is made between general and firm specific human capital. General human capital is the type of knowledge one can apply in different firms, while specific human capital is only applicable in one firm. The theory states that in case of general human capital, individuals will completely pay for the investment and will completely get the benefits. Contrary, individuals and firms will share the costs and benefits in case of investment in specific human capital.In case of ICT, human capital will mainly be of the general type. Then human capital theory predicts that older worker invest less in ICT skills than younger workers. This is caused by the fact that the pay-off period for older workers is shorter. Individuals will predominantly invest in education and training at younger age. Owing to this, productivity increases at young age, but gradually the increase slows down and may even turn into a decrease at older age. As far as pay follows productivity, the age-income profile has the same shape. For formal models that produce such age-income profiles we refer to Mincer (1974) and Ben-Porath (1967). The typical shape of age-income and age-productivity profiles emerging from these models has been confirmed in empirical research. In wage and income equations both age and age squared (or the number of years worked both linear and squared) are usually significant, giving rise to a parabolic shape for (log) wage or income. A similar shape is found in studies in which the relationship between productivity and age is studied on the basis of data on the performance of individual workers as measured by judgments of superiors or perceptions of the workers themselves (Groot, 1994; Gelderblom and de Koning, 1996). Finally, the parabolic shape mentioned is also found when productivity is measured on the company level and related to the age composition of the workforce (Gelderblom et al., 2004) and Crepon et al. (2002). For a review of the literature on the relationship between age and productivity we refer to De Koning et al. (2003).The assumption that workers take care of the costs of general training completely, does not, however, correspond with the facts. The high costs of training, coupled with uncertainty about the returns on it, make that workers are reluctant to invest in general training. In practice, companies are prepared to pay for a considerable part of the training costs or even to take care of the costs completely. Often the worker is required to stay with the firm for a certain period and has to pay back the company's contribution, or part of it, in case of leaving the company during this period[1]. One could argue that, owing to the short pay-off period, the training returns for older workers are equally low when employers take care of the costs. Groot and Maassen van den Brink (1997), however, point to a important difference if we look at the rate of return of training from the viewpoint of employers. They argue that quit rates are considerably lower among older workers compared to younger workers. This could mean that from an employer's perspective the pay-off period for older workers is not shorter compared to younger workers.But also other points are important, that have not been dealt with so far. Do older workers learn as easily as younger workers do? If older workers learn less easily, training returns would be lower for them. From the literature (see De Koning et al., 2003, for a review) we can conclude that the learning ability of humans stay intact until fairly high age. However, there are indications that older people have more problems in processing high quantities of information in a short time. Particularly in case of ICT this could be a problem. Therefore, although it is probably not generally true that older workers perform less in their jobs and in job-related training, it may be true for particular types of jobs and training including jobs and training in the field of ICT. Also the fact may play a role that the educational level of older workers is lower than average. Lower educated workers engage less frequently in company training than higher educated workers. Probably, this is also true for training in the field of ICT.As indicated previously, the human capital theory leads to the conclusion that owing to the concentration of investment in human capital at young age, the stock of human capital will eventually stabilise and may even decrease at older age. But also ICT can play a role. In the printing industry, for example, one of the two industries on which we concentrate in this paper, ICT has lead to a radical change in the production process. The contents of many functions changed considerably and some functions disappeared altogether. Owing to this development many workers experienced that suddenly the work-experience gained during their whole work-life became obsolete[2]. Retraining was therefore necessary. However, in those cases older workers simply do not have the time anymore to develop the same skill level with the new technology as they had with the old one[3].A number of studies analyse the use of ICT by older workers compared to younger workers and the impact of ICT on the labour market position of older workers. However, these studies do not provide a consistent picture. In the paper by Friedberg referred to earlier, the conclusion is that older workers that do not use computers in their jobs have a higher chance of leaving the labour-market prematurely. Weinberg (2002) finds on the basis of US data that among higher educated, experienced workers the use of computers has increased less than among young higher educated workers. But for workers with secondary education his conclusion is that it is the other way round: more experienced workers have picked up the new technology more frequently than their younger colleagues.Using British data Borghans and ter Weel (2000 and 2001) find, that although older workers use ICT less frequently than younger workers, this does not affect their wages negatively. Assuming that wages are a good indicator for productivity, they conclude from their findings that ICT does not give rise to a weaker labour market situation of older workers. They also develop an alternative theory according to which productivity influences the use of ICT rather than the other way round. First they cite DiNardo and Pischke (1997), who view computers as tools for workers and make the analogy with pencils. Higher educated and more productive workers use pencils more than older workers, but nobody would argue that using pencils make workers more productive. This may also apply to computers. Borghans and ter Weel add to this that for more productive and higher salaried workers the costs of a computer are relatively low compared to the total labour costs for these workers. Therefore, companies will be inclined to equip these workers with computers first. However, in industries such as the printing industry computers are not simply a tool for individual workers, but an integral feature of the new production technology. In our view it is likely that companies in these industries invest in computer technology to increase productivity.We also think that the assumption made by Borghans and ter Weel that wage differences between age categories are a good indicator for productivity differences, is highly questionable[4]. According to contract theory (Lazear and Moore, 1984) employers pay younger workers less than their productivity, but offer them a perspective of increasing wages to tie them to the company and keep them motivated. The theory implies that wages are higher than productivity for older workers. Although the theory deals with implicit contracts, the rising pattern of wages with age is often institutionalised in pay systems. Several studies found evidence supporting the theory (Gelderblom and de Koning, 1992; Gelderblom and de Koning, 2002; Gelderblom et al., 2004; Medoff and Abraham, 1980; Mendes de Oliviera et al., 1989; Crepon et al., 2002). The fact that non-use of ICT does not affect older workers' pay does not, therefore, imply that there is no effect on their productivity.In the previous paragraphs the use of ICT and the training in ICT skills is seen as the result of decision-making on the basis of costs and benefits. However, social and psychological factors can also play a role. If, as is the case in the printing industry, ICT implies that workers that previously held a key position in the production process, have to change over completely and get a less prominent place, it also implies loss of status. This will reduce the motivation for retraining, particularly when alternatives such as early retirement under good financial conditions are available. Furthermore, uneasiness with the use of computers can lead to less using them. Mikkelsen et al. (2002) find that this is the case for many older people (but also for women and the low educated). For that matter their results also show that this problem can be dealt with by company policies (such as financial contributions to workers purchasing a PC for home use) stimulating the use of computers.Wrapping up the available evidence we can say that it is clear that older workers make less use of ICT in their work than younger workers. However, the available literature does not say much about the level and the quality of the ICT-use by older workers who do use the technology. Older workers might also lack behind in this respect. Lesser use of ICT by older workers only harms their position when it affects their productivity, but the literature contains conflicting results on this point. Some studies point to an effect of ICT on performance, while other studies claim that there is no effect or even that the causal relationship runs from productivity to ICT use instead of the other way round. The literature provides some indications that company policies can increase the use of ICT among older workers. In the next sections we try to find further empirical evidence on these issues. Important aspects of our analyses are that we do not only look at ICT use as such, but also take quality aspects of it into account. Furthermore, we do not approximate productivity by wages, but measure the former more directly by worker's perceptions and judgments by superiors.\nData and models: Data\nOutcomes: Use of ICT in the job\nConclusions: Using data on individual workers in the printing industry and the wholesale trade, we have tested three hypotheses:H1. Fewer older workers use ICT in their job than younger workers and when older workers do use ICT their skills in it are comparatively low, involving less complicated applications.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this research is to find out to what extent older workers make use of ICT and to what extent this influences their job performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Workers of various age groups are surveyed in two sectors: printing industry and wholesale trade. The use of (various types of) ICT is compared for a number of age groups, controlling the influence of other explanatory variables and correcting the fact that older users are a selective group. In the next step, the use of ICT is one of the factors explaining performance.\nFindings: - The results show that, compared with younger workers, older workers make less use of ICT in their job, use less complicated applications and have more difficulties in using ICT. This is to their disadvantage as the use of ICT and particularly the level of use appear to affect performance positively.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The research is concentrated on two specific sectors which are forerunners in the field of ICT. A generalization of the results is therefore most applicable to industries and jobs in which ICT plays an important role.\nPractical implications: - The results suggest that company policies can be of help in dealing with the problem. However, the provision of formal training in ICT has no significant effect.\nOriginality/value: - Contrary to what is often done in this type of study, the level on which ICT is used is taken into account. Moreover, direct indicators for performance are used instead of wages. Particularly for older workers wages may not reflect productivity.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Research on trust: a bibliography and brief bibliometric analysis of the special issue submissions
|
[
"Trust",
"Bibliographies"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The function of this bibliography is two-fold:1. to provide a starting point for researchers new to the area of trust in a business and marketing context; and2. to gather together a listing of useful materials from the rather disparate sources of research on trust.As the number of items listed in this bibliography attests, there is no shortage of research in the area. However, as will become obvious those sources are scattered across a number of disciplines (sociology, psychology, ethics, politics, information systems, organizational behavior, strategy and marketing) with marketing being relatively poorly represented. As modern researchers increasingly rely on subject-specific databases, many of the articles listed here could be overlooked in an initial search of marketing, and the simple search term \"trust\" throws up innumerable irrelevant articles (e.g. on finance, hospitals, pharmaceuticals, etc.). Hence, a cross-disciplinary collection of sources on trust was deemed a useful addendum to this special issue.The compilation does not claim to be definitive (space precludes it and a fuller and regularly updated listing can be located on the lead editor's home page via www.wbs.ac.uk), but it has been developed over several years and every effort has been made to verify the accuracy of its contents. It should be noted that only items with a direct bearing on trust as a concept are included. The list steps outside the marketing discipline because most researchers into trust in a marketing context draw on such materials. Space decrees that important but field-specific, trust-related references are excluded (e.g. those on channel control or channel behaviour from the business-to-business field, or inter-departmental relationships or inter-group conflict from the organization behavior field, or branding, loyalty or CRM from the marketing field). There are also numerous articles where trust is considered but not as a core concept, and these too are excluded. For those interested in field-specific issues with a bearing on trust the reference listings in the papers in this special issue form an excellent starting point.The articles in the database have been compiled from a range of sources. Inclusion of an item is based on citation frequency, direct reference to the concept of trust in the title or abstract of the work, or on the use of trust as a key construct within the paper. Sources include peer-reviewed journal articles, books and anthologies (some with partial contents), and conference and working papers. There are a few online resources, but these have been kept to a minimum.As with any reference source some articles are more frequently used than others, so, by way of a guide, the following presents a simple analysis of a random sample of 22 of the 55 papers submitted to this special issue and illustrates the dominance of certain papers. These 22 papers made reference to 336 unique trust related citations with an average referencing rate of just over 30, although the sample was slightly biased by a literature review (not accepted for publication). Of the 22 papers analysed:* 18 made reference to Morgan and Hunt (1994);* 13 made reference to Doney and Cannon (1997);* 11 made reference to Mayer et al. (1995);* ten made reference to each of Moorman et al. (1992, 1993);* nine made reference to Zucker (1986);* eight made reference to Dwyer et al. (1987);* seven made reference to Ganesan and Hess (1997);* six made reference to Lewis and Weigert (1985) and Sirdeshmukh et al. (2002); and* five made reference to Barber (1983) and Selnes (1998).The remainder of the 336 references received four citations or fewer, with the vast majority (234 of the 336, some 70 per cent) receiving just a single citation. The number of trust citations amongst the papers accepted for the special issue averaged 25 and ranged from seven to 48, with trust-to-total citation ratios ranging from 0.14 to 0.49. Making allowances for the small sample used, these figures are comparable to analyses of the leading journal citations in the BIDS and Google Scholar databases in which the Moorman et al. (1993), Morgan and Hunt (1994) and Dwyer et al. (1987) papers achieve the highest citation ratings in trust-related work.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The primary purpose of this bibliography is to provide a compilation of trust-related articles from the disparate fields in which trust has been explored (from psychology to sociology and information systems to marketing. Years in its compilation and (still incomplete), it provides a listing that is not easily obtained even with the search capability of the internet and electronic library catalogues. Its secondary purpose is to highlight which articles are used most by marketing-related trust researchers both in general and within the submissions to the special issue.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The bibliography was compiled via search and analysis of databases, reference lists, bibliographies, internet searches, library catalogues, university web pages, researchers' curricula vitae (inter alia) for conference papers, journal articles, and books that use trust as a key concept within the work.\nFindings: - The paper finds that there is a plethora of material on trust, but spread across several thousand sources. No single comprehensive collection exists and the need for such a compilation is of value to researchers.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The paper is an invaluable source of references on trust from across a wide range of academic disciplines.\nOriginality/value: - The main contribution of the paper is the cross-disciplinary nature of the compilation of reference materials.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Psyching up to become exceptional: Getting into employees' minds is not so scary
|
[
"Coaching",
"Leadership",
"Talent management",
"Talent development"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: When managers are tasked with the daunting challenge of developing their people, they might welcome a budget to spend on a workshop, an advancement program or other educational aids to point them and the people they manage in the right direction. Suggest to them that they apply psychology to the process and do not be surprised if they become a little uneasy and reckon that is all a bit too mysterious. Tell them to consider how their own and the employees' minds operate, and the importance of our \"psyches\" in our working lives, and that uneasy feeling might become downright scary.\nAcknowledging our mind's operating system: \"Everyday psychology\" is defined by Dr Wendy Axelrod - who has studied what she terms \"exceptional development managers\" (EDMs) -as \"applying practical knowledge of both human nature and individual people during interactions with others, for positive effect\". The type of development EDMs provide expands employees' ability to take on broader and deeper assignments (for example, increased customer responsiveness, enhanced adaptability to change and managed tasks of great complexity) with greater independence and fewer mistakes.\nVenturing into the unknown - with practical behaviors: In the end, insights and accomplishments gained by employees who venture into the unknown, backed by managers who apply everyday psychology, will be the ones that lead to significant development. So how do these exceptional managers apply everyday psychology as they develop their people? They move past the typical managerial coaching to master practical behaviors of applying everyday psychology. Here are some of their actions.\nComment: This review is based on \"How exceptional managers use everyday psychology to develop their people\" by Axelrod (2015). The author explains an important - yet often overlooked - approach to talent management: managers who apply everyday psychology with their people to drive significant growth. She describes five actions managers can take toward this goal.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Indicates an important and often overlooked approach to talent development: managers who apply everyday psychology with their people to drive significant growth.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Shows how to grow people in significant ways, based upon years of consulting with managers, original research of the practices of exceptional development managers and expert recommended approaches.\nFindings: Concludes that companies undervalue the important role managers can play in talent development. Advises that managers are well positioned to significantly develop people, yet most do not. Describes five actions managers can take using everyday psychology to help to drive employees' development.\nPractical implications: Alerts companies to the fact that, while they strive for a fully skilled workforce, for the majority this is far from reality. Suggests that, with greater investments being made to company-wide talent development, it is wise to also invest in equipping managers to turn everyday work into everyday development for their employees. Counsels that, because development breakthroughs can be daunting, managers who know how to practically apply everyday psychology have a significant edge. Adds that human resources (HR) departments, company leadership and individual managers can benefit greatly from leveraging these practices.\nOriginality/value: Acknowledges that, while managers' involvement in employee development is not new, it has not gone far enough. Warns that companies are often not relying on the development driven by managers to make a significant impact on their talent-development objectives. Encourages the view that managers are key to developing people, and making psychological principles readily adaptable by managers unlocks their path forward.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Examination of organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behaviour among local government civil servants in Uganda
|
[
"Uganda",
"Local government",
"Organizational citizenship behaviour",
"Organizational commitment"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The concept of organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB) has recently attracted a lot of scholarly debate. This comes in the wake of efforts to explain employee behaviour and performance. Scholars like Organ et al. (2006) have elaborated OCB as simple behaviours extended to colleagues, supervisors and clients. These could be lending a colleague a hand with work overload or undertaking innovative and spontaneous activities and talking favourably about the organizations to outsiders. Research has shown that OCBs improve organizational effectiveness, which has been a dilemma for many years. Based on the conviction that the ways employees behave affect their beliefs, emotions, attitudes and behaviours at work (Park and Yoon, 2010), OCB takes centre stage in the model. Organizational operations can be managed with greater efficiency, and services are delivered with higher quality whenever employees interact with colleagues and clients in a way that exhibits positive actions associated with OCB (Kim, 2005). However, it has not been adequately examined; this applies to civil servants in lower local governments and importantly in the context of an African developing country. This paper attempts to bridge this knowledge gap.\nRelated literature: There have been gains in organizational theories that underpin human behaviour at work. We review this literature directed to a position of theorizing within the extant body of literature. So novel are theories on behaviour as they stretch across management into psychology and sociology. We limit our study to institutional frameworks of problematizing taking the frame of reference from Suddaby, Hardy and Huy (2011). Organizational commitment is viewed as the employees' loyalty to their employer (Muchinsky, 2007). Meyer and Allen (1991) and Davenport (1999) asserted that organizational commitment is established when the employee and the organization foster greater interest on keeping their working relationship. Mathieu and Zajac (1990) indicated what the different measures and definitions have in common and considered them as a link between the individual and the organization. According to Davis and Newstron (2001), the employee experiences a degree of loyalty related to his bonding with the organization, and his willingness to continue participating or working with it. Organizational commitment is an emotional connection that the employee feels with his job.\nMethodology: The study used a cross-sectional survey design and quantitative data for the civil servants in the local government in Uganda. A sample of 265 people was examined from a population of 844 guided by Krejcie and Morgan's 1970 sampling table. Consistent with Amin (2005), we realized an adequate response rate with a total of 239 usable questionnaires filled and returned. Civil servants in a local government setting provide a hitherto unexplored study population on our study variables. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire. The data were collected with approval and consent of the accounting officers in the higher supervision ranks. Given that we studied human behaviour, we kept identities of the respondents confidential.\nResults and discussion: We took keen interest in the personal characteristics of the respondents as they could affect commitment and OCBs. These were later controlled in the analysis in order to avoid endogenous biases. For purposes of the general impression, these are summarized here. The respondents were 60 and 40 per cent male and female, respectively. The gender dimension has influence on our study variables. The marital status is another key characteristic; we had majority married followed by singles. Another aspect of interest was age as it directly affects people's behaviour at work. The majority at 29 per cent were between 32 and 38 years old, while the smallest score was only 4 per cent which included those who were above 52 years. Finally, we took interest in the education level of respondents; majority had education of diploma qualification (36.8 per cent), followed by bachelor's degree (28.5 per cent) and last was postgraduate study (8.4 per cent). Most of the respondents had worked with the local government for over five years.\nConclusion, implications and limitations: The study adds on to the growing debate on OCB and its predictors. Accordingly, our study has reaffirmed organizational commitment as a significant predictor. However, the results have equally raised an important area of further scrutiny on the relatively low coefficient of determination. The study also raised new interest on the role of control personal variables in the model. It is consequential that we found these personal factors not significant in view that OCB is a human behaviour. The success and relevance of organizations depend on the ability to cultivate the habit of performance excellence through the development of new approaches, evaluative skills and techniques for handling its human capital. Organizations should guide efforts and foster attitudes and attributes to urge and promote the organizational citizenship noble conduct. The result would allow us to develop leaders who model the attributes required to support organizations with a system aligned with the vision, mission and strategies required in a highly competitive global market. These employees may impact the organization and the community creating the platform to improve the quality of life in our countries. The study provides important implications to policy, practice and research. While policies provide for expected efficiencies and productivity, we note that an environment in which these are to be achieved is important when it promotes OCB. Policy makers should bear in mind behavioural elements for affective, normative and continuance commitment. As elaborated, OCB comes in various constructs that cannot be legislated upon. It is therefore incumbent upon practitioners to create that environment that instills sportsmanship, courtesy and civic virtues. Such managerial behaviours are favourable leadership style, communication and considerate policy implementation. For further researcher, this study raises important gaps. We have noted mainly the need to investigate further the low predictive power of organizational commitment in the African and or local government context as against studies in different settings. The control variables, namely age, gender, level of education and level of tenure are personal to employees and factor into their behaviour. Our finding that they were not significant warrants attention from scholars.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB) among local government civil servants.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper adopts a cross-sectional survey research design with a response of 239 civil servants in the local government sector; data was collected using a questionnaire and quantitative approaches were used in analysis.\nFindings: The findings reveal that there is a significant positive relationship between organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behaviour. The predictive power of organizational commitment on OCB is, however, lower than other similar studies in extant literature. Despite being significant, the coefficient of determination in the final model was very low raising thoughtful concerns hence recommendation for further analytical studies in the local government context in the African setting.\nResearch limitations/implications: The results in this study cannot be without limitations. The authors take a note of the sector that the authors studied, i.e., local governments, in which the authors may not have contextualized the concepts very well and had challenges of interpretation by the respondents. The authors were also limited by the lack of context-specific literature to underpin our discussion. The paper is also limited by the narrow scope of one region in Uganda and thus generalizability to the African level may be done with caution.\nPractical implications: This study provides important implications to policy, practice and research. While policies provide for expected efficiencies and productivity, the authors note that an environment in which these are to be achieved is important when it promotes OCB. Policy makers should bear in mind behavioural elements for affective, normative and continuance commitment.\nOriginality/value: This study contributes to the body of knowledge by finding further support for the relationship between organizational commitment and OCB, and advances a likely debate that among local government civil servants in a developing country context the predictive power could be very low. This possibly explains the efficiency gaps at this level of state governance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Plausibility and probability in scenario planning
|
[
"Methodology",
"Scenario planning",
"Probability",
"Choice of method",
"Plausibility",
"Schools of scenario planning"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In this paper we unpack and examine the oft-repeated claim by many in the scenario planning community that a key performance indicator of scenarios effectiveness is plausibility. We explore what lies behind this claim and how it works in practice, as well as theoretically. The paper contributes to a more rigorous theoretical understanding of plausibility, its relations with and differences with probability, and how they have been and still are related. We suggest that the links between them have been more complex than has generally been accepted, and clarify how the distinction can be more helpfully drawn to enhance the effectiveness of scenario work.\nSense-making: retrospective and prospective: Prospective sense-making is a seldom-explored element of organizing (except in leadership research) although it is increasingly important as business, political, financial and social systems become more complex, inter-related, uncertain and turbulent. The past is a reasonable guide when growth is stable and past and present trends can be extrapolated reliably to account for emergence. However when change is novel, unexpected, unforeseen, unique, and/or radical, perhaps involving also manifold unintended consequences; the future and the uncertainty it holds means organizations can no longer rely on past or unfolding trends. Making sense of uncertain futures becomes a key survival skill within organizational life in turbulent times (Ramirez et al., 2010).\nThe chequered past: the etymological history of the plausibility-probability distinction: The etymology of plausibility and probability in English has three distinct periods - a confused one up to and including the sixteenth century; a transition period in the seventeenth century wherein probability becomes part of the then unfolding and distinct field of science, and a clearer distinction period as of the eighteenth century. In the first period (see Figure 1), both terms are confused as both derive from classical Latin, which largely confused them. Probability first appeared in English in 1387 and plausibility over 150 years later, in 1541. In the sixteenth century probability denoted \"appearing\" truthful and plausibility \"seeming reasonable or probable\". Both were perception, not fact. Yet already then probability is associated with \"likelihood\" whereas the possibility of abusing plausibility as \"false appearance\" - which as we show below developed over the centuries into a consummate art - had already begun. Plausibility from its very beginning lent itself to what today is called \"spin\", as it is etymologically linked with \"applause\", expressing publicly available forms of approbation as early as 1542. Plausibility is also more attached to how a person is perceived than probability ever was.\nThree cultures of scenario planning and their models of plausibility and probability: Here we propose that the etymological confusions reviewed above are apparent in three distinctive but related culture clashes in scenario work. Each clash manifests preferences for plausibility or probability in its own way. First we have the qualitative vs quantitative divide. While often related to disciplinary orientation, a tendency to privilege an either quantitative or qualitative approach is often related to institutional context. A second clash arises with one camp epistemologically wanting to approximate prediction, while the other believes scenarios are only of help in intrinsically uncertain situations that are unforecastable. The final clash concerns the roles of creativity and codified knowledge in alternative futures, rendering scenario planning as entailing either \"art\" or \"science\".\nUsing plausibility and probability in practice: Comparing the relative merits of actually deploying a probability-centered approach to scenarios with those of a plausibility-centered approach within a single scenarios situation is difficult for practical and methodological reasons that go well beyond the definitional issues surveyed in the first section, and the cultural ones surveyed in the second one.\nPlausibility and probability as social defences against anxiety: Psychology plays an important role in every aspect of scenario work. Social psychologists have found that ambiguity and uncertainty are uncomfortable and can create anxiety (Heath and Tversky, 1991; Cao et al., 2011). Organizational efforts and even designs attempt to address this anxiety by tailoring work so that only \"small chunks\" of stress are involved for every individual worker (Menzies Lyth, 1960). This tendency to keep the \"dis\" out of \"distress\" (Selye, 1974) and keep the \"stress\" productive; to fix onto the flux, to construct order out of chaos, and to stand on firm footing appears linked to a basic human need to reduce ambiguity to productive levels, to obtain sufficient certainty, and to deny excessively stressful evil (Cohen, 2001). Seeking to end the exposure to stressful ambiguity through closure is made by pushing for greater plausibility and by enumerating probability. Whether through plausibility or probability, at heart is a desire to alleviate the discomfort and distress that ambiguity and uncertainty entail; and to push for comfort, or at least a level of stress that is generative and helpful - not paralyzing and unsettling.\nDiscussion: safeguarding productive ambiguity in scenario planning: Resisting the urge to find a falsely certain, infertile, and unproductive steady ground in numerical or other accounting - or in overly plausible outcomes - is a key factor of the effective practice of scenario work. Rethinking plausibility and reframing the plausibility-probability debate offers an entry point for more robust assessments of these problematic issues and more effective potential approaches. If an important benefit of scenarios is what Kahn (1962) called to help \"think the unthinkable\", and in so doing to surface implicit assumptions, test tacit knowledge, question preconceptions of the impossible and the possible, change views and minds; then staying with ambiguity and uncertainty that is productive, rather than seeking the seductive comfort of early but unproductive resolution is a key purpose of scenario work.\nConclusions: In this paper we have surveyed the history of the concepts of probability and plausibility, the problems of distinguishing them, the cultural stances that prefer the one over the other - often equating them with methodological preferences - and the difficulties that each approach encounters in practice. We have also suggested that it so far has been impossible to empirically settle how helpful the distinctions might be. We pinpointed how the tensions raised by plausibilitic and probabilistic approaches play out differently in five specific phases of scenario planning.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore extant distinctions between plausibility and probability in scenario planning and re-frame the either/or stance in the literature within a broader set of methodological choice possibilities.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper surveys the history of both terms in both the English language and more narrowly within scenario planning, critically assessing the confusions that have arisen. The paper questions the distinctions that have been made and offers a richer set of combinations to open up the methodological space available.\nFindings: The paper suggests that the either/or stances that have been dominant in the literature - and even shaped distinctions between different schools of scenario planning - must be surpassed by a richer set of combinations that open up new methodological approaches and possibilities.\nResearch limitations/implications: This is a conceptual and exploratory paper. Therefore the findings are propositions and tentative.\nPractical implications: The paper opens up new ways of producing scenarios and may dissolve some of the infertile distinctions that have plagued the field to now.\nOriginality/value: The paper dilutes distinctions that have been accepted for decades and opens up new possibilities in the scenarios field, which is growing and is now producing some 2,200 peer-reviewed articles/year in English alone as per the EBSCO database.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A transformative value co-creation framework for online services
|
[
"Social support",
"Value co-creation",
"Transformative services",
"Transformative value"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Improving consumer well-being is of growing interest in services and marketing research (Anderson et al., 2013; Dodds et al., 2018; Osei-Frimpong et al., 2015). Well-being, which involves feeling good and functioning well, is associated with a 19 percent reduction in all-cause mortality in healthy populations (Chida and Steptoe, 2008). Services, which are almost omnipresent in our lives, have an important role to play in uplifting consumers' well-being (Anderson et al., 2013). Thus, there is a need to understand how to design and optimize services so that they can contribute to improved consumer well-being, leading to the emergence of the transformative service research (TSR) paradigm (Rosenbaum, 2015).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Online transformative services\n3. Method: Communication (posts) among online transformative service participants (consumers) from Michelle Bridges 12 Week Body Transformation (12WBT), a three-month paid weight management program was analyzed over a four-month period. The time period examined extends beyond the three-month weight management program as this service was available for one month pre-program and one week post-program. The value-consumption stages proposed by Russell-Bennett et al.(2009) of pre-program consumption, program consumption and post-program consumption are used to organize the findings over time.\n4. Findings: To provide insight into the co-creation of value over time this study examined the consumer journey through the stages of pre-program consumption, program consumption and post-program consumption (Russell-Bennett et al., 2009). The first sub-section of the findings examines resource integration, benefits and value co-creation, and where they occurred throughout the consumer journey. The second sub-section examines the dynamic process of transformative value.\n5. Discussion: The purpose of this study was to deepen our understanding of the resources integrated, benefits realized and value co-created in online transformative services over time. At a time when service researchers and the broader community are increasingly emphasizing the importance of enhancing consumer well-being, this study contributes to the TSR literature and provides important managerial implications.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Online offerings for transformative services create value for consumers, although little research examines the process through which these services deliver this value. The purpose of this paper is to develop a comprehensive framework to capture the complexity of the co-creation of transformative value experienced by the consumers of online transformative services.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper uses a netnography approach to examine longitudinal data from an online weight management program. In total, this research examines 15,304 posts from 3,149 users, including eight staff users.\nFindings: Consumers integrate a range of social support resources, from informational support to esteem support, which provide a range of benefits such as new ideas and self-efficacy that underpin the different types of value such as epistemic and personal value. The degree of co-created value differs across the consumption experience but culminates over time into transformative value.\nResearch limitations/implications: The proposed framework may be useful beyond the weight management and online contexts; however, further work is required in a range of behavioral contexts and other modes of service delivery.\nPractical implications: By understanding the resources consumers integrate and value, co-created services can develop appropriate value propositions to assist in improving consumers' well-being.\nOriginality/value: This research provides a comprehensive framework of the transformative value co-creation process, extending on existing frameworks which examine either the process, value co-creation or the types of value co-created.\n",
"role": "assistant"
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] |
Clinical productivity system - a decision support model
|
[
"Decision support systems",
"Electronic media",
"Customer records",
"Mental health services",
"Community health centres",
"United States of America"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Recent years have seen the proliferation of electronic health records (EHR's) across the mental healthcare field. The problem is turning that data into useful information. The actual collection of data in an electronic health record (EHR) is only the first step - indeed, we must leverage that data through technology in order to provide useable, actionable information. Even the popular media is picking up on this fact (\"Little benefit seen, so far, in electronic patient records\" New York Times, 11/15/2009). Without additional technology, above and beyond simply collecting and displaying information, EHR's are essentially just copies of paper-based records that happen to be stored in electronic form. The expected gain in terms of clinical outcomes, quality, and efficiency is limited.Here, we describe one example of this approach - a clinical productivity system incorporating decision support methodology, based on mathematical models of productivity and efficiency and utilizing a feedback mechanism of decision support (Wan, 2006; March and Hevnar, 2007; Wright and Sittig, 2008). The productivity metric is completely data driven, rather than based on an arbitrary weighting system. This data driven approach allows the productivity system to drive productivity as well as quality, with the potential to be adapted to drive clinical outcomes as well. The result of this approach is a tightly bound mathematical relationship that directly links actual production to the budgeted expectation, as suggested in the theoretical literature (Purbey et al., 2007). In order to evaluate the system's effectiveness, we compare it to traditional models of clinical productivity in a real-world setting, evaluating the effects pre versus post of a system-wide implementation.Historically, productivity systems and related research have attempted to assign this value using such key concepts as \"weighted productivity\", billable hours, and RVU's (relative value units). By far, the most common methods to measure clinical productivity have used a \"weighted productivity\" metric based on weighted billable hours (Abouleish, 2008). This method assigns some approximation of the \"value\" of a clinical service. For instance, an individual therapy session might receive a \"1\" while a group therapy gets a \"0.5\" based on some perceived 2:1 value ratio between the two. The problem is that, in reality, those weightings are in essence arbitrary and lack any mathematical foundation to accurately \"value\" a clinical service. Thus the ratios, which are intended to influence clinical choices, are misaligned. One proposed improvement to these \"weighted productivity\" systems was the concept of RVU's (Glass and Anderson, 2002; Willis et al., 2004). RVU's are still weighted measures, but are based on Medicare recommended rates. Compared to the predecessor systems based on arbitrary valuations, RVU's represent a positive movement towards constructing a mathematical framework around clinical productivity. However, RVU's still face limitations in that they impact only quantity rather than quality of care (Willis et al., 2004).\nMethods: Setting\nResults: The productivity system described here simultaneously optimizes health care organizational function around a number of domains. The impact was significant. Note that the time ranges and scales on the subsequent graphs and tables vary due to availability of the underlying data and the different launch dates for the system's various components. The data period presented was limited by other organizational changes (e.g. contractual changes at either end) and because historical analysis of that range indicated no major seasonal affects during the period in question. In short, implementation studies are difficult in real-world settings, but the time period in question was the best available.The most immediate impact of the VPU clinical productivity system was on revenue and how staff scheduled their time (Figure 1). Using December 2008 as a baseline till March 2009, or just three months, there was a 28 percent increase in Actual Revenue. Using a paired t-test, the March average (M =$7,528 per staff) was significantly greater than the December average (M=$5,409 per staff), t(344)=-14.071, p<0.001. Total staff time only rose 2.1 percent during that same period and actually fell 7.9 percent between December and February (during which there was still a 21.7 percent rise in revenue). Historically, revenue has remained fairly stable between September and May each year (data not shown). Also of note from Figure 1 was the decrease in variation between the Actual Revenue and the VPU Revenue, where the initial variation fell from nearly 30 percent to 1-3 percent. This disparity was due to a misalignment of disparate targets and ancillary staff responsibilities necessary to actually get paid and/or avoid compliance/audit issues.The VPU productivity system also had a positive impact on a number of ancillary components of the system as they related to client care, collection of outcomes, and compliance/audit issues. For example, treatment plan completion rates increased approximately 25 percent (data not shown). Using paired t-test, the April average (M=94 percent) was significantly greater than the September average (M=68.8 percent), t(306)=-14.929, p<0.001.Additionally, the productivity system had a major impact on case management services (Figure 2). Note that different programs adopted use in different months - the first adopters being Child and Youth (C&Y) case management in October 2008. Adult areas began actively using during November and December of 2008. School-based case managers were the last adopters. The pattern of adoption can clearly be seen in the graph. The average case management eligibility in September was 79.4 percent, with a standard deviation of 7 percent. By March 2009, the average was 96.3 percent with a standard deviation of 1 percent. Not only has the average significantly increased (paired t-test, t(157)=-11.325, p<0.001), but unnecessary variation was driven out of the system. Figure 3 shows the absolute increase in eligible cases during that time period relative to the overall client count in case management (eligibility here was determined based on Medicaid (Tenncare) which represented 90 percent of clients in case management). In September 2008 total caseload of 4,519. By March 2009, total eligible clients exceeded baseline total caseload by 10.6 percent. In other words, Centerstone was getting paid for over 10 percent more case management clients than were even on caseloads to begin with.Finally, there is some assumption that this kind of productivity system might decrease access for certain groups based on payment ability. In fact, the VPU productivity system has coincided with a 23 percent decrease in access time across the board (defined as time from scheduling of intake to actual intake, data not shown). Access time for consumers with Tenncare (Medicaid), Safety Net, and Self Pay are all down significantly - in fact they are at historical lows, as is access time overall. Overall, increased efficiency in service provision appears to coincide with decreases in access intervals.\nDiscussion: The VPU clinical productivity system has been very successful to-date in affecting change within the organization. This change can be seen in the various improvements in metrics related to revenue, billable hours, clinical percentage, compliance/audit variables, caseload expectations, chart completion, authorizations, outcomes collection, access times, etc. These changes are the result of leveraging the data in the organization's EHR to inform clinical decision-making. The results also suggest that a data-driven approach to clinical productivity is potentially more effective than a historical \"weighted\" productivity methodology.There are significant limitations in the current work, primarily due to the real-world implementation of the system. Given that the system grew out of the need to address pressing revenue and productivity concerns in live clinical practice, a rigorous study design was impractical. Additional work remains to evaluate the effects of such an approach to clinical productivity in controlled, systematic settings. The model also currently lacks any quantitative or qualitative evaluation of specific behavioral changes of affected clinicians, which is a critical barrier to real-world implementation (Francke et al., 2008).A data-driven, mathematical approach to clinical productivity holds potential utility for healthcare providers. First, the mathematical approach opens the door to the inclusion of outcome measures directly into productivity metrics, rather than utilizing two separate metrics. This is important because better outcomes may sometimes be in conflict with higher revenue and/or billable time. Integrating these into one measure can capture the sometimes synergistic, sometimes conflicting, nature of producing them, allowing for simultaneous optimization of both. Second, this inclusion of outcomes can be advantageous in pay-for-performance environments by driving both efficiency and quality. It is likely that the lack of such clinical productivity measures have impeded prior attempts to sustain pay-for-performance models (Peterson et al., 2006; Rosenthal and Frank, 2006; Rosenthal, 2008; McDonald and Roland, 2009). A third advantage is that the productivity system links directly into the billing system, and thus captures the conflicting payment methodologies of different payers, sometimes even for the same exact service. This is critical in a hybrid fee-for-service and case rate environment, as otherwise clinicians must rely on ad-hoc information in order to meet payer rules and restrictions and often provide unnecessary and/or unbillable services. Finally, this approach reduces overall variability in client care. Incorporating various quality measures, such as the requirement of completed treatment plans, directly into the productivity system via data calculations enhances compliance.A long-term goal is to mathematically incorporate client outcomes directly into a clinical productivity metric and optimize them simultaneously with all other variables. This would allow a clinical productivity system to adapt to any payment methodology, including a pay-for-performance methodology or an outcomes-incentive model. Outcomes would be applied as a variable in the equation by converting them into a cost-based value reverse-engineered from the data itself, calculating \"cost per unit change\" (CPUC) from the total population using a standardized rates and/or deriving CPUC from population metrics (e.g. hospitalization rates, etc.). After that, the value can be applied as scaling factor. Another possibility would be to calculate the delta, D, per client per month (change from baseline to end point). As an example:He =Expected Hourly Earnings=$100CPUC =Cost Per Unit Change=$500Ch =Hours of Client's Services that Month=4.5O0 =Outcome at Baseline=2.5O1 =Outcome at End Point=3.5Then the slicer (S) is:S =(CPUC * (O1 - O0)) / (He * Ch)=(500 * (3.5 - 2.5)) / (4.5*100)=1.11So for one particular service that month, if:VPUbase =Base VPU=0.9Then:VPUbase * S =0.9 * 1.11=0.99=VPUfinalWhere O1 - O0 equates to D. This equation is simplified for explanatory purposes. There may be challenges to incorporating outcomes into these equations depending on the funding environment, where better outcomes may not be financially incentivized.The future is moving towards the integration of outcomes and clinical quality data with productivity across the healthcare spectrum, coinciding with pressures to hold down costs while improving the quality of care. The adoption of EHR's is indeed only the first step. Technology must be developed to leverage the data existing within those EHR's, producing actionable information that can inform clinical practice and make predictions about future events (Bennett and Doub, 2010). These technologies can turn EHR's into the transformative decision support tools they were envisioned as in the beginning.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of a data-driven clinical productivity system that leverages Electronic Health Record (EHR) data to provide productivity decision support functionality in a real-world clinical setting. The system was implemented for a large behavioral health care provider seeing over 75,000 distinct clients a year.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The key metric in this system is a \"VPU\", which simultaneously optimizes multiple aspects of clinical care. The resulting mathematical value of clinical productivity was hypothesized to tightly link the organization's performance to its expectations and, through transparency and decision support tools at the clinician level, affect significant changes in productivity, quality, and consistency relative to traditional models of clinical productivity.\nFindings: - In only three months, every single variable integrated into the VPU system showed significant improvement, including a 30 percent rise in revenue, 10 percent rise in clinical percentage, a 25 percent rise in treatment plan completion, a 20 percent rise in case rate eligibility, along with similar improvements in compliance/audit issues, outcomes collection, access, etc.\nPractical implications: - A data-driven clinical productivity system employing decision support functionality is effective, because of the impact on clinician behavior relative to traditional clinical productivity systems. Critically, the model is also extensible to integration with outcomes-based productivity.\nOriginality/value: - EHR's are only a first step - the problem is turning that data into useful information. Technology can leverage the data in order to produce actionable information that can inform clinical practice and decision-making. Without additional technology, EHR's are essentially just copies of paper-based records stored in electronic form.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Green supply chain management and the circular economy: Reviewing theory for advancement of both fields
|
[
"Green supply chain management",
"Literature review",
"Theoretical analysis",
"Circular economy",
"Critical analysis"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Green supply chain management (GSCM) and the circular economy (CE) are emerging sustainable development concepts overlapping and supplementing each other (Genovese et al., 2017; Zhu, Geng and Lai, 2011). GSCM and CE practices both aim to improve environmental and economic performance but with somewhat different perspectives. GSCM mainly focuses on improved environmental performance while economic performance can also be associated with the concept (Sarkis, 2012). Similarly, the CE philosophy has been promoted as a policy that can improve economic development while alleviating environmental and resource challenges (Geng et al., 2009). Studies considering both GSCM and the CE have been published (Zhu and Sarkis, 2004; Su et al., 2013; Brandenburg et al., 2014; Dubey et al., 2016; Ghisellini et al., 2016); but a conceptual and theoretical linkage of the research literature is still needed. In most of these studies, GSCM can been regarded as an organizational element to support CE practices.\nGSCM, CE concepts and their linkages: Green supply chain management\nMethodology and results - a systematic literature review: In this section, a descriptive analysis summarizes theories along the five GSCM practices and the four CE levels.\nExtended critical and theoretical analyses: In Table II, critical and theoretical analyses provide insights into theory applications and shed light on extending theory applicability across both fields. To further check if results in Table II validate results in Figure 1, we examine theories that overlap in GSCM and CE studies. This evaluation includes 12 theories applied in both fields (1-1~1-12), 4 theories applied in GSCM while mentioned in CE (2-1~2-4), and 4 theories applied in CE while mentioned in GSCM (4-1~4-3). These theories seem to be the best contributors to both fields.\nConclusions: In this paper, linkages between GSCM and the CE are identified and mutual theoretical applications are discussed. A systematic literature review identified 19 and 20 theories used in GSCM and CE studies, respectively. In all, 12 theories overlapped both fields of study. A critical analysis is employed to explore the mutual potential application of GSCM and CE theories; a cross-pollination of theories to advance both fields. Totally 182 GSCM studies have applied 19 theories. Each theory shows substantial promise for exploring and advancing CE study. CE studies with theoretical analysis are relatively limited, when evaluated as a percentage of all CE studies. These CE studies did seek to introduce 20 theoretical perspectives. In addition to the 12 theories already applied in both GSCM and CE, the remaining eight CE theories show promise to advance GSCM study.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Green supply chain management (GSCM) and the circular economy (CE) overlap but also differ. The purpose of this paper is to clarify linkages between these two concepts. It identifies mutual theory applications used to study GSCM and CE.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A systematic literature review is conducted to identify theories from GSCM and CE studies. A critical analysis explores the theories that can provide mutual applications between GSCM and CE fields. Propositions are developed.\nFindings: In all, 12 theories are applied in both GSCM and CE studies. Several theories are only applied in GSCM studies, but can help to advance CE study. These theories include complexity, transaction cost economics, agency, and information theories. Each of the eight theories only applied to CE can potentially advance GSCM study.\nResearch limitations/implications: The findings contribute to further theory development for both GSCM and CE study. A methodological review can advance theoretical development and cross-pollination in both fields.\nOriginality/value: This work is the first study to explicitly explore linkages of GSCM and CE from a theoretical perspective.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Wine tourist valuation of information sources: the role of prior travel
|
[
"Marketing",
"Tourism",
"Survey research",
"Bounded rationality",
"Enrichment theory",
"Information source usage",
"Visitor intercept"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: For many regions and communities, winescapes have become a major addition to their tourism product offerings (Peters, 1997). Wine tourism is:\n2. Background literature: Trip planning is often separated by time and space from actual consumption of the destination and its services, as travel consumers acquire information about a product in advance of final selection or purchase (Capriello et al., 2013; Kim et al., 2007). The choice and use of information sources in the trip planning process, that is, type, number and variety used, can be influenced by a multitude of factors, including gender (Barber, 2009; Bishop and Barber, 2012; Hall et al., 2000a; Mitchell and Hall, 2001); age (Bruwer and Alant, 2009; Bruwer et al., 2012; Nowak and Newton 2008); prior knowledge and experience (Alonso, 2009; Brucks, 1985); prior visit (Bruwer and Thach, 2013; Hall et al., 2000a); place of origin (Bruwer and Thach, 2013; Bruwer and Lesschaeve, 2012); and involvement (Dodd et al., 1996).\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Research design\n4. Results: 4.1 Demographics of the respondent profile\n5. Discussion, conclusions and future research: The current study presents a distinctive test of enrichment theory in the wine tourism setting. In all, 16 information sources were examined in the context of planning future winery visits. A large percentage of respondents (over 80 per cent) recognized the existence of the 16 different types of information sources available for planning winery visits, although state-sponsored sources of information about wine tourism seemed to have slightly lower visibility than did the other types of information when looking at the sample as a whole. For respondents who indicated familiarity with the source, the sources deemed most valuable for planning winery visits were personal recommendations, internet sites, the state tourism website and information directly provided by wineries, for example, brochures or websites. Traditional outlets such as news ads, billboards, television and radio ranked lower in terms of value for winery visit planning.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine winery visitors' use of information sources in making decisions regarding the choice of wineries to visit. Enrichment theory is used as a framework for determining how previous experience influences the decision on how much and what type of information individuals will use when planning a trip using wine tourism as the context for the research.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A visitor study was conducted at 23 wineries in the US Southeast. Data were collected from winery visitors using a structured self-administered questionnaire.\nFindings: Results from 832 consumers indicate that an individual's previous travel systematically influences the number and type of information sources that they will seek out when making future consumer decisions. Findings confirmed the hypothesized expectations about wine tourist information search behavior and help to partially explain the nature of bounded rationality in the case of tourists' winery visit decisions.\nResearch limitations/implications: Because the study focused only on winery visitors in the US Southeast, the research results may lack generalizability.\nPractical implications: These findings can assist winery owners and destinations with wineries in their promotional efforts. Of major importance is the finding that increases in experiential knowledge from prior travel are monotonically associated with increases in the number of information sources marked to be valuable in selecting a winery. The influence of experience is particularly dramatic in that the mean number of information sources marked to be valuable moves from a low of 2.5 to a high of 10.0 out of 16 as travel experience increases.\nOriginality/value: The study contributed significant and useful findings that advance the application of enrichment theory to wine tourism. Enrichment theory does not currently differentiate between types of knowledge that enrich a consumer's ability to more easily encode and use new information. The current study confirms that experiential knowledge is an important knowledge construct in models of bounded rationality.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
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