Search results

The purpose of this paper is to develop a research framework to explain the relationship between overall restaurant quality and customer satisfaction.

To test this model, the authors deploy 48 mystery shoppers to evaluate 496 Taiwanese restaurants. Further, the authors performed two different regression models and performing the Baron and Kenny (1986) procedure to test the hypotheses.

This study investigates whether restaurants are susceptible to the quality and level of restaurant service, and the restaurant’s physical atmosphere. Further, this study investigates whether these two constructs are likely to improve customers’ perception of restaurant quality, and whether such a strategy may also lead to customers’ satisfaction and facilities word-of-mouth recommendations.

The evidence suggests that the construct of “restaurant service” and “physical atmosphere” are strong determinant of improving customers’ perception of overall quality of restaurant. That is, there is a tendency to innovate when restaurant managers prioritize customers’ satisfaction. Further, managers who believe that service and physical atmosphere issues are top priorities will also improve the overall quality in their restaurants.

Measuring the relationships between Michelin star evaluation criteria via a large observation sample is rare in the present literature. As far as the authors know, this is the first paper to exam the relationships between Michelin star evaluation criteria.

The purpose of this paper is to draw on social network theory to develop a new theoretical model to explain how experience and leadership influence critical network position. Broad analyses of the mediating role of leadership between experience and critical network position calls attention to the need to investigate the direct relationship between leadership and critical network position. Empirical examinations of the roles of leadership and experience within the social network context are lacking. The authors seeks to fill this gap by constructing a new theoretical model and testing it in the knowledge-intensive sector.

The authors made 3,356 observations involving 427 faculty members in business and management departments in Taiwanese universities. To test the model, the authors performed two different regression models using the Baron and Kenny (1986) procedure and the Sobel test.

The results that the authors obtained lead to three conclusions. First, scholars’ experience positively relates to leadership in grouping the followers toward the common goal and to their publications. Second, scholars’ leadership predicts occupying the critical network position, which, in turn, facilitates acquiring more information and resources. Third, experience relates to critical network position through influence on personal leadership.

Although the insights gained from the study are important in theoretical and empirical implications, this study has its limitations. The research examined the professional interaction networks of business management scholars of Taiwanese universities. Although the authors believe that the findings are generalizable to other fields of similar phenomena settings, there are also settings where the generalizability of the study is probably quite limited. Future research could study samples in other fields, such as biomedical research and chemical research, and samples in other knowledge-intensive industries.

The results imply that managers can reap the benefits of their leadership either informal or informal organizations by occupying a critical position to control the flow of resources and information. In other words, the results indicate that leadership can be developed through experience. As well, leadership plays an important mediating role between experience and critical network positions. This may seem to contradict the evidence from research on network concepts and resources control, which primarily draws attention to leadership being a helpful quality for those in critical network positions.

This research extends beyond previous studies that focussed on the value of critical network positions. Furthermore, the paper also examines how the relationship between prior relevant experience and leadership plays a role in academic network settings. To the authors’ knowledge, no studies explore this perspective. Finally, studies that examine the relationship between business management academic networks and different methodology used to measures the network position are few in number, and those that use such longitudinal empirical work are particularly lacking. This study addresses these issues.

France is honouring this year the birthday centenary of a man who conferred a benefaction upon the whole world yet died without distinction and in comparative poverty, if not obscurity. When in the early ’fifties of last century governments in Europe were becoming gravely concerned over the rapidly diminishing margin between food demands and supplies, it was Charles Tellier who came to their rescue. Tellier, who was born at Auteuil, Paris, in 1828, had been trained as a civil engineer, but he combined with the practical mind of the craftsman the analytical capacity of the scientist, and was early attracted by the problems associated with the chemical production of cold. The spectacle presented by a vast continent like Europe faced by the prospect of imminent food famine, while countries like Australia, New Zealand and America, particularly the Argentine, had far greater supplies than they knew what to do with stirred his imagination. Inventive genius in all parts of the world had been stimulated by the promise of a rich reward to the inventor of a practical method of preserving not only meat, but other perishable foodstuffs. The Government of the Argentine held out $8,000 as a bait to the ingenious. In Australia, where the tinning of meat was first exploited, new experiments along the same lines were tried. In England, where a Committee of the Society of Arts had been appointed “to consider practical steps in the direction of providing a more ample food supply,” officials were kept busy testing the inventions submitted for their consideration. One suggestion took the shape of the manufacture of what was described as the “Flour of Meat”; another inventor, borrowing his idea from the method of curing English hams, submitted a device for the production of “Australian Mutton Hams,” and still another ingenious person discovered a process for drying meat with sulphur dioxide. Tellier first experimented with air‐tight chambers. But the presence of the elements of decay in the meat itself defeated his designs. Pasteur's pronouncements on the subject of the preexistent presence of organic germs, at once authoritative and decisive, had the effect of diverting his attention to the refrigerator, and by repeated investigations he found that not only flowers but all kinds of perishable goods could be preserved for long periods on being frozen. It was in “The Engine Carre,” an ammonia compression machine, produced by the French engineer Carre, with whom he is said to have been in some way associated, that Tellier found perhaps the most important factor in facilitating the solution of his problem. This engine was completed about 1860. Eight years later Tellier made his first experiment in the shipment of meat under refrigeration. An ammonia compression machine was installed in a vessel, the “City of Rio de Janeiro,” which shipped three hundred kilos of beef from London for Monte Video. The intention was to place a cargo of meat on board at Uruguay for shipment on the homeward journey to France. But twenty‐three days out from London an accident which could not be repaired occurred to the refrigerating apparatus and the meat had to be eaten on board. So it came about that the United States were able to anticipate Tellier in the actual inauguration of a meat trade between the new and the old worlds dependent upon artificially cooled storage during transport. A shipment of chilled beef was made from the United States to this country in 1874.

Looks at the distinctive Australian background and the features of the national communication culture that may impact on business life as well as those of the traditional executive culture. Brings out the specifics of the Australian management style from a foreign viewpoint, looking at what differences exist compared to New Zealand, the United States and Asian countries. Concludes that Australians need to develop understanding of the global market whilst retaining their easy regard in which they are held.

If I were a wealthy man there are two things I would do : in the first place, I would found a Chair at one of our more progressive medical schools and instal in it a man whose duty it would be to give as part of the clinical training of every student a course of lectures in the prevention of disease by good food. Something must be done to dispel from the medical man's mind the idea that vitamins are a kind of medicine to be prescribed for certain disorders, much as you give quinine to counter malaria. It has been said with much wisdom that it is better to build a fence at the top of the cliff than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom—incidentally, it is also cheaper. We do need to make it more clearly understood that, apart from all humanitarian considerations, the proper feeding of the people is a question of national insurance. This aspect of the future of nutrition has always seemed to me so obvious that it has surprised me that those whose job it is to understand the basic principles of insurance have not appreciated years ago its potential value to them. When I was in Canada recently I found, however, that they had got hold of the idea. One of the largest insurance companies in the Dominion is contributing $500,000 towards the cost of the national nutrition propaganda campaign because they are convinced that it is the most promising project for improving health and increasing expectation of life. The second benefaction I would make would be to finance the sending to each of about half a dozen countries of a small, well qualified and equipped team of young medical men and nutrition experts, trained to correlate on the spot information about diet and the incidence of disease. I would send one team to the heavy meat‐eating areas of the South American plains. They would solve in a year or two the long disputed question whether very high protein intakes are harmful to health and liable to produce certain disorders. I would send another team to South‐Eastern Europe to one of the areas where the peasants live almost entirely on vegetables, coarse bread and goats' milk. Is it true that these people have a very low incidence of digestive disorders and hardly ever suffer from cancer of the digestive tract? We do not know, but a team using standardised methods of examination and survey would not be long in finding the truth. Dr. Sinclair and his Oxford Nutrition Survey team has prepared the model of what is required. Such teams will, I believe, be widely used in the post‐war years. They may actually be required even earlier. They would be invaluable if they could be rushed into territories as soon as they are liberated from the enemy, where their task would be to survey and advise on the nutritional conditions of the liberated people—which in many cases, we fear, are likely to be grievous. War has few virtues. One undoubtedly is that activity in many fields of enterprise is enormously stimulated. Another is that problems can often be lifted clear of the arena of political dispute. This war of liberation will offer some compensation for the devastation and waste of human effort if it brings nearer by years the day when every man, woman and child can be assured that they will never know the want of the foods on which their health depends. Not until that day dawns can the Atlantic Charter, calling for freedom from fear, freedom from want, become reality.

If it is a fraud to dye an unripe orange to make it look ripe, why should it be permissible to dye winter butter to make it look like summer butter?”, he says. Or one might add, to dye a biscuit brown to imply the presence of chocolate or to colour a cake yellow to simulate the addition of eggs? Our third heading is, What? What colouring matters should be allowed, and upon what conditions? Great Britain is the only leading country which has not a legal schedule of permitted colours. In this country any colouring agent may be added to food, except compounds of antimony, arsenic, cadmium, chromium, copper, mercury, lead and zinc. Gamboge, picric acid, victoria yellow, manchester yellow, aurantia and aurine are also prohibited. The addition, however, of any other colouring agent which is injurious to health would be an offence under the Food and Drugs Act. Other countries, including the United States of America, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Spain, Sweden and Denmark have drawn up lists of permissible colours. And so the question arises—is it preferable to draw up a list of permissible colours or one of prohibited colours? It is obvious that if only certain colours are prohibited the remainder may be legally employed so long as they are not injurious to health. Thus a colouring agent may be used for a considerable time before it is proved to be injurious, whereas, if only‐certain colouring agents which have been previously proved to be non‐injurious were permitted, this risk of possible danger to health would be avoided. There is no doubt that in many cases proof of injury to the health of the human being is difficult to obtain. Much of the work that has been carried out to establish whether a particular dye is harmless or not has involved the use of dogs as test subjects. This does not appear to be a very satisfactory method of testing, for obviously dogs may react very differently from human beings towards chemicals. A dog's digestive powers are stronger than those of humans. No one would think of suggesting that bones are suitable food for humans just because dogs love them! Matta found that the capacity to depress the human digestion is possessed not only by poisonous dyes but also by dyes which he had proved to be non‐poisonous to animals. In bacteriology the addition of very small amounts of certain dyes to the culture medium will retard the growth of particular organisms and therefore it would seem possible that some dyes might adversely affect the action of enzymes in the body. So it would seem of importance that, if possible, all colouring matters, before being permitted to be used in food, should be proved by a competent authority to be harmless to human beings. If the effects of colouring matters upon the human digestive processes cannot be easily carried out in the body then it might be possible to perform such tests in vitro, using artificial gastric juice. It may be argued that the proportion of colouring matter added to food, ranging from about 1 part in 2,000 to about 1 part in 300,000, is so small that any particular colouring agent would need to be a deadly poison before any appreciable injurious effect upon health would occur. This argument does not, however, take into account the possible injurious effects which may be caused by the frequent ingestion of colouring matters which may have but mild toxic properties. It is known, for instance, that many synthetic colours have marked antiseptic properties even in highly diluted solutions, and therefore they may adversely affect the digestive processes. In any case, surely it would be wiser to eliminate all risks by requiring that official physiological tests should be carried out upon colouring matters before they are permitted to be used in food. One has to safeguard not only the healthy person but also the very young, the old and those who are of a delicate constitution. A harmless colour has been defined in Canada as one “which will not retard digestion nor have special physiological effects when consumed in quantities corresponding to 2 grains per day per adult.” The Departmental Committee in its report on “The use of preservatives and colouring matters in food,” published in 1924, stated that “It appears to us that definite evidence from direct experiments should be obtained as to the harmlessness of a dye before its use should be permitted in food. We have therefore come to the conclusion that a list of permitted colours should be prepared and that no colours other than those in such a list should be allowed to be used in the preparation of food. The list should, in our opinion, be prepared by the Minister of Health and issued by him, provision being made for the consideration of claims advanced by traders for the recognition and approval of additional colours on satisfactory evidence of harmlessness. We do not think that action such as this should seriously embarrass manufacturing interests, or is a course on which it is unreasonable, in view of the importance of the subject, to insist.” Yet, in spite of these recommendations of the Committee, no list of permitted colours was passed into law, and one wonders why. One argument against the drawing up of a list of prohibited colours is that even if a non‐prohibited colour is proved to the satisfaction of a given Court to be injurious to health that decision is not binding on other Courts and so there may be a lack of uniformity. A certain colour may be permitted in one town and prohibited in the next, which fact might add to the difficulties of the large scale manufacturer whose products are sold over a wide area. The leading manufacturers of dyes for use in food no doubt exercise great care in their preparation and such products are normally free from objectionable impurities, but it is possible that other dyestuff manufacturers are not so particular concerning the purity of their products. For instance, about 1938 a firm was fined for selling “Damson Blue” containing 540 parts of lead per million. Therefore it would seem necessary that some official control over the dyes that are sold for use in food should be introduced. The manufacture of some dyes involves complicated processes, and it is stated that in the production of one particular colour over 100 different chemicals are used and thirty different reactions, occupying several weeks, must be carried out before the finished colour is produced.

This paper deals with the rationales which prevail in the organisation of the communication function of international companies, ie the reasons which govern this organisation and the principal patterns and underlying conceptions of corporate communication. Beyond the logic or absence of logic in this organisation, one should be able to contribute to knowledge of communication in the following areas: what conceptions (definition) of corporate communication does this organisation manifest? What are the main patterns in the organisation of communication according to business field and to country? Are some better than others? To what extent does this organisation depend on managerial cultures (national culture, culture of the business sector, management style, culture of the company, etc…)? This paper was written from a survey conducted in the chair ‘Communication et Management’ of ESSEC, Graduate School of Management, in 1995. Its results appeared in International Public Relations Review, IPRA, Volume 16, 1995.

Great moves are afoot to ensure that the nation receives its food and milk in a hygienic condition. The first of these, affecting milk, were the new Milk and Dairy Regulations which put into effect from October 1 last the provisions of the Food and Drugs (Milk and Dairies) Act, 1944 (Appointed Day) Order, 1949, and the Milk (Special Designations) Act, 1949. Next the focus was on food, with the issue to local authorities by the Ministry of Food of model by‐laws to ensure cleanliness in the handling, wrapping, and delivery of food. Now, to complete the trio, we have an authoritative report by the joint committee of the British Medical Association and the National Veterinary Medical Association—a new co‐operation between doctors and veterinarians—on the production, distribution, and control of milk supplies. During its discussions the committee had three main principles in mind :—

It is almost to the day ten years since I had the honour of delivering before your Society the third of the Cantor Lectures for 1932. It is no less wise for the scientist than for the politician to remind himself of what he has said on previous occasions, so I read again what I had written then. Although it is part of my job in life to keep myself acquainted with advances in the study of nutrition I found myself wondering that so much had been learnt in these ten years. I was surprised to be reminded that nutrition experts at that time were unable to indicate more precisely than by a series of plus and minus signs what amounts of the more important vitamins are present in our common foods. Many other matters I discussed in those lectures brought home forcibly to me how inadequately prepared we would have been on what I may term the “ nutritional front,” had plans for feeding the people of this country for several years of war been called for in 1929. Comparisons between conditions prevailing during the warof 1914–18 and those existing to‐day constantly come to the mind of those whose experience covers both. But I will remind you of one great difference which is curiously rarely appreciated. In the last struggle the food position in Great Britain did not materially deteriorate until the latter part of 1917—after three years of war—and it was not found necessary to introduce rationing until February of 1918—a mere nine months before the Armistice. We are apt complacently to think our people were reasonably well fed for the latter part of that war period, and to point to the contrast with terrible conditions in Germany and Central Europe. What we often fail to recognise or even, perhaps, admit, is that, had the submarine campaign of 1918 continued for another year and become intensified to an extent comparable with what is being faced to‐day, we would probably have run into serious nutritional troubles because we had not then the scientific knowledge either to foresee them or to devise protective measures. The outbreak of the second world war in 1939 found us in an incomparably stronger position. It is true there were still disconcerting gaps in our knowledge, such, for example, as the lack of any trustworthy data as to the protein requirements of the adult man and woman, but, by and large, it was possible to draw up a basic plan for providing all categories of the population with food suitable for their nutritional requirements. The foundations of this plan were quantitative data, much of which had been acquired in very recent years. The importance of this basic plan lay in the fact that, whereas it was constructed in the first instance from these quantitative data concerning proteins, calories, vitamins and other nutrients, it could be developed in a variety of ways when it came to translation in terms of actual commodities. This gave it the quality of flexibility so essential if the plan were to be adaptable to changes in the quantities of individual foodstuffs available. We had something more than the estimates of requirements on which this basic plan was built. We had the invaluable information which Sir John Orr and others had collected from the surveys they had conducted during the four or five years before the war. This gave us a measure of the extent to which diets consumed in this country were nutritionally defective and in need of improvement. Moreover, it indicated quite clearly how important it would be to control the distribution of essential foods so that gross nutritional inequalities, revealed by these surveys, should be redressed as far as possible. The striking example of the success that has been achieved in this latter direction concerns the distribution of the liquid milk supply. Nutrition experts agree that the average consumption per head of the population ought to be not less than a pint a day. Before the war we drank about about half that quantity, but the curve relating volume consumed to income spent on food was disturbingly steep. Families spending more than 18s. a week per head on food were able to purchase nearly six pints a week for each member. Those who were unable to spare more than 5s. a week on their diet could not afford to purchase more than 1½ pints. It was clear at the beginning of the war, and even more obvious after the fall of Denmark and Holland, that there would be very great difficulties in the way of raising significantly the total milk consumption, much as that was to be desired. On the other hand, there was everything to be said for distributing more equably such supplies as were available. By one measure or another this has been achieved. The Milk in Schools Scheme, the National Milk Scheme, the Special Category Priority Scheme, each has served to flatten out the steep consumption income curve of pre‐war years. To‐day, we find that the poorest families covered by our surveys are drinking nearly 3½ pints of milk per head per week; the well‐to‐do families, scarcely more than 4½ pints. This naturally has raised a few grumbles from those who were fortunate enough before restrictions were imposed to be able to purchase all they wished to have, but we regard their troubles as trivial when we look at the benefits gained by the poorer people who have thus been enabled to get a fairer share of a food that has been aptly described as the keystone of the nutritional structure. If we look to the post‐war years—and it is one of the most heartening signs of the spirit in which we are waging this struggle against barbarism that so much attention is being paid to questions of reconstruction—we cannot see ourselves reverting to a state in which the consumption of milk can be seriously restricted by lack of purchasing power. The consumption of milk in one form or another must be raised. Our post‐war target should be a level 100 per cent. higher than the present figures, which, it may surprise you to learn, are actually higher than in 1939. But the curve must not be allowed to become steep again. Nearly a horizontal line, as it now is, its level must be raised without changing in shape. I believe that will be done. If it is, it will be a direct outcome of our nutrition policy during the present war. Those of us who have for many years studied experimental animals have long known of the profound effects of pre‐natal diet on the welfare of the mother and her offspring. Although there was every reason to believe that the same conditions would influence a woman and her child, precise information was curiously scanty. Here and there in the medical literature, suggestive records or observations could be gleaned, but there was not a convincing picture and much remained mere surmise. Largely as a result of the enthusiasm and enterprise of Miss Olga Nethersole, founder of the People's League of Health, an investigation was begun in London a year or so before the outbreak of war. I was privileged to serve on the Committee that directed the work. In all, no less than 5,000 women, typical of those coming for their confinements to the large London hospitals, were covered by the investigation. Approximately half the number of women were given vitamin and mineral supplements during the latter half of pregnancy; the supplements being in quantities likely to bring their total intake up to what scientists regard as desirable for that condition. The remainder were not so treated and served as controls. I will not give you the results in detail of this very comprehensive test, for they are about to be published in the medical press, but the chief finding was that the treated group showed a reduction in the incidence of toxæmic conditions and their sequelæ of such an order that, had the figures been applicable to the country as a whole—and, may I remind you that London has a relatively low toxæmia incidence by comparison with some other large towns?—the lives of no less than 10,000 women a year would have been saved.

This is the last part of the book, and it highlights the international perspective of women's empowerment in construction. The chapter also captures women's participation in the context of European, Asian, African and other continents. Essential factors influencing women's empowerment and involvement in the construction industry have also been considered.