Search results

The purpose of this paper is to show how the business model of the information and communications technology (ICT) industry has evolved and the general differences that evolution has made to information management.

Literature review was carried out accompanied by conceptual analysis.

It shows that changes in the business model of the ICT industry have been quite dramatic and have led to significant changes in the structure of the industry.

This research is based on analysis of the ICT industry. The analysis could be broadened to include other industries. Research into business model change should consider adopting the evolutionary approach taken in this paper.

Managers in the ICT industry should factor the likely evolution of business models in their industry into their planning.

Government policymakers considering how to stimulate the development of the ICT industry in their country should be aware of the moving nature of their target.

This is one of the first papers to apply the evolutionary approach to business model change.

Customer satisfaction programmes are an increasingly costly part of most business budgets, yet proof that they produce loyal customers is elusive. As a result, leading companies are turning to ‘relationship marketing’ to ensure that their clients steer clear of the competition.

There has been an increasing application of remote technology to customer service. This research, from business‐to‐business financial services, seeks to gain insight and understanding into how the supplier/customer relationship and account management are impacted.

Taking a realism approach, the qualitative research in this study was based on gaining access to experts, suppliers and customers who had direct experience of the subject area.

Three levels of account management are identified in the paper: transactional, operational and strategic. The service offered at all levels often requires close and intensive cooperation on both sides, but increasingly it has been centralised and automated. Key account management is practised as an integrative relationship function, but it has limitations and by definition it is not available to all customers.

This exploratory research suggests a number of factors that may impact on the effectiveness of remote servicing. Understanding the relationship impact of remote servicing may be enhanced by recognising the appropriate levels and types of service for each situation. Further research is needed in this area.

Managers need to carefully consider the transactional, operational and strategic implications of applying new technologies to managing interactions with customers. A better understanding of these may help in justifying the expense of relational efforts in account servicing.

In providing contextually rich data from a sector that is utilising technology as part of a strategy to centralise and automate many aspects of customer service this research explores some important aspects of remote servicing.

The logic of consequences and the logic of appropriateness have long been central to understanding behavior in organizations. However, scholarly work on the logic of appropriateness has consisted mostly of conceptual clarification and ex post explanation of observed behavior. In an effort to facilitate the study of the logic of appropriateness through experimental methods, this paper introduces an experimental paradigm that allows for the manipulation of decision logic as an independent variable. Using this paradigm, 710 participants played four iconic behavioral games in which profitability and ethics are both at play and, sometimes, at odds: Prisoners’ Dilemma, Dictator Game, Ultimatum Game, and Trust Game. The manipulation generated behavioral data, as well as qualitative data about participants’ considerations while deciding according to each logic. The behavioral data show that, compared to participants employing a logic of consequences, participants employing a logic of appropriateness rejected more unfair offers in an Ultimatum Game and were more generous when reciprocating trusting behavior in a Trust Game. In all other cases, behavior between the two logics was not significantly different. An analysis of the qualitative data suggests that a logic of consequences increased participants’ focus on monetary concerns, whereas a logic of appropriateness increased participants’ focus on moral concerns. Taken together, these data provide new insights into when, how, and why the two logics result in behavioral and cognitive differences. The authors conclude by considering directions for future research that they see as particularly amenable to study using the experimental manipulation presented here.

In the field of innovation, there is growing interest in exploring the factors that determine the extent to which firms can learn from external sources. However, most previous studies neglect the role of human factors. Little is known about which employee behaviors are desirable for boundary-spanning learning activities and which human resource management (HRM) practices are appropriate to respond to external knowledge transfer across boundaries. To fill this gap, the authors investigate the role of empowerment-focused HRM in interfirm learning and explore the integration of external inputs from the perspective of employees.

Based on empirical survey data collected from different countries, the authors test the proposed model with structural equation modeling.

The authors’ findings indicate that empowerment-focused HRM practices, including job enrichment, job autonomy, teamwork and cross-functional communication, are positively associated with relationship learning.

In this study, the authors present a theoretical explanation for how empowerment-focused HRM may influence firm's innovation through relationship learning process and provide empirical evidence regarding the specific HRM practices that can have different effects on the different phases of relationship learning.

This study presents a conceptual model of knowledge sharing in global organizations, examining the facilitating role of international experience through cognitive, relational and structural social capital perspectives.

This is a conceptual paper that applies multilevel thinking to the issue of knowledge sharing in global environments.

The presented conceptual model contributes to our understanding of the microfoundational role of international experience in facilitating knowledge sharing in global organizations by integrating individual, dyadic and group perspectives.

Managerial implications are discussed for how to strengthen individuals' propensities for knowledge sharing from international experience through strategic hiring, employee development, succession planning and expatriate mobility.

The presented framework explicitly considers the implications of individual heterogeneity in international experience for differences in organizational knowledge sharing capabilities, thereby contributing to the search for microfoundations of competitive advantage in global organizations.

Universities are considered as learning institutions and their output is knowledge. Their main objectives are to promote knowledge and to integrate three main roles: (1) teaching and learning toward an award; (2) research and publication; and (3) activities centred toward work-based learning. Researchers generally categorize knowledge in three dimensions, cognitive, functional and social competence which are clearly consistent with the French paradigm- savoir, savoir faire, and savoir être. Delamare Le Deist and Winterton (2007) acknowledged that knowledge, that is, understanding is captured by cognitive competence, skills are captured by functional competence and behavioral and attitudinal competencies are captured by social competencies. This chapter describes some basic concepts of social competence in the tertiary education and examines the relationship that exists among knowledge, knowledge management, and social competence. Achieving personal goals and at the same time maintaining positive relationship over time and across situations is one of the main definition of social competence, as brought forward by Rubin and Rose-krasner (1992). Social competence also embraces all the social, emotional and cognitive knowledge and skills individuals require to achieve their goals and to be effective in their relations with others (Kostlenik et al., 2014).

The purpose of this article is to extend effectuation theory at the front end by building cognitive foundations for the effectual design process.

We adopt an integrative conceptual approach drawing on design cognition theory to explain entrepreneurial cognition.

We find a significant gap in the entrepreneurial cognition literature with respect to effectuation processes. We thus integrate the Situated Function–Behavior–Structure framework from design theory to elaborate on the cognitive processes of effectuation, specifically with regard to the opportunity development process. This framework describes the cognitive subprocesses by which entrepreneurs means and ends are cyclically (re)formulated over time until a viable “opportunity” emerges, and the venture is formalized, or else, the entrepreneur abandons the venture and exits.”

Unravelling this entrepreneurial design process may facilitate more appropriate and effective design work by entrepreneurs, leading to more successful product designs. It also should facilitate the development of better design techniques and instruction.

This research contributes to new cognitive foundations for effectuation theory and entrepreneurial process research. It better explains how means are transformed into valuable goods over time through an iterative reconsideration of means-ends frameworks. This theoretical elaboration will expectedly facilitate additional research into the iterative cognitive processes of design and enable more formulaic design thinking.

The Austrian School of Economics, pioneered in the late nineteenth century by Menger and developed in the twentieth century by Mises and Hayek, is poised to make significant contributions to the methodology, analytics, and social philosophy of economics and political economy in the twenty-first century. But it can only do so if its practitioners accept responsibility to pursue the approach to its logical conclusions with confidence and absence of fear, and with an attitude of open inquiry, acceptance of their own fallibility, and a desire to track truth and offer social understanding. The reason the Austrian school is so well positioned to do this is because (1) it embraces its role as a human science, (2) it does not shy away from public engagement, (3) it takes a humble stance, (4) it seeks to be practical, and (5) there remains so much evolutionary potential to the ideas at the methodological, analytical, and social philosophical level that would challenge the conventional wisdom in economics, political science, sociology, history, law, business, and philosophy. The author explores these five tenants of Austrian economics as a response to the comments on his lead chapter “What Is Still Wrong with the Austrian School of Economics?”