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This research focuses on the role of product acquisition cues in positive word-of-mouth (PWOM) content on social media, comparing the characteristics of different sources of product acquisition (purchased vs. gifted) and exploring whether and how they affect consumers' reliance on word-of-mouth (WOM).

The research model was developed based on the mental imagery theory. Two offline experiments and two online experiments were used to test the proposed hypotheses.

The results show that, compared to the purchased source, the gifted source evokes more positive mental imagery and greater emotional attachment to the product, resulting in greater consumer reliance on PWOM. In addition, the effect of the source of product acquisition on reliance on PWOM was stronger for experiential (vs. material) products and for consumers with higher interdependent (vs. independent) self-construal.

This research highlights the role of product acquisition cues in PWOM in influencing consumers' evaluation of WOM, while also revealing the processes inherent in how consumers process information through mental imagery. The findings provide a more comprehensive understanding of the antecedents of reliance on WOM and offer new insights and recommendations for management practitioners.

The purpose of this study is to develop and validate the business streamlining (BS) model proposed in 2017.

This study/paper develops and validates the qualitatively generated BS model, a conceptual model of service sourcing relationships, by testing it quantitatively. A survey was sent to chief exective officers, chief purchasing officers or facility managers in 764 private or public companies in Sweden with an annual turnover exceeding € 10m. The categories were tested and analyzed by means of factor analysis.

The BS model for managing service sourcing processes was confirmed to be significant overall, meaning that it is applicable irrespective of service sourcing context. The efficiency pursuing (EP) was found to have an interlinking role that calls for a revision of the BS model. Furthermore, the four categories tended to load pairwise.

Although this cross-sectional study confirms the relevance of the BS model for managing service-sourcing processes, further studies should examine both the relative significance of its categories in different service-sourcing contexts and why the four main categories tend to pair.

The results support that the model is flexible and adaptable to a wide range of service-sourcing circumstances. Irrespective of the relative complexity of facility management (FM) sourcing processes, the categories can be adapted to fit the service sourcing context. Thus, it can be used as a tool to analyze and facilitate strategic decision-making.

The paper validates that the BS model can represent the dynamics of different service-sourcing processes, regardless of the complexity of the context.

The construction industry is shifting towards becoming more circular by reducing waste, reusing building materials and embracing regenerative solutions for energy generation and biodiversity conservation. Thus, construction professionals must perform diversified services to achieve a circular built environment (CBE). Implementing resource planning and waste management in CBE has already posed challenges to the quantity surveying profession; thus, quantity surveyors (QSs) should be equipped with new roles and competencies to tackle challenges in achieving a CBE. Hence, this study aimed to investigate the functions and competencies of QSs at the design and building material sourcing stages in achieving a CBE according to 3R principles.

The research apprehended a qualitative approach, including two expert interview rounds adhering to the Delphi technique with 14 and 11 experts per each round. Manual content analysis was incorporated to analyse the collected data.

The research findings revealed the important roles and competencies of QSs in achieving a CBE. In addition, essential functions and competencies were categorised according to the 3R principles (reduce, reuse, recycle) to successfully implement CBE during the Design and Building Material Sourcing stages. According to the 3R principles of CBE, cost control, cost planning, feasibility studies, measurement and quantification, risk management, value engineering and innovations and technologies were well-received by most interviewees as essential roles of QSs during the Design and Building Material Sourcing stages. Further, basic/mandatory competencies (personal, interpersonal, professional practice and business skills), economic analysis, BIM management, cost management and risk management are highly regarded by experts for QS as important competencies to achieve CBE.

With new construction trends, QSs must enhance their conventional roles and competencies and search for new skills and competencies. Those skills and competencies could be linked to the CE concept, either directly or indirectly. Since QS holds a prominent place in sustainable construction in CBE, adapting to changes in the construction industry such as CBE is timely for QSs. Further, there is a shortage of literature regarding QSs' roles and competencies in achieving a CBE; thus, this study will contribute by identifying new avenues for QSs in achieving a CBE in the practice and the research.

The objective of this chapter is to identify the key characteristics of Global Services businesses that will thrive and achieve success in the future. These factors are integrated into three main pillars, which we refer to as the Triple-Win. The first and most obvious pillar is technology as a tool. The second pillar is the design and sustainability of the business model, without which the previous factor would be merely a cost and not an investment. And last but not the least, there is the purpose which gives meaning to the proposal, focusing on the human being and their environment. The DIDPAGA business model sits at the intersection of these three elements.

After reviewing the literature focused on real-world course–client marketing projects as well as the literature regarding teaching entrepreneurial marketing (EM), the current paper assesses a census population (N = 106) of course–client projects selected by the current author via Riipen – an online course–project matching hub – for marketing courses taught from Spring 2018 through Spring 2023. The purpose of this paper is to uncover and explore the degree of EM teaching relevance of said course projects over the five-year span indicated.

All Riipen-sourced course–client projects selected by the current author for marketing courses taught from Spring 2018 through Spring 2023 (N = 106) were reviewed so that broad project-level and firm-level characteristics and trends – especially EM relevance – could be excavated and assessed over the five-year/10-semester span. In addition, an in-depth qualitative primacy-recency/bookend approach was taken with regards to the first semester (Spring 2018) and the most recent semester (Spring 2023).

The main finding is that Riipen-sourced course–client projects exhibited an increasingly high degree of EM relevance between Spring 2018 through Spring 2023. Project representatives at the founder/co-founder level or the equivalent made up only 20% of the pool in Spring 2018 yet constituted slightly over 94% of the pool by Spring 2023. Similarly, whereas only 33% of firms sourced and selected in Spring 2018 were in startup mode, fully 100% of firms selected in Spring 2023 were in startup mode.

The population of 106 Riipen-sourced-and-selected course–client projects do not represent a statistically valid basis for “apples-to-apples” comparisons because: the population of projects was spread across multiple courses and across multiple semesters over a five-year span where many shifts and trends were ongoing – including impacts to course-delivery modality due to COVID-19, and it is likely that unconscious idiosyncratic biases of the current author were operant during selection. Moving forward, researchers are encouraged to pursue questions such as the following: are there statistically significant EM-related learning outcomes that differ for students paired to projects that vary across the preliminary project taxonomy detailed?

Many practical teaching recommendations regarding effective ways to source, select and integrate high-EM course–client projects into otherwise standard-issue marketing courses are made. The paper also serves as something of a primer on how best to source and adapt Riipen marketing projects. Cautionary teaching notes and recommendations based on the current author’s observations are also shared.

Over the course of the five-period (Spring 2018 through Spring 2023), it was observed that a rapidly increasing percentage of firms on the Riipen platform self-identified as female-owned, minority-owned and/or LGBTQ-owned. Similarly, a moderately increasing percentage of marketing projects with “social entrepreneurship” and/or “social impact” and/or “environmental impact” elements were posted to the platform.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first peer-reviewed journal article to explore the EM value of real-world course–client marketing projects sourced via Riipen.

Users' voluntary forwarding behavior opens a new avenue for companies to promote their brands and products on social networking sites (SNS). However, research on voluntary information disseminators is limited. This paper aims to bring an in-depth understanding of voluntary disseminators by answering the following questions: (1) What is the underlying mechanism by which some users are more enthusiastic to voluntarily forward content of interest? (2) How to identify them? We propose a theoretical model based on the Elaboration-Likelihood Model (ELM) and examine three types of factors that moderate the effect of preference matching on individual forwarding behavior, including personal characteristics, tweet characteristics and sender–receiver relationships.

Via Twitter API, we randomly crawled 1967 Twitter users' data to validate the conceptual framework. Each user’s original tweets and retweeted tweets, profile data such as the number of followers and followees and verification status were obtained. The final corpus contains 163,554 data points composed of 1,634 valid twitterers' retweeting behavior. Tweets produced by these core users' followees were also crawled. These data points constitute an unbalanced panel data and we employ different models — fixed-effects, random-effects and pooled logit models — to test the moderation effects. The robustness test shows consistency among these different models.

Preference matching significantly affects users' forwarding behavior, implying that SNS users are more likely to share contents that align with their preferences. In addition, we find that popular users with lots of followers, heavy SNS users who author tweets or forward other-sourced tweets more frequently and users who tend to produce longer original contents are more enthusiastic to disseminate contents of interest. Furthermore, interaction strength has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between preference matching and individuals' forwarding decisions, suggesting that users are more likely to disseminate content of interest when it comes from strong ties. However, the moderating effect of perceived affinity is significantly negative, indicating that an online community of individuals with many common friends is not an ideal place to engage individuals in sharing information.

This work brings about a deep understanding of users' voluntary forwarding behavior of content of interest. To the best of our knowledge, the current study is the first to examine (1) the underlying mechanism by which some users are more likely to voluntarily forward content of interest; and (2) how to identify these potential voluntary disseminators. By extending the ELM, we examine the moderating effect of tweet characteristics, sender–receiver relationships as well as personal characteristics. Our research findings provide practical guidelines for enterprises and government institutions to choose voluntary endorsers when trying to engage individuals in information dissemination on SNS.

Sourcing decisions are one of the most crucial strategic decisions in companies and often confronted with inherent unexpected uncertainties and risks. This study aims to investigate the impact of ownership involvement on purchasing (PUR) supplier selection activities, including risk consideration in family firms (FFs).

The investigation is based on a structured literature review (SLR) of 83 studies to identify FF-specific supplier sourcing characteristics. To verify these propositions, the authors conducted a second SLR of non-FF behaviour research (179 papers) to generate a non-FF reference base for the respective behavioural characteristics. Following this analysis, the authors conducted 16 qualitative and explorative-oriented expert interviews (EIs).

Based on reviews, the authors deduce that PUR activities of family and non-FFs are different regarding the PUR decision processes and PUR risk behaviour, and that suppliers' selection criteria like sustainability, partnership and long-term orientation are prioritised in FFs. Additionally, several trends of family and non-FF behaviour approximation were identified. Besides these findings, it might be expected that the differentiating characteristics of family and non-FFs vary based on their region or industry sector. The EIs indicated that “the depth of added values” should be considered as a further potential differentiating influence factor.

The analysis encourages to execute further quantitative studies on FF sourcing activities and requests managers to strengthen the position of the PUR departments in FFs.

The study aims to analyze the intellectual structure in sustainable procurement (SP) research to identify the knowledge research clusters and provide potential avenues for future research.

The study conducted a bibliometric analysis to analyze the intellectual structure in the area of SP. Overall, 1,294 articles were selected from the Scopus database published between 2000 and 2022. The analysis was conducted using bibliometric R package, Biblioshiny and VOSviewer software. Further, content analysis of research clusters was carried out to set the future research agenda.

The study identifies four major knowledge research clusters of SP, namely, (1) green supply chain practices, (2) socially responsible purchasing, (3) environmental purchasing and (4) public procurement and policy. The study suggests a few research directions in the SP field. Moreover, the future research directions are aligned with specific organizational theories applicable in the area of SP research.

The study is dependent on the Scopus database for the source of research publications on SP. Future studies may consider other research database sources.

Identifying knowledge research clusters of SP research is of paramount importance for developing policies in the near future. These policy initiatives pave the way for the adoption of SP practices in the business. The findings indicate the issues managers encounter while implementing SP in organizations.

The study offers valuable insights concerning parameters such as significant publication outlets, influential countries concerning the number of publications, impactful authors, title keywords and identifying major knowledge research clusters of SP to suggest future research directions. Further, the present study highlights emerging areas that require further research, including process governance, supplier diversity, innovation, the role of emerging technologies and the application of organizational theories in SP.

This study is an analysis that aims to understand the rationale behind the concept of value creation contained in the integrated reporting (IR) framework. As such, the authors examined the quality of the disclosures made in integrated reports by measuring the level to which the six capitals (6Cs) have been integrated into disclosures on value creation.

The IR framework’s value creation model focuses on six content elements and three guiding principles. Hence, the present analysis combines content analysis with quantitative measures in the form of a bespoke Integrated Disclosure Index. The index measures the level of integration found in the disclosures instead of the mere presence or absence of mentioned capitals, content elements and guiding principles in isolation. The present sample comprised the 2016 integrated/sustainability reports for 184 listed companies sourced from the Integrated Reporting Examples Database.

The 6Cs are well disclosed in form but only partially disclosed in substance. Further, overall levels of integration between the capitals, the content elements and the guiding principles are higher than average. Disclosures on materiality, business models and stakeholder relationships are somewhat lacking, as are the related medium- and long-term disclosures on outlook.

The paper contributes to the academic debate on IR by building a case for holistically assessing the substance of integrated reports. Considering that the IR value creation model can underpin and align with the 17 UN sustainable development goals, the authors show how the fundamental concept of the 6Cs sustaining value creation is understood and implemented differently across the various elements and principles of the IR framework.

This research also provides guidance for overcoming some of the practical hurdles associated with assessing the quality of reports because the authors provide tools for spotlighting the substance of disclosures over their form.

This paper delves into the substance of integrated reports by assessing how well the 6Cs have been integrated into disclosures on the content elements and guiding principles of the IR framework. In contrast to previous IR research that has mainly analysed capital, elements and principles in isolation, the authors develop an index assessing the integration of these three fundamental concepts of IR.

Decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) are internet-native self-governing enterprises where individual groups, communities, agencies, consumers and providers work together using blockchain-led smart contracts (SCs). This study aims to examine the role of DAO marketplaces in technology-led autonomous organisation design for enterprise technology sourcing industries, with algorithmic trust and governance.

The authors examined the importance of an enterprise marketplace governance platform for technology sourcing using DAO as a decentralised/democratised business model. A total of 98 DAO products/services are evaluated across 11 industries that envisage DAO as a strategic choice for the governance of decentralised marketplace platforms.

The research findings validate how a DAO-led enterprise marketplace governance platform can create a cohesive collaboration between consumers (enterprises) and providers (solution vendors) in a disintermediated way. The proposed novel layered solution for an autonomous governance-led enterprise marketplace promises algorithmic trust-led, self-governed tactical alternatives to a strategic plan.

The research targets multiple industry outlooks to understand decentralised autonomous marketplace governance and develop the theoretical foundation for research and extensive corporate suitability.

The research underpinnings boost the entrepreneurs’ ability to realise the practical potential of DAO between multiple parties using SCs and tokenise the entire product and service offerings over immutable ledger technologies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research is unique and the first of its kind to study the multi-industry role of algorithmic trust and governance in enterprise technology sourcing marketplaces driven by 98 decentralised and consensus-based DAO products across 11 industries.