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The purpose of this paper is to better understand the role of closeness and the relationships between social media influencers and their followers, and, more specifically, how social media influencers can effectively manage their human brands.

Two studies were conducted to explore social media influencers. Qualitative content analysis and modeling with path analysis were used to analyze the data.

Results found attractiveness and likeability to positively predict attitudes toward the influencer, word-of-mouth and purchase intentions, whereas similarity only predicted word-of-mouth from the follower. Closeness served as a moderator but had different effects. Closeness positively moderated the effect of attractiveness on purchase intentions; however, it had a negative effect with similarity on purchase intentions. Moreover, closeness moderated the effect of likeability on attitude toward the influencer.

This study was limited by the student sample as well as the students’ self-identification of a social media influencer. Future research should include experimental design manipulating well-known/followed or fictional social media influencers on different social media.

This paper explores the characteristics of social media influencers as well as the potential outcomes associated with influencers on social media. The implications for marketers and advertisers include a better understanding of how consumers engage with influencers on social media.

The role of closeness is identified as a moderator of consumers’ behaviors toward social media influencers.

The results from citation studies of journals have often been used as a benchmark in evaluating a faculty member's productivity for tenure, salary adjustment, teaching load reduction and other areas. It is also often used in ranking academic programs of particular disciplines in universities. This paper attempts to rank the leading journals in the logistics and transportation discipline using three different approaches: total weighted score, total weighted score on citations provided by journals other than the journal in question, and standardized weighted score. A different weight is assigned to each citation depending on whether the article in question is written by single or multiple authors, there are multiple citations of the same study, or the citation is from author/s’ own work. The ranks of journals differ depending on the citation study methods used. A sample of 19 journals in the logistics and transportation field for the year, 1999 was used as a sample space. The results of the study using the most objective and rigorous criterion, standardized weighted score, indicate that the top five journals in the logistics and transportation field are in order of their ranks, the Journal of Business Logistics, International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Transportation Journal, Production and Inventory Management Journal, and Journal of Supply Chain Management. Although this study reveals that the top three ranked journals remain stable regardless of the method used, there is strong evidence that the rankings of journals fluctuate widely based on volume and numbers of pages of the journals in question as depicted by the wide movements in Transportation Quarterly, Transportation Science and International Journal of Logistics. Standardized approach is a unique method to neutralize such bias in the citation study. Study limitations including study period of one year are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to provide rankings of quality of peer reviewed periodicals for faculty research use, rankings of usefuless of both peer reviewed and non‐peer reviewed periodicals for teaching and outreach purposes, and rankings of usefulness of search engines for finding articles.

An online survey was conducted during the Autumn Semester of 2006. 82 periodicals were identified as relevant to the Supply Chain Management field. Respondents were asked to rank their top used journals in terms of use for teaching, outreach and research.

A total of 143 surveys were completed. Journal of Business Logistics, Harvard Business Review, and International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management were the top three ranked journals in the composite index. EBSCO Business Source Premier, ProQuest, and Google Scholar were the top three search engines used to find logistics and SCM articles.

A clear global consensus is forming on the top journals for SCM. However, the emergence of Operations Management/Operations Research Journals into the rankings is an important trend. There was also the absence of previously ranked journals as the field evolved from transportation and distribution to logistics to SCM.

This paper is the largest survey completed to date in the field and substantially updates previous surveys. All academics who are active in SCM will find value in this paper.

This paper seeks to explore the impact of different negotiation strategies on the negotiation setting in different buyer‐supplier relationships. So far, the extant supply chain management (SCM) literature has only briefly touched this subject, though such a study has been advocated on previous notes in the SCM literature.

A qualitative research methodology was chosen in order to investigate a focal firm's negotiations with five of its suppliers. A total of 25 hours of interviews and 15 hours of observations were carried out at the focal firm and with a number of the firms' tier one suppliers in order to investigate the subject at hand.

Explanation is given of when the use of different negotiation strategies can be considered expedient in different relational settings, pairing a distributive negotiation strategy with arm's length relationships, while integrative negotiation strategies remain a more ambiguous exercise. Valuable insight concerning the impact of different negotiation strategies on the negotiation setting are advanced, which, in turn, leads to a questioning of previous research conclusions regarding the application of distributive negotiation strategies in strategic partnerships. The reason for such questioning is due to a limited focal perspective applied in previous research on negotiations in SCM.

Future research should statistically and analytically validate the research in order to reject or confirm the reached conclusions.

The paper is the first to specifically investigate the role of negotiation strategies in the academic discipline of SCM from a qualitative angle using participant observations and interviews.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

The monograph analyses (a) the potential impact of information technology (IT) on organisational issues that directly concern the personnel function; (b) the nature of personnel’s involvement in the decision making and activities surrounding the choice and implementation of advanced technologies, and (c) their own use of IT in developing and carrying out their own range of specialist activities. The monograph attempts to explain why personnel’s involvement is often late, peripheral and reactive. Finally, an analysis is made of whether personnel specialists – or the Human Resource Management function more generally – will play a more proactive role in relation to such technologies in the future.

Contemporary literature reveals that, to date, the poultry livestock sector has not received sufficient research attention. This particular industry suffers from unstructured supply chain practices, lack of awareness of the implications of the sustainability concept and failure to recycle poultry wastes. The current research thus attempts to develop an integrated supply chain model in the context of poultry industry in Bangladesh. The study considers both sustainability and supply chain issues in order to incorporate them in the poultry supply chain. By placing the forward and reverse supply chains in a single framework, existing problems can be resolved to gain economic, social and environmental benefits, which will be more sustainable than the present practices.

The theoretical underpinning of this research is ‘sustainability’ and the ‘supply chain processes’ in order to examine possible improvements in the poultry production process along with waste management. The research adopts the positivist paradigm and ‘design science’ methods with the support of system dynamics (SD) and the case study methods. Initially, a mental model is developed followed by the causal loop diagram based on in-depth interviews, focus group discussions and observation techniques. The causal model helps to understand the linkages between the associated variables for each issue. Finally, the causal loop diagram is transformed into a stock and flow (quantitative) model, which is a prerequisite for SD-based simulation modelling. A decision support system (DSS) is then developed to analyse the complex decision-making process along the supply chains.

The findings reveal that integration of the supply chain can bring economic, social and environmental sustainability along with a structured production process. It is also observed that the poultry industry can apply the model outcomes in the real-life practices with minor adjustments. This present research has both theoretical and practical implications. The proposed model’s unique characteristics in mitigating the existing problems are supported by the sustainability and supply chain theories. As for practical implications, the poultry industry in Bangladesh can follow the proposed supply chain structure (as par the research model) and test various policies via simulation prior to its application. Positive outcomes of the simulation study may provide enough confidence to implement the desired changes within the industry and their supply chain networks.

This study aims to examine the effect of opinion leadership on individuals’ susceptibility to social influence, which eventually affects their adoption behavior and assess how these relationships vary with gender in new product adoption.

Data were collected based on a survey of young consumers regarding the adoption of new consumer electronics. The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling and multiple sample analyses.

The study finds that opinion leaders are more sensitive to influence from others when the mechanism of status competition is at work. Although consumers who are more susceptible to normative influence tend to adopt new products later than others, those who are more susceptible to status competition are more likely to adopt earlier. The results also provide evidence for gender differences. Female leaders are more susceptible to status competition, whereas male leaders are less sensitive to informational influence. The effects of susceptibility to normative influence and status competition on adoption behavior are stronger for female than for male consumers.

The overall structural model predicts an interesting relationship between individual influence and susceptibility, as well as the effects of these factors on adoption behavior. This study also provides deeper insights into the dynamics of the social influence mechanisms at work for each gender in new product adoption.