Search results

This paper investigates why and when messages regarding unsustainable luxury products lead to negative word-of-mouth (NWOM) through a focus on the role of guilt, need to warn others and consumers' cultural orientation.

Three experiments test whether messages describing unsustainable versus sustainable luxury manufacturing processes elicit guilt and a need to warn others and whether and how the need to warn others affects consumers' NWOM depending on their cultural orientation.

Consumers experience guilt in response to messages emphasizing the unsustainable (vs sustainable) nature of luxury products. In turn, guilt triggers a need to warn other consumers, which leads to NWOM about the luxury company. Furthermore, the results suggest that two dimensions of Hofstede's model of national culture – namely individualism/collectivism and masculinity/femininity – moderate the effect of the need to warn others on NWOM.

Luxury managers should design appropriate strategies to cope with consumers' different reactions to information regarding luxury brands' unsustainability. Managers should be aware that the risk of NWOM diffusion may be higher in countries characterized by a collectivistic and feminine orientation rather than an individualistic and masculine orientation.

Consumer reaction to unsustainable luxury, especially across different cultural groups, is a neglected area of investigation. This work contributes to this novel area of research by investigating NWOM stemming from unsustainable luxury manufacturing practices in different cultural contexts.

The literature mainly concentrates on the relationships between externally oriented digital transformation (ExtDT), big data analytics capability (BDAC) and business model innovation (BMI) from an intra-organizational perspective. However, it is acknowledged that the external environment shapes the firm's strategy and affects innovation outcomes. Embracing an external environment perspective, the authors aim to fill this gap. The authors develop and test a moderated mediation model linking ExtDT to BMI. Drawing on the dynamic capabilities view, the authors' model posits that the effect of ExtDT on BMI is mediated by BDAC, while environmental hostility (EH) moderates these relationships.

The authors adopt a quantitative approach based on bootstrapped partial least square-path modeling (PLS-PM) to analyze a sample of 200 Italian data-driven SMEs.

The results highlight that ExtDT and BDAC positively affect BMI. The findings also indicate that ExtDT is an antecedent of BMI that is less disruptive than BDAC. The authors also obtain that ExtDT solely does not lead to BDAC. Interestingly, the effect of BDAC on BMI increases when EH moderates the relationship.

Analyzing the relationships between ExtDT, BDAC and BMI from an external environment perspective is an underexplored area of research. The authors contribute to this topic by evaluating how EH interacts with ExtDT and BDAC toward BMI.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the significant role of accounting in the expropriation of Jewish real estate after the enforcement of race laws under Benito Mussolini’s Fascist regime in Italy.

Hannah Arendt’s understanding of government bureaucracy in the twentieth century totalitarian regimes informs the research which draws upon a wide range of primary sources.

Implementation of the program of expropriation was the responsibility of a government body, EGELI, which was created specifically for this purpose. The language of accounting provided the means to disguise the nature and brutality of the process and allow bureaucrats to be removed from the consequences of their actions. Accounting reports from EGELI to the Ministry of Finance confirmed each year that those who worked in EGELI were devoted to its mission as an agency of the Fascist State.

The findings of this study recognize the need for further research on the role played by servicemen, bureaucrats and accounting as a technology of government in the deportation of Italian Jews to Germany. The study also provides impetus to examine how other countries managed the properties confiscated or expropriated from the Jews in the earlier stages of the Final Solution.

The study is the first to identify the significant role played by accounting and accountants in the persecution of Italian Jews under the Fascism.

This paper aims to provide an analysis of the productivity evolution of a sample of 18,459 knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) firms operating in Italy over the period 2012–2018. The interaction between productivity heterogeneity firm localization and firm sector of business are also analyzed.

The empirical setting is based on data envelopment analysis (DEA) to measure the multifactor productivity index (MPI) and on the multilevel models to investigate if the source of productivity heterogeneity among the Italian KIBS are due to the geographic location and/or to the specific business sectors in which firms operate. Data have been gathered from the AIDA database, which contains financial data of all Italian firms.

The empirical results show that MPI heterogeneity in the Italian KIBS firms' is sensitive to the regional context in which firms operate to the specific KIBS sector and above all at the interactions arising between region and sector.

The paper contributes to identify the source of productivity dispersion in the Italian KIBS.

Supply chain risk (SCR) has increasingly attracted academic and corporate interest; however, the SCR debate in academic literature is rather limited to case- and location-specific studies. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to utilize a systematic literature review (SLR) to explore the SCR research trends and gaps within the management literature.

To achieve the research objective an SLR, looking into 25 years since 1990, into supply chain risk management (SCRM) was conducted, which resulted in 114 papers.

While the SCRM literature is growing, results from the SLR identified limited organized understanding of what constitutes a holistic SCR process, and high reliance of particular categories for SCR, such as the high reliance on specific country settings (the USA and the UK); limited presence of cross competitive SCR process analysis and challenges in developing conceptual SCR frameworks.

The SCR embeds categories of location, scope of supply chain, risk management tools, and the industry sectors involved. The search for related publications was mainly used from a wide range of coverage from accountancy to design in SCR; hence, although there is indication to specific industries, and foci of risk, this could be explored further.

This review of SCRM identifies various research gaps and directions for future research to develop theory and a practical understanding of SCR.

The current literature on SCR has been assessed based on its definition and utilization. The current paper bridges this gap by synthesizing the diverse academic journal papers into the categories based on the design continuum, relationship continuum, process continuum and economic continuum. In addition, it highlights the gaps in industry context, theoretical contribution, geographic location, and research methods applied and addresses the scope for further research.

This study investigates the user’s perspective regarding opportunities, challenges and implications related to artificial intelligence technologies such as ChatGPT in several contexts, such as education and healthcare. In detail, the aim was to understand user’ perceptions of the relationship between ChatGPT and sustainability and their views about how companies can contribute to achieving well-being.

To reach the research aim, the study adopts an explorative inductive design, carried out through a qualitative approach and grounded in 34 in-depth consumer interviews.

The interviewees perceive ChatGPT as a helpful tool that simplifies activities and reduces time and human errors. However, risks associated with using this tool have been identified, such as the reliability of the information provided, the need for more privacy for the requested personal data and the lack of empathy and human interaction. AI tools can support businesses and governments in creating and promoting sustainable strategies and reducing waste. Furthermore, the study shows how these tools can improve the community's well-being by disseminating knowledge and information, supporting workers and generating less stress.

The paper describes the users' perspective on the opportunities of ChatGPT in promoting sustainable development and well-being, providing suggestions for future research.

Operating as a commodity disables the scope of differentiation. In turn, the organization becomes vulnerable to competition. A strong brand ensures the selling company to get premium prices and in the best case rejection of competitive products by the buyers. Branding was often seen as the province of business‐to‐consumer (B2C) products. But in reality, the role of brand in business‐to‐business (B2B) market is also important. B2B sector is fiercely competitive in nature and in the recent past a strong need has been felt by small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) operating in this sector to elevate from commodity construct to brand for sustainable competitive advantages. Products from SMEs, in the B2B market, have nearly identical physical looks and performance specifications. As a result, it is difficult to achieve differentiation. In this backdrop, the purpose of this paper is to study branding readiness of SMEs which are operating in a B2B market and a strategic road map has been proposed.

An empirical analysis has been made to understand relevance, objectives, benefits and hindrances of branding in this industry. In the second stage, a verbal conceptual model has been proposed to explain strategic steps of branding for SMEs which are operating in the B2B sector.

From the research it has been found that SMEs having different motivations behind branding based on criticality of the components and their market orientation. A strategic branding roadmap has been proposed in this section. Construction of the “Brand Initiative Framework” involves plotting of a “degree of product criticality” and “degree of market orientation” in the matrix form, each made of two states – high and low. The objective of this decision matrix is to guide SMEs operating in B2B sector to opt for requisite branding initiatives.

The proposed “Brand Initiatives Framework” can be of immense use to SMEs for managing branding initiatives to ensure clutter free differentiation with target segment.

This paper presents a generic approach that may work beyond country boundaries. The conceptual model of “Brand Initiative Framework” is of immense help to manage branding activities in a strategically profitable way.

Based on the more than 120 papers presented at the fourth conference on Performance Measurement and Control, this paper examines the current state of research in this field. It examines the diversity in research settings, theoretical backgrounds, research designs, and topics covered. The picture that emerges is that of a dynamic field where different ideas and perspectives converge to create a rich and interesting environment. The papers show the progress that this field has made both in terms of the quality of the research as well as the attractiveness of the research questions being addressed. The paper concludes with some thoughts about how to improve even more the quality going forward and an optimistic assessment of the future of the field.

The purpose of this study is use a bibliometric analysis to explore the relational nature of knowledge creation in WFM in operations. Companies live under constant pressure to find the best ways to plan their workforce, and the workforce emangement (WFM) is one of the biggest challenges faced by managers. Relevant research on WFM in operations has been published in a several range of journals that vary in their scope and readership, and thus the academic contribution to the topic remains largely fragmented.

To address this gap, this review aims to map research on WFM in operations to understand where it comes from and where it is going and, therefore, provides opportunities for future work. This study combined two bibliometric approaches with manual document coding to examine the literature corpus of WFM in operations to draw a holistic picture of its different aspects.

Content and thematic analysis of the seminal studies resulted in the extraction of three key research themes: workforce cross-training, planning workforce mixed methods and individual workforce characteristics. The findings of this study further highlight the gaps in the WFM in operations literature and raise some research questions that warrant further academic investigation in the future.

Likewise, this study has important implications for practitioners who are likely to benefit from a holistic understanding of the different aspects of WFM in operations.

Given the nature of corona chaos, tech startups confront strategic disorientation; therefore, this study aims to constructively engage with the theory development process in the area of management decision, adopt causal complexity with a configurational approach of McKinsey's 5R paradigm and the Newtonian gravitational field.

This study provides a novel conceptualization of systematic research of explanatory mechanisms for navigating the turbulence and consequences of the COVID-19 crisis. This configurational study shows how European tech startups adopt strategies in addressing COVID-19 challenges successfully.

The analysis reveals configurations that lead to the outcome of the conceptual model, namely, reimagining the equifinal paths to the next normal. The findings suggest that, in navigating the crisis, tech startups are able to seize market opportunities, capture technological opportunities and consolidate their future positions.

The principal limitation consists of limited empirical evidence regarding tech startups’ ability to navigate Covid-19 crisis and choose the appropriate path to the next normal.

This study enhances European tech startups’ capability to adopt reflexivity and openness while navigating the Covid-19 chaotic context. Furthermore, the study provides a managerial toolkit to guide strategic decisions via deepening their understanding of the new created realities.

This study provides a novel conceptualization of systematic research on explanatory mechanisms for navigating the turbulence and consequences of the COVID-19 crisis context. This configurational study shows how European tech startups adopt strategies that address COVID-19 challenges successfully.