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The aim of this paper is to understand how, in tough economic times, British‐owned, English language newspapers such as The Pioneer received and filtered news, especially gender‐related and nationalist‐related events and thinking.

Using qualitative and quantitative methods to assess communications by and about pro‐nationalist women, coverage of female activities was categorised into two groups: first, educational, social and peaceful campaigns and second, direct action such as strikes, burning of British cloth and business/land rent boycotts.

Direct action provided “bad news” coverage, but it simultaneously gave a small window for publicity. Less threatening peaceful campaigns provided a bigger window – enhanced by the novelty value of female activism.

Historians need to look specifically at Indian newspapers during the struggle for independence for a counter‐hegemonic discourse that reached a wide public. When evidence of women's activism is paired with financial news, it becomes clear that women had a negative impact on British business. Furthermore, The Pioneer's own business dilemmas made the paper part of the economic and ideological maelstrom that it reported on.

This is the first time that the colonial press in India itself has been scrutinised in detail on the subject of the rising nationalist movement and women. Findings underline female influence on both economics and ideology – a neglected aspect of Indian gender scholarship and economic history.

This paper aims to contribute to the subsidiary initiative literature by studying the interaction between a headquarters and its subsidiary during an initiative process that has the potential to “wag the corporate dog” that is, for the global corporation’s promising subsidiary initiative in a strategically important emerging market to question the corporation’s prevailing schemata.

The longitudinal single case study draws on evidence from the Indian subsidiary of Swedish Volvo Bus and its efforts to introduce a value product in India.

The study argues that wag the dog initiatives provoke the corporate immune system independent of the initiative’s potential and the subsidiary’s autonomy and legitimacy. If the idea behind the wag the dog initiative is perceived as strategically important for the multinational corporation, then the corporate immune system tries to engulf – most likely unsuccessfully – the idea within the prevailing schemata. Failed attempts to engulf the initiative weaken the corporate immune system temporarily, thereby opening the organization to revitalization of the original initiative. Resistance, even though weakened, from the corporate immune system continues to exist.

Subsidiary managers need to avoid having their headquarters perceive an initiative as a wag the dog initiative by balancing their need to sell persistently the initiative with avoiding negative attention.

This study is a pioneer in explaining how the corporate immune system reacts towards wag the dog initiatives taken from subsidiaries in large emerging markets.

The learning outcomes of this paper are as follows: to comprehend the unique features of the DMart business model, to understand the dynamics of the Indian food and grocery market, to analyse the reasons for the success of DMart, to analyse the financial health of a business by using financial ratios and to appreciate the effect of business and operating strategy on financial statements.

In September 2020, the management team of Pegasus Consulting (PS) – a boutique strategy consulting firm headquartered in Mumbai, India had convened a meeting to evaluate business options for future growth. Post the COVID −19 pandemic outbreak in India in March 2020; many industry sectors had been experiencing a general slowdown in business. Retail was one such sector identified, which had faced a slowdown. A recent Edelweiss report suggested a 39% dip in revenues of DMart stores that were owned and operated by Avenue Supermarts Limited (ASL). The PS team had been following the impressive growth story of DMart since 2017 when they had made a historic market debut with the initial public offering. Over the years the company had grown and emerged as one of the most valued listed retailers in the Indian retail space in the fiscal year 2019–2020. However, much had changed, as the imposition of the countrywide lockdown in March 2020. Based on the Government of India and local government directives nearly 50% of the stores had to be temporarily shut. The case highlights the dynamics of the Indian retail market with multiple players and formats and the changes in consumer behaviour. ASL had used its DMart Ready online app and DMart on Wheels to service the needs of its customers during the period of the lockdown. The PS team wanted to make a business consulting pitch to DMart to help them revive their growth trajectory. What could be the best advice that the PS team could offer to DMart in their pitch?

The case has been written with the objective of enabling the students to understand the dynamics of a rapidly changing emerging market. It is structured for use at a Master’s level course and an MBA audience in the subject of business strategy and/or retail strategy.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the stock market performance of companies featured in the survey “Best Companies to Work For” as a proxy for corporate culture.

The authors employed the portfolio formation and event study methods from finance to examine the linkage between corporate culture and future stocks returns. The lists of India’s best place to work for by Great Place to Work® Institute and Business Today (BT), India’s leading business magazine, form the primary surrogate for a great corporate culture. The authors compared the stock market performance of the culture portfolio vis-à-vis market index, in addition to using Carhart’s (1997) four-factor model.

A portfolio of Indian firms that featured in the “Best Companies to Work For” by Great Place to Work© Institute and BT magazine provides a higher return than the market index Sensex both on an ordinary return and on a risk-adjusted basis. The four-factor αs of the value-weighted culture portfolios are significant, implying that these portfolios have provided abnormal returns during the sample period. Moreover, the findings suggest a positive drift in the abnormal returns after inclusion in the “Best Companies to Work For” list.

The results are largely in conformity with the prediction of the theory that states that corporate culture is an economic asset for a firm that increases its value.

From an investor’s point of view, the study indicates that investment in “Best Companies to Work For” is a better alternative than passive index investing.

This study fills the empirical void in the relationship between corporate culture and stock market performance in the Indian context.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influences of parent brand characteristics and brand-extension fit on attitude towards the extension in the context of services-to-goods (SG) brand extension compared with services-to-services (SS) brand extension.

A survey design was used to collect data from 626 individual respondents. The respondents were selected using probability sampling from two cities in India. The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM).

The study indicated that context (SS or SG) moderated the influence of factors on attitude toward brand extension. A favorable attitude towards the parent brand had a greater positive influence on SS brand extension compared with SG brand extension. Quality variance among service types under the parent brand had a higher negative impact on attitude towards SG brand extension than on attitude towards SS brand extension.

Managers may prefer extending a service brand to another service rather than a good when consumers have a favorable attitude towards the brand. Furthermore, when the perceived quality of service types under a service brand varies substantially, extension of the brand to a good requires greater concern than extension to a service.

The unique contribution of this study is the examination of the moderating influence of the characteristics of an offering (SS vis-à-vis SG) on the link between brand extension attitude and its influencing factors.

One of the most decisive objectives of human resource management (HRM), essential for business performance, is to attract, maintain and engage a qualified workforce. This study aims to identify and prioritize the antecedents of employer branding, which are considered extremely important by potential applicants when they choose to join a particular employer.

The authors have adopted a popular multicriteria decision-making technique fuzzy analytical hierarchy process, to prioritize the identified antecedents. The modified Delphi techniques with the 22 experts have been conducted to validate the identified antecedents. Structured questionnaires were discussed, and their reliability was assessed using the expert’s opinion.

Results of this study indicate that potential applicants consider career advancement opportunities as the most important enabler that persuades them to join a particular employer. Future employees are also motivated to join if they are offered attractive compensation packages, which are distinct from competitors. Furthermore, corporate social responsibility is evolving as an antecedent of employer branding as potential candidates are attracted to employers who are socially responsible.

Employer branding can serve as a strategic HRM technique for any business seeking to attract, recruit, retain and involve outstanding employees, as the success of the organization is determined by how its image is built, communicated and promoted. This study provides insights for HR managers and practitioners who can think of developing an effective employer brand communication that offers a distinct and in-imitable image and reputation as an employer of choice.

This study is unique, as it offers meaningful visions to HR practitioners and experts for designing employer branding strategies for attracting potential applicants to join their organizations.

The subject area is strategy and business.

The case can be used for MBA students. This is equally effective in short courses meant for low-to-mid-level working executives. The case is suited for classes in strategy, general marketing, media management and family business courses.

Dainik Jagran – a vernacular daily – is the most read newspaper in India. Under the banner of Jagran Prakashan Ltd.; which is one of the leading media houses in India, the success of Dainik Jagran has been an outcome of the strategic marketing decisions taken by its founder and his successors in the post-independence era. With extensive circulation, it created a large readership base and took bold decisions to launch multi editions to its daily through a series of acquisitions, mergers and consolidations from 1975 to 2010, enabling it to step into product diversification. Readership surveys, investments in technology, advertising, regular branding events and smart phone applications are a few tools that helped. While the group has diversified into other industries, there is an underlying anxiety about the future prospects of its newspaper business. With the onslaught of online news dailies, will Dainik Jagran be able to expand and maintain its readership base using its previous business and marketing strategies? Or is it time to change strategies for businesses in the newspaper and allied media industry in India?

The study has the following outcomes: application of value chain concept in businesses serving two-sided markets; application of environmental analysis, Porter’s five forces analysis and related strategy concepts; and learning to critically approach and develop a sustainable growth strategy framework for a successful family-run newspaper business in India.

Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 11: Strategy.

The Government of India dramatically altered the dynamic between business and society when it introduced the Companies Act 2013, which mandated firms to expend at least 2 per cent of average net profits on corporate responsibility (CR) programmes. This reconfiguration of social value creation may serve as a template for a closer and participatory relationship between the private sector and government in emerging economies and beyond. This paper aims to analyse how CR expectations have taken shape in the print media in India. Specifically, the authors ask the following: What are the dimensions of CR expectations in mainstream Indian newspapers?, and Why, according to the newspaper narratives, do corporations have these responsibilities?

In this qualitative study, the authors randomly selected and analysed 50 per cent (n = 442) of the newspaper articles that dealt explicitly with CR. The articles appeared in the top five Indian English-language newspapers and the top two Hindi-language newspapers between 1 January and 31 December 2015. Using Content Configuration Analysis (CCA), the authors developed a typology of CR expectations and analysed their associated justifications. Finally, they used CCA to analyse how this typology and its justifications connect to the two main stakeholders: the business sector and government.

The analyses reveal how the introduction of the Companies Act 2013 had a major impact on CR expectations by explicitly and legally casting the business sector as the engine of social development. The authors were able to describe how contextual and cultural dimensions frame evolving interests and societal demands towards corporations, and how difficult it may be for corporations to fulfil CR expectations that are well beyond their core business and that reach domains usually pertaining to government.

This study contributes an empirical exploration of media discourse on contemporary CR expectations in India and its associated notions of social value creation, and how these are shaped by various cultural and contextual influences. The authors discuss how this novel approach to CR modifies the relations between business and society, and they reflect on the opportunities and limits of this model for other emerging economies, which struggle to formulate a symbiotic relationship between business and society.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Indian newspaper web sites using Alexa databank.

The list compiled by Audit Bureau of Circulations of top newspapers in India by daily circulation was used for selecting newspapers. The list included 28 newspapers in various languages. Out of these 26 were available online. These 26 newspapers are taken for evaluation in the present study. Each newspaper web site was searched in Alexa databank and relevant data including traffic rank, pages viewed, speed, links, bounce percentage, time on site, search percentage, and Indian/foreign users were collected. The data collected were analysed and tabulated to reveal findings in accordance with the desired objectives.

The results of this study show that Dainik Bhaskar has the highest traffic rank. Punjab Kesari has the highest number of average pages viewed per day and estimated daily time spent on site by the visitors. The fastest downloading speed is for Economic Times. Hindustan Times has the highest number of links. Decan Herald has the highest reach amongst the global internet users, where as Udayavani has the lowest bounce percentage. The highest percentage of visits that came from search engines is for Dainik Jagran. The highest number of foreign users is for Ananda Bazar Patrika. Most of the foreign users to Indian newspapers come from the USA.

Besides administrators of Indian newspapers, the results of this study will be useful for web site managers in any field including those in charge of library web sites. The study will also help librarians and anyone interested to increase usage of a web site by analysing the use of web site.