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The paper investigates the successful establishment of a strong corporate brand with a particular emphasis on analysing the corporate branding literature’s assumptions about coherency. Successful corporate branding is claimed to imply a shared set of coherent statements about the company’s values towards its external and internal stakeholders over time. An empirical test is applied to the coherency assumption. First, the coherency of a corporate brand over time is investigated as it develops in the media. Secondly, the coherency between two stakeholders’ perceptions of the corporate brand, organisational members and the media is investigated. This research suggests there are three distinct types of coherencies in corporate branding strategies over time: statement coherency, interpretation coherency and uniqueness coherency. On the one hand, a strong corporate brand is characterised by tight coherency, as top management’s statements about values remain the same over time and towards different stakeholders, ie statement coherency. On the other hand, a strong corporate brand is simultaneously characterised by a loose, or even absent, coherency between stakeholders’ interpretations of top management’s statements as well as a lack of coherency in stakeholders’ interpretations of the corporate brand over time, ie interpretation coherency. Finally, a third coherency phenomenon is observed, ie stakeholders’ emphasis on changing topics over time, which they relate to the corporate brand. Stakeholders agree that these themes are unique features and hence the company is considered unique, ie the uniqueness coherency. The implications of multiple interpretations are discussed as well as changing interpretations in corporate branding. It is argued that statement coherency is a necessary element in successful corporate branding, and the viability of the ambition to develop interpretation coherency over time and across stakeholders in corporate branding is discussed from the point of view of allowing room for interpretation incoherency. Finally, the question of maintaining uniqueness coherency is discussed: for how long can a company represent “newness” in the eyes of its stakeholders – including itself? Implications for management are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to present Danish distribution research, with an emphasis on research conducted during the last decade. In order to give the reader an understanding of the background of current research, a number of older projects are also mentioned. We refrain, on the other hand, from suggesting any trends for the future development of Danish distribution research — trends concerning topics, paradigms and methodology. As will be seen, the volume of research is quite small and the number of researchers is very limited. Hence, the future of distribution research is very dependent on the development of a few individuals and on their subjective choices. Having said this, it should also be made clear that what is presented below deals only with academic research.

Traditional quality measurements based on ‘closed’ indicators such as annual results reinforce a management focus on short‐term ‘fire‐fighting’. The development of predictive elements for customer and employee satisfaction opens the way to a measurement system able to drive an improvement cycle.

Investigating demands within an occupational context has always been an essential endeavor to guarantee worker well-being and performance efficiency. In blue-collar occupations, the physical demands of manual labor have always been the major focus, but recent technological changes may come with higher demands on the intellectual capacities of workers. For this reason, the purpose of this paper is to assess physical and cognitive demands that construction workers face.

The authors conducted a quantitative study using standardized research instruments. Construction workers of three German construction companies were asked to volunteer to participate in interviews (n=35) and a survey (n=30) that assessed the extent of physical demands and a variety of cognitive demands experienced by construction workers.

The results suggest that construction work is demanding in physical terms as well as in perceptual, psychomotor, social and cognitive terms. Using and updating specialized knowledge, giving advice and providing consultation, friendliness, assertiveness and reliability are important demands among construction workers.

Construction workers face an undervalued level of demands in their everyday work environment. As high demands can affect well-being and mental health, construction companies would greatly benefit from investing efforts into evaluating the multi-component demands profile of their workers and the impact on their health, in particular through the strongly increasing cognitive demands due to the ongoing digitization of the sector.

The study identified essential demands in construction work that are relevant for the workers’ productivity and well-being.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the research domain of Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) beyond the hard issues by focusing on soft issues in S&OP processes. This paper aims to investigate how consciousness of different personality types can affect S&OP processes.

This paper is based on a single longitudinal case study from a medium-sized enterprise with a data collection period of more than two years. This paper is based on observation and interviews gathered at several stages during pilot implementation and operation phases.

This paper indicates that a focus on behavior using personality type theory and key behavioral indicators has provided a common framework for understanding how the S&OP process is impacted by different personalities and behavior. This knowledge has increased the awareness of which behavior sustains a silo mentality and which behavior breaks it down. Quotations are used to provide substance of this explorative topic.

As a single case study, this paper only provides results for analytical generalization.

Consciousness of behavioral elements in S&OP processes is proposed here as a complement to key performance indicators as levers to implement and obtain sustained operation of S&OP.

This paper is the first explicitly integrating personality type theory for a better understanding of implementing and operating S&OP processes. This paper contributes with a new understanding of S&OP success factors and how a common language may improve process efficiency.

Users are key stakeholders in event facilities, and therefore facilities management (FM) services must meet their needs and expectations. The paper aims to assess users’ perceptions of FM practices and sustainability in event facilities in higher education institutions.

The study used a descriptive design approach to explore the perceptions of end-users of event facilities. Using Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology as a case study, 384 users of the event facilities were contacted through the email directory of the event facilities. Questionnaires were used to collect data and analysed in descriptive and inferential statistics with the aid of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS v22.0).

The study categorised users’ perceptions into customer care, security and safety and service quality dimensions. The results revealed that constituent key important indices of these three dimensions were not significant at both the composite and individual levels. Thus, the users generally perceived FM practices in the event facilities to be below standard. None of the three sustainability constituents was significant, suggesting that users perceived event FM sustainability practices as below standard.

The study presents users’ perceptions of FM practices in event facilities. It has also suggested effective ways of managing event facilities to improve user comfort, safety and satisfaction.

The study provides relevant information on users’ perceptions of FM practices. It specifically has sustainable FM as a key component, which is crucial for achieving sustainable development goals.

Significant transitions in firms (e.g. outsourcing) may impact the relative importance of production and inventory assets, affecting the hierarchical separation of planning decisions. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to planning literature by investigating how the production system and the planning environment influence the performance difference between hierarchical and monolithic planning. Further, it seeks to reduce the prevailing theory-practice gap in tactical planning.

Through an action research study, a monolithic model integrating tactical production planning decisions, subject to upstream supply chain constraints, with strategic investments decisions was developed, tested and implemented in a global OEM. Using the developed model and a measure of the capital cost of production assets relative to the cost of holding inventory, it is numerically examined how the production system and planning environment influence the performance of hierarchical and monolithic planning.

The research demonstrates the potential of integrating decisions and reveals significant performance differences between hierarchical and monolithic planning for firms with low capital cost relative to inventory holding cost.

The findings suggest a fit between planning processes, the production system and planning environment. Future research should empirically validate the findings and propositions.

The paper combine capital investments and production planning decisions, which usually transpire at different hierarchical levels and on different time-horizons, and investigates the consequences of hierarchical separation through a real-life validated case and numerical analysis.

Barriers to employment are a significant issue in the United States and abroad. As civil rights legislation continues to be enforced and as employers seek to diversify their workplaces, it is incumbent upon the management field to offer insights that address obstacles to work. Although barriers to employment have been addressed in various fields such as psychology and economics, management scholars have addressed this issue in a piecemeal fashion. As such, our review will offer a comprehensive, integrative model of barriers to employment that addresses both individual and organizational perspectives. We will also address societal-level concerns involving these barriers. An integrative perspective is necessary for research to progress in this area because many individuals with barriers to employment face multiple challenges that prevent them from obtaining and maintaining full employment. While the additive, or possibly multiplicative, effect of employment barriers have been acknowledged in related fields like rehabilitation counseling and vocational psychology, the Human Resource Management (HRM) literature has virtually ignored this issue. We discuss suggestions for the reduction or elimination of barriers to employment. We also provide an integrative model of employment barriers that addresses the mutable (amenable to change) nature of some barriers, while acknowledging the less mutable nature of others.