Search results

In December 1991, General Motors Corp. announced that it would lay off 74,000 employees. The same month, The New York Times reported that Xerox Corp., Eastman Kodak Co., IBM Corp., and General Motors, among other organizations, expect many 1991 layoffs to be permanent. Some feel that's because this latest US recession is not a cyclical downturn but an overdue adjustment indicative of a relocation of the world economy.

In the Eighties, U.S. business learned important new skills for identifying and satisfying external customers. Inevitably, this experience led to a recognition that the needs of internal work processes and internal customers were critical to external service delivery. The Conference Board and the Hay Group's conferences “Satisfying Internal Customers” held in New York and recently in San Diego, explored how enhancements in internal systems, processes, and activities can support improved external customer service. The presentations offered different perspectives on how companies manage the relationship between internal and external customer service. For example, some innovative companies focus on one internal customer relationship or core process, while others recognize numerous internal customer relationships and core processes to which each department or function must respond.

Professor Vijay Govindarajan’s “Three Box Solution” framework provides a useful way of looking at a transformative business innovation initiative started at General Motors almost three decades ago and now being further developed by its current CEO Mary Barra.

Drawing on 18 years of experience at GM the author offers insights into how the company used the “Three Box” aproach: 10;•9;Box 1: Strengthen the core. 10;•9;Box 2: Let go of the practices that drive the core business but hinder the new one. 10;•9;Box 3: Invented a new business model. 10;

GM management found creative ways to enable the current business to thrive while exploring the potential market for a visionary business model.

%2010%3BThe%20paper%20provides%20new%20insight%20into%20how%20General%20Motors%20has%20changed%20and%20how%20it%20is%20continuing%20to%20adapt%20%20emerging%20future%20markets..

Based on actual experience of participating in strategy development this paper should help decision makers address their current actions and future strategies simultaneously.

Behavioural change practice has focussed attention on understanding behaviour; failing to apply dynamic approaches that capture the underlying determinants of behavioural change. Following recommendations to direct analytical focus towards understanding both the causal factors of behaviour and behavioural change to enhance intervention practice, this paper aims to apply a hidden Markov model (HMM) approach to understand why people transition from one state to another (e.g. reporting changes from wasting food to not wasting food or vice versa).

Data were drawn from a 2017 food waste programme that aimed to reduce waste of fruit and vegetables by increasing self-efficacy through a two-week pilot, featuring recipes and in-store cooking demonstrations. A repeated measure longitudinal research design was used. In total, 314 households completed a phone survey prior to the two-week pilot and 244 completed the survey in the weeks following the intervention (77% retention in the evaluation study).

Two behavioural states were identified, namely, fruit and vegetable (FV) wasters and non-FV wasters. Age was identified as a causal factor for FV food wasting prior to the campaign (45-54 years were most likely to waste FV). Following the intervention, a total of 43.8% transitioned away from FV wasters to non-wasters, and attitudes and self-efficacy were indicated as potential causal factors of this change in FV waste behaviour.

Through this application, it is demonstrated how HMM can identify behavioural states, rates of behaviour change and importantly how HMM can identify both causal determinants of behaviour and behavioural change. Implications, limitations and future research directions are outlined.

For consumers, cross-channel behaviour is increasingly prevalent. Such behaviour involves consumers actively engaging in (and deriving benefit) from one channel during a product search but switching to another channel when making a purchase. Drawing on multi-attribute utility theory, this study proposes a cross-channel behaviour typology consisting of three key aspects: channel choice behaviour, functional and economic outcomes and consumer-specific psychographic and demographic variables.

Segmentation analysis conducted via latent class analysis (LCA) was performed on a sample of 400 US consumers collected via an online survey.

Cross-channel behaviour is not always intentional. We identify a specific segment of consumers that most often engage in unplanned, rather than intentional, cross-channel switching. We find that of all shoppers that engage in cross-channel behaviour, a fifth (20%) are forced to switch channels at the point of purchase.

Cross-channel behaviour can be mitigated by retailers via a deep understanding of the driving factors of different configurations of showrooming and webrooming.

In contrast with existing conceptualisations, this study suggests that cross-channel behaviour often stems from consumers being “forced” by factors outside of their control, but within the retailers' control. This research presents a nuanced approach to decompose consumer cross-channel behaviour from the consumer perspective as planned, forced or opportunistic.

Increasingly, retailers are adopting technologies such as augmented reality (AR) as tools to enhance the customer experience. However, little is known about consumers' differing attitudes towards AR. The aim of this study is to explore how consumers differ in terms of the value they receive from using AR, as well as the trade-offs they experience when using the technology for shopping. Moreover, the study explores the individual characteristics that lead to these differences by segmenting consumers according to their perceptions of and attitudes towards AR as a shopping tool.

To identify the segments, latent class analysis was conducted on the data collected from an online survey of 503 US consumers.

The analysis yielded four distinct segments of consumers who vary in their attitude towards AR as a shopping tool – AR Averse, AR Hesitant, AR Open and AR Enthusiastic. Covariate analysis indicated that the factors which drive membership of these segments include perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and psychographic characteristics such as innovativeness, time pressure and shopping enjoyment.

The heterogeneity of consumer attitudes towards AR is driven by consumers' perceptions of decision confidence (how they see AR enhancing their ability to make choices), information overload (the potential for AR to over-stimulate shoppers) and experiential value (the derived value from engaging with AR). Hence, retailers should leverage these dimensions when communicating the value of AR in assisting consumers when shopping.

This study highlights that heterogeneity exists in consumer attitudes towards AR, and suggests that the attitude towards AR is not a fixed value, but can change through education.

This study aims to identify profiles of inclusion in the workplace to provide evidence-based guidance to build an inclusive organization.

Latent profile analysis (LPA), a person-centred classification analytical tool, was applied to determine the subtypes of inclusion with Mplus 7.4, using two-wave data collected from 368 employees in 8 Chinese companies.

Three subgroups were identified: identity inclusion group (the highest level of inclusion, 34.0%), value inclusion group (the moderate level of inclusion, 47.5%) and low inclusion group (the lowest level of inclusion, 18.5%). The findings indicate that groups with male, aged and highly educated members, as well as members from developed areas generally tend to feel more included and greater inclusion relates to more favourable outcomes and fewer detrimental consequences.

As this study was conducted only in China, the results may not be generalizable to non-Chinese contexts.

The results may help organizational leaders develop a deeper understanding of the significance and the crux of inclusion. To address the duality of workforce diversity, managers can take initiatives to create an inclusive organization. To achieve inclusion, managers should pay attention to ways of improving the perceptions of inclusion among all employees.

This is among the first studies to identify the variants in inclusion in China using LPA. It reveals the subtypes and characteristics of inclusion and can serve as a starting point to explore how to realize organizational inclusion in theory and practice.