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The purpose of this paper is to discuss the importance of a coordinated marketing and operations strategy in goods and service producing business organizations. Customer engagement and co-production are imperative service delivery considerations, and therefore an aligned marketing and operations strategy is essential for the formulation, development, and effectiveness of managerial decisions especially for service sector firms.

The authors present arguments in support of this paper's primary objectives by reviewing past research that have introduced theoretical frameworks, empirical support and applications in support of the close coordination between marketing and operations strategy. The paper then describes how the inter-relationship between marketing and operations strategy impacts several managerial decisions.

The paper discusses several different types of managerial decisions within goods and service producing firms that require active interaction between marketing and operations. These decisions include aligning strategic priorities, new product development, service design, and experience design.

This paper is primarily theoretical and therefore does not include any new empirical data.

The inter-relationship between the marketing and operations functions is well known to practicing managers. However, they may not have a specific understanding of the academic research described in this paper that shows how firm performance can be further improved by better managing these interactions for specific managerial decisions.

This paper is theoretical and provides a comprehensive review of literature and a compelling argument for including marketing and operations strategy in the corporate executive suite. Therefore, this paper should be of interest to researchers and practitioners interested in the functional areas of marketing, operations, and strategy for service organizations.

The respective roles of marketing and operations management in contributing to effective strategy are considered. This article considers both the technological developments and the changes in management perspectives. Technology has presented management with increased flexibility in the strategic positions available. Some argue (Porter, 1996) that technological developments have been viewed as opportunities to increase productivity rather than to shift the organisations strategic direction. An increasing application of value as a customer requirement has resulted in a corporate value proposition: a statement of how superior value is to be created and delivered. Operations strategy has typically been described as being supportive (to the overall organisational strategy) or exceptionally as a major element of an organisations competitive advantage. A number of authors have identified operations strategies which link manufacturing operations and strategic management. A missing link is an exploration of the marketing/operations interface and how this may lead to an effective value based strategy.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relations in the Marketing/Operations interface through the analysis of data of the operational reality of a Brazilian company with a low technological intensity. The study aims to quantify and determine the impacts of marketing decisions on delivery performance and on flexibility of the operations area.

A longitudinal case study was conducted and the variables used in the model were derived from established theories and were evaluated with artificial neural networks. The case of a food manufacturing company was selected to reflect the relations in the marketing/operations interface of a low technological intensity enterprise.

The results show that the decisions on Place/Channel, Price and Product dimensions of marketing exert a significant impact on flexibility and delivery performance of the operation area.

The findings of the case study cannot be generalised and the outcomes are specific to just one firm. However, the approach lends itself to replication, particularly within low technological intensity companies.

Prior studies have focussed on coordination among functional areas as marketing and operations at higher levels of abstraction. The study contemplate empirical propositions through the data analysis of a company with a low technological intensity that can be used to improve managers' decisions and alignment in the Marketing/Operation Interface.

This paper aims to study a scale development and validation process for an integrative marketing–operations alignment (MOA) theory. This theory was derived from several distinct theories that have attempted to explain the interaction between marketing and operations functions of manufacturing organizations. An initial qualitative research and literature review identified five antecedents to the MOA construct (decision coordination, reward system, information exchange, leadership strategy and performance evaluation) as well as two outcomes (customer orientation and competitor orientation).

The scale was developed and validated using successive testing processes including exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling (LISREL).

The outcome of the research is a tested and validated model of MOA. While more work needs to be done to test and potentially extend the theory, this research has produced a basic functional model of the MOA process.

The limitations include target populations, choice of industry and geography and cross-sectional time horizon of the study.

This study represents an original contribution to the organizational theory literature, as it provides both a sound theoretical basis and a validated measurement model for the proposed theory of MOA. While this research does draw on existing models, it is more comprehensive and theory-based than the existing models.

The purpose of this study is to draw on several perspectives rarely used in reverse logistics (RL) research – such as sustainable development, the natural resource-based view and green innovation – to examine the relationship between RL innovation and environmental and economic performance while incorporating institutional theory to verify how institutional pressures moderate these relationships.

A questionnaire survey is used to investigate Taiwan's electrical, electronic and information industries, as well as maintenance and retail stores selling computers, communications and consumer electronics. First, a hierarchical regression analysis is used. Next, moderating relationships are examined along with the related regulatory, competitor and customer pressures.

The results indicate that RL innovation is positively associated with environmental and economic performance. Moreover, three institutional pressures positively moderated the relationships between RL innovation and environmental performance. However, investment in greater RL innovation under higher-level institutional pressures did not always enhance economic performance.

Reverse logistics innovation comprises five components, one of which is cross-functional integration, the process of obtaining information from marketing, production and logistics managers about how their firms created the marketing-operations interface to better handle RL. However, we obtained RL innovation information only from individual respondents. In addition, this study focuses on the economic and environmental aspects of RL activities. Future studies should apply the RL perspective on social sustainability to probe RL issues from sustainability's environmental, social and economic points of views.

Contrary to the conventional wisdom that RL imposes costs, reduces productivity and curbs competitiveness, this study finds that RL innovation can enrich environmental and economic performances, indicating that firms with more innovative RL capabilities yield more sustainable outcomes for environmental protection, social responsibility and economic performance.

This study contributes to the RL literature by applying multiple perspectives – including sustainable development, the natural resource-based view and green innovation – to explore the relationship between RL innovation and performance while using institutional theory to probe the moderating effects of institutional pressures on RL innovation and performance.

Considerable amount of purchases in business-to-business (B2B) markets make through the tendering process. As technology keeps driving B2B procurement, both the supplier/contractor and buyer firms have settled down in their respective roles in the electronic-tendering environment. Researchers have ignored the supplier-side e-tender-driven marketing process that might lead to substantively successful financial performance. The purpose of this study is to improve the performance of an e-tender-driven marketing process of an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) incorporating the stakeholder's inputs.

Discrete event simulation modelling (DESM) has been used as a methodology to model, analyse and improve the process with the involvement of stakeholders at every stage of the study. Different scenarios are analysed to identify the near-optimal scenario based on agreed-upon key performance indicators.

Scenario that incorporated man-power sharing and eliminating avoidable activities gives the near-optimal solution for implementation.

This study highlights that better insights can be gained by adopting the process-oriented view of the marketing–operations interface. Embracing a stakeholder-based consultative approach gives research a more practical outlook and reduces the gap between theory and practice. Suggestions for further research are provided.

B2B organizations, where lines between marketing and operations are blurred, can improve their marketing processes by implementing operations research tools.

This study provides an attempt to improve the performance of a supplier-side e-tender-driven marketing process of an OEM using the DESM methodology incorporating stakeholder's inputs.

“After creating a market for his “new to the world” product and a significant partnership with the German-based SAP, Sridhar Tayur had an opportunity to take the partnership with SAP to another level by establishing a reseller arrangement, available to only a dozen or so of SAP's elite partners—widely considered in the enterprise software industry as a dream come true for technology entrepreneurs.

Suitable for use in MBA, EMBA, and GEMBA programs, this case offers the opportunity to focus decision making on several key marketing and sales issues. Should Tayur sign a deal with SAP, thereby handing significant control of the messaging and positioning of SmartOps to a global giant? How reliant on SAP did he really want to get? Would signing the deal make losing control of his company more likely and alienate prospects who were not fans of SAP? What would not doing the deal mean for the relationship with SAP? Would SAP go down the reseller route with a competitor? What exactly was a good reseller contract, and was it possible for a company as small as SmartOps to make the agreement a win-win?”

Human Resource Management & Social Entrepreneurship.

The target audiences for the case study are undergraduate and postgraduate (e.g. BSc, MSc as well as MBA) students and also management trainees and executives who are interested in understanding the social capital enhancing practices, policies and strategies adopted by the world’s largest commercial employer to ensure complete satisfaction and contentment of 1.7 million employees and their family. Even senior management teams could be targeted in executive education programs, as this case discusses time tested practices, policies and strategies which have been sparsely discussed so far and hence can be expected to provide insights to senior corporate managers. The case also demonstrates the application of different frameworks on social capital and corporate social responsibility which can be used by the participants in their firms to assess the social capital.

Indian Railways (IR) remains the world’s largest commercial employer, with approximately 1.7 million employees, which conveys the huge magnitude of social capital inventory accrued. This social capital, especially people side of IR, played a very crucial role in running the organization successfully for more than a century. As an organization, IR has guaranteed heavy importance for its employees while making decisions on strategic level. But recently, IR was moving towards automation and was cutting on cost incurred for its employees. IR was already exhibiting decreasing trend in the number of employees employed in the organization. These initiatives were resisted by IR employees due to fear of job losses and insecurity. In 2013, Chief Personnel Officer’s (CPO) of different zones have to rethink about their HR practices to assure confidence for employees on the security of their jobs and sustain the social capital accrued by IR over years. The objective of this case study is to describe the social capital accrued by IR over the years by offering livelihoods for nearly 1.7 million families across the country. Teaching note applies the frameworks on social capital in literature in the context of IR. Teaching note also discusses how CPOs of IR can pursue the change initiatives among the employees without affecting the social capital accrued so far.

Case study’s primary objective is to apply frameworks available in literature on social capital and corporate social responsibility to understand the social capital accrued by IR over decades. The case study attempts to answer the following assignment questions which forms the learning objectives of this case study: How do the existing frameworks on social capital measurement explain the social capital accrued by IR over decades? How can a firm assess its accrued social capital? How can one demonstrate the same using the case of IR? How can IR pursue change initiatives when it comes to its employees without affecting the social capital accrued over time?

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:10 Public sector management.

Human Resource Management and Public Sector Management.

The target audiences for the case study are BSc, MSc and MBA students and management trainees and executives who are interested in learning the human resource (HR) practices, policies and strategies adopted by the world’s largest commercial employer to ensure complete satisfaction and contentment of their employees and their employee’s family which, in turn, motivates them to contribute more efficiently and effectively for the organisation. Even senior management teams could be targeted in executive education programmes as this case discusses time-tested HR practices, policies and strategies which have been sparsely discussed so far and hence can be expected to provide insights to senior corporate managers.

India has and is undergoing sweeping economic changes lately. There are several organisations that have supported this positive change. Of these, one such organisation, which shouldered the infrastructural burden of the transportation sector in India’s growth story, was the 160-year-old Indian Railways (IR), the world’s largest commercial employer. IR’s profit over the past few years was a far cry from its loss-making days, which tempted the government of India to consider privatisation in 2001. The transformational turnaround would not have been possible but for IR’s employees. After celebrating IR’s 160th anniversary in 2013, the case organisation wished to revisit its HR practices to understand its recent economic transformations and to strategise how they can improve and sustain maximum efficiency in future. The objective of this case study is to understand the “people side” of IR by explaining its current HR practices and to investigate and identify changes over the years so that changes then can be implemented in the context of HR practices for the future. Hence, the case attempts to explain the role of HR management in IR’s turnaround strategies. Resistance exhibited by IR staff towards its recent initiative of enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation across India due to fear of job losses and insecurity is also discussed in the case. Teaching note for this case study explains existing people management frameworks published in the research literature to class participants by applying it to the case company. In addition, the teaching note also discusses how chief personnel officers (CPOs) of IR can pursue the change initiatives among the employees with least resistance. Changes/initiatives that can be imbibed by the CPOs in the existing HR practices to overcome the resistance exerted by the employees and to improve the existing system are also discussed.

This case study’s primary objective is to provide a comprehensive understanding of the HR practices being followed in IR, the world’s largest commercial employer. The case also attempts to assess the ERP system initiative by IR and analyse how it can be imbibed into the existing IR’s HR system. In short, the case study attempts to answer the following assignment questions which form the learning objectives of this case study: What are the HR practices that are being followed in the world’s largest commercial employer? How are the HR practices followed helpful in the retention of employees? How can IR pursue the change initiatives, especially ERP implementation, among the employees without any resistance? What are the changes/initiatives that can be imbibed in the HR practices to improve the existing system?

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 6: Human Resource Management.

Over the past three decades, many researchers have studied the relationship between sales and production departments. This has raised the question: Does the quality of the relationship between production and sales affect the customer? This study uses survey methodology to examine the link between customer satisfaction and the interface variables (connectedness, conflict, coordination) from both a sales and a production perspective. Customer satisfaction responses are aggregated for each sales‐production combination and analyzed to determine the impact of the relationship between production and sales personnel. Product type (i.e. engineered‐to‐order (ETO)) is introduced as a moderating variable. Results indicate that there is a significant impact on customer satisfaction as a result of the cross‐functional situation when moderated by product type. The main managerial implication is that the internal relationship between sales and production is important to the customer, specifically in ETO product situations.