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1 – 10 of 161Riccardo Stacchezzini, Francesca Rossignoli and Silvano Corbella
This article investigates the implementation of a compliance programme (CP) in terms of how practitioners conceive of and execute the responsibilities arising from this corporate…
Abstract
Purpose
This article investigates the implementation of a compliance programme (CP) in terms of how practitioners conceive of and execute the responsibilities arising from this corporate governance mechanism.
Design/methodology/approach
This study involves a practice lens approach forms the case study analysis and interpretation, involving both interviews and documentary materials collected from an Italian company with prolonged compliance experience. Schatzki's (2002, 2010) practice organisation framework guides the interpretation of CP as a practice organised by rules, practical and general understandings and teleoaffective structures.
Findings
CP practice evolves over time. A practical understanding of daily actions required to accomplish the CP and a general understanding of the responsibilities connected with the CP, such as the attitudes with which the CP is performed, are mutually constitutive and jointly favour this evolution. Dedicated artefacts – such as IT platforms, training seminars and compliance performance indicators – help spread both of these types of understanding. These artefacts also align practitioners' general understanding with the CP's teleoaffective structures imposed, including the CP's assigned objectives and the desired reactions to them.
Research limitations/implications
The findings have theoretical and practical implications by revealing the relevance of practitioners' understanding of corporate governance mechanisms in their implementation processes.
Originality/value
This study reveals the potential benefits of practice lens approaches in corporate governance studies. It responds to the call for qualitative studies that demonstrate corporate governance as implemented in daily activities.
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Emanuele Lettieri, Laura Marone, Nicola Spezia, Ilenia Gheno, Cinzia Mambretti and Giuseppe Andreoni
This study aims to offer novel insights on how industrial marketing might contribute to bringing innovations to market in the peculiar case of health care. This study aims at…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to offer novel insights on how industrial marketing might contribute to bringing innovations to market in the peculiar case of health care. This study aims at shedding first light on how the alignment between dissemination and exploitation activities might contribute to bringing to market innovations developed by public–private partnerships funded by the European Commission (EC).
Design/methodology/approach
The theoretical development comes from an inductive research design based on the 42-month pan-European H2020 research project NESTORE aimed at developing an integrated portfolio of innovations for the healthy aging of European citizens.
Findings
This study advances the theory and practice of industrial marketing in health care by conceptualizing an actionable method to align dissemination and exploitation activities within EC-funded projects, facilitating that innovations will go to market. The method is composed of five phases. First, an external analysis to define market opportunities and users’/stakeholders’ needs. Second, an internal analysis to identify the most promising exploitable outputs. Third, scenarios crystallization to define the most suitable scenarios (business models) to bring the selected exploitable outputs to market. Fourth, exploitation and dissemination alignment through the identification and involvement of the most relevant stakeholders. Fifth, scenario refinement and business plan.
Originality/value
This study is relevant because many EC-funded projects still fail to move innovations from labs to market, thus limiting the benefits for the European citizens and the competitiveness of Europe with respect to the USA and China. Although this relevance, past studies overlooked the peculiar context of EC-funded innovation projects, privileging pharmaceutical and biomedical companies. This study advance theory and practice of industrial marketing in health care.
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Eveline van Zeeland and Jörg Henseler
Vendors’ social cues – physical or behavioural hints – have an impact on the professional buyer. However, little is known about that impact. The purpose of this paper is to place…
Abstract
Purpose
Vendors’ social cues – physical or behavioural hints – have an impact on the professional buyer. However, little is known about that impact. The purpose of this paper is to place knowledge about the impact of social cues that other disciplines acquired in the context of business-to-business (B2B) marketing to contribute constructively to the research agenda.
Design/methodology/approach
By integrating findings on the processing of social cues and the behavioural response from the disciplines of neuroscience, biology and psychology (specifically the behavioural inhibition system [BIS]/behavioural activation system [BAS]-theory), this paper aims to provide an interdisciplinary perspective on the automatic evaluation of vendors by professional buyers.
Findings
Social cues are likely to be of substantial value in the (first) encounter between buyer and seller. Positively evaluated social cues create an approach-motivated behavioural intention, whereas negatively evaluated ones create avoidance. This process is probably predominantly mediated by trust and moderated by personality and contextual factors.
Research limitations/implications
This paper stimulates research about the impact of social cues in a B2B context. While such knowledge would add practical value, this paper also explores possibilities for managers to use neuroscientific techniques to assess and train sales agents.
Originality/value
The impact of social cues is hardly covered in the B2B marketing literature, but they have an important impact on B2B decision-making. The conceptual framework combines the BIS/BAS theory (approach/avoidance) with the SOR-model (stimulus-organism-response), which is unique to the B2B marketing field.
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This paper aims to identify and report the differential effects of activity control and capability control on role stressors, which subsequently affect salespeople’s job…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to identify and report the differential effects of activity control and capability control on role stressors, which subsequently affect salespeople’s job satisfaction and sales performance.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, the authors defined active control and customer demandingness as the job demands and capability control as the job resource, and designed their relationship with role stressors, which are indicated as role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload. The authors enrolled a sample of 223 industrial salespeople from pharmaceutical companies. After collecting the data, the authors used structural equation modeling using AMOS to test and estimate causal relationships along with a two-step approach to examine the interaction effect. The authors have also tested the simple slope of two-way interactions. All of the measured variables were identical to those used in previous studies.
Findings
The study findings indicate that behavior-based control can be counterproductive. Reducing activity control can decrease role stress, increase job satisfaction and improve job performance; increasing capability control, however, can reduce role stress and increase job satisfaction and performance. It is also important to acknowledge the external environment of the sales context in which behavior-based control is most effective: whereas high customer demandingness and capability control are related to reduced role stress, high customer demandingness and activity control are related to increased role stress.
Practical implications
Sales managers should recognize that different control management regimes reinforce or mitigate salespeople’s job stressors and outcomes under specific conditions (i.e. work environments marked by higher or lower customer demandingness).
Originality/value
Drawing on JD-R theory, the research shows that a behavior control (i.e. activity control and capability control) has differential, and even opposite, psychological consequences.
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This paper analyzes how information systems (IS) can serve as tools of neo-colonial control in offshore outsourcing of research and development work. It draws on critical work…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper analyzes how information systems (IS) can serve as tools of neo-colonial control in offshore outsourcing of research and development work. It draws on critical work examining business and knowledge process outsourcing.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper reports an empirical study of how laboratory information management systems (LIMS) shape offshore outsourcing practices involving Western client firms and Indian contract research organizations (CROs) in the pharmaceutical industry. The study adopted a multi-actor perspective, involving interviews with representatives of Western clients, Indian CROs, system validation auditors, and software vendors. The analysis was iterative and interpretative, guided by postcolonial sensitivity to themes of power and control.
Findings
The study found that LIMS act as tools of neo-colonial control at three levels. As Western clients specify particular brands of LIMS, they create a hierarchy among local CROs and impact the development of the local LIMS industry. At inter-organizational level, LIMS shape relationships by allowing remote, real-time and retrospective surveillance of CROs’ work. At individual level, the ability of LIMS to support micro-modularizing of research leads to routinization of scientific discovery, negatively impacting scientists’ work satisfaction.
Originality/value
By examining multiple actors’ perceptions of IS, this paper looks beyond the rhetoric of system efficiency characteristic of most international business research. As it explores dynamics of power and control surrounding IS, it also questions the proposition that outsourcing of high-end work will move emerging economies upstream in the value chain.
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Jennifer Fleetwood and Caroline Chatwin
This chapter examines representations of gender in online modafinil markets. While gender has often been absent from scholarship on online drug markets, our analysis demonstrates…
Abstract
This chapter examines representations of gender in online modafinil markets. While gender has often been absent from scholarship on online drug markets, our analysis demonstrates the ubiquity of gender in representations of modafinil users and sellers. The analysis draws on visual images, blogs, and marketing emails relating to three websites selling modafinil, discussed pseudonymously. We describe the range of ways that notions of gender are represented in advertising. Although women represent around 40% of that buying modafinil online, websites and communications tended not to feature women. Although sexist stereotypes of women were rarely present (in contrast to direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical advertising), the ways that modafinil was imagined tended to focus narrowly on corporate spheres of work and productivity. We contrast this narrow imaginary with female journalists’ own accounts of using modafinil to manage illness and enhance creativity. Thus, we conclude that the ways that modafinil has been imagined reflects working assumptions as to who is considered the ‘normal’ participant in online modafinil markets.
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Benjamin Mwakyeja and Honest F. Kimario
Optimization of dynamics determining distribution performance of pharmaceuticals is vital in realizing Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number 3 which insists on provision of…
Abstract
Purpose
Optimization of dynamics determining distribution performance of pharmaceuticals is vital in realizing Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number 3 which insists on provision of good health and well-being to the society. This study was designed at unfolding diverse factors that influence the distribution performance of pharmaceuticals in the Medical Stores Department (MSD) of Tanzania.
Design/methodology/approach
This study utilized cross-sectional survey strategy in gathering data from 67 staff members working in the MSD using census approach. A structured questionnaire facilitated the collection of quantitative data which were later analyzed using ordinal logistic regression.
Findings
The results disclosed that all variables of inventory management, information management system and facility location positively and significantly govern the distribution performance and henceforth rejection of the foreseen null hypothesis.
Research limitations/implications
This study realized dynamics inducing distribution performance of pharmaceuticals but did not cover the role of 3PLS and 4PLS in enhancing the same, and hence, an imminent study ought to seal this gap. Also, having grasped management information system is of strategic pillar, then it would sound imperative to analyze the application of artificial intelligence in distribution system performance.
Originality/value
This paper assimilates the concept of subaspects of supply chain management in footings of distribution management and that of pharmaceuticals and hence multidisciplinary value addition. Also, this study illustrates the applicability of strategic choice theory in strategic management in developing countries through pertinent choice of inventory management, information management system and facility location in triumphing SDGs.
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The purpose of this study is to shed light on the tools, processes and negotiations involved in the formation of acceptable current values in the context of goodwill impairment…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to shed light on the tools, processes and negotiations involved in the formation of acceptable current values in the context of goodwill impairment testing. The study raises the questions of how a current value for goodwill becomes a faithful representation and how one expectation about the future becomes more convincing than other expectations.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on the study of associations, the analysis presents a case study of a large, internationally active organisation. By combining field notes, interview transcripts and a variety of documents, the qualitative analysis focusses on strategies and mechanisms of persuasion.
Findings
The findings reveal how epistemological objectivity of current values forms in three moments of relational becoming that codify, depersonalise and proceduralise the valuation task. Further, the study suggests that a convincing argument forms with the help of four enablers: a bricolage of inscriptions, methodological mystification, transformed professional identities and a practical need for closure.
Originality/value
The study contributes with an analysis and illustration of financial accounting as practice, elaborating on the meaning and construction of faithful representation in cases of measurement uncertainty.
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Marta Giovannetti, Silvio Cardinali and Piyush Sharma
This paper aims to explore the impact of salespeople’s goal orientation and self-regulatory mode on their performance through sales ambidexterity and sales technology infusion…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the impact of salespeople’s goal orientation and self-regulatory mode on their performance through sales ambidexterity and sales technology infusion (STI) using a sales technology ecosystem approach.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper adopts a qualitative methodology, through in-depth interviews with salespeople from a diverse range of industries, age profiles and contexts, to explore the narratives and original meanings related to their goal orientation, self-regulatory mode, ambidexterity, STI and performance.
Findings
Sceptics are salespeople who may fear or hesitate to fully use the sales technology, whereas enthusiasts are ambidextrous salespeople with high STI, who are more open to change and able to face uncertainty, regardless of the differences in their background in terms of industry, age and experience.
Practical implications
STI may be influenced by individual factors, such as the salesperson’s goal orientation and self-regulatory mode. Hence, sales organizations should try to foster and facilitate further STI and sales ambidexterity, which are key to achieving positive outcomes in today’s technology-intensive sales settings.
Originality/value
This paper extends the current literature on sales technology and sales ambidexterity within a sales technology ecosystem perspective and provides new insight on the combined impact of these variables on the salesperson’s performance.
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This paper aims to contribute to the development of the European Union (EU) regulatory environment for sustainability reporting by analyzing how materiality is defined in the…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to contribute to the development of the European Union (EU) regulatory environment for sustainability reporting by analyzing how materiality is defined in the Non-Financial Reporting Directive (NFRD) and Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and by examining the added value and challenges of legalizing reporting and materiality requirements from both regulatory and practical company perspectives. It provides insights on whether this is reflected by EU pharmaceutical companies and to what extent companies report information on their materiality analysis process.
Design/methodology/approach
Doctrinal analysis was used to examine regulatory instruments. Qualitative document analysis was used to analyze companies’ reports. The added value and challenges were examined using a governance approach. It focused on legalizing reporting and materiality requirements, with a brief extension to corporate management and organization studies.
Findings
Materiality has evolved from a vague concept in the NFRD toward double materiality in the CSRD. This was reflected by the industry, but reports revealed inconsistencies in materiality definitions and reported information. Challenges include lack of self-reflection and company-centric perceptions of materiality. Companies should explain how they identify relevant stakeholders and how input is considered in decision-making.
Practical implications
Managers must consider how they conduct materiality assessments to meet society’s expectations. The underlying processes should be explained to increase the credibility of reports. Sustainability reporting should be seen as a corporate governance tool.
Originality/value
This work contributes to the literature on materiality in sustainability reporting and to the debate on the need for a holistic, society-centric approach to enhance the sustainability of companies.
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