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The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate a multi-dimensional second-order operationalization of strategic planning, to advance the understanding of this construct.

Data on the strategic planning construct were collected using survey questionnaire administered to 123 small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises (SMEs) in India.

The findings clearly reveal that the strategic planning construct can be effectively operationalized as a second-order multi-dimensional construct.

Data for this study have been collected primarily from SMEs of manufacturing firms. Further investigation in other kinds of firms may help in the enhancement of the construct.

Scholars have long called for using second-order constructs in strategy research. Operationalizing multi-dimensional constructs as unidimensional leads to inaccurate results and interpretations. By demonstrating a second-order operationalization of strategic planning, the authors illustrate better ways of operationalizing a construct. At the same time, this operationalization should help in better understanding of the implications of strategic planning on firm performance.

The purpose of this study is to investigate potential lenders of legitimacy for business-to-business (B2B) startups as reflected in the willingness of potential customers to do business with startup firms. This study theorizes the role of familiarity with B2B startups, their founding teams and their product offerings in influencing perceptions about legitimacy among potential customers.

Data are collected from key decision-makers involved in B2B procurements in large Indian companies and analyzed using conjoint analysis.

Results suggest that familiarity with product/service offerings from B2B startups is the most salient factor in forming favorable assessments for the venture, followed by the awareness of the startups and their founding teams, in that order.

The research makes several contributions to understanding the legitimacy of B2B startups from the customers’ perspective. The study provides a nuanced view of the factors impinging on legitimacy. The conceptualization of legitimacy as a reflection of willingness to buy (in other words, willingness to do business with) provides a useful lens with which to study the interactions between B2B startups and potential customers.

The strong empirical support the study finds for the predicted relationships in an international context, specifically India, enhances theory development, providing a solid foundation for future knowledge generation around the demand side legitimacy concept.

Firms take design leaps when they imitate an established business model developed either by another firm or in another market to create business opportunities. While recent research has suggested the use of contextual intelligence for imitation, the exact process of adaptation of a business model is not fully understood. The purpose of this paper is to outline the process through which an emerging market firm adapts a developed market business model for creating business opportunities in the local market.

This paper investigates the journey of Air Deccan, the pioneer low-cost airline in India, from its founding until its successful adaptation of a (Western) business model and eventual failure. The authors use a qualitative case-based approach to study business model adaptation.

The authors find that adaptation involves the incorporation of following design features: novelty to overcome problem of institutional voids, elasticity to exploit unexpected increase in demand and efficiency to serve large volumes. Based on the evidence, the authors suggest the introduction of global efficiency measures as the boundary conditions of business model adaptation in emerging markets.

The paper contributes to the literature on business models by suggesting elasticity as a unique design feature relevant for emerging markets. This paper provides granular understanding of business model toxicity.

Entrepreneurs and managers – looking to enter emerging markets through opportunity creation – should focus on providing contextually novel design features in the adapted business model. The authors also caution practitioners against the perils of toxicity arising out of combining contextual novelty with efficiency.

Recent literature suggests that multinationals need contextual intelligence to successfully monetize their investment in emerging economies. This paper provides rich description of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs in emerging markets, local innovations used to overcome them and boundary conditions.

A large number of roads have been constructed in the rural areas of India to connect habitations with the nearest major roads. With time, the pavements of these roads have deteriorated and they need some kind of maintenance, although they all do not need maintenance at the same time, as they have all not deteriorated to the same level. Hence, they have to be prioritized for maintenance.

In order to present a scientific methodology for prioritizing pavement maintenance, the factors affecting prioritization and the relative importance of each were identified through an expert survey. Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) was used to scientifically establish weight (importance) of each factor based on its relative importance over other factors. The proposed methodology was validated through a case study of 203 low volume rural roads in the state of Himachal Pradesh in India. Ranking of these roads in order of their priority for maintenance was presented as the final result.

The results show that pavement distresses, traffic volume, type of connectivity and the socioeconomic facilities located along a road are the four major factors to be considered in determining the priority of a road for maintenance.

The methodology provides a comprehensive, scientific and socially responsible pavement maintenance prioritization method which will automatically select roads for maintenance without any bias.

Timely maintenance of roads will also save budgetary expenditure of restoration/reconstruction, leading to enhancement of road service life. The government will not only save money but also provide timely benefit to the needy population.

Road transportation is the primary mode of inland transportation in rural areas. Timely maintenance of the pavements will be of great help to the socioeconomic development of rural areas.

The proposed methodology lays special emphasis on rural roads which are small in length, but large in number. Instead of random, a scientific method for selection of roads for maintenance will be of great help to the public works department for better management of rural road network.

In this paper, the authors undertake a systematic analysis of multinationality–performance (M-P) literature published in the last decade, when antecedents for internationalization and moderators of the M-P relationship had attained a center stage in international business and international management research. Though M-P relationship is one of the most widely studied topics within international business literature, so far synthesis of the entire theoretical landscape is missing in extant literature.

Through keywords search process, the authors found 111 studies in management literature that look at internationalization, its antecedents, performance of internationalized firms, and moderators of the M-P relationship. The focus of this study is to identify theoretical foundations used to explain the antecedents and moderators in M-P relationship, in order to suggest the future research direction for the field. The authors classify the antecedents and moderators based on their theoretical underpinnings not only to identify commonly used theoretical foundations in the last 10 years of international strategy research but also to highlight potential areas for future research.

The authors’ analysis indicates that research on international strategy in the last decade was dominated by theory testing in the context of developed economies. The authors’ review suggests that majority of the antecedents and moderators in the M-P relationship are anchored within institutional theory, organizational structure, resource-based view, social capital, and upper echelon theory.

The authors’ findings are indicative of a rich research potential of M-P relationship in the contextual research setting of emerging markets while leveraging more diversified theoretical bases and multiple levels of research design.

The Hydromagnetics instability of non-Newtonian Walters'B' viscoelastic rotating fluid in porous medium is considered. By applying normal mode analysis method, the dispersion relation has been derived and solved analytically. For stationary convection, the Walters'B' viscoelastic fluid behaves like an ordinary (Newtonian) fluid. The magnetic fluid is found to have a stabilizing effect on the thermal convection of Walters'B' fluid in the absence of rotation whereas the medium permeability has a destabilizing effect on the thermal convection of Walters'B' fluid in the absence of rotation, Rotation always has a stabilizing effect. The magnetic field, the medium permeability and rotation introduce oscillatory modes in the systems, which were non-existent in their absence.

The purpose of this paper is used to study the combined effect of solute gradient and magnetic field on dusty couple-stress fluid in the presence of rotation through a porous medium.

The perturbation technique (experimental method) is applied in this study.

For the case of stationary convection, solute gradient and rotation have stabilizing effect, whereas destabilizing effect is found in dust particles in the system. Couple stress and medium permeability both have dual character to its stabilizing effect in the absence of magnetic field and rotation. Magnetic field succeeded in establishing a stabilizing effect in the absence of rotation.

The results are discussed by allowing one variable to vary and keeping other variables constant, as well as by drawing graphs.

Organizations are realizing the fact that it takes more than quality, cost, and delivery commitments to ensure survival. Organizations are recognizing the need for extra efforts in terms of ability to adjust quickly and effectively to demand fluctuations as well as product diversification according to the requirement of customer. The remedy, to face and come out as winner from this critical scenario, is the adoption of lean approach. The paper tries to trace the evolution of lean approach with an effort to re‐define the efficiency and effectiveness parameters under lean thinking. The paper also deals with the underlying principles of lean approach. The main objective of this paper lies in our proposed model, which shows the scope of SCM under lean operations. Finally, the paper exposes the benefits of lean approach at different levels of organization and customers.

The success of Six Sigma implementation is known to depend on a number of critical factors. The purpose of this paper is to explore and analyse Six Sigma critical success factors (CSFs) in the context of Indian manufacturing organizations.

Although Six Sigma success factors have been amply researched in the global context, in this paper, a maiden attempt is made to identify, through an extensive literature review, the CSFs for Six Sigma implementation followed by their validation and prioritization using primary data collection from Indian companies. A total of 22 CSFs have thus been compiled through an extensive literature review. These CSFs are then validated through an empirical research of select Indian manufacturing companies at various stages of implementation of the Six Sigma process improvement methodology.

A factor analysis was used to finally reduce the 22 factors to seven groups of underlying CSFs, the top factors being use of right tools, measurement assurance, innovation and supplier collaboration. Based on the factors extracted, a Six Sigma adoption model has been proposed in the Asian context.

The factor analysis of CSFs of the Indian manufacturing organizations selected in this study demonstrates that the top factor is a composite factor showing combination of the ability of the project teams to use the right tools, measurement assurance, innovation and creativity skills in problem solving, and also the long‐term supplier collaboration of the firm. Perhaps there has been an overemphasis on the role and commitment of the management in the success of a Six Sigma program. Though it is undisputed, certain other factors also play an equally important role in ensuring that the Six Sigma programs are successful.

The CSFs extracted through the factor analysis could provide a basis for manufacturing organizations embarking on the Six Sigma journey to look beyond just management involvement and develop an integrated framework of other factors as outlined and give them appropriate priority and focus. The study could well be extended to service industries.

The success or failure of any Six Sigma program/project depends on some critical factors. The purpose of this paper is to identify and explore critical success factors (CSFs) of Six Sigma from an extensive literature review of research articles published in the context of Six Sigma and propose a categorized list of vital CSFs.

The methodology used is the systematic analysis of 64 different research publications and case studies from 34 different journals that are relevant in the context of Six Sigma by filtering, using keywords like Six Sigma and CSFs. This analysis leads to the exploration of a number of CSFs followed by their prioritization by using a Pareto analysis quality tool. These CSFs are then sorted into a proposed list of “vital few” and “useful many” CSFs groups in accordance to their frequency of occurrence.

The literature revealed 13 vital CSFs: management involvement and commitment, training, cultural change, communication, customer focus and requirements, organizational infrastructure and resources, project management skills, project prioritization and selection, understanding the Six Sigma methodology, tools and techniques, linking Six Sigma to business strategy, linking Six Sigma to customers, customer focus and requirements, quality data and reporting and linking Six Sigma to suppliers. The consideration of these CSFs will increase the success rates of a Six Sigma program/project in an organization.

The CSFs extracted spotlight only small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and do not consider large industries. This paper is confined to those articles that argued that the Six Sigma is beneficial to SMEs and does not consider the failure experience of the industries.

This paper identifies the CSFs for implementing Six Sigma that are comprehensive and potential to address the quality-related issues of industries. This paper also provides an extract of the relevant publishing to both the academicians and practitioners in the field of Six Sigma for implementing Six Sigma framework in an organization. This study is apparently the first of its kind on CSF assessment and categorization.