Search results

The purpose of this paper is to advance extant theorizing around resource integration by conceptualizing and delineating the notion of a usage center. A usage center consists of a combination of interdependent actors that draw on resources across their individual usage processes to create value.

This paper provides a conceptual inquiry into the usage center.

This paper delineates the notion of a usage center by way of focal and peripheral resource integrators, as well as focal and peripheral resources that form part of interdependent resource usage processes. The conceptual analysis reveals the need for resources to be accessible and shareable to focal and peripheral actors, with rivalry and emergence central factors influencing the actor’s usage processes.

Responding to recent calls for research developing insights into multi-actor value cocreation, this paper is the first to comprehensively and coherently conceptualize the notion of a usage center. In doing so, the authors build an important foundation for future theorizing related to the potential emergence of usage centers as well as the cocreation of individual and collective value.

This paper aims to join a growing movement in marketing history to include the voices of consumers in historical research on retail environments. It aims to show that consumer perspectives offer new insights to the emergence and reception of large-scale, pre-planned shopping centers in Australia during the 1960s, and allow one to write a history of this retail form from below, in contrast to the top-down approach that is characteristic of the broader literature on shopping mall development.

Written testimonies by consumers were gathered using a qualitative online questionnaire. The methodology is related to oral history, in that it seeks to capture the subjective experiences of participants, has the capacity to create new archives, to fill or explain gaps in existing repositories and provide a voice to those frequently lost to the historical record.

The written testimonies gathered for this project provide an important contribution to the understanding of shopping centers in Australia and, particularly Sydney, during the 1960s, the ways that they were envisaged and used and insights into their reception and success.

As with oral history, written testimony has limitations as a methodology due to its reliance on memory, requiring both sophisticated and cautious readings of the data.

The methodology used in this paper is unique in this context and provides new understandings of Australian retail property development. For current marketers, the historically constituted relationship between people and place offers potential for community targeted promotional campaigns.

Explains the concept of market segmentation and uses the results of two surveys carried out in two urban areas of the UK to illustrate how leisure centre managers might improve their performance in terms of volume and cost‐effectiveness. Reveals that the concept of customer segmentation within a catchment area does have some practical validity, and that there is evidence to suggest a planned approach to managing a leisure centre using this information would be of benefit.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether and to what extent different forms of symbiotic relationships (named mutualism and collaboration) within a usage centre lead to different levels of value in use for its resource integrators. This study focusses on the educational services provided in deprived neighbourhoods to potentially vulnerable adolescents.

This study applies a two-phase sequential exploratory mixed-method design. The first phase included a qualitative study that involved both the focal (the students) and peripheral resource integrators (the students’ parents) of a Brazilian educational institution that had exceptional results. The qualitative findings were used to build a comparative multi-group survey with four subgroups in which 530 peripheral resource integrators participated.

A mutualistic educational institution in which the participation of students’ parents is mandatory creates more value in use than collaborative institutions in which parental participation is optional. In the context of educational services for vulnerable adolescents, value in use is echoed in the coexistence of families, greater caring about the students, and the encouragement from the adolescents’ positive beliefs about education and respectful relationships with others.

Initiatives aimed at addressing social issues regarding children or adolescents in situations of vulnerability will achieve better results if their families are contemplated and involved.

This study is the first to empirically test Kleinaltenkamp et al.’s usage centre framework (2017). In so doing, the study advances the understanding of how the interdependence of actors in the usage processes leads to value creation for vulnerable populations.

This chapter draws from an understanding of measurement error to address practical issues that arise in measurement and research design in the day-to-day conduct of research. The topics include constructs and measurement error, the measure development process, and the indicators of measurement error. The discussion covers types of measurement error, types of measures, and common scenarios in conducting research, linking measurement to research design.

This study seeks to examine the extent to which the use of career center services results in the significant incremental prediction of career outcomes beyond its established predictors.

The authors survey the clients of a public agency's career center and use hierarchical multiple regressions in order to examine the extent to which it achieved its goals.

Career center usage predicted career resilience and action as well as perceived management commitment to employee development beyond established predictors for these variables. Employees' belief that they were personally responsible for their careers was the prime predictor of career center usage.

The primary limitations of this research are the cross‐sectional research design, the self‐selected sample, and the single source of survey data.

Making a career center available to employees can help them adjust to the new protean career model and an environment of considerable downsizing. Using the career center leads to positive results with respect to the perceptions of management.

Although the cultural barrier to career center usage is likely to be resolvable only over time, supervisors could be encouraged to offer more support and coaching to employees. Also, employees' jobs can be developed by increasing the extent to which supervisors provide feedback to employees, allow employees to work autonomously, and require the use of multiple skills.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how library reference departments and writing centers have extended their services to reach audiences beyond their respective locations, and to analyze the experiences of one university in collaboration between the two entities. The aim is to provide insight into the advantages and disadvantages of two approaches toward collaboration: that of a reference librarian holding office hours in a writing center, and writing center consultants providing service hours within the library.

Reference/consultation logs and input from participating consultants and librarians are utilized to explore the usage and effectiveness of the two collaborative approaches.

Analyzing student participation in the library and writing center services indicate that, while students are not likely to seek library reference services in the writing center, they appreciate having writing consultation services available within the library at times when the writing center is not open. Observation also suggests that students use services differently at the two locations, preferring extended interactions at the writing center where hour‐long consultations are customary.

This work conveys first hand experiences and makes suggestions regarding scheduling, staffing, equipment, and publicity.

Little has been written about the feasibility and practical implications of writing center consultants working within libraries.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a collaborative agent-based web architecture and an agent-based green IS assessment tool to aid information technology (IT) practitioners in data centers assess their current green information systems (IS) practice toward attaining sustainability.

The methodology comprises that the collaborative agent-based web architecture, agents’ algorithm and the green IS assessment tool, which is validated by employing focus group questionnaire targeting IT practitioners in seven Malaysian-based enterprises that have an in-house data centers. With 105 valid samples at hand, descriptive analysis and exploratory factor analysis was utilized to determine the applicability of the implemented agent-based green IS assessment tool.

Findings reveal that the agent-based green IS assessment tool possesses the capability to evaluate benchmark and rate enterprise data centers current green IS practice. Additional findings indicate that the agent-based green IS assessment tool provide suggestions on how green IS practice can be improved in enterprise data centers.

This study only collected data from 105 IT practitioners in enterprise data centers based in Malaysia; as such results from this research cannot be generalized to other countries. Moreover, the developed collaborative agents for green IS practice assessment can only be fully deployed after domain experts has added green IS practice assessment questions and alternative answers.

This study presents an autonomous agent-based green IS assessment tool that supports the assessment of enterprise toward inclusion of sustainability considerations to enhance enterprise environmental performance.

This study provides empirical evidence for data centers efficacy leading toward a greener society for environmental conservation for future generations to come.

This study creates awareness by presenting the green IS practice to be implemented by IT practitioners in data centers. In addition, the agent-based green IS assessment tool provides a web-based platform for promoting environmental sustainability by supporting data centers toward evaluating, benchmarking and rating their current green IS practices.

Economic, socio-cultural and demographic changes in Famagusta have altered consumers’ shopping expectations; they expect good architectural quality as well as various functions and activities besides shopping. The concept of shopping has moved away from being purely a necessity towards being part of the urban lifestyle. Accordingly, recently developed shopping centres try to satisfy these new demands in a variety of ways. The new Lemar shopping centre in Famagusta, Northern Cyprus, is an example of such a centre. This study aimed to measure user satisfaction and identifies the impact of the Lemar shopping centre on the immediate local context by surveying 104 randomly selected consumers, local residents and shopkeepers. Statistical analysis of the resulting data was used to determine Lemar’s physical qualities, functions and activities as well as its general impact on its close urban context and the wider city. Survey data is supplemented with on-site observations. This study reveals that the majority of respondents perceive the shopping centre as a positive contribution to the area, as an attractive building with a contemporary style and pleasant indoor spaces. On the other hand, it has increased the traffic on the high street, the area has become more crowded and air pollution has increased. This study suggests that consumers’ and citizens’ viewpoints should be considered in planning decisions in order to contribute to the success of shopping centres.