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The use of choice-based, matched, and other stratified sample designs is common in auditing research. However, it is not widely appreciated that the data analysis for these studies has to take into account the non-random nature of sample selection in these designs. A choice-based, matched or otherwise stratified sample is a nonrandom sample that must be analyzed using conditional analysis techniques. We review five research streams in the auditing area. These streams include work on determinants of audit litigation, audit fees, auditor reporting in financially distressed firms, audit quality and auditor switches. Cram, Karan, and Stuart (CKS) (2009) demonstrated the accuracy of conditional analysis, compared to unconditional analysis, of nonrandom samples through the use of simulations, replications, and mathematical proofs. Papers since published have continued to rely upon questionable research, however, and it is hard for researchers to identify what is the reliability of a given work. We complement and extend CKS (2009) by identifying audit papers in selected research streams whose results will likely differ if the data gathered are analyzed using conditional analysis techniques. Thus research can be advanced either by replication and reanalysis, or by refocus of new research upon issues that should no longer be viewed as settled.

Although prior research documents that analysts sometimes herd their forecasts, very few studies investigate how investors’ judgments are influenced by their perceptions of the likelihood of analyst herding. I conduct an experimental study to investigate the conditions under which investors’ assessments of uncertainty about future earnings are influenced by their perceptions of the likelihood of analyst herding. As expected, and consistent with motivated reasoning, the results show that the temporal order of analyst forecasts influences investors’ estimates of the likelihood of analyst herding and investors’ uncertainty judgments when analyst forecasts are preference-inconsistent but not when analyst forecasts are preference-consistent. This study provides a potential explanation for the mixed findings of prior research in regard to investors’ reactions to the likelihood of analyst herding. In addition, this study extends research on investors’ credulity by providing evidence that motivated reasoning and skepticism may serve as a mechanism that contributes to that credulity.

According to Yubin et al. (2023), films serve as a medium for conveying visual representations of various elements such as landscapes, buildings, landmarks and monuments, which provide a contextual backdrop for the narrative. According to Vila et al. (2021), the number of global tourists visiting film locations exceeds 80 million. In addition, according to Yubin et al. (2023), the promotion of tourism is facilitated through the utilisation of films, which serve to create novel representations, counteract negative perceptions and enhance the portrayal of underdeveloped destinations. A significant number of individuals engage in the practise of visiting movie sets with the intention of re-experiencing the emotional impact of the film. The devaluation of film marketing has been observed. This method represents a highly indirect approach to enticing tourists. This chapter examines the comprehension of travellers' motivations and the perception of film-exposed locations in Bollywood films (Salnick, 2023). Film tourism provides a tailored and personalised experience for individuals. The difficulty in measuring this concept arises from factors such as the emotional responsiveness, personality traits, background and interpretive abilities of the viewers in relation to media images. According to Castro et al. (2023), the inclusion of a destination on a screen can serve as a means to enhance the diversity of a site's tourist offerings or mitigate the effects of seasonality by providing opportunities for experiential activities, showcasing notable landmarks or serving as a filming location. Film destinations have the potential to gain popularity and benefit from advertising and the perception of spectators.

The challenge of sustaining growth seems to be getting steeper and steeper. This Masterclass provides context for two recent books that have valuable insights to offer to company leaders and strategists on how to build resilience and sustain growth in increasingly dynamic and uncertain global competitive markets.

In The Founder’s Mentality: How to Overcome the Predictable Crises of Growth (2016), well-known Bain strategy consultants, Chris Zook and James Allen offer a strategy for consciously embedding “the founder’s mentality” into the culture of young firms as they scale or rediscovering it in mature firms that might be stalling and losing their way. For strategy and innovation guru, Vijay Govindarajan, sustaining growth increasingly requires being able to pursue simultaneously two very different types of activity and mindset – exploiting a legacy business while exploring new business opportunities. He offers a very practical framework for approaching this challenge in The Three Box Solution: A Strategy for Leading Innovation.

The “founder’s mentality” refers to “a collection of specific behaviors and attitudes best exemplified by the traits of great founders that if properly cultivated in the rest of the organization, can lead more reliably to sustainable growth.” Some young firms fail to establish a founder’s mentality from the outset, while many mature founder-led companies come to lose their sense of insurgency and other key founder’s mentality traits over time. “Just about every company, at any stage in its life, can benefit from the attitudes and behaviors that make up the founder’s mentality.”

Govindarajan argues that “asking what assumptions must be true for this idea to be highly profitable” and testing the most critical of these “as early and as inexpensively as possible” is ‘the best way to reveal an ill-conceived project.

The two books, taken together, provide a wealth of insight for leaders seeking to diagnose their firm’s growth problems and looking for potential solutions for reviving innovation and growth.

Recycling construction waste is a promising way towards sustainable development in construction. Recycled aggregate (RA) is obtained from demolished concrete structures, laboratory crushed concrete, concrete waste at a ready mix concrete plant and the concrete made from RA is known as RA concrete. The purpose of this study is to apply multiple linear regressions (MLRs) and artificial neural network (ANN) to predict the mechanical properties, such as compressive strength (CS), flexural strength (FS) and split tensile strength (STS) of concrete at the age of 28 days curing made completely from the recycled coarse aggregate (RCA).

MLR and ANN are used to develop a prediction model. The model was developed in the training phase by using data from a previously published research study and a developed model was further tested by obtaining data from laboratory experiments.

ANN shows more accuracy than MLR with an R²-value of more than 0.8 in the training phase and 0.9 in a testing phase. The high R²-value indicates strong relation between the actual and predicted values of mechanical properties of RCA concrete. These models will help construction professionals to save their time and cost in predicting the mechanical properties of RCA concrete at 28 days of curing.

ANN with rectified linear unit transfer function and backpropagation algorithm for training is used to develop a prediction model. The outcome of this study is the prediction model for CS, FS and STS of concrete at 28 days of curing.

This study aims to assess the risk profile of millennial investors residing in the Delhi NCR region. In addition, the relationship between the risk profile and demographic traits of millennial investors was also analyzed.

Data was collected using a structured questionnaire segregated into two sections. In the first section, millennials were asked questions on socio-demographic factors, and the second section contained ten Likert-type statements to cover the multidimensionality of financial risk. Factor analysis and one-way ANOVA were used to analyze the primary data collected for this study.

The findings indicate that the risk profile of millennials is mainly affected by three factors: risk-taking capacity, risk attitude and risk propensity. Except for educational qualification and occupation, all other demographic features, such as age, gender, marital status, income and family size, seem to significantly influence the factors defining millennials' risk profile.

Uncertainty is inherent in any financial decision, and an investor’s willingness to deal with these variations determines their investment risk profile. To make sound financial decisions, it is mandatory to understand one’s risk profile. The awareness of millennials' distinctive risk profile will come in handy to financial stakeholders because they account for one-third of India’s population, and their financial decisions will shape the financial world for the decades to come.

This paper aims to examine the strategic issues of risk for independent theatrical film distributors in the Hindi film industry in India.

The study adopted qualitative grounded theory approach to explore contextually relevant strategic issues of risk for independent theatrical film distributors. Semi-structured in-depth interviews with Hindi film distributors helped to gain explorative insights about the risk behaviour of film distributors operating in Mumbai “circuit”.

The findings suggest that risk faced by distributors is a function of product (film content) features, contractual terms, resources such as finance and strength of strategic alliances with the producers. The study develops a business risk model for the film distributors from a series of propositions.

The paper contributes to the literature on motion picture industry by highlighting the importance of distribution risk in the film value chain.

There is limited evidence on the determinants of hospitalisation and its causes in India. This study aims to examine the differential in the hospitalisation rates and its socioeconomic determinants. This study also examines the causes of diseases in hospitalisation among the elderly (≥60 years) in India.

This study used data from the 75th round of the National Sample Survey Organizations, collected from July 2017 to June 2018. The elderly samples in this survey are 42,759, where 11,070 were hospitalised, and 31,689 were not hospitalised in the past year or 365 days. This study estimated hospitalisation rates and carried out binary logistic regression analysis to examine the associations of hospitalisation with the background variables. The cause of diseases in hospitalisations was also calculated.

The hospitalisation rate was lower among elderly female compared to elderly male. Elderly who belongs to middle-old aged groups, non-married, North-Eastern region, Southern region, general caste, health insurance, partially and fully economically dependent have a higher chance of being hospitalised. About 38% elderly were hospitalised due to communicable diseases (CDs), 52% due to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and 10% due to injuries and others (IO). Nearly 40% elderly were hospitalised in public hospitals due to CDs, whereas 52% were hospitalised in private hospitals due to NCDs and 11% due to IO.

Firstly, this study is based on cross-sectional survey due to which temporal ambiguity averted to draw causal inferences. Secondly, other significant factors can also predict hospitalisations and provide insightful results, such as lifestyle factors, behavioral factors, obesity, mental state and several personal habits such as smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol, consuming tobacco or other harmful substances. But this information was not available in this study. Even with these limitations, the hospitalisation issues among the elderly are beneficial to understand the current circumstances of CDs, NCDs and injury and other diseases for India and its states to formulate health policy.

Early screening and early treatment for NCDs are needed, which are non-existent in almost all parts of India. It is essential to necessitate and identify the important factors that best predict hospitalisation or re-visit of hospital admission. Although, the medical advances in India have made rapid strides in the past few decades, it is burdened none the less, as the doctor–patient ratio is very low. It is important to develop preventive measures to minimize the accidents and causalities to avoid substantial cost associated with elderly health care.

Raising awareness, promotion of healthy life style and improving the quality of good health-care provisions at primary level is a necessity.

The findings, practical and social implications provide a way forward for the health policymakers to potentially alter the future research to reduce associated comorbidities, unnecessary hospitalisations and other medical complications.

Despite the volume of work on the subject, product design and its conceptualization has remained relatively abstract. There is hardly any discussion about the holistic meaning of design, especially with regards to its meaning for a user. This paper aims to explore consumer design perception to provide it a multidimensional definition and measure that is more relevant to industrial designers.

The study was done in two qualitative phases: the first to generate and confirm the design dimensions pre-conceived from literature, corroborated with consumer voices; and the second to include gamified depth interviews triangulated with conventional depth interviews and word association-based correspondence analysis to generate items that can measure each of those dimensions.

The first study confirms five dimensions of consumer design perception: visual, functional, kinesthetic, interface and information. Following the second phase, the study proposes five items for visual design, seven for functional design, three for kinesthetic design, four for interface design and five for information design.

Though through multiple qualitative studies, combined with literary evidence, this work provides reasonable qualitative validity to the findings, a semiotic analysis-based methodologies that can further concretize, if not refute, the findings. Rooted in the theory of design value, the study explores transformation of design values, from the designer’s domain to that of a consumer. While each of the design constructs has gone through a thorough investigation in literature, this work is the first to provide a unified theory of consumer design perception.

Designers have long struggled to know what consumers want. There is a clear divide in designers and consumers’ meanings of design. This study attempts to bridge this divide. Items measuring each construct should enable them in tweaking their offerings to a consumer’s liking.

Design is an abstract term and can be applied by a designer or a consumer. Dimensionalization of this complex term for better understanding using innovative qualitative tools serves as an original contribution to field of design research.

The learning outcomes of this case are in understanding core concepts of brand management and brand dilution. Assessment of macro-economic risks and proper positioning strategies are the key take-away from this case. The case gives an understanding of how brands are built and positioned, and the pitfalls of poor brand planning and assessment that could lead to brand dilution. The case is useful for highlighting the importance of brand management and the challenges of re-positioning. The discussions would shed light on why it is important to plan and manage spending on marketing for brand building activities, and why brands would suffer when spending is reduced. This case is a teaching case and not a research case. It will help participants assimilate available information in combination with existing academic theories and publications to help develop an accurate assessment and prognosis of the events leading until the point of slicing the case.

Reid & Taylor in 2015 had been reduced to a discounter brand offering extended end-of-season sales when most other competitors have ended their promotions. In the 17 years since its big-budget launch in the Indian market in one of the most memorable brand introductions, Reid & Taylor changed its ambassador twice and repositioned itself thrice. The case would allow participants to delve deeper into aspects of marketing spending, brand management, positioning and advertising effectiveness. The case brings to the fore discussions on marketing, specifically on branding, positioning and its related advertising in the textile sector for a brand that has not been studied in academic literature until the present time. The discussion allows for novelty, involving both forward- and backward-looking assessments and evaluations to help participants better imbibe learnings in brand management and positioning.

The case is suitable for a graduate-level (Master’s level) course in marketing and brand management. This case is suitable for elective courses that discuss positioning and brands.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing