Perceived importance of native language use in service encounters

Despite the importance of interactions in services, the role language plays in services is an under-researched field. This paper outlines for which services language is especially important. Consistent across studies in three countries (Belgium, Canada and Finland), the findings suggest that bilingual consumers find it particularly important to be served in their native language in high-involvement services. Moreover, for high-involvement services, all consumers find it important to be served in their native language. For low-involvement services, elderly consumers are less willing to switch language than young consumers. The importance of native language use did not differ between males and females.     

The Difficult Client‐Acceptance Decision in Canadian Audit Firms: A Field Investigation*

Auditing is often depicted in scientific and professional literature as being subject to conflicting forces, such as mechanization versus flexibility, and professionalism versus commercialism. This paper examines how auditors actually make the client‐acceptance decision in the midst of these forces. The investigation was conducted via a field study at three Big 6 firms located in Canada. The results show that in all firms the client‐acceptance decision process in action is largely flexible, being characterized by a high degree of informal communication and the adaptation of the client‐acceptance written policies and decision aids to circumstances. Furthermore, while commercialism in one firm (A) has a significant influence on the decision process, in the two other firms (B and C) the decision process is mostly consistent with professionalism. This result conflicts with the concerns that North American regulators have recently expressed about auditors' professionalism.     

Condorcet cycles in bipartite populations

Summary. Simple majority voting between pairs of alternatives is used to aggregate individual preferences. The occurence of Condorcet cycles is limited thanks to a principle of homogeneity on individual preferences. The restrictions induced on the domain of the latters are weak: among the n! possible orderings of n alternatives, more than one half are admissible within a domain. The resulting aggregated preference has then a neglectable probability of showing up cycles. We show moreover that the set of individual preferences can be `naturally' partitioned into two such domains. Received: June 17, 1996; revised version: April 15, 1997     

Mythical representations of trust in auditors and the preservation of social order in the financial community

The present paper investigates financial practitioners’ use and perception of audited financial statements. In-depth interviews, which we conducted with Canadian institutional investors, financial analysts and bankers, indicate: (1) a firm tendency to favour the quality of management over the content of financial statements in investment decisions and recommendation processes; and (2) a fundamental scepticism regarding the work of auditors. However, representations of auditor trustworthiness abound in formal texts surrounding the financial analysis domain—as if audited financial statements and the trust they convey towards numbers are indispensable to the work of financial analysts. Based on the work of Roland Barthes, we argue that financial practitioners’ trust in auditors constitutes a mythical representation whose main function is to maintain order and reproduce status quo within the financial system.     

On the satisfaction of peak demand in the certainty case

The concept of full-capacity flat-rate equilibrium is explored for a version of the Arrow-Debreu model with time-differentiated goods and production subject to a capacity constraint. The corresponding equilibrium allocations are shown to be inefficient in general. It is also shown that rationing peak demand is Pareto superior to non-rationing.     

How to boost frontline employee service recovery performance: the role of cultural intelligence

Service Business - Satisfying complaining customers is challenging, especially when dealing with the increasing number of customers with culturally diverse backgrounds. The purpose of this study is...     

Does City Structure Affect Job Search and Welfare?

We develop a model in which workers' search efficiency is negatively affected by access to jobs. Workers' location in a city is endogenous and reflects a trade-off between commuting costs and the surplus associated with search. Different configurations emerge in equilibrium; notably, the unemployed workers may reside far away (segregated city) or close to jobs (integrated city). We prove that there exists a unique and stable market equilibrium in which both land and labor markets are solved for simultaneously. We find that, despite inefficient search in the segregated city equilibrium, the welfare difference between the two equilibria is not so large due to differences in commuting costs. We also show how a social planner can manipulate wages by subsidizing/taxing the transport costs and can accordingly restore the efficiency.     

The Impact of Internal Corporate Social Responsibility on Organizational Commitment: Evidence from Vietnamese Service Firms

This study examines the relationship between internal corporate social responsibility (CSR) and organizational commitment in the service sector in Vietnam. Results from a survey of 256 employees indicate that internal CSR has a positive and significant correlation with organizational commitment. More specifically, labor relations, health and safety, and training and education had a significant effect on organizational commitment whereas work–life balance and social dialogue have no significant association with organizational commitment. The authors also provide implications, limitations, and recommendations for future research.     

Introduction to general equilibrium

This introduces the symposium on general equilibrium.     

On the stability of nonsunspot equilibria

This paper analyzes the stability of the (Pareto efficient) nonsunspot equilibria as a function of the constraints faced by consumers in their ability to transfer wealth between states of nature. Equilibria that are stable for the certainty economy define nonsunspot equilibria that are stable in the following two polar cases: 1) All consumers are unconstrained; 2) All consumers are fully constrained. Furthermore, the stable certainty equilibria with small trade vectors define nonsunspot equilibria that are also stable independently of the constraint levels. Instability can develop only at intermediate constraint levels and for nonsunspot equilibria that feature sufficiently large trade vectors.