Images and writing in tourist brochures

The scope of the paper is to investigate the role of visual and verbal modes in destination image formation, with a focus on the 2009 ‘Malta, Gozo and Comino’ brochure issued by the Malta Tourism Authority. Discussing brochures as pivotal genres within tourism communication [Antelmi, D., Held, G., & Santulli, F. (2007). Pragmatica della comunicazione turistica. Roma: Editori Riuniti; Calvi, M.V. (2010). Los generos discursivos en la lengua del turismo: Una propuesta de clasificaci?n. Iberica, 19, 9–32; Dann, G. (1996a). The language of tourism. A sociolinguistic perspective. Oxford: CAB International; Francesconi, S. (2007). English for tourism promotion: Italy in British tourism texts. Milano: Hoepli], attention will be paid to specific multimodal framing of the ideational, interpersonal and textual functions [Halliday, M.A.K. (1978). Language as social semiotics. London: Edward Arnold; Halliday, M.A.K., & Hasan, R. (1985). Language, context and text: Aspects of language in a social-semiotic perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press]. First, the visual text will be addressed, through the observation of participants, perspective, frame, social distance, light and colours [Kress, G., & Van Leeuwen, T. (2006). The grammar of visual design (2nd ed.). London: Routledge]. Assumptions will be then checked and the verbal text will be analysed by means of corpus linguistics and the Wordsmith Tools 5.0 software. Particular attention will be devoted to verbal items like pronouns and adjectives shaping of the three core values of heritage, hospitality and diversity, these last identified as the cornerstone of Malta Brand in internal and external campaigns. The multimodal analysis of the brochure will show that both visual and verbal texts promote the core values. More specifically, these are first communicated through the predominant visual text, then described, clarified, expanded and confirmed through the accompanying verbal text.     

Understanding types of organizational networking behaviors in the UK manufacturing sector

This research is aimed at understanding firms' different types of ‘networking behaviors’, i.e., how and why firms affect their strategic network position by activities/routines/practices aimed not just at their business partners, but beyond such direct relationships. Thus, we adopt a network perspective to examine how firms exploit their webs of direct and indirect business relationships in order to assess and embrace the potential opportunities and constraints in the network. Based on the industrial network approach (INA), this exploratory research specifically focuses on networking behaviors in the UK manufacturing sector. Thirty-one semi-structured interviews with executive managers from fifteen firms were conducted. We identify four types of organizational networking behaviors by the way in which firms utilize their web of relationships to achieve certain goals. By using the concept of networking behaviors based on the INA as well as the strong-and-weak-tie argument in economic sociology, purposeful networking behaviors can be categorized into the following: information acquisition, opportunity enabling, strong-tie resource mobilization and weak-tie resource mobilization. These four ‘types’ of organizational networking behaviors provide a deeper understanding of how firms operating in business-to-business exchanges relate to and exploit their webs of direct and indirect relationships, taking into consideration the embeddedness and interconnectedness of the network context.     

Undisclosed orders and optimal submission strategies in a limit order market

Reserve orders enable traders to hide a portion of their orders and now appear in most electronic limit order markets. This paper outlines a theory to determine an optimal submission strategy in a limit order book, in which traders choose among limit, market, and reserve orders and simultaneously set price, quantity, and exposure. We show that reserve orders help traders compete for the provision of liquidity and reduce the friction generated by exposure costs. Therefore, total gains from trade increase. Large traders always benefit from reserve orders, whereas small traders benefit only when the tick size is large.     

An integrated approach to supply chain risk analysis

Despite the increasing attention that supply chain risk management is receiving by both researchers and practitioners, companies still lack a risk culture. Moreover, risk management approaches are either too general or require pieces of information not regularly recorded by organisations. This work develops a risk identification and analysis methodology that integrates widely adopted supply chain and risk management tools. In particular, process analysis is performed by means of the standard framework provided by the Supply Chain Operations Reference Model, the risk identification and analysis tasks are accomplished by applying the Risk Breakdown Structure and the Risk Breakdown Matrix, and the effects of risk occurrence on activities are assessed by indicators that are already measured by companies in order to monitor their performances. In such a way, the framework contributes to increase companies’ awareness and communication about risk, which are essential components of the management of modern supply chains. A base case has been developed by applying the proposed approach to a hypothetical manufacturing supply chain. An in-depth validation will be carried out to improve the methodology and further demonstrate its benefits and limitations. Future research will extend the framework to include the understanding of the multiple effects of risky events on different processes.     

Conceptualizing and validating organizational networking as a second-order formative construct

Based on an existing conceptualization in the literature, this study operationalizes the construct of organizational networking, through a rigorous two-stage scale construction and validation process. Organizational networking refers to firm behaviors, i.e. the activities/routines/practices, which enable an organization to make sense of and capitalize on their networks of direct and indirect business relationships. We conceptualize the measurement model as a second-order formative construct with four first-order reflective constructs based on a four-dimensional view of organizational networking comprising information acquisition, opportunity enabling, strong-tie resource mobilization and weak-tie resource mobilization. The scale validation was undertaken at the first- and second-order levels. The result confirms the four distinct first-order measurement models. At the second-order level, a MIMIC (multiple indicators and multiple causes) model was employed to assess the validity of the formative measurement model. The results suggest that all four components significantly contribute to the overarching construct of organizational networking, with strong-tie resource mobilization being the most important contributor. Thus, our operationalization confirms the uniqueness of the different dimensions of organizational networking that should be configured as a strategy of sensing and seizing opportunities in the network. The organizational networking scale will provide future research with a basis to explore different strategic patterns of networking behaviors in varying contexts, and its role in relation to other organizational behaviors and outcome variables, such as firm performance.     

Do consumers still believe what is said in online product reviews? A persuasion knowledge approach

The objective of this paper is to examine the effects of knowledge about manipulated online product reviews on the effectiveness of such reviews in influencing consumers' product evaluations. The results of two empirical studies show that consumers clearly differ with regard to their knowledge that product reviews can be manipulated and that consumers who have such knowledge are less influenced in their product evaluations by reviews, specifically by negative ones. Furthermore, the effects of negative reviews are even weaker when consumers acquire their knowledge through a highly credible source (compared to a less credible source).     

Fiscal policy,government size and EMU business cycle synchronization

We provide new evidence on the effects of fiscal policy and government size on pairwise business cycle synchronization in EMU. A novel time-varying framework is employed to estimate business cycle synchronization and subsequently a panel approach is used to establish the role of fiscal variables in determining the pairwise synchronization observations across time. The findings suggest similarities in the size of the public sector, yet divergence in fiscal policy stance, matter for the determination of business cycle synchronization. Hence, increased fiscal federalism in EMU will contribute to increased business cycle synchronization. Our results remain robust to different specifications and sub-periods.     

Signaling Corporate Social Responsibility: Third‐Party Certification versus Brands

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a credence attribute of products, which can be signaled either through a label certified by a third party, or via unsubstantiated claims used as part of a brand‐building strategy. We use an experimental posted‐offer market with sellers and buyers to compare the impact of these signaling strategies on market efficiency. Only third‐party certification gives rise to a separating equilibrium and an increase in CSR investments. Unsubstantiated claims can generate a halo effect on consumers, whereby the latter are nudged into paying more for the same level of CSR investments by firms.     

Implied correlation indices and volatility forecasting

Implied volatility indices are an important measure for ‘market fear’ and well-known in academia and practice. Correlation is still paid less attention even though the CBOE started to calculate implied correlation indices for the S&P500 in 2009. However, the literature especially on cross-country dependencies and applications is still quite thin. We are closing this gap by constructing an implied correlation index for the DAX and taking a deeper look at the (intercontinental) relationship between equity, volatility and correlation indices. Additionally, we show that implied correlation could improve implied volatility forecasting.