How does CEO tenure matter? The mediating role of firm‐employee and firm‐customer relationships

While the direct influence of CEO tenure on firm performance has been examined in the strategy literature, the underlying channels of influence have remained largely unexplored. This article draws upon the career seasons paradigm, learning perspectives, and marketing literature to examine whether firm‐employee and firm‐customer relationships are the pathways through which CEO tenure influences firm performance. Results from the analysis of a large data set reveal that: (1) CEO tenure has a positive and linear association with firm‐employee relationship strength but an inverted U‐shaped association with firm‐customer relationship strength; (2) industry uncertainty intensifies these associations; and (3) firm‐employee and firm‐customer relationship strength mediate the effects of CEO tenure on firm performance. These findings have implications for a more balanced and nuanced view of CEO tenure. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Marketing's contribution to the implementation of business strategy: an empirical analysis

This paper describes a study that assesses the performance implications of matching marketing strategy to business strategy. In order to conduct this study we first reviewed the literature on marketing strategy to identify its key dimensions. We then conducted a survey of 1000 senior marketing executives about the strategic marketing practices adopted in their respective firms or business units, and developed scales to describe 11 strategic marketing activities. We next performed a K‐means cluster analysis using these scales to develop a taxonomy of marketing strategy types consisting of: Aggressive Marketers, Mass Marketers, Marketing Minimizers, and Value Marketers. We then observed that superior performance at the firm or SBU level was achieved when specific marketing strategy types were matched with appropriate Miles and Snow (1978) business strategy types. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Infusing flexibility into business-to-business firms: A contingency theory and resource-based view perspective and practical implications

Two questions motivate this research. What conditions foster flexibility and how might business-to-business firms infuse flexibility throughout their organizations? A synthesis of the strategic management, marketing, and new product development literature was undertaken, which provided an updated interdisciplinary focus. Contingency theory and the resource-based view perspective were utilized to enhance our knowledge and emphasize the importance of flexibility and organizational performance. Superior intra- and inter-firm flexibility are proposed to influence business-to-business marketplace success.     

Building commitment in buyer-seller relationships: A tie strength perspective

The strength of inter firm buyer-seller ties is vital to understanding the formation of commitment. Drawing upon the tie strength sociology and embeddedness literature, this study conceptualizes four dimensions of tie strength and examines their effects on the buyer firm's commitment to the selling firm, as well as the impact of commitment on favorable buyer behavior. A survey of 119 buyer organizations reveals that three of the four identified properties of tie strength (reciprocal services, mutual confiding and emotional intensity) are positively related to buyer commitment to the selling organization. Interestingly, the strongest relationship was found between emotional intensity and commitment — an understudied dimension of buyer-seller relationships. This study contributes to the B2B relationship marketing literature by increasing our understanding of the differential effects of behavioral and emotional aspects of ties on commitment. The study suggests to managers in manufacturing firms to develop strong behavioral and emotional ties with buyer firms in their relationship marketing strategy.     

Strategy support models

A major challenge in strategy development is to deduce the consequences of the interacting programmes underlying strategy. The paper argues that behavioural simulation models can help meet this challenge by acting out the consequences of strategy proposals in their full organizational setting. However, the real key to effective strategy support is not simply having a model, but using it in a structured dialogue with executives. To illustrate the idea, the paper presents a system dynamics simulation model used to aid executives of an advanced office equipment firm in setting their marketing strategy. The paper describes the process by which the model was created and brought to the attention of executives. Several examples are provided of the dialectical use of the model, showing how differences in management intuition and model-generated opinion led to improved insight into the consequences of strategy.     

Food and agricultural marketing in China

The author reports on the marketing and distribution system in China, the world's most populous country. He examines the scope and dimension of the system, the incentives for production, the various marketing channels, transport, seasonal pricing, locational differences, consumer services, and prices and margins. The marketing system is relatively simple but effective, does not offer a wide consumer choice but provides basic requirements for all. As mechanization enables increased productivity the author expects more land to be made available to produce a wider range of foods.     

Alignments and misalignments of realized marketing strategies with administrative systems: Performance implications

On the basis of intended marketing strategy plans, firms design administrative systems to support strategy implementation. In increasingly turbulent business environments—characterized by complexity, scarce resources, and escalating competitive opportunities and threats—firms are forced to alter intended and realize emergent strategies more frequently than ever before. The eventualities of realized marketing strategies may lead to misalignments between the strategy and the existing administrative system designed to support it. To examine performance implications of such misalignments we use Slater and Olson's (2001) taxonomy of marketing strategies. We distinguish between intended and realized plans and we propose an administrative system framework of structural (i.e., centralization, formalization, and specialization) and dynamic (i.e., interdepartmental connectedness and strategic control mechanisms) parameters for the effective implementation of realized strategies. We propose three-way interactions between realized marketing strategies and the dynamic parameters of the system. Research hypotheses on performance implications and responses from 215 marketing executives show performance differences across strategy types and (mis)alignments of the administrative system. Our findings confirm three-way interactions among strategy types, interdepartmental connectedness, and control mechanisms for all realized strategy types.     

Effects of collaborative communication on the development of market-relating capabilities and relational performance metrics in industrial markets

Research in marketing suggests that collaborative communication is important for firms to sustain competitive advantage, especially in industrial markets. This study integrates relational and resource-based views to articulate how collaborative communication influences different relational performance metrics. Based on a survey of 167 marketing executives in Taiwan's electronics industry, empirical findings indicate that market-relating capabilities (i.e., market-linking and marketing capabilities) completely mediate the collaborative communication–financial performance relationship, while market-relating capabilities partially mediate the collaborative communication–customer-focused performance relationship. In addition, collaborative communication directly influences customer cooperation performance instead of indirectly affecting it through the development of market-relating capabilities. The results of this study provide new insights into the role of collaborative communication as well as important theoretical and managerial implications.     

Services, products, and the institutional structure of production

This paper revisits the product-service distinction from an institutional perspective. Much of the literature in marketing and management has focused on the intrinsic characteristics of services with a view to derive implications for the management of service-based firms. Our key argument is that the quest for foundational differences between products and services is misguided. What counts as a product or a service is dependent on the nature of producer-user interactions and the institutional structure of production rather than on any essentialist feature of products or services. Furthermore, we develop the argument that services play an increasingly important role in manufacturing firms and we explore the reasons that underpin this trend.     

Fight or flight: managing stigma in executive careers

We examine the labor market consequences borne by executives who remain at financially distressed firms relative to those who flee to another employer to avoid the stigma of failure. Our study makes two contributions. First, we document an ex ante dimension of executive labor markets unaccounted for by ex post settling up models. Specifically, we show that executives who ‘jump ship’—change employers in the two years prior to the failure—suffer fewer labor market consequences than their counterparts who remain with the failing firm. Second, we extend the study of bankruptcy stigma to examine how stigma might be managed by jumping ship. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Marketing to the industrial lease buyer

This article reports on a survey of financial executives concerning their attitudes towards the leasing of industrial equipment. Specifically, the study seeks to explore the reasons why lessees lease. The research findings are viewed in terms of their implications for the marketing of industrial equipment.     

Strategy fit and performance consequences of international marketing standardization

This study addresses a long‐standing debate in the literature regarding the appropriateness and performance consequences of marketing strategy standardization vs. adaptation. Much of the relevant literature represents the headquarters' viewpoint and broadly assesses antecedents of standardization or adaptation across widely varying markets. Using strategic fit as the theoretical platform for analysis, the study investigates international marketing strategy for a specific product or line within subsidiaries of U.S., Japanese, and German multinational corporations (MNCs) operating in the U.K. The results indicate that degree of strategy standardization is significantly related to similarity between markets with respect to regulatory environments, technological intensity and velocity, customs and traditions, customer characteristics, a product's stage in its life cycle, and competitive intensity. On the critical question of performance consequences, the findings suggest that superior performance results from strategy standardization only to the extent that there is fit or coalignment between the MNC's environmental context and its international marketing strategy choice. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An integrated marketing capability benchmarking approach to dealer performance through parametric and nonparametric analyses

The role of marketing capabilities as a source of sustainable competitive advantage has been discussed previously in the marketing strategy field. Benchmarking, a well-known learning mechanism, is suggested as a tool to identify and improve the marketing capabilities of a firm. Despite its popularity as a theoretical concept, there is not much empirical evidence to support the view of benchmarking marketing capabilities as a route to guide managers' efforts in this direction. This paper contributes to the three perspectives in the literature that support the view that benchmarking marketing capabilities can offer a basis for sustainable competitive advantage of the firm through both a conceptual and integrated benchmarking model. They are empirically analyzed using stochastic frontier and data envelopment analysis methods based on four-year data set of forty-five dealers of a leading business-to-business supplier. The results indicate the importance of competent salespeople and building a long-term relationship in enhancing dealer performance. In addition, they reinforce a recipe of how marketing capabilities can be benchmarked to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Discussions and implications for managers are also presented.     

Engineering consultants' perceptions of corporate branding: A case study of an international engineering consultancy

The corporate branding literature on B2B markets has developed fairly rapidly over the past decade. However, empirical support on employees' perception of corporate branding is very limited, particularly with respect to employees who fall outside the marketing/branding function within their organizations. This paper explores engineering consultants' views - as an under-researched context - on the implications of corporate branding. Findings reveal engineers' views about the significance of personal brands, the implications of incorporation, the ways in which corporate branding is carried out in their organizations, and associations of technical proficiency with the corporate brand. From the findings, four hypotheses have been developed for future research.     

Institutional life of intuitive insights: Legitimacy of virtuoso intuitive marketing management

Intuitive insights have been recognized as an integral part of marketing and managerial proficiency. In this article, we expand upon this understanding by theorizing the institutional dimension of intuitive expertise. By developing a theoretical framework with supportive propositions we maintain that for intuitive managerial expertise to be effective it requires legitimization in its inter-organizational contexts. Intuitive insights hence have a significant institutional and social existence, irreducible to cognition. This means that institutional logic may support or contradict efficient cognitive strategies, significantly influencing the performance of marketing management. Managerial implications follow to the fields of marketing management and intuitive decision-making.     

Exploratory navigation and salesperson performance: Investigating selected antecedents and boundary conditions in high-technology and financial services contexts

Salesperson behavior aimed at improving internal company response to customer requests has received little attention in the industrial marketing literature in comparison to external, customer-directed behaviors. In this study, the phenomenon of “salesperson navigation” (SpN) is developed within the context of a research model of selected antecedents and boundary-conditions that influence a primary form of navigational behavior, or “exploratory navigation”. The research model's utility in predicting sales performance is tested empirically with data from two Fortune 500 sales forces. The findings show that the traits of competitiveness and expert power significantly enhance the salesperson's propensity to engage in exploratory navigation behavior. Exploratory navigation, in turn, is found to have a significant and positive association with salesperson job performance, contingent upon specific boundary conditions within the salesperson's own organization (i.e., sales management support and internal competitive climate). The article concludes by offering sales researchers and industrial marketing managers implications derived from the study as well as directions for further work.     

The ‘visible hand’ behind cooperation in franchising: A model of franchisor practices that influence cooperation within social networks

Although scholars recognise that social networks within marketing channels can enhance cooperation (the implementation of joint goals), research provides a deficient understanding of how suppliers can efficiently manage them. Our study investigates the ‘visible hand’ behind franchising cooperation by asking: How do franchisors build cooperation within franchise systems? Using multiple case study research on retail franchises recognised for high-quality cooperation, our study builds a model of how franchisor practices maintain and increase cohesive ties that foster cooperation within the franchising community; a type of social network nested within the franchise system. This model is underpinned by social capital theory, self-categorisation theory, and the constructs relational norms and behaviour from research on marketing channels. Our study provides insight into the key organisational, social network, and individual agency drivers of cooperation within branding marketing channels. This provides an understanding of: 1) how centralised organisational practices interact with individual agency to maintain efficient cooperation, and 2) heterarchical processes to improve cooperation efficiency.     

The New Approach to Assessing the Marketing Effectiveness of Korean Firms

This study attempted to revise Philip Kotler's marketing effectiveness model to diagnose and offer managerial implications for Korean marketing practices. Nineteen Korean firms, divided into ten manufacturing and nine service sectors, were examined to assess their level of marketing effectiveness. By industry, these firms were further divided into five categories; electronics, machinery, chemicals, finance, and service-oriented. The five marketing effectiveness attributes — strategy, organization, operations, personnel, and information system — along with accompanying factor components were incorporated into the measurement of the marketing effectiveness. The findings showed that manufacturing sector firms were less effective in marketing operations than the service sector firms. In both sectors, relative to the predetermined factor importance weights, the Korean firms were found to underperform in planning and controlling functions. Managerial implications regarding the underperforming marketing functions and future recommendations are offered.     

Innovation Process and Outcomes for Large Japanese Firms: Roles of Entrepreneurial Proclivity and Customer Equity

The authors investigate the structural relationships among entrepreneurial proclivity, innovation process characteristics (technological strength, marketing strength, and marketing–R&D integration), and customer equity in achieving business growth and financial return in the Japanese context. Following field interviews and a pilot test, survey data are collected from 207 pairs of marketing and R&D executives from strategic business units (SBUs) of large manufacturing companies in Japan. Based on the partial least squares analysis of data, the authors find nuanced effects of organizations' entrepreneurial proclivity on the critical organizational process, resource, and business performance. The study theorizes and empirically supports the idea that customer equity is a potent intermediary outcome that contributes to both top‐line (growth) and the bottom‐line (ROI) of a business. Specifically, the study shows that: (1) entrepreneurial proclivity directly and positively influences technology strength, marketing strength, and marketing‐R&D integration; (2) entrepreneurial proclivity's effect on business growth and financial return is positive and mediated by customer equity; (3) marketing–R&D integration has a moderating effect on the positive impact of technology strength on customer equity; and (4) customer equity is a strong driver of business growth and financial return. There is a dearth of research on entrepreneurship in Asia; very few empirical studies have been reported from Japan in particular. This study contributes to boundary testing of the theoretical relationships. Although entrepreneurial proclivity appears to be an inspirational concept, its actual adoption remains an important question for many Japanese companies. Those Japanese firms that aspire to be entrepreneurial need to be mindful what innovation processes and resources it takes to fulfill the positive influences of entrepreneurship.     

Innovativeness: Its antecedents and impact on business performance

In this study, we address three research questions: (1) Why are some industrial firms more innovative than others? (2) What effect does innovativeness has on business performance? (3) Does the linkage between innovativeness and business performance depend on the environmental context? Accordingly, we draw on various theoretical perspectives to develop hypotheses that propose market orientation, entrepreneurial orientation, and learning orientation as key antecedents to innovativeness, as well as a direct relationship between innovativeness and business performance. A model is devised and tested that examines these relationships in general and in the context of varying market turbulence. Findings confirm the validity of the model and afford various insights on the role of market turbulence in the proposed relationships. Lastly, implications are offered on the antecedents and consequences of organizational innovativeness.