Exploring the Interplay of the Design and Emergence of Business Processes as Organizational Routines

Much of the BPM literature views business process design and implementation as a top-down process that is built on strategic alignment and managerial control. While this view has enabled the design of many IT artifacts for business processes, it is inconsistent with the observation that information infrastructures, including a company’s business process infrastructure, are at drift, a term that refers to the lack of top-down management control. The paper contributes to resolving this inconsistency by developing a meta-framework that conceptualizes business processes as emergent organizational routines that are represented, enabled, and constrained by IT artifacts. IT artifacts are developed in processes of functional-hierarchical decomposition and social design processes. Organizational routines have ostensive and performative aspects, forming a mutually constitutive duality. A literature review demonstrates that the propositions offered by the meta-framework have been insufficiently considered in the BPM field. The paper concludes with an outlook to applying the meta-framework to theorize about the interplay of design projects with the subsequent emergence of business processes in organizations.     

Network view of MNCs' socio-political behavior

While business networks and relationships in international and industrial marketing studies are explored extensively, relationships between firms and socio-political actors are rarely been studied. This paper addresses this gap and examines how MNCs manage their relationship with socio-political organizations. The study builds from the proposition that business firms, besides their actions in business market, have to manage their socio-political market. The study aims to develop a theoretical view that is based in business networks and contains the three concepts of legitimacy, commitment and trust. The proposition is that business firms behave proactively towards the actors in the socio-political environment which is related to their business goals. The three conceptual elements will enable us to understand more deeply the varieties in the firms' managerial behavior. Two cases test the concept in the model — those of Daewoo Motor Company (a South Korean MNC) and the Swedish MNC, Vattenfall. The study will contribute towards deeper understanding of socio-political market and how firms manage their socio-political relationships. The conclusions describe the theoretical and managerial implications.     

Market Orientation in Public Service—A Comparison Between Buyers and Providers

Public services have been subjected to processes of deregulation, competition, and privatization in many countries worldwide. One popular reform has involved focusing on competitive procurement. This context, where public and private organizations jointly deliver the service in a dyad, makes the market orientation of public services highly complex. The main elements of market orientation – intelligence generation, intelligence dissemination and responsiveness– have shown themselves to be valid and of significance in both the private and public sectors. Nevertheless, the empirical context of the public sector involves a complexity that has been poorly addressed in market orientation research. In this study, we research the Swedish public transport industry and survey buyer and provider organizations in order to determine how market-orientated activities are approached in public-private service dyads. We present three theoretically-underpinned relationship types - buyer dominated, provider dominated and collaborative - which we suggest as having implications for market-oriented activities. A survey of public transport authorities’ (buyers, n = 48) and operators’ (providers, n = 49) market orientation activities reveals the concurrent prevalence of characteristics from all three relationship types, as both parties try to dominate the relationship while also engaging in collaborative efforts. Drawing on our theoretical framework and our empirical results, we conclude that there are legitimate differences in the perspectives of buyers and providers, and that these differences, if acknowledged and properly managed, can provide valuable resources in the development of a joint market orientation in complex public-private settings.     

企业与非政府组织的关系:态度与策略

非政府组织是非市场环境的一个重要组成部分。非政府组织对市场主体———企业产生什么影响?企业在如何与非政府组织打交道?西方学者对这些问题进行了广泛研究,也对跨国公司与中国非政府组织的关系进行过一些案例研究。对西方学者的相关主要研究为中国企业研究自身与NGO的关系提供有价值的参考。     

Designing Mobile Brand Communities: Concept and Empirical Illustration

Brand communities are a commonly used marketing instrument to enhance customer attraction and retention. Well-known success stories of brand communities include brands such as Jeep®, Apple Macintosh®, or Harley Davidson®. Despite the great importance for companies to effectively manage the social facet of their products, research in this field has been rare. In literature, indications for success factors and constituting elements of communities have been found. However, seldom have viable business cases for the community operator been provided.

We propose the mobile channel to be a particularly promising media for establishing brand communities. Due to the significant and still increasing worldwide penetration of mobile devices and current always-on location sensitive mobile services, innovative community concepts bear the potential for substantial value creation, which tends to result in positive effects on customer loyalty and brand equity for the community operator.

In this article, we review selected literature to develop propositions on how concepts for mobile brand communities can be developed. Building on the 4 constituting elements of a community, which are member entities, shared interest, common space of interaction, and relation, combined with the specific characteristics of the mobile channel, which are location awareness, ubiquity, identification, and immediacy, we developed a procedure on how to design mobile brand communities according to perceived consumer value. We use the case of a mobile content provider to illustrate the suggested process. Starting from the theoretical mobile community model, we apply means–end chains to do justice to the specific brand values. In concluding, we propose a 4-step model of key mobile brand community design tasks.     

The community dynamics of entrepreneurship: The birth of the american film industry, 1895–1929

This paper provides insight for practitioners by exploring the collective process of entrepreneurship in the context of the formation of new industries. In contrast to the popular notions of entrepreneurship, with their emphasis on individual traits, we argue that successful entrepreneurship is often not solely the result of solitary individuals acting in isolation. In many respects, entrepreneurs exist as part of larger collectives. First and foremost, there is the population of organizations engaging in activities similar to those of the entrepreneurial firm, which constitute a social system that can affect entrepreneurial success. In addition, there is also a community of populations of organizations characterized by interdependence of outcomes. Individual entrepreneurs may be more successful in the venturing process if they recognize some of the ways in which their success may depend on the actions of entrepreneurs throughout this community. Thus, we urge practitioners and theorists alike to include a community perspective in their approach to entrepreneurship. We also suggest that one way of conceptualizing the community of relevance might be in terms of populations of organizations that constitute the value chain. For example, in the early film industry a simple value chain with three functions—production, distribution, and exhibition—is a convenient heuristic for considering what populations of organizations might be relevant. As we show in our case study of that industry, a community model offers insights into the collective nature of entrepreneurship and the emergence of new industries.Our basic thesis is that the role of entrepreneurship in the creation of new industries can be conceptualized in terms of the dynamics of a community of organizational populations. At least three implications of this view may be important for practitioners. First, the kind of widespread and fundamental economic and social change that has often been linked with entrepreneurship requires a variety of behaviors. While most definitions of entrepreneurship have recognized that entrepreneurship requires the introduction of innovation, they have tended to ignore the importance of behaviors that subsequently support that innovation. To encompass these important behaviors, we believe that a broad definition of entrepreneurial behaviors is justified. To capture this, the framework of entrepreneurial behaviors that we develop includes the variety of behaviors that are important to the success of a collective process of entrepreneurship. We believe that recognition of a variety of different behaviors that are important to the success of the entrepreneurial process can help practicing entrepreneurs to understand more fully the complex dynamics of new industry creation. In terms of our framework, the range of behaviors of potential importance to entrepreneurship includes all of the following: creating a firm that innovates, creating a new business that imitates the practices of others, innovating within an existing business, and imitating by creating change in an existing business. In addition, we recognize that the kinds of innovative change that support entrepreneurship in the context of new industry creation are not narrowly technological; other kinds of product and service changes as well as administrative innovations may also be relevant.Second, entrepreneurship in one part of the community often creates the opportunity for entrepreneurial activity elsewhere in the community. For example, the founding of movie palaces did not begin until feature length films appeared. The challenge for entrepreneurs is to recognize these opportunities and act on them. Third, and related, the long-term success of entrepreneurial behaviors in one population of the community frequently requires that supportive entrepreneurial behaviors occur in other populations in the community. For example, the success of feature length films was hastened by the development of distribution organizations to replace traveling shows and localized markets. Their success was also hastened by the movement away from nickelodeons towards larger, more comfortable exhibition outlets, such as theaters and show palaces. When the interdependence among populations in the community is stated this way, another challenge to entrepreneurs becomes clear: the facilitation and encouragement of supportive behaviors in other populations.We are not the first to propose that the community is important, but we contribute to this idea by showing in a specific context how various types of behaviors interact and ultimately promote entrepreneurship throughout the community. Our contribution for practitioners is twofold. We would urge practitioners to consider the variety of behaviors necessary to create, reinforce, and maintain fundamental and widespread change. Further, we would suggest that practitioners consider how activities in a broad community of organizations can set the stage for entrepreneurship and have a high impact on its ultimate success or failure. Thus, we would suggest that practitioners who seek to innovate should search broadly for opportunities and understand the importance of relations with businesses elsewhere in the community. The success of their entrepreneurial efforts may depend on the occurrence of supportive entrepreneurial changes in those businesses as well. Their ability to do this will be enhanced by a broad understanding of entrepreneurial behaviors and sensitivity to the opportunities that their entrepreneurial behaviors may create for others.     

The robust pricing–hedging duality for American options in discrete time financial markets

We investigate the pricing–hedging duality for American options in discrete time financial models where some assets are traded dynamically and others, for example, a family of European options, only statically. In the first part of the paper, we consider an abstract setting, which includes the classical case with a fixed reference probability measure as well as the robust framework with a nondominated family of probability measures. Our first insight is that, by considering an enlargement of the space, we can see American options as European options and recover the pricing–hedging duality, which may fail in the original formulation. This can be seen as a weak formulation of the original problem. Our second insight is that a duality gap arises from the lack of dynamic consistency, and hence that a different enlargement, which reintroduces dynamic consistency is sufficient to recover the pricing–hedging duality: It is enough to consider fictitious extensions of the market in which all the assets are traded dynamically. In the second part of the paper, we study two important examples of the robust framework: the setup of Bouchard and Nutz and the martingale optimal transport setup of Beiglböck, Henry‐Labordère, and Penkner, and show that our general results apply in both cases and enable us to obtain the pricing–hedging duality for American options.     

Use of the Customer Value/Mission (CV/M) Matrix in Strategic Nonprofit Marketing Analysis

ABSTRACT

Application of traditional portfolio methods to nonprofit marketing situations is difficult, to say the least. For the most part, they require detailed market share, market strength, market growth, market attractiveness, and cost and profit accounting information that many nonprofits do not have and may not be able to acquire given the nature of products typically offered by nonprofits, e.g., services and/or social behavior programs. We suggest use of a recently proposed product portfolio model, the customer value/mission (CV/M) matrix as a method that can help nonprofits in then-product planning endeavors. The CV/M matrix better serves the needs of marketing strategists not only in for-profit organizations but in nonprofit ones as well. This is because it reflects on customer value and differential advantage in the eyes of an organization's consumers. This paper directly compares the use of an older portfolio matrix that has been suggested for use in nonprofit organizations with use of the new matrix and discusses some advantages and disadvantages of each.     

The Role of Leadership in Creating Virtuous and Compassionate Organizations: Narratives of Benevolent Leadership in an Anatolian Tiger

This study explores the role and potential of benevolent leadership in creating virtuous and compassionate organizations. A number of small and medium enterprises in Turkey, also called “The Anatolian Tigers”, have been experimenting with new ways of incorporating care and compassion at work. The study uses narrative inquiry to explore how benevolent leadership enhances collective performance and wellbeing in Anatolian Tigers. The paper reviews and integrates four streams of research associated with creating common good in organizations: Spirituality, morality, positivity, and community, and links each of these elements to creating virtuous and compassionate organizations through narrative inquiry. The paper proposes that benevolent leadership can contribute to the long-term health and sustainability of organizations through its four elements: spiritual depth, ethical sensitivity, positive engagement, and community responsiveness.     

开放条件下中国零售组织的市场结构与政策选择

对于开放背景下中国零售组织的结构政策,政府处于两难处境。本文分析认为,在目前开放条件下,在短期内,为与跨国零售企业竞争的需要,政府应鼓励国内零售企业作大作强,多形成几个国内零售寡头与跨国零售企业进行竞争,构建以寡头市场为主的市场结构;从长远来看,从消费者利益考虑,垄断竞争的市场结构将是较为理想的选择。文章最后提出了具体的构建策略。     

Why Organizations Struggle to Implement a Market Orientation: Insights Into Beliefs of Top Management

The role of management as an antecedent and barrier to market orientation is well documented. However, the often deeply held beliefs of top management that influence the degree to which their firms are market oriented has been largely overlooked. This study sought to understand these beliefs using a qualitative research method. Case study research employing in-depth semistructured interviews of four Australian vertically integrated horticultural enterprises was undertaken. A total of 28 beliefs of senior management team members were identified. These beliefs, which appeared to have become part of organizational culture, influenced the way market intelligence was gathered and shared and the degree to which the organizations planned, coordinated, and timed their responses to market opportunities and threats. The results suggest that changing management beliefs about marketing and market orientation may be an important component of enhancing the degree to which firms are market oriented.     

成熟金融市场与新兴金融市场间的传导性研究

运用BVAR计量模型研究Granger因果关系,通过因果关系研究成熟金融市场与新兴金融市场之间的传导性,再通过脉冲响应函数进一步验证因果关系的结论;并实证分析上涨和下跌过程中成熟金融市场与新兴金融市场间传导性的变化特征。实证研究表明：在整个样本期,香港股市与新加坡股市互相传导,日本股市与韩国股市互相传导,美国股市对其他股市单向传导,中国沪市对韩国股市单向传导,中国沪市对新加坡股市单向传导,中国沪市对香港股市单向传导;下跌时期六个股市间的传导关系比上涨时期更为复杂,更加强烈。     

Joining forces: Top management team and board chair characteristics as antecedents of board service involvement

Boards in early stage high tech firms have an important role to play through their involvement in service tasks. Building on the attention based view of the firm and self-efficacy theory, we investigate the role of top management team (TMT) and board chair characteristics as antecedents of board service involvement (BSI). Studying a sample of 117 Norwegian early stage high tech firms, we find that TMT diversity positively affects BSI, whereas CEO duality negatively affects BSI. We further find that the industry experience of the board chair positively moderates the relationship between TMT size and BSI whereas CEO duality reinforces the TMT diversity-BSI relationship.     

Making a market for male dairy calves: alternative and mainstream relationality

ABSTRACT

The article uses actor network theory and the field of market studies to take a processual and relational approach to the alternative/mainstream food duality. Questions about how food systems or products make claim to be of the alternative or mainstream, and to what consequence, underpin the study. Analysis traces the making and shaping of two market versions for male dairy calves, a by-product of the dairy industry, often treated as ‘waste’ in the UK. Analysis focuses on the assemblage of actors, the breaking of matters of fact and shaping and communication of concerns, and at actions. Contrary to many approaches to the alternative, focus is paid to overlap between systems, knowledge and actors and simultaneous development of two products. From this, the ethicality of the mainstream, the continued duality and its consequences are discussed. Beyond seeing mainstream/alternative as co-constituted constructs, the two are symbiotic, mutually supportive and implicated in the circuit of culinary capital.     

When do spinouts benefit from market overlap with parent firms?

We examine how market overlap with parent organizations impacts the performance of startups founded by the former employees of these incumbent firms. Building on knowledge inheritance and competitive dynamics theories, we propose that the degree to which the operating markets of spinouts overlap with their parent organizations has a curvilinear relationship with their likelihood of survival. Market overlap is beneficial to spinouts because it reduces uncertainty during the early stages of new venture development. However, substantial market overlap may spark hostile actions by the parent organizations, thereby creating disruptive competition that may lower the likelihood of spinouts' survival. Furthermore, we hypothesize that the previous hierarchical position of founders in parent organizations moderates the overlap–performance relationship. Using a sample of European biotech spinouts and their parent firms, we find support for our hypotheses.     

Controls as a Sharable Knowledge Commodity: An Architecture for Open Exchange

The world seems to be getting more dangerous: terrorists; fraudulent corporations; money laundering; hurricanes; pandemics. Governments and organizations respond with a flurry of new controls. In some cases these are centrally mandated (e.g. Sarbanes Oxley). In others, organizations struggle to find their own control solutions. Seldom, however, do organizations work together as a community of common interests to share solutions to their control threats. In this paper we consider how an open exchange of control solutions might be supported electronically. We assume a community of similar organizations that wish to exchange detailed knowledge about organizational control techniques. These might be non-competing institutions, such as libraries, customs agencies, and even universities; or, they may in fact be competing organizations, wishing to exchange control solutions in dimensions where they do not compete – e.g. the airlines exchanging best practice about safety and security. The main point is to propose an information technology architecture that permits a view of organizational controls as shareable, exchangeable knowledge commodities.     

宁安“渤海国”旅游景区可持续发展策略分析

宁安市“渤海国”旅游景区经过十余年的发展对推动当地经济与文化的发展起到了重要作用。然而，从可持续发展角度来看，景区在其发展过程中仍存在着市场适应性不强、利益群体间关系无法理顺以及游客体验质量无法保障等问题。在市场经济体制下，景区只有转变管理模式、重新整合旅游资源、科学评价各利益群体间的价值创造关系，才能逐步确立竞争优势力量，参与到国内、国际旅游市场竞争中来。     

Spatial competition and market power in banking

Banks in non-metropolitan areas compete in a spatially differentiated environment. Non-metro community banks have been insulated from increasing competition from metro banks due to their reliance on soft information in relationship lending. Proximity to borrowers, therefore, may be an important source of market power for non-metro community banks. This paper estimates a structural model of the supply and demand of banking services in which pricing power is allowed to depend explicitly on the distance between rival banks. A spatial autoregressive econometric model shows that approximately 38.0% of economic surplus earned by firms in non-metropolitan banking in the upper midwest is due to spatial market power.     

Exploring the Role of CSR in the Organizational Identity of Hospitality Companies: A Case from the Spanish Tourism Industry

Recently, organizational identity is being given more attention than ever before in the business world. This notion has grown substantially in importance in the hospitality industry. Facing increased competition, hospitality companies are driven to project a positive image to their stakeholders. Therefore, these organizations have begun to develop new organizational identity programs as part of their strategies to achieve their desired identities. This study analyzes the role of corporate social responsibility in the definition of the Organizational Identity of these organizations, employing a qualitative research methodology based on an illustrative case study. Particularly, the authors analyze the case of Meliá Hotels International, a leading hotel company in Spain with a presence in 27 countries. The findings indicate that the company has formally integrated CSR into its strategy to align its actual identity with its desired and conceived identity in view of the critics in its local community. Moreover, the interest of the firm toward its stakeholders suggests that the company understands its conceived identity as an important link in understanding its organizational identity. This paper demonstrates that firm’s organizational identity is a set of several elements. When analyzing Meliá Hotels International’s identity, we see that the firm defines this concept as that which is most central, enduring, and distinctive about the organization. In this sense, the company appears to follow the vision-driven approach by referring to the organizational mission and vision statements, organizational philosophy, and core values as the basis of organizational identity.     

Cause-Brand Community: Toward Consumer Citizenship

Brand communities have been proven to be successful with commercial brands. However, a review of the literature indicated that brand community has not been studied in charity organizations. To shed light on this issue, a qualitative research was conducted among stakeholders of an internationally well-known charity organization using three different techniques: in-depth interviews, netnography, and nonparticipant observation at the charity’s brandfest. The results suggest that cause-brand communities exist, sharing the same elements of commercial-brand communities, but the two have some unique characteristics, such as the existence of different stakeholders and small communities that demonstrate an extreme commitment, the promotion of consumer citizenship among them, and the lack of oppositional brand loyalty. A cause-brand community has important managerial implications as it helps build the charity’s brand equity; at the same time, a well-known brand supports the construction of the brand community.