Marketing in five “simple” questions!

Peters (1987) describes how after some of his seminars he is asked “But what do I DO?”. This question is also often directed at people who have been introducing marketing ideas to businessmen—particularly businessmen whose work does not bring them into contact with customers. This article explains how anybody can start to think in marketing terms by asking five simple questions about the organisation they work for. “Simple” to ask, but requiring disciplined thought if answers are to be found which lead to appropriate managerial actions. “Difficult” to answer not least because the answers to each question affect the answers given to the others. In doing so it also introduces a number of basic but important marketing concepts.     

Democratizing the workplace through professionalization of human resource development*

This article critically examines democratizing the workplace through the professionalization of HRD. The primary question the article seeks to explore is to what extent can a democratic profession potentially minimize undemocratic workplaces. Drawing from several conceptual and research bodies of literature, including democracy and democratic workplaces, globalization and sociology of professions, this article describes democracy and how professions can enhance its growth.     

Testing the human capital development model: the case of apprenticeships in Turkey

Human capital theory was developed to study how individual agents make rational choices or how they invest in human capital to maximize their welfare. One of the leading founders of this perspective, Becker, argues that schooling, on‐the‐job training, medical care, migration and searching for information about prices and incomes are different types of human capital as all these investments improve skills, knowledge or health, thereby increasing individual welfare. He states that education and training are the most important investments in human capital. Apprenticeship training is, thus, identified and treated as a type of investment in human capital. At first glance, it seems that apprentices who are being trained are acquiring skills in a specific vocation. One would suppose that the trainees are getting knowledge and skills and that they would become masters in their profession after a long training process. However, further enquiry is needed to see if this is the case in reality. The present small‐scale, exploratory study, based on 20 interviews – 10 with apprentices and 10 with their employers – aims to investigate the apprenticeship training system in Turkey. In doing so, it seeks to test the basic tenets of human capital theory against the facts discovered. The findings, if they could be generalized, suggest that the Turkish apprenticeship system is a form of child labour rather than a training process. Contrary to apprentice training being a human capital investment, the study finds that trainees do not rationally decide to enter an apprenticeship nor are they selected by a meritocratic system. All of them come from poor peasant families or low‐wage working families where the most pressing need is for the child to earn money.     

Ethics as a Dependent Variable in Individual and Organisational Decision Making

This paper draws upon a recently completed research study of the responses of accountants and HR professionals to actual issues at work that had posed them ethical qualms. The study sought to get beyond ethical reasoning about hypothetical scenarios and to address issues of actual behaviour, focusing upon the interviewees explanations of these behaviours. In general terms there was an observable difference between the attitudes and behaviours of accountants and HR professions, but not in the simple, stereotypical sense. The concerns expressed by the interviewees when calculating their chosen courses of action in a given situation, reflected grave concerns for their current and future employment prospects, if they were to raise their concerns, either within their employing organisation, or beyond. The problems of whistleblowers are well documented, but at a time when corporate governance issues occupy the attention of financial markets and corporate boards around the world, and national governments are introducing new laws to ostensibly provide enhanced protection for whistleblowers, the evidence of this study is that moral agency remains at best an aspiration, and at worst a chimera.     

Confronting indifference toward truth: Dealing with workplace bullshit

Many organizations are drowning in a flood of corporate bullshit, and this is particularly true of organizations in trouble, whose managers tend to make up stuff on the fly and with little regard for future consequences. Bullshitting and lying are not synonymous. While the liar knows the truth and wittingly bends it to suit their purpose, the bullshitter simply does not care about the truth. Managers can actually do something about organizational bullshit, and this Executive Digest provides a sequential framework that enables them to do so. They can comprehend it, they can recognize it for what it is, they can act against it, and they can take steps to prevent it from happening in the future. While it is unlikely that any organization will ever be able to rid itself of bullshit entirely, this article argues that by taking these steps, astute managers can work toward stemming its flood.     

Constrained Morality in the Professional Work of Corporate Lawyers

In this article, we contribute to sociological literatures on morality, professional and institutional contexts, and morally stigmatized ‘dirty work’ by emphasizing and exploring how they mutually inform one another in lawyers’ work activities. Drawing on interview data with 58 practitioners in the commercial legal industry in Singapore, we analyze how they experience professional and institutional constraints on the expressions of morality in their work. Our findings illustrate how a dominant managerial and economic focus maintains and reproduces a constrained form of morality, limited to instrumental, utilitarian and commercial ends, and subordinated to lucrative client and firm interests. We discuss our findings in terms of the need to research and reform professions in ways that support more rounded and unconstrained moral reflexivity and autonomy in how work is undertaken and valued. This in turn has implications for how organizations and professions might achieve alternative moral institutional orders, and for legal work to avoid the moral and social taints of dirty work.

     

Work relationships and media use: A social network analysis

Our research provided empirical evidence about the alternative means of communication used by 25 members of a research group who had available to them: unscheduled face-to-face encounters, sheduled face-to-face meetings, electronic mail, telephone, fax, and desktop videoconferencing. The intent of our research is to learn whether there are elements in existing group communication patterns that suggest how future communication systems can be designed or selected to fit the actual work relationships of a group. A detailed social network survey provided information about what members of the group communicated about, how they communicated, and with whom they communicated. Most communication was done through a combination of media, but predominately through unscheduled encounters, electronic mail, and scheduled meetings; people rarely videoconferenced, telephoned, or faxed. Factor analysis reduced the 24 work relationships to six distinct dimensions: receiving work, giving work, collaborative writing, major emotional support, sociability, and computer programming. The proportion in which the three main media were used varied according to the nature of the work dimension. Our findings suggest that a multivariate perspective that considers group norms and practices, social networks, and work dimensions is necessary to analyze media use.     

Confidentiality decisions: The reasoning process of CPAS in resolving ethical dilemmas

As in other professions, such as law and medicine, accounting has a Code of Professional Conduct (Code) that members are expected to abide by. In today's legalistic society, however, the question of “what is the right thing to do,” is often confused with “what is legal?” In many instances, this may present a conflict between adhering to the Code and doing what some may perceive as proper ethical behavior. This paper examines (1) the reasoning process that CPAs use in resolving ethical issues related to confidentiality; and, (2) whether or not there is a perceived conflict in adhering to the Code and the moral values of some CPAs. The results indicate that although most CPAs sampled resolve ethical issues in accordance with the Code, such decisions do not always reflect their belief of what is morally right. Although the results are useful in understanding how some CPAs reason in making moral choices involving confidentiality decisions, care should be exercised in drawing further inferences from this study due to the limited sample size.     

Relevance of qualifications and work experience in the recruiting of foreign‐trained immigrants – comparative insights from the Health and ICT Sectors in Germany and Canada

Germany and Canada differ significantly regarding their migration policy as well as the structures of the national labour markets and their educational systems. This paper aims to analyse how these differences affect the labour market outcomes of immigrants and the usability of foreign qualifications and work experiences by using the health and ICT sectors as example. The comparison focuses on the question how qualifications and work experience serve as signals and are screened for in the recruiting process of enterprises. The results show clear differences as well as several commonalities between the two compared countries.     

基于电力企业直达配送绩效考核研究

针对电力企业的物资管理,我们最为关心的问题是如何对供应商进行管理使其在配送效率满足订货要求。本文在研究了大量国内外相关文献和调研我国电力物资配送实际情况的基础上,提出了电力物资直达配送绩效评价方法,并对该方法进行了详解。     

Consumer laundry practices in Germany

Sustainability is a guiding principle for a responsible, future‐oriented 21st century lifestyle and this already begins in private households with the daily household tasks. Approximately 25% of an average household's electricity consumption is required to do the laundry and dishwashing – 5% alone is for washing clothes with a corresponding energy consumption of 6 billion kilowatt hours. In addition, 600 000 tonnes of detergent and 330 million cubic metres of water are used for textile care in Germany. These figures provide the rationale for the scientific study of current practices of using washing machines and for a resulting estimate of the latent energy‐saving potential in German households. In the context of the in‐home study presented here, 236 private households throughout Germany were studied with respect to their washing practices and existing knowledge about topics on the sustainable, energy‐saving use of their washing machines. Overall, across all households 2867 wash cycles were individually recorded and subsequently analysed over a 4‐week period. The results of this study show that washing machines tend to be underloaded, and therefore maximum loading of the machines could lead to a reduction of wash cycles per household. With respect to detergent dosage, it was determined that the consumer does not adjust the dosage to the textile type, load size, soil level and/or water hardness, and this can lead to under‐ or overdosing depending on prevailing conditions. Finally, the selection of the wash temperature showed a 90°C/95°C programme was only chosen in 2.3% of all recorded wash cycles, however, every fourth cycle was completed at 60°C. Therefore, adjusting the load size and detergent dosage as well as selecting the right wash temperature are key themes to be taken into account in future consumer communication about energy‐saving households.     

Applications of business analytics in healthcare

The American healthcare system is at a crossroads, and analytics, as an organizational skill, figures to play a pivotal role in its future. As more healthcare systems capture information electronically and begin to collect more novel forms of data, such as human DNA, how will we leverage these resources and use them to improve human health at a manageable cost? In this article, we argue that analytics will play a fundamental role in the transformation of the American healthcare system. However, there are numerous challenges to the application and use of analytics: the lack of data standards, barriers to the collection of high-quality data, and a shortage of qualified personnel to conduct such analyses. There are also multiple managerial issues, such as how to get end users of electronic data to employ it consistently to improve healthcare delivery and how to manage the public reporting and sharing of data. In this article, we explore applications of analytics in healthcare, barriers and facilitators to its widespread adoption, and ways in which analytics can help us achieve the goals of the modern healthcare system: high-quality, responsive, affordable, and efficient care.     

Informational Cascades,Herding Bias,and Food Taste Evaluations

Herding behavior is observed when consumers simply replicate the behavior of others instead of making their own elaborate decision. This study contains two experiments in which participants are asked to evaluate how good different food products taste under different conditions of induced herding situations. The results of the first experiment show that simply convincing consumers that a herd exists (i.e., informing them of the behavior of others) will influence their judgment of how good the food product in question tastes, and also their purchase intentions and belief in future product success. Whether they are informed about the existence of the herd before or after they taste the product also affects their evaluations. In the second experiment, the characteristics of the herd (who it consists of) are manipulated along with the country from where the food product originates. Here, the characteristics of the herd have significant effects on the evaluation of taste, purchase intentions, and expectations of future product success, whereas country-of-origin has no significant main effects. Theoretical and managerial implications are offered.     

A model and measure for quality service user involvement in health research

In the UK, researchers across the health professions are increasingly being encouraged by policymakers and research commissioners to ‘involve’ service users in research. A recent review shows there is some evidence that involving patients, carers, relatives, social or community groups directly and actively as part of the research process can improve the conduct of research studies and the impact of the findings. Yet, little is known about how involvement is played out within research studies and there is a need for more critical and consistent assessment of what constitutes quality involvement. The overall purpose of this paper is to support learning about quality service user involvement in health care research. The aim is to provide service users and researchers with a structured and consistent way to reflect and report on their experiences. A range of philosophical and social theories of power and empowerment were reviewed and synthesized to create a model of quality involvement. The analysis encompassed both service user factors (what a person feels able to do, whether they feel their potential is being fulfilled and their sense of being valued) alongside research factors (research relationships, ways of doing research, research structures). A model is presented (Quality Involvement Framework), which contributes theoretically informed perspectives about the meaning and assessment of quality service user involvement in research. The model is developed as a practical measure (a Quality Involvement Questionnaire) for researchers and service users to be more reflective about the constraints and possibilities of involvement. The tools presented here could help research teams to examine personal factors and the research contexts that influence the nature and quality of service user involvement in research. They may also help to identify reoccurring issues about quality which could inform future policy, practice and research.     

Accounting and Medicine: An Exploratory Investigation into Physicians’ Attitudes Toward the Use of Standard Cost-Accounting Methods in Medicine

Research studies demonstrate wide variation in how physicians diagnose and treat patients with similar medical conditions and suggest that at least some of the variation reflects inefficiencies and unnecessary medical costs. Health care researchers are actively examining ways to reduce variations in practice through standardization of medicine to reduce the cost of treatment and ensure the quality of outcomes. The most widely accepted form of this standardization is Evidence Based Best Practices (EBBP). Furthermore, financial health care providers such as hospitals and managed care organizations are investigating methods to tie resource usage to medical protocols in their efforts to monitor and control health care costs. Such proposals are contentious because they report on physicians’ medical practice behaviors (such as the number of tests ordered, use of specific therapies, etc.) and such reports could potentially be used to influence their clinical behaviors. The intent of this exploratory study was to examine physicians’ perceptions about linking a standard costing system to EBBP guidelines. The authors interviewed nine practicing physicians asking each physician to respond to the question, ‘As a physician working in a hospital environment, what are your reactions to and concerns with combining standard costing techniques with EBBP?’ The interviews were in-depth and free form in nature. The physicians’ responses were recorded and analyzed using Grounded Theory Methodology. Using this methodology the field data was categorized into two major themes. The most important theme centered on ethics and the second theme was concerned with the implementation and use of a standard cost system in regard to EBBP. If physicians’ worries about ethical dilemmas and implementation issues are not resolved, then it is likely that doctors would be unwilling to participate in any efforts to develop or use a standard cost-reporting system in medicine. While this study was exploratory in nature, it should provide future guidance to accountants, health care researchers and health care providers about physicians’ issues with the use of standard costing methods in medicine.     

Clean laundry with pure conscience—A study on laundry practices among Finnish consumers

The previous study concerning laundry practices in Finland was published 16 years ago. Since that time, many pro‐environmental debates have been going on and sustainable actions have been implemented in many areas of individual lives and households. The purpose of this study is to investigate the textile laundering practices of Finnish consumers and their attitudes toward clothing care procedures. This study discusses how laundry habits could be developed into a more sustainable direction. The data for this research were gathered through an online enquiry that consisted of structured multiple‐choice questions. The data were obtained from 1,841 persons of whom 97.5% were women (n = 1,795). The data were analyzed by statistical means using the SPSS program. The data show that, despite media attention and debate about textile care procedures, there still are factors in laundering that burden the environment. From a sustainability point of view, some improvements exist when comparing to the situation 16 years ago, but washing machines still are seldom filled to their full capacity and consumers, being unaware of water hardness, administer excessive amounts of detergent. The current life situations of the household members seem to be major factors influencing laundry habits and sustainable actions. Especially, young people and families with children would benefit from information and instructions on laundry practices. Topics could contain knowledge about water hardness and proper dosing of detergent, filling the washing machine, washing temperatures, drying methods, and saving energy. Furthermore, general promotion of gender equality is important because household work and laundering is strikingly women‐performed work.     

The pedagogical side of entrepreneurship theory

This is the second article in a set of two in this issue that deals with challenges in entrepreneurship education related to theory building and pedagogy. The first article argued that educators must increase the theoretical content in their courses if they hope to develop in students the cognitive skills to make better entrepreneurial decisions. This second article discusses a strategy for teaching entrepreneurship theory.The difficulty with teaching theory to entrepreneurship students is that they are likely to complain that “theory is boring! Lectures are boring! School is boring!” All three of these—theory, lecture, and school can also be irrelevant. We as teachers can also be boring and irrelevant! Students may not understand that learning theory can be highly interesting. Unfortunately, the process used to teach theory could be boring.We become boring as teachers when our classroom style becomes predictable because students are never surprised. We become irrelevant as teachers when we fail to apply theory as a tool to answer student questions. Good theory can always pass the test of applicability. If we fail to teach our students how to apply it in surprising ways, it is we who are at fault, not the theory.An effective strategy for teaching theory to students must be approved by them and monitored by teachers to be effective. If our purpose is to assist students to become skilled in theory-based competencies, the most effective method is to establish a student-approved system for class meetings that requires students to practice specific skills. Obtaining student approval is important because almost any system will work better if students feel good about it. In other words, students acquire competencies through their practice with theory-based activities.A theory-based activity approach is based on the assumption that to the extent that a teacher is the initiator of knowledge transfer, students tend to practice less and acquire fewer competencies. This occurs because it is the teacher who is the most engaged, not the students, which is the reverse of what is optimal.One way to evaluate our involvement in the classroom is to ask ourselves if our goal is to have students leaving class talking about how great we are as a teacher, rather than about how wonderful it would be to be an entrepreneur. If our students leave talking about being entrepreneurs instead of about us, we have probably figured out how to involve them in activities that help them to develop personal competencies.The teacher's primary role is to achieve student approval of the learning contract and to identify the theory-based competencies to be mastered. The question for educators faced with ensuring student mastery is not, “What an I going to teach today?” but “What am I going to have my students do today?” The teacher's task can be made easier by delegating part of the responsibility for the second question to students. Delegation of learning activities to students can introduce more variety and surprises into the classroom, each of which can aleviate boredom. It also provides teachers an opportunity to work more closely with students as they attempt to understand theory in anticipation of their classroom assignment to lead the learning activity.The remainder of this article discusses how to implement a theory-based activity approach, obstacles to its success and advantages of its use. The greatest advantage of its use is that students will be learning theory that can improve their odds of being successful as entrepreneurs. Of course their success depends upon us as scholars having gone before them and discovered the rules (theory) according to which events occur (c.f., Whitehead, 1917).