Researcher Interaction Biases and Business Ethics Research: Respondent Reactions to Researcher Characteristics

The potential for biased responses that occur when researchers interact with their study participants has long been of interest to both academicians and practitioners. Given the sensitive nature of the field, researcher interaction biases are of particular concern for business ethics researchers regardless of their preference for survey, experimental, or qualitative methodology. Whereas some ethics researchers may inadvertently bias data by misrecording or misinterpreting responses, other biases may occur when study participants’ responses are systematically influenced by the mere introduction of researchers into the participants’ environment. Although substantial empirical research has been conducted on the general topic of researcher interaction biases, none has focused specifically on business ethics research. In order to remedy this lack of empirical substantiation in the field, we review the related literature on researcher interaction biases, present an empirical example of how such biases can influence research results in an experiment assessing reactions to insurance fraud, and discuss the implications for business ethics research.     

Exploring the influence of resource environments on absorptive capacity development: The case of emerging market firms

Research recognizes that emerging market firms (EMFs) have relatively underdeveloped absorptive capacity. Yet, scarce attention has been paid to the conditions that constrain or facilitate EMFs’ absorptive capacity development. In this article, we explore how differences in home country resource environments influence EMFs’ absorptive capacity. We suggest that home country institutions and factor markets influence EMFs’ choice among three learning strategies: duplicative imitation, creative imitation, and innovation. Building on the organizational learning perspective, we then explore how learning strategies of EMFs’ from different emerging economies influence their preferences with respect to sources of new knowledge, and consequently the implications of these strategic choices for their absorptive capacity.     

The Hotal and Catering Industry: Employment Prospects for the Eighties

Small business enterprises (SBEs) are considered to be the economic engine leading to worldwide economic development. They have attracted substantial consideration from researchers, academics and practitioners in the last three decades. Meanwhile, E-marketing (EM) has emerged as one of the key drivers in sustaining an organisation's competitive advantage. Yet, there is a lack of systematic empirical evidence regarding marketing activities that are affected by the use of EM in the (SBEs) context, and their consequent performance outcomes. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of EM use by SBEs on marketing success and to develop and test a conceptual model of the antecedents and consequences of EM use by SBEs. The conceptual framework consists of the following constructs: EM budget, EM tools, pre-sales activities, after-sales activities, marketing performance and marketing effectiveness. Moreover, 12 hypotheses were developed and tested. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to test the validity of measures, while structural equation modelling was used in hypotheses testing. Data were collected from 114 SBEs who had used different EM tools. Findings reveal that the use of EM tools has a positive influence on SBEs pre-sales activities, after-sales activities, marketing performance and marketing effectiveness. The results of this study have major implications for the marketing domain, as they stress the central role of marketing people in the successful implementation of EM in SBEs.     

Disaggregating entrepreneurial orientation: the non-linear impact of innovativeness, proactiveness and risk-taking on SME performance

Previous studies have generally established a positive relationship between aggregated measures of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and firm performance. However, there are theoretical reasons suggesting that three dimensions of EO (innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking) may possess differential relationships with performance in smaller firms. This study utilizes a sample consisting of 1,668 small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in nine countries across 13 different industries to provide a finer-grained analysis of the EO-performance relationship. Specifically, we theorize and test a non-monotonic influence of innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking on SME performance. Innovativeness and proactiveness displayed predominantly positive U-shaped relationships with SME performance. Risk-taking, however, displayed a predominantly negative U-shaped relationship with SME performance. Further, individualism was found to positively moderate the relationships between innovativeness-performance and proactiveness-performance. Taken together, these results suggest that differential relationships exist between three dimensions of EO and SME performance, with important theoretical implications for future EO research.     

Academy of Marketing Conference "2001: A Marketing Odyssey"

This study examines the mediating influence of consumer expertise on the antecedents and consequences of Affect within a professional services market context. Whilst there is increasing evidence to suggest an empirical link between Affect evoked and satisfaction within such contexts, previous research has largely ignored the role of consumer expertise as a mediating influence. Using a scenario based approach, the objective of the study was to test for multigroup invariance among competing structural models based on the ability of the respondents to form expectation and performance assessments about the service they are receiving. The results indicate that it is important to examine different levels of consumer expertise in detail to better understand how certain characteristics such as experience and qualifications influence the priority and functionality attached to service attributes when making satisfaction judgments within a professional service context. This may in turn have broader implications for our contextual understanding of services.     

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.     

The Micro-level Foundations and Dynamics of Political Corporate Social Responsibility: Hegemony and Passive Revolution through Civil Society

Exploration of the political roles firms play in society is a flourishing stream within corporate social responsibility (CSR) research. However, few empirical studies have examined multiple levels of political CSR at the same time from a critical perspective. We explore both how the motivations of managers and internal organizational practices affect a company’s choice between competing CSR approaches, and how the different CSR programs of corporate and civil society actors compete with each other. We present a qualitative interpretative case study of how a French children’s clothing retailer develops CSR practices in response to accusations of poor working conditions and child labor in its supply chain. The company’s CSR approach consists of superficial practices, such as supplier audits by a cooperative business-organized nongovernmental organization (NGO) and philanthropic activities, which enable managers to silence more radical alternative models defended by other NGOs, activists, and trade unions. By this approach, the core business model based on exploitative low-cost country sourcing remains intact through self-regulated CSR. Through the case study, we develop a framework of dynamism in competing CSR programs. We discuss the implications of our study for CSR researchers, company managers, and policy makers.     

Investigating the Impacts of Organizational Factors on Employees’ Unethical Behavior Within Organization in the Context of Chinese Firms

Unethical behavior is under-examined in the workplace. To date, few studies have attempted to explore the antecedents of an employee’s ethical decisions, particularly with respect to unethical behavior and its effects. To capture an employee’s psychological perception of unethical behavior in the workplace, this paper integrates organizational factors (codes of conduct, likelihood of detection, and performance pressure) into the Theory of Reasoned Action. By conducting an empirical study in a Chinese firm, we found that codes of conduct and performance pressure have a significant influence on an employee’s attitude toward and social beliefs about unethical behavior. We also demonstrated that employees’ unethical behaviors affect the firm performance of an entrepreneurial venture. The insights gleaned from the findings on this Chinese company have a number of important implications for both research and practice.     

The performance implications of strategic capital for public leisure providers

Strategic capital has emerged as a key source of competitive heterogeneity in the private sector. Despite this, little is known about the performance implications of strategic capital in public organisations. Adopting a resource-advantage perspective, we examine the performance implications of strategic capital for public leisure providers. Analysing data generated from public leisure providers, we find that effective strategy implementation enables leisure providers to exploit comparative advantages, which is itself a source of sustained advantage. Furthermore, high performers are endowed with significantly greater levels of strategic capital – which include ‘strategy commitment’, ‘implementation support’, ‘implementation effectiveness’, and ‘learning’ – in contrast with low performers. Important differences between internal and external approaches to provision are also identified and discussed, along with the implications of this study for researchers and public policy.     

Hidden Connections: The Link Between Board Gender Diversity and Corporate Social Performance

This study examines whether and how female board directors may affect corporate social performance (CSP) by drawing on social role theory and feminist ethics literature. The empirical analysis, based on a sample of 126 firms drawn from the S&P500 group of companies over a 5-year period, suggests that board gender diversity (BGD) significantly affects CSP. However, this impact depends on the social performance metric under investigation. In particular, more gender diverse boards exert stronger influence on CSP metrics focusing on ‘negative’ business practices, such as the ‘concerns’ dimension of the Kinder Lydenberg Domini, Inc. (KLD) ratings. This is because such CSP ratings have the potential to induce higher levels of ‘empathic caring’, which strongly appeals to female directors. Hence, this study reveals further hidden connections in the BGD–CSP link which have important implications for managers, nongovernmental organisations and socially responsible investors.     

Will enterprise social networking systems promote knowledge management and organizational learning? An empirical study

ABSTRACT

Nowadays, enterprise social media practitioners and researchers are keen to know how the enterprise usage of social media can be converted into the improved organizational performance. Meanwhile, organizational learning has long been considered as one of the measures of organizational performance. This article investigated the impact of enterprise social networking systems (ESNS) usage on knowledge management processes and organizational learning; in particular, we examined the mediating role of knowledge creation and knowledge sharing. Four theories from sociology and strategic management were used to build the hypotheses in the research model. An online survey was conducted to empirically test the model. Our study results showed that ESNS usage directly and indirectly influences organizational learning; and that knowledge management processes (knowledge creation and sharing) mediate the path between the two. This study contributes to the existing literature on enterprise social media for three reasons. First, it is among the first to connect the three independent concepts (social media, knowledge management, and organizational learning) and explore their relationships in one theoretical framework. Second, this work also specifically examines the influence of ESNS (Yammer in this case) on organizational processes and outcomes. Third, this is a pioneering study that employs multiple theories to address the research questions under the organizational social media context. Therefore, the research gives implications for both practitioners and scholars who are interested in understanding the effectiveness of ESNS usage in the modern organizations today.     

Gender differences in firm performance: Evidence from new ventures in the United States

Prior studies examining the performance of female- and male-owned firms have generally reported that female-owned firms underperform male-owned firms. However, it is conceivable that the performance measures used by previous studies and/or their inability to control for key demographic differences may have contributed to this finding. For example, few studies use size adjusted performance measures and yet we know that female-owned firms tend to be smaller than their male counterparts. Similarly, risk is typically not considered even though evidence suggests that women tend to be more risk averse than men. We use a longitudinal (five-year) database of more than 4000 new ventures that began operations in the U.S. in 2004 to determine whether potential differences in the performances of female- and male-owned firms disappear when appropriate performance measures are used and important demographic differences are controlled for in the models. The performance measures we examine include: 4-year closure rates; return on assets (ROA); and a risk-adjusted measure (Sharpe ratio). Univariate test results confirm our expectation (based on both liberal and social feminist theory) that there is no difference in the performance of female- and male-owned new ventures provided performance is appropriately measured. Further, these results are supported by our multivariate analyses, which control for demographic differences such as industry, experience and hours worked. Our findings should be of interest to researchers, financiers, advisors and policy makers. Perhaps more importantly, our findings should also ensure that women who are contemplating starting a new venture are not discouraged from doing so by a false belief that new ventures initiated by women are less likely to succeed than those initiated by men.     

An Exploratory Cross-Cultural Analysis of Marketing Ethics: The Case of Turkish,Thai, and American Businesspeople

Although a number of studies have shown that corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities often lead to greater organisational performance in western developed economies, researchers are yet to examine the strategic value of CSR in emerging economies. Using survey data from 280 firms operating in Dubai, this study examines the link between CSR activities and organisational performance. The results show that CSR has a positive relationship with all three measures of organisational performance: financial performance, employee commitment, and corporate reputation. These results reinforce the accumulating body of empirical support for the positive impact of CSR on performance and challenge the dominant assumption that, given the weak institutional framework in emerging economies, CSR activities drain resources and compromise firms’ competitiveness.     

Pricing practices: A critical review of their effects on consumer perceptions and behaviour

With the present challenge to compete on price or product assortment, retailers and manufacturers are increasingly focusing on state-of-the-art pricing strategies which have their roots in behavioural economics and psychology. The current review is an empirical investigation on the relative effectiveness of various pricing practices on consumer perceptions and behaviour. Six pricing strategies were reviewed; drip pricing, reference pricing, the use of the word ‘free’, bait pricing, bundling and time-limited offers. The review shows that the former three have received a significant amount of attention and have a robust impact on consumer perceptions and behaviour. There is less research on the latter three; however, the available evidence does suggest that they, too, may be capable of influencing consumers’ choices. Finally, it is also clear that the effects of pricing practices can be moderated by a variety of factors. Overall, the current review indicates that sellers are able to influence perceptions and purchase decisions of consumers based on the manner in which prices are displayed. The implications of these findings for retailers, policy makers and researchers are discussed.     

Cultural intelligence as a predictor of expatriate adjustment and performance in Malaysia

This research tests the linkage between cultural intelligence, expatriate adjustment to the host country's environment and expatriate performance while on international assignments. The investigation is carried out with data from 134 expatriates based in multinational corporations in Malaysia. The results highlight a direct influence of expatriates’ cultural intelligence on general, interaction and work adjustments. The improved adjustments consequently have positive effects on both the expatriates’ task and contextual performance. The research findings have implications for both international human resource management (IHRM) researchers and managers.     

Ethical perception: are differences between ethnic groups situation dependent?

This study was conducted to determine how culture influences the ethical perception of managers. Most studies conducted so far have only stated similarities and differences in ethical perception between cultural or ethnic groups and little attention has been paid towards understanding how cultural values influence the ethnic groups' ethical perception. Moreover, most empirical research in this area has focused on moral judgement, moral decision making and action, with limited empirical work in the area of ethical perception. A total of 22 interviews were conducted and the questionnaire survey yielded 272 managerial responses. Three implications were obtained based on the findings of the study. The first implication is that differences in ethical perception can exist when one culture attributes moral significance to something that another culture does not. The results of the study also suggest that similarities in ethical perception can occur when a situation is viewed as an accepted and institutionalised part of doing business. Finally, the findings of the study also show that the influence of culture on ethical perception varied according to the different types of scenarios.     

The stock of external sovereign debt: Can we take the data at ‘face value’?

The stock of sovereign debt is typically measured at face value. Defined as the undiscounted sum of future principal repayments, face values are misleading when debts are issued with different contractual forms or maturities. In this paper, we construct alternative measures of the stock of external sovereign debt for 100 developing countries from 1979 through 2006 that correct for differences in contractual form and maturity. We show that our alternative measures: (1) paint a very different quantitative, and in some cases also qualitative, picture of the stock of developing country external sovereign debt; (2) often invert rankings of indebtedness across countries, which historically defined eligibility for debt forgiveness; (3) indicate that the empirical performance of the benchmark quantitative model of sovereign debt deteriorates by roughly 50% once model-consistent measures of debt are used; (4) show how the spread of aggregation clauses in debt contracts that award creditors voting power in proportion to the contractual face value may introduce inefficiencies into the process of restructuring sovereign debts; and (5) illustrate how countries have manipulated their debt issuance to meet fiscal targets written in terms of face values.     

Beyond “Does it Pay to be Green?” A Meta-Analysis of Moderators of the CEP–CFP Relationship

Review of extant research on the corporate environmental performance (CEP) and corporate financial performance (CFP) link generally demonstrates a positive relationship. However, some arguments and empirical results have demonstrated otherwise. As a result, researchers have called for a contingency approach to this research stream, which moves beyond the basic question “does it pay to be green?” and instead asks “when does it pay to be green?” In answering this call, we provide a meta-analytic review of CEP–CFP literature in which we identify potential moderators to the CEP–CFP relationship including environmental performance type (e.g., reactive vs. proactive performance), firm characteristics (e.g., large vs. small firms), and methodological issues (e.g., self-report measures). By analyzing these contingencies, this study attempts to provide a basis on which to draw conclusions regarding some inconsistencies and debates in the CEP–CFP research. Some of the results of the moderator analysis suggest that small firms benefit from environmental performance as much or more than large firms, US firms seem to benefit more than international counterparts, and environmental performance seems to have the strongest influence on market-measures of financial performance.     

The effects of detailing on prescribing decisions under quality uncertainty

Motivated by recent empirical findings on the relationship between new clinical evidence and the effectiveness of detailing, this paper develops a new structural model of detailing and prescribing decisions under the environment where both manufacturers and physicians are uncertain about drug qualities. Our model assumes (1) a representative opinion leader is responsible for updating the prior belief about the quality of drugs via consumption experiences and clinical trial outcomes, and (2) manufacturers use detailing as a means to build/maintain the measure of physicians who are informed of the current information sets. Unlike previous learning models with informative detailing, our model directly links the effectiveness of detailing to the current information sets and the measures of well-informed physicians. To illustrate the empirical implications of the new model, we estimate our model using a product level panel data on sales volume, prices, detailing minutes, and clinical trial outcomes for ACE-inhibitors with diuretics in Canada. Using our estimates, we demonstrate how the effectiveness of detailing depends on the information sets and the measures of well-informed physicians. Furthermore, we conduct a policy experiment to examine how a public awareness campaign, which encourages physicians/patients to report their drug experiences, would affect managerial incentives to detail. The results demonstrate that the empirical and managerial implications of our model can be very different from those of previous models. We argue that our results point out the importance of developing a structural model that captures the mechanism of how detailing/advertising conveys information in the market under study.