An approach to researching managerial labour markets

Recently there has been a revival of interest in the nature of the employment relationship. The employment relationship in a market economy has been traditionally understood as a dynamic equilibrium between the contending forces of conflict and cooperation. However, some contemporary accounts purport to detect a fundamental change in the nature of the employment relationship. These arguments are flawed because they appear to mistake changes in employment arrangements for changes in the core features of the employment relationship. As the contemporary employment relationship remains rooted in market economies, where labour is bought and sold, its core characteristics persist. In testing this claim, we examine whether new working arrangements are associated with changes in attitudes and behaviour. This is based on a survey of white-collar union members in Ireland. We find little support for the assumption that new working arrangements such as increased job autonomy and involvement in decision-making are eradicating the old conflictual attitudes associated with the traditional employment relationship and psychological contract.     

The influence of workgroup identification on turnover intention and knowledge sharing: the perspective of employees in subsidiaries

Abstract

Turnover intention and knowledge sharing of local employees in multinational enterprise (MNE) subsidiary workgroups have received relatively little attention in IHRM research, yet are central to everyday operation of the organisation. Drawing on optimal distinctiveness theory, we consider the influence of workgroup identification on two important employee attitudes and behaviours, turnover intention and knowledge sharing, by examining the influence of the supervisor on workgroup identification. Participants included 306 employees in an Australian and New Zealand subsidiary of an MNE headquartered in Europe. The results indicate that employees’ tendency to identify with their workgroup is enhanced by the distinctiveness of a supervisor from a different national or cultural group, which in turn leads to decreased turnover intention and increased knowledge sharing among workgroup members. Higher supervisor prototypicality however, that counterbalances distinctiveness through higher inclusion, weakens the mediation effect. An important practical implication of this research is that the HR function could play a valuable role in training or group development to raise supervisors’ and employees’ understanding and management of needs for both inclusion and distinctiveness.     

To Thine Own Self Be True? Employees’ Judgments of the Authenticity of Their Organization’s Corporate Social Responsibility Program

Despite recognizing the importance of developing authentic corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs, noticeably absent from the literature is consideration for how employees distinguish between authentic and inauthentic CSR programs. This is somewhat surprising given that employees are essentially the face of their organization and are largely expected to act as ambassadors for the organization’s CSR program (Collier and Esteban in Bus Ethics 16:19–33, 2007). The current research, by conducting depth interviews with employees, builds a better understanding of how employees differentiate between authentic and inauthentic CSR programs, and how these judgments influence their perceptions of the organization. We find that employees rely on two different referent standards to form authenticity judgments—the extent to which the image put forth in the CSR program aligns with the organization’s true identity and the extent to which the CSR program itself is developmental. To assess the former, employees draw on cues about resource commitment, alignment between elements of the organization’s CSR program, emotional engagement, justice, and embeddedness. The latter assessments are based on the extent to which the organization adopts a leadership role with regards to its CSR initiatives. We also find that perceived authenticity can lead to positive outcomes such as organizational identification and employee connections. This study contributes to the broad literatures on both CSR and authenticity, as well as more specifically adding to the conversation on authenticity as a potentially valuable lens for enriching business ethics theorizing.     

A convex polytope technique for analysing the performance of universities

As a technique for analysing the performance of institutions of higher education, the convex polytope technique has a number of advantages; it can accommodate (1) multiple inputs and outputs (2) joint production (3) non-linear input-output relationships and (4) data for individual institutions rather than data representative of the institutional set. This paper discusses a general convex polytope technique for exploratory data analysis and its particular application to analysing the input-output relationships in universities. Its use is illustrated by means of a simple analysis of data from Australian universities. The technique is considered to have application both in fundamental research into the nature of the relationship between inputs and outputs and in providing useful empirical information for practical decision-making in universities and colleges.     

A diagrammatical template for business market demand estimation

This article describes a template that can help guide managers through a minefield of complex product interactions and demand drivers on the way to producing a realistic demand estimation. It is based on many years of consulting and conducting postmortems to find out what went wrong when demand forecasts have gone awry.A menu of troublesome variables that make up a rogue's gallery of the worst offending causes of estimation error are presented. The premise being, if we are aware of the potential trouble spots in demand estimation, we are likely to avoid some of the more serious problems that plague market projections.A diagrammatical template is presented that shows these troublesome variables and where they enter into the demand evaluation process. Next, the template components are introduced to show how the various product interactions and drivers that affect demand estimation are used and how they impact market projections. Throughout, a list of dos and don'ts are provided along with a sufficient number of real-life disaster stories to reinforce the issues.     

The Influence of B to B Social Media Message Features on Brand Engagement: A Fluency Perspective

Purpose: Social media is increasingly drawing the attention and interest of business-to-business (B to B) organizations. Yet, B to B organizations remain cautious in their social media pursuits, in part based on a stated lack of understanding for best practices. The purpose of the current work is to take initial steps to address this challenge by identifying specific social media message features that influence online users’ engagement with B to B organizations.

Methodology/Approach: This work examines the Twitter feeds of the top 50 social B to B brands (as reported by Brandwatch in 2015) to examine the effects of message features (hashtags, text difficulty, embedded media, and message timing) on user engagement, captured in terms of Twitter likes and retweets.

Findings: We argue that message features that enhance fluency (e.g., images) should enhance engagement. In contrast, those that disrupt fluency (e.g., hasthags) should result in lower levels of engagement. Consistent with these predictions, we find that hashtags and text difficulty correlate to lower levels of engagement whereas embedded media in the form of images and video correlate to higher levels of engagement. Also consistent with the proposed fluency framework, we find that tweets from B to B organizations generate greater engagement on evenings and weekends.

Research Implications: This research applies a fluency lens to identify specific message features that influence online engagement. In doing so, it highlights fluency as a powerful construct for understanding the drivers of B to B social media brand engagement. More generally, this work suggests fluency as a valuable conceptual lens for developing effective B to B social media strategies. This research also speaks to the complexity of B to B social media strategies – organizations must go beyond content and platform decisions, to also consider the specific features of the message.

Practical Implications: Social media is becoming more and more important to B to B organizations and is as yet an underutilized engagement tool. The current work offers initial strategies regarding message features that business practitioners can incorporate into their content development strategies to strengthen engagement. Specifically, efforts should be made to attain high levels of fluency in B to B social media content development.

Originality/Value/Contribution of the Paper: The current work offers initial insights as to the importance of understanding not only how social media topics/content influence engagement, but also the influence of message features (e.g., hashtags, embedded media). In doing so, it highlights fluency as a novel conceptual lens for developing more effective B to B social media strategies. Finally, it draws on actual tweets from leading B to B brands to examine the proposed influence of message features on engagement.     

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One of the key features of the legal regulation of Network Marketing schemes around the world is "buyback" – the statutory duty of firms to repurchase the unsold stocks of distributors leaving the scheme. Although this seems an eminently reasonable approach to the problem of would-be entrepreneurs being persuaded to part with their life savings, in practice "buyback" provisions are widely avoided. More seriously, though, "buyback" ultimately exposes consumers to still greater levels of risk. Also exposed are banks, suppliers, and employees. The paper evaluates a number of alternative approaches to deal with the anomaly, recommending a pragmatic combination of regulatory control and "best practice."