How to build a blockbuster

Coming up with fabulously successful products takes more than creative people with groundbreaking ideas. Top executives need to roll up their sleeves and get involved. Since they control resources and have the power to cut through red tape, they can clear a path for the creative team to develop hit products.     

Nursing presence,patient satisfaction,and the bottom line

Hospital planners rely on a number of motivational models to increase patient satisfaction. Missing is the user friendly model oriented to nursing presence. Absent is the approach which taps into that contribution particular nurses might make to increase patient satisfaction and enhance the bottom line. This paper remedies this circumstance by the introduction of the Nursing Presence Grid model. The model is based upon a review of the literature conducted in the manner of Polit and Hungler (1995) and appearing since 1983. Nursing presence is defined. The Nursing Presence Grid matches the various dimensions of nursing presence with various courses of action thought to attain nursing presence. An explanation of how the model might be applied is presented.     

Impact of Restaurant Experience on Brand Image and Customer Loyalty: Moderating Role of Dining Motivation

This study seeks to determine which restaurant experiences influence the image of a restaurant's brand and formation of customers' loyalty. The research examines the connections among restaurant experiences, brand image, satisfaction, and loyalty in the context of full-service restaurants. This study also investigates the moderating effect of customers' dining motivations on the formation of brand image. The results of this study suggest that: (a) A restaurant's environment and food quality positively influences brand image and customers' satisfaction, (b) customers' perceptions of price fairness do not influence brand image but does affect customers' satisfaction, (c) development of customers' positive brand image does not drive satisfaction but does influence loyalty in full-service restaurants, and (d) customers' dining motivations moderate the relationship between restaurant experiences and perceptions of brand image. These results provide a basis for investigating which restaurant experiences are critical in eliciting development of a positive brand image and which have behavioral consequences. This study also offers mangers a perspective for developing marketing strategies to strengthen brand image in full-service restaurants.     

Classification of Asian Complainers in Restaurant Services

In restaurant businesses, customer dissatisfaction must be accounted for and thus avoided in order to generate revenue. In the literature, researchers have confirmed a positive relationship between complaint behaviour and consumer dissatisfaction. Three types of complaint behaviour have been discussed in previous studies: voice response, private response and third-party response. This study targeted Asian consumers (n = 300) and segmented them based on their complaint behaviour. These results signify that Asian internationals' complaint behaviour is not homogenous and can therefore be segmented in terms of their complaint behaviour. Personal characteristics as well as socio-demographics were also investigated with consumer complaint behaviour of research participants.     

Corporate policy and the ethics of competitor intelligence gathering

Competitor intelligence, information that helps managers understand their competitors, is highly valued in today's marketplace. Firms, large and small, are taking a more systematic approach to competitor intelligence collection. At the same time, information crimes and litigation over information disputes appear to be on the rise, and survey data show widespread approval of unethical and questionable intelligence-gathering methods. Despite these developments, few corporations address the ethics of intelligence gathering in their corporate codes of conduct. Neither managers nor management educators have paid sufficient attention to this topic. From a review of questionable intelligence-gathering practices reported in various literatures, the author identifies some important ethical principles to help managers draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate methods of information acquisition. The paper also discusses the costs of failure to heed these principles and suggests steps managers can take to provide ethical leadership in this area.Lynn Sharp Paine is an Associate Professor at the Harvard Business School. A former lawyer and occasional consultant in business ethics, she has published articles on business ethics, moral philosophy, and jurisprudence. Her current research focuses on ethical questions related to the flow of information and ideas.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the European Business Ethics Network conference held in Barcelona in September 1989. The author is grateful to members of that group for their criticisms and suggestions. She also wishes to thank Professor J. Ron Fox for his detailed comments on a version of the paper and Gary Edwards, Executive Director of The Ethics Resource Center, for discussions of intelligence-gathering practices and for making the Center's resources available for research. In addition, the staff at the Defense Industry Initiative Clearing House were most helpful.     

Salary Discrimination by Black Males?

A bstract . Utilizing the human capital framework , the authors apply OLS methods to cross-sectional salary data for 1989-90 for a Southern, historically black, public university (SHBU) to determine whether salary discrimination against other race-sex groups exists when black males hold the top economic power Results indicate that it does.