Subordinate‐Superior Upward Communication: Power,Politics, and Political Skill

A multiphase study involving 1,285 respondents was conducted to answer an important yet overlooked question: for a job requiring frequent informal communication with superiors, should an organization focus more on selecting employees with higher trait‐like willingness to communicate or on providing an environment where the flow of communication is easy and aided? We found support for the latter. Further, we observed that subordinates alter their communication behaviors based on the perception of superior's power, politics in the organization, and their own political skills. The study contributes to a better understanding of how situational variables affect subordinate‐superior upward communication. Implications of the study are also discussed. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Perceived usefulness,ease of use and user acceptance of blockchain technology for digital transactions – insights from user-generated content on Twitter

Although blockchain has attracted a great deal of attention from academia and industry there is a lack of studies on acceptance drivers. This study explores blockchain acceptance by mining the collective intelligence of users on Twitter. It maps blockchain user acceptance drivers to technology acceptance constructs. The analysis shows that users are attracted by security, privacy, transparency, trust and traceability aspects provided by blockchain. On Twitter more discussions on blockchain benefits than on drawbacks. Initial coin offering (ICO) is extensively discussed. The study provides guidelines for managers and concludes by presenting the limitations of the study along with future research directions.     

Exploring the link between research and economic growth: an empirical study of China and USA

In this paper, we explore the link between scientific and technical research and economic growth in China and USA over the sample period 1981–2012 using the extended Cobb–Douglas model with capital per worker and the quantity of scientific and technical journal articles (research publications) per worker. We examine the cointegration relationship and present the short-run and long-run results using the autoregressive distributed lag bounds procedure. Further, we examine the direction of causality between research publications per worker results and economic growth variables using the Toda and Yamamoto (J Econom 66(1–2):225–250, 1995) procedure. Our results indicate for both countries research publications per worker positively influence the output per worker both in the short-run and the long-run. The causality results for China indicate a bi-directional causality between research publications per worker and output per worker, duly emphasizing the mutually reinforcing effect. In case of USA, we note a unidirectional causation output per worker to research publications per worker indicating that output Granger cause research publications.     

Economic impact of hypoglycemia among insulin-treated patients with diabetes

Objective: The objective of this study was to assess the cost of hypoglycemic events among insulin-treated patients with diabetes and the potential cost savings to a hypothetical US health plan and employer of reducing hypoglycemic events with a device intervention.

Methods: A cost-calculator model was developed to estimate the direct costs of hypoglycemic events, accounting for diabetes type, age, and event severity. Model inputs were derived from published incidence rates of hypoglycemic events and direct medical costs. Assumed intervention efficacy was based on published studies of an emerging technology which yielded 72.2% (LGS Trial; ACTRN12610000024044) and 31.8% (ASPIRE Trial; NCT01497938) reductions in severe and non-severe hypoglycemic events, respectively. Model outcomes—including the number of severe (requiring medical assistance) and non-severe events, and direct/indirect medical costs (excluding intervention costs)—were evaluated over a 1-year period for a hypothetical health plan and employer perspectives.

Results: In a health plan with 10 million enrollees, patients without the intervention would have experienced 0.09 and 14.60 severe and non-severe hypoglycemic events per patient per year (PPPY), respectively (vs 0.02 severe and 9.96 non-severe events with the intervention). This translated into total direct medical cost savings of $45 million ($177 PPPY) for the health plan. For an employer with 100,000 employees, the intervention would have yielded additional savings of $492 PPPY in indirect costs.

Conclusion: Insulin-treated patients experience hypoglycemic events, which are associated with substantial direct and indirect medical costs. The cost savings of reducing hypoglycemic events need to be weighed against the costs of using diabetes device interventions.     

Self-service innovativeness scale: introduction,development, and validation of scale

Consumer innovativeness is a central variable in innovation diffusion and adoption literature. The foremost challenge confronted by investigators involved in innovation diffusion and adoption research is the problem of measuring the innovativeness construct. Furthermore, a scale measuring innovativeness towards self-service technologies (SSTs) adoption is required as SSTs have grown considerably in the last few decades. To this end, this study develops and validates a self-service innovativeness (SSI) scale applicable across a variety of SSTs. The study presents a series of six distinct phases describing the development and validation of a six-item, self-report scale. The innovativeness scale has been validated in different contexts, allowing comparisons across distinct samples (i.e., student vs. non-student sample) and different industries (i.e., retail and hospitality industries). The SSI scale presented in this paper is short, valid, reliable, and easy to administer in service domains.     

Brand Analyses of U.S. Global and Local Brands in India: The Case of Levi's

ABSTRACT

This study investigates differences between U.S. global and local brands in the Indian market. Attitudes toward American products and the brand equity of U.S. global and local casual apparel brand in the Indian market are examined. It is postulated that global and local brand influence brand equity, which is composed of brand image, brand awareness, emotional value, perceived quality, brand loyalty, and purchase intention. A total of 411 college students in India participated in the survey. Using repeated measures ANOVA, this study finds that Indian consumers perceive global and local brands differently based on brand equity.     

How mutual fund investors’ objective and subjective knowledge impacts their information search and processing behaviour

Contrary to the popular belief that objective knowledge (OK) (that is, what is actually stored in the memory) and subjective knowledge (SK) (that is, what individuals perceive they know) differently impact information search and information-processing behaviour, an empirical study conducted on 268 mutual fund (MF) investors suggests no significant difference in the impact of OK and SK on the width and depth of information search and information processing. The study suggests that OK and SK significantly positively impact the width and depth of information search and information-processing behaviour, however, no significant difference exists in the way they impact. The possible explanation put forward is that even though MF investors may suffer from self-deception (that is, pseudo expertise) and report high knowledge (that is, high SK), the impact of SK on actual investment behaviour is not significantly different from that of OK. The implications of the findings are also discussed.     

An analysis of inflation and stock returns for the UK

Whether common stocks provide a hedge against inflation has been long debated. This paper focuses on this question by investigating the relationship between inflation and stock returns in the short term and medium term and under different inflationary regimes using the UK data. Empirical evidence suggests that the UK stock market fails to hedge against inflation in the short term. However, in the medium term there is mixed results. Results from different inflationary regimes show that the relationship between inflation and returns varies in different regimes.     

Household Income Inequality and Income Mobility: Implications Towards Equalizing Longer-Term Incomes in India

This paper addresses three important questions. First, what are the trends, levels and sources of income inequality in India? Second, how have been the patterns of income mobility? And finally, exploring the relationship between income mobility and income inequality in the context of India. Results, based on recent India Human Development Survey (IHDS) longitudinal data, advocate that not only is income inequality very high, nonetheless, it has increased – mainly attributable to different income sources – in India. The paper also focused on whether or not this income mobility equalizes longer-term incomes. Results suggest income mobility has resulted in-albeit not robust- equalizing longer-term incomes. Thus, based on imperative findings, the paper suggests, the nature of longer-term well-being is crucial to designing policy interventions to effectively tackle inequality and in this context, economic mobility can be seen as an avenue to long-term equality.     

Managing Customer Relations in a Modern Business Environment: Towards an Ecosystem-Based Sustainable CRM Model

The adoption of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) has witnessed tremendous growth across sectors, geographies, and management cultures in the last several decades. The perception of CRM as an IT-based tool has undergone a paradigm shift and is now treated as a strategic indulgence by modern-day businesses where IT is an indispensable enabler. CRM has garnered the interest of both academicians and practitioners over the years. In this article, the authors establish the value of sustainability in CRM and make an attempt at proposing a conceptual framework for modern businesses through its integration with various social networking sites that produces volumes of real-time data. The article also explores the importance of Customer Experience Management (CEM). The authors provide a thorough investigation of CRM models in the period of 1990 to 2016 through a survey of the literature explaining the need for managing experiences and engagement around existing CRM processes. In addition to exploring the intricate relationship between CRM and CEM, the authors also provide an interactive ecosystem-based framework for the creation of a sustainable CRM framework.