Marketing capabilities and innovation. How do they affect the financial results of hotels?

From the point of view of firms’ managers, the knowledge of the factors which explain their firms’ financial results is considered of great usefulness to propose the most appropriate and profitable marketing strategies and actions. This research sets out from this central idea and proposes a model of relationships that considers the marketing results, the marketing capabilities, and the innovation capability as key factors for achieving good financial results. This model is verified via an empirical investigation carried out among 200 directors of hotel establishments in Andalusia, a region in the south of Spain which is one of the country's main tourist destinations. The results indicate that innovation capability is strongly conditioned by marketing capabilities and resources and that this innovation capability affects the financial results of the firms analyzed. Likewise, it is deduced that a market-oriented management philosophy contributes to the development of these marketing capabilities. The implications for management are considered very relevant as they must lead these firms to invest in the development of marketing resources and capabilities, and apply a market-oriented management philosophy if they wish to improve their financial results.     

Self-determination and risk: the role of life goals and causality orientation in domain-specific risk propensity

A growing body of risk research shows that risk is content specific. Accordingly, various studies have highlighted some factors that could explain why people’s risk propensity may arise in certain domains of risk (e.g. the financial domain) but not in other domains (e.g. the recreational domain). Until now, no research has examined motivation as a possible correlate of domain-specific risk propensity. On the basis of self-determination theory (SDT), we examined the role of both extrinsic life goals (i.e. superficial goal striving, including fame, money, and physical attraction) and control-orientated personality style (i.e. feeling that one’s behaviors are governed by external contingencies) in the propensity to take risks in various domains (social, ethical, recreational, financial, and health/safety). A community sample of 197 participants completed measures scaled to assess extrinsic life goals, controlled orientation, and domain-specific propensity (DOSPERT). The results showed that pursuing extrinsic goals and being control oriented increased the propensity to take ethical, recreational, financial, and health/safety risks but decreased the propensity to take social risks. In addition, to corroborate that risk propensity is domain specific, these results indicate that superficial life aspiration and sensitivity to social pressures are highly predictive of instrumental risks (e.g. ethical and financial), moderately predictive of health risks, and negatively predictive of ego-threatening risks (e.g. social risk). The results are discussed in light of the domain-specific risk literature and in the perspective of interventions based on SDT.     

Dimensions of entrepreneurial orientation and small and medium enterprise performance in emerging economies

The removal of trade barriers has encouraged the entry of new competitors into formerly protected markets. This situation creates pressure on many small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in emerging economies such as Tanzania. Using a survey method and cross-sectional research design, the research examines three dimensions of entrepreneurial orientation (EO), namely: pro-activeness, risk-taking and competitive aggressiveness. Understanding their relationships and variance may help to improve our ability to explain SME performance. The findings contribute to how SME performance in emerging economies can be enhanced to enable SMEs to face challenges posed by competitor influx in the context of an open market economy. The findings indicate a strong relationship between EO dimensions and performance, with risk-taking and competitive aggressiveness moderating the effect of pro-activeness. The proposed model could predict 72% of the variance explained in SME performance.     

Creating competitive advantage: Linking perspectives of organization learning,innovation behavior and intellectual capital

Drawing on learning theories and the intellectual capital (IC) theory, organizational learning research has discussed the benefits of searching for market opportunities and maintaining a competitive advantage in dynamic environments. To explain organizational performance and survival, the previous literature has focused mainly on what organizations do, but it has failed to address how and what they should do. This study argues that if hotel management is open-minded about exploratory and exploitative learning, it can open the door to capturing opportunity and competitive advantage through increased innovation behavior and human capital accumulation. Further, IC theory has also confirmed that social capital and relational capital will strengthen the relationship between innovation behavior and human capital. This study analyzes data from 595 hotel managers and finds strong support for the proposed hypotheses.     

El estado del arte de la orientación al mercado en las organizaciones culturales

A diversity of studies in previous literature has focused on determining the contribution of market orientation in the companies' performance. However, the research on the effects of market orientation in the performance of cultural organizations is an incipient area of research. In this sense, the present study has the purpose of presenting a review of the main aspects of market orientation in nonprofit organizations, specifically in cultural organizations, and identifies future research directions for this still fertile field of study.     

Leadership marketing: an exploratory study

In an era when collaboration is the key to business prosperity, the ability to develop one truly coherent and agile brand lived by its employees and delivered to external stakeholders has become extremely challenging. Unity between the internal brand and a company’s external image, when change is the only constant, has almost ceased to exist. The marketing function is frequently underemphasised at board level and its role is often devalued in leading organisational change. This paper concerns how marketing can partner with organisational leadership for a mutually beneficial exchange of skills and capabilities to be able to reinvent organisations rapidly enough to cope with shifts in the external business environment and create a sustainable future for the business. This paper explores the concept of “leadership marketing” from an interpretivist perspective which challenges the conventional view of marketing and leadership as two separate fields and offers a holistic approach for business management and brand alignment.     

基于股东利益要求及其实现方式的非财务指标关注程度研究

从股东角度出发,对股东所关注的反映其利益要求和实现方式信息的非财务指标的关注程度进行了排序研究和分组研究。研究表明：股东对不同类的反映其利益要求和实现方式信息的非财务指标的关注程度存在显著的差异。详尽必要的信息披露更易取得股东对企业的理解和支持。因此,企业除应当进行法定性披露和习惯性披露外,还应当根据本企业股东特点和本企业股东对非财务指标关注的需要以及关注程度的差异对非财务指标信息进行科学、恰当的自愿性详细披露,以满足本企业股东关注相关信息的需要。     

Effects of service orientation on job embeddedness in hotel industry

This research aims to develop and analyze a model that depicts work engagement (WE) as a mediator of the relationship between job embeddedness and service orientation. Specifically, the model examines external environmental factors (EEFs) as moderator of the effects of service orientation and job embeddedness in the hospitality industry. All data used for this study were gathered in Iran from hotels frontline employees with a two-weeks’ time lag. These relationships mentioned above were analyzed using AMOS 22.0. It was discovered in the results that WE was indeed a partial mediator and that EEFs indeed moderated the effects of service orientation on job embeddedness with adequate empirical support. The implications of the findings for the managers, the study limitations, and future research recommendations were also discussed.     

素质为本人性提升全面发展——对高职院校加强思想品德和人文素质教育的思考

近20年来,我国高等职业教育得到了飞速发展,已进入内涵建设的关键时期.当前,我国的高职教育理念存在误区,普遍存在重技能、轻素质,重智育、轻德育的“偏科”现象,加强思想品德和人文素质教育势在必行.高职院校必须转变教育观念,把“做事”和“做人”结合起来,提高学生的综合素质,实现“能力本位”向“素质本位”转变,从而真正培养出德、智、体、美全面发展的高素质技术技能型人才.