The impact of service innovation on firm-level financial performance

This article empirically investigates if firms focusing on service innovation perform better financially than firms not focusing on service innovation. Analysis of the financial performance of 3575 Norwegian firms in the manufacturing industries supports the proposition that firms focusing on service innovation have significantly higher growth of operating results than firms not focusing on service innovation. However, this proposition is not supported in a corresponding analysis of 1132 Norwegian firms in the service industries. We elaborate on these results by investigating a variety of performance measures and by comparing the effects of service innovation between manufacturing and service industries. The article contributes to the service innovation measurement literature and to a better general understanding of the determinants of service innovation performance effects.     

Interest rate model comparisons for participating products under Solvency II

Under the Solvency II regulatory framework it is essential for life insurers to have an adequate interest rate model. In this paper, we investigate whether the choice of the interest rate model has an impact on the valuation of the best estimate of the liabilities. We use three well-known interest rate models; the CIR++-model, the G2++-model and the Libor Market model. Our numerical results show that for low to medium durations of the liabilities and a relatively low proportion of credit bonds in the asset portfolio, the three interest rate models produce quite similar values for the best estimate liabilities. However, for large durations of the liabilities, or a large bond proportion, or both, the differences can be quite large. There is no easy answer to the question of which model should be used in cases where the choice of interest rate model has a significant impact. Based on the study described in this paper, our advice is to use the G2++-model, which seems to represent an appropriate trade-off between accuracy and complexity.     

Rhetoric and hegemony in consumptive wildlife tourism: polarizing sustainability discourses among angling tourism stakeholders

Nature-based tourism frequently results in controversies over access rights, but also over how resources should be managed and utilized. In this article, we explore disagreements on management strategies and angling practices, which followed in the wake of the gradual introduction of increasingly strict harvest regulations in salmon angling in the Orkla River of Norway. Different views on what represent the most severe threats to the salmon stock appeared in this case to originate in rather complex patterns with respect to the ways stakeholders related to and engaged with salmon, rivers and nature in general. The identification of incompatible goals and motives of various categories of stakeholders has for long been a dominant approach in research on these types of conflicts. In this contribution, we broaden the scope by exploring how such controversies involve competition for hegemony with respect to how management and angling practices should be discursively framed.     

Imitation,Contagion, or Exertion? Using a Tax Reform to Reveal How Colleagues' Sick Leaves Influence Worker Behaviour

We analyse the social interaction effects in sick‐leave behaviour in the workplace, using high‐quality Norwegian matched employer–employee data with detailed individual information on sick leaves during the 2004–2006 period. We find that social interaction effects in sick‐leave behaviour in the workplace do exist, and that the effects are noticeable in size. The strong relationship between the sick‐leave rates among colleagues is not solely the result of contagious diseases, nor is it caused by improved informational quality or by the increased workload for the non‐absent workers. Evidence supports the existence of reciprocal worker behaviour that is unrelated to joint leisure‐seeking activities.     

Modelling and predicting customer churn from an insurance company

Within a company's customer relationship management strategy, finding the customers most likely to leave is a central aspect. We present a dynamic modelling approach for predicting individual customers’ risk of leaving an insurance company. A logistic longitudinal regression model that incorporates time-dynamic explanatory variables and interactions is fitted to the data. As an intermediate step in the modelling procedure, we apply generalised additive models to identify non-linear relationships between the logit and the explanatory variables. Both out-of-sample and out-of-time prediction indicate that the model performs well in terms of identifying customers likely to leave the company each month. Our approach is general and may be applied to other industries as well.     

Price Dispersion and the Role of Stores*

In this paper, we study price dispersion in the Norwegian retail market for 766 products across 4,297 stores over 60 months. Price dispersion for homogeneous products is significant and persistent, with a coefficient of variation of 37 percent for the median product. Price dispersion differs between product categories and over time. Store heterogeneity accounts for 30 percent of the observed variation in prices for the median product–month, and for around 50 percent for the sample as a whole. Price dispersion is still prevalent after correcting for store heterogeneity.     

Household composition and the importance of experience attributes of nature based tourism activity products – A Norwegian case study of outdoor recreationists

This study examines the relationship between household composition and the consumption of nature based tourism products by analysing the results of a survey among members from two of Norway’s largest outdoor recreation NGOs. Survey respondents were categorised into five main household types, namely: nuclear family, single parent, couples without children, single, and adults living together. These five main household types were then further divided into 19 age-based subgroups. Four key experience attributes connected to nature based tourism activities were identified, namely: Risk/challenge, Facilitation, Learning and Family/children friendly. This study reveals differences between household types in terms of the importance of the experience attributes sought from nature based tourism activity products. The tourism sector needs to be aware of variations in the key experience attributes different household types seek and to adapt to the process of changes in household structures in post-industrialised societies.     

Tears and Framing Contests: Public Organizations Countering Critical and Emotional Stories

The reputation and legitimacy of public organizations can be threatened by emotional news stories depicting a faceless bureaucratic power apparatus that is blind to how their decisions affect humans negatively. This qualitative study focuses on the strategies of the Norwegian immigration authorities as they handle emotional accounts of family reunion cases. The analysis first reconstructs what is called a Man Against the System-frame, and then moves on to investigate the competing frame that the authorities construct and the strategies used to promote this frame. The article sheds new light on the concept of framing contests by analyzing the possibilities and constraints of public organizations when they construct and use a frame.