Schedules, Calendars and Agendas

Time management instruments such as schedules, calendars and agendas are obvious tools to organise individual and collective action. Besides being of great practical significance in the western world and beyond, these tools are remarkable in that they are rarely questioned by those who are governed by them. Yet, they are tools and as such they can be used by management in organisations. This paper will explore: -why these time instruments are much legs visible than the task itself, -to what extent they are knowingly used by management, and -if their effectiveness is somehow limited to certain activities. It is argued that the unobtrusiveness oftime instruments is related to the natural distinction between content and context. Tasks, intellectual or practical, lead the actors to focus on content. Time management instruments appear to belong to context instead. Hence, they are normally taken for granted, framing the problem.Time; management

A bibliometric analysis of brand equity 1991 - 2018

Este artículo proporciona un análisis bibliométrico del estado actual de la investigación del brand equity, mediante el mapeo del panorama de investigación del concepto para identificar autores y países más productivos a lo largo del tiempo, análisis de publicaciones, cooperación entre autores, co-citas y co-ocurrencias de palabras clave; además, la identificación de clústeres de investigación para visualizar la estructura conceptual de este campo de conocimiento. Utilizando la colección de Scopus, este estudio realiza un análisis de 2000 publicaciones que estudian el brand equity. Se identifican cuatro grandes grupos de investigación: brand equity, análisis empíricos, el sector servicios y la metodología común de los estudios, los cuales caracterizan las diferentes corrientes de investigación y permiten analizar los campos de acción más preponderantes para el entendimiento del brand equity. Se proponen nuevos estudios que incluyan revisión sistemática tradicional para complementar lo planteado en este documento. Esta investigación otorga una visión general que puede ser una guía valiosa para docentes, investigadores y profesionalesThis document provides a bibliometric analysis of the current state of the brand equity research by mapping the research landscape to identify more productive authors and countries over time, analysis of publications, cooperation between authors, co-appointments, co-occurrences of keywords; plus, identification of research clusters to visualize the conceptual structure of the field of knowledge. Using the Scopus collection, this study analyzes 2000 publications that study brand equity. Identify four major research groups: brand equity, empirical analysis, the services sector and the common methodology of the studies, which characterize the different research trends and analyze the most preponderant fields of action for the understanding of brand equity; new studies are proposed that include a traditional systematic review to complement what is stated in this document. This research provides an overview that can be a valuable guide for teachers, researchers and professionalsUniversidad Pablo de Olavid

Measuring Family Business Performance: A Holistic, Idiosyncratic Approach

For any type of organization, performance represents the measure of outcomes, goals, and aspirations vital to various organization stakeholders; thus performance is an important research variable (Seijts, Latham, Tasa, & Latham, 2004, Simon, 1964). Family businesses are different from non-family businesses in that the family subsystem and the business subsystem overlap and interact to form the family business system. The desired outcomes, goals, and aspirations of each family business are a product of its particular family and business sub-systems. Thus, in family business, especially privately owned entities, performance is of particular interest since families can set their goals in their own ways, which may go well beyond financial outcomes. Despite notable recent advances, especially on conceptual grounds, current approaches to measuring performance in family business are limited by a focus solely on financial measures, and current approaches fail to acknowledge that goals are idiosyncratic to each family business. The purpose of this research was to begin the process of developing a performance measurement scale that is holistic – including the entire set of family business goals, both financial and non-financial – and considers the idiosyncratic nature of family businesses. The present study produced a family business performance measurement scale that employs twenty-one goals spread among six latent constructs

Value of the stochastic efficiency in data envelopment analysis

YesThis article examines the potential benefits of solving a stochastic DEA model over solving a deterministic DEA model. It demonstrates that wrong decisions could be made whenever a possible stochastic DEA problem is solved when the stochastic information is either unobserved or limited to a measure of central tendency. We propose two linear models: a semi-stochastic model where the inputs of the DMU of interest are treated as random while the inputs of the other DMUs are frozen at their expected values, and a stochastic model where the inputs of all of the DMUs are treated as random. These two models can be used with any empirical distribution in a Monte Carlo sampling approach. We also define the value of the stochastic efficiency (or semi-stochastic efficiency) and the expected value of the efficiency

Sustainability, Digital Transformation and Fintech: The New Challenges of the Banking Industry

In the current competitive scenario, the banking industry must contend with multiple challenges tied to regulations, legacy systems, disruptive models/technologies, new competitors, and a restive customer base, while simultaneously pursuing new strategies for sustainable growth. Banking institutions that can address these emerging challenges and opportunities to effectively balance long-term goals with short-term performance pressures could be aptly rewarded. This book comprises a selection of papers addressing some of these relevant issues concerning the current challenges and opportunities for international banking institutions. Papers in this collection focus on the digital transformation of the banking industry and its effect on sustainability, the emergence of new competitors such as FinTech companies, the role of mobile banking in the industry, the connections between sustainability and financial performance, and other general sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) topics related to the banking industry. The book is a Special Issue of the MDPI journal Sustainability, which has been sponsored by the Santander Financial Institute (SANFI), a Spanish research and training institution created as a collaboration between Santander Bank and the University of Cantabria. SANFI works to identify, develop, support, and promote knowledge, study, talent, and innovation in the financial sector

Greening of industry: an ecological economic appraisal of eco-innovations and eco-labelling

In a market economy, the behaviour of firms determines the extent and type of anthropogenic impacts that affect natural ecosystems. As such it is critical that the regulation of corporate behaviour is closely appraised. All economic production systems use natural resource inputs and release waste emissions to environmental sinks; they also contribute to sustainability in terms of income generation. The analysis of economic efficiency is thus coined in terms of juxtaposing and balancing these effects and the role of regulation is to intervene so that the outcome (in terms of corporate behaviour) approximates to this theoretical social optimum. Determining optimal regulation is the core focus of this thesis. The role of environmental regulation has become prominent of late owing to developments in the science (and social science) of climate change and ecosystems functioning. It has also been strongly influenced by the Porter Hypothesis (PH) which challenges the non-interventionist doctrine of neo-classical economics in favour of stricter environmental regulation, based on the presumption that significant pollution offsets are available if and only firms are forced to search for eco-innovations. In order to progress the argument vis-à-vis optimal regulation it is first essential to explore the role of the firm in society, i.e. what the responsibilities of industry ought to be with respect to the sustainability agenda. I juxtapose and critically appraise functionalist theory and its associated utilitarian ethic with social permission theory; the outcome of this analysis is the contention that ‘I&We’ deontological theory is the most defensible alternative and as such a firm’s fiduciaries ought to balance the conflicting claims of stakeholders, i.e. shareholders are important but not paramount. Given this outcome, the role of the regulator is to intervene when the market for ‘green’ corporate behaviour does not function. There are various reasons outlined as to why such intervention might be required. On the demand side, evidence is presented of consumers’ willingness-to-pay for perceived environmental quality. This product attribute is typically a credence attribute and there is asymmetric information; there is an incentive for ‘greenwashing’, i.e. false or misleading environmental marketing claims. The strategic behavioural model developed herein implies that the status quo is potential sub-optimality in that consumers play a mixed strategy and, over time, there is the potential for a vicious cycle in that progressively less and less ‘green’ marketing claims are genuine. On the supply side, firms may be ‘satisficing’ as opposed to optimising with respect to eco-innovations; a firm’s search for and selection of innovation is path-dependent, i.e. the history of innovations is influential. This supports the PH in that stimulating a shift to an eco-innovation trajectory realises benefits not only in the current time period but into the future. I also demonstrate that firms may be ‘locked in’ to technological paths that are sub-optimal (and environmentally damaging) owing to ‘coordination effects’ and as such there is a further role for economically efficient regulatory intervention on the supply side. Well-designed regulation can improve economic welfare in that it might propagate a shift in (as opposed to movement along) abatement cost curves. This in turn implies a convergence between the ‘best’ level of pollution for the polluter and for society, therein ameliorating the potential deadweight losses from the strategic interaction between the polluter and the regulator

VALIDATING THE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY OF SMMEs IN THE AFRICAN CONTEXT: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SMMEs IN GHANA AND SOUTH AFRICA

Published ThesisAuthors who support the notion that the responsibility of businesses goes beyond profit-making to include social and environmental objectives have largely found a positive relationship between business social responsibility (BSR) and firm performance. However, most of these studies have either focused on large firms or have been conducted outside of Africa. This made it necessary for this study to examine the relationship between BSR and small, medium, and micro enterprise (SMME) performance in Africa – particularly so when SMMEs have been found to be significant contributors to the economic development of nations. The study was conducted within the framework of stakeholder theory where BSR was defined as actions taken by SMMEs to address issues concerning employees, customers, community, and the environment with the view to ultimately affect firm performance positively. To test the hypothesis, a sample of 262 South African SMME owners or managers and another sample of 253 Ghanaian SMME owners or managers were surveyed. Descriptive and inferential statistical analyses were performed on the data collected. The empirical findings showed that BSR issues are significantly positively correlated with some performance variables (i.e. expected benefits and realised benefits) but not significantly correlated with other performance variables (i.e. sales growth and profit levels) in the Ghana sample. However, in the South Africa sample, all BSR issues are significantly positively correlated with all four measures of performance considered in this study. A further analysis of the relationship between BSR variables and firm performance variables was undertaken using regression analysis to test the degree to which BSR variables predict the firm performance variables. The results showed that customer and environment issues are significant predictors of realised benefits in the Ghana sample while employee, customer and community issues significantly predict realised benefits in the South African sample. Although the results of the study were mixed, in the sense that not all BSR variables had significant positive relationships with firm performance variables, they do give an indication of how BSR can contribute to SMME performance in the African context. Based on the findings, it is recommended that a formal policy and legislation aimed at bringing about uniformity and clarity in the BSR processes are instituted to regulate SMME BSR in both countries. This is expected to improve compliance and thus increase the benefits of BSR to SMMEs and the economies that they contribute to