Analyse économétrique des coûts des services d’eau potable et qualité des prestations offertes aux usagers

Issues on service quality are crucial for water utility management and regulation. Omitting these aspects can lead to possible bias in estimating the efficiency of services. We integrate in a Translog cost function variables proxying this multi-dimensionality. Empirical results show that taking into account the level of quality of the delivered services has a significant impact on the measure of the efficiency computed from a stochastic frontier. Moreover we highlight that efficiency depends on ownership (public vs. private) and level of quality. Institute of Forestry, Agricultural and Environmental Engineering (ENGREF) and the National Institute of Agronomic research (INRA). The mission of the LEF is to conceive, develop, and transfer methods and tools of economic analysis to improve the management of the goods, services and products of the forest and the forestry sector. The aim of this issue of the “Cahiers du LEF” is to present the results of the researchs of the forest economics laobratory between 2003 and 2007.Service quality, cost, stochastic frontier, efficiency, water supply

Gathering Information Based on Focus Groups: Consumer’s Involvement in the Use of Vending Machines

The purpose of the present study is to describe the use of two focus groups to identify and refine a set of questionnaire items. They were also used to provide descriptions of lived experiences and to realize the importance, or not, of the use of Vending Machines in the university context. Vending Machines consumer students from different areas of knowledge participated on a voluntary basis (economics and management areas define the fist group, and engineering and marketing the second group). Based on the data collection and analysis it was possible to identify the attributes of vending machines that are important on both marketing and operations management in the performance of this type of machines. The participants, despite having lived bad experiences, consider their involvement useful, important, advantageous, necessary and interesting. Performance, efficiency, level of service, flexibility and availability for the needs of consumers were also identified

An Empirical Examination of Relational Governance and Service Capabilities on the Success of Professional Service Firms Offshore Outscoring the Client Perspective

Professional services, such as accounting, finance, engineering and management consulting, are significant contributors to the U.S. economy accounting for the largest value added industry within the private sector. Knowledge-intensive professional services reached this level of economic prominence by responding to heightened competition, managing rising costs, utilizing key resources, and re-directing their focus to internal core competencies through the strategic decision to engage in offshore outsourcing relationships. By 2015, the Congressional Research Study report predicts 3.4 million, or 13.7 of professional service jobs will be offshore outsourced. Offshore outsourcing is a firm level strategic decision to relocate business activities to an offshore third party primarily to emerging markets. Based on existing theories of transaction cost economics, resource based view, and resource dependence theory, this dissertation empirically validates a comprehensive model evaluating the multi-dimensional relational governance mechanism of collaboration on the capabilities of the offshore service provider. In addition, the model examines the influence of the service capabilities on the success of the client firm. One of the key contributions of this study is the client perspective examination of the relationship between the U.S. client firm and offshore service provider thereby addressing a stated need for additional academic research. The importance of governance mechanisms established by professional service firms have evolved over time from minimizing transaction costs and opportunistic behavior, to maximizing access to complementary resources, to building long-term relationships based on communication, commitment and information sharing. These governance mechanisms are integral to a collaborative client-vendor relationship. This dissertation develops hypotheses, from existing outsourcing literature, evaluating the influence of collaboration on the client\u27s perception of the learning capability, the se

Perspektiven der landwirtschaftlichen Betriebslehre

Traditional objects of farm management research and farm management science are farms and farm households. In the course of time new objects have been added, for example different forms of horizontal and vertical co-operation, commerce and manufacturing enterprises in the field of agriculture, partly supplying, and service industries in agriculture. Corresponding to that, there are numerous addressees: relevant academics, students, farmers and their consultants, agricultural experts, also increasingly employees in agribusiness, agricultural societies and administrations, partly also jurisdiction, agrarian politicians, and finally the public. There is a large variety of topics concerning farm management research and science. Important traditional topics with varying focuses are: description of forms of enterprises, operations research and analysis, cooperate planning, appraisal, site assessment, use of electronic media, analysis of new technologies and their results, and finally the individual farm analysis of agrarian policy measures. Recent topics are in particular: economic research on organic farming, farm economic questions in connection with biotechnology and genetic engineering, farm economic controlling, internal procuring and marketing policy, business relations, analysis of international competitiveness of farm businesses as well as enterprises in agribusiness, farm environmental economy, and economic examinations of agricultural institutions. As far as organisation is concerned, farm management economics should stay in future within agricultural faculties. Farm management economics should not be classified as part of business economics and should not be integrated in business science faculties. Due to the large field of topics, farm management economics should have two professorships per faculty. Besides, a basic level of science has to be passed at any agricultural university. Above that, varied priority programs on special fields should be offered as it is currently the case.agricultural sector, farm management economics, farm economic research projects, organisation of agricultural economics research and science, Farm Management, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Recent advances and applications in accessibility modelling

Accessibility is a concept that has become central to physical planning and spatial modelling for more than fifty years. As measure of the relative nearness or proximity of one place and persons to all other places or persons, conceptually linked to Newton\u2019s law of gravity, its origins can be traced back to the 1920s when it was used in location theory and regional economic planning and retail planning. Accessibility models have in the past decades been applied in several academic fields such as spatial economics, urban geography, rural geography, health geography, time geography, and transport engineering. Many different applications have been developed in these fields and can be categorized in several ways Here we distinguish four basic perspectives on accessibility: (i) infrastructure-based measures, analyzing the performance or service level of transport infrastructure, (ii) location-based measures, analyzing accessibility of spatially distributed activities, typically on an aggregate level, (iii) person-based measures, founded in the space\u2013time geography, analyzing accessibility at the level of the individual level, and (iv) utility-based measures, analyzing the welfare benefits that people derive from levels of access to the spatially distributed activities. It seems with advances in geospatial technology, internet technology, and abundance of detailed spatial data and real-time transport data sets, the field of accessibility modelling is thriving. In this era of data abundance, reflections on the role of accessibility modeling are more than ever important in the search for sound and interdisciplinary accessibility theories and tools. This is the rationale which characterizes the articles included in this Special Issue

Value co-creation characteristics and creativity-oriented customer citizenship behavior

For the competitive advantage of service organization, it is important to improve the creative performance of human resources in the organization. For example, when employees perform creatively, in other words, if they generate novel and useful ideas, it will contribute to organizational competiveness. Therefore, there has been an increased focus in identifying its antecedents and consequences. Unfortunately, little is known about the creative performance of customers. According to service-centered dominant logic, customer is the value co-creator, it emphasizes co-opting customer involvement in the value creation process as an additional human resource. In addition, customers can be a valuable resource for service improvement efforts for firms. For instance, companies might benefit greatly from customer feedback and complaints regarding their offerings and can enhance their productivity in terms of quality and quantity. In this paper, the type of novel, creative-oriented customer behaviors highlighted in the preceding paragraph are referred to as creativity-oriented customer citizenship behaviors (CCBs). In the customer value co-creation context, creative-oriented CCBs refer to extra-role efforts by customers with regards the development of ideas about products, practices, services, and procedures that are novel and potentially useful to a firm. According to the intrinsic motivation perspective, the context in which customers create values, influences their intrinsic motivation, which in turn affects creativity-oriented CCBs. The intrinsic motivation perspective suggests that high intrinsic motivation is affected by information from both task characteristics (i.e., autonomy) and social characteristics (e.g., supplier support). Specifically, complex and challenging task characteristics such as high levels of variety, identity, significance, autonomy, and feedback are expected to increase customer intrinsic motivation. Under these conditions, customers should increase the likelihood of creativity-oriented CCBs. Therefore, customers are expected to be most creative when they experience a high level of intrinsic motivation. In contrast, complex and challenging task and social characteristics can have the opposite effect to customers. For example, in a high level of variety task, increased autonomy can lead to increased workload because they must take on related extra responsibilities and accountability. Increased workload, in turn, is expected to lead to decreased likelihood of creativity-oriented CCBs. Therefore, this study attempts to explore the impact of task characteristics and social characteristics on creativity-oriented CCBs. Furthermore, a substantial body of research has examined the possibility that creativity is affected by personal characteristics. As such, in addition to the relevant task and social characteristics, the moderating influence of several trait variables is also considered. This article makes several contributions. First, this study investigates the trade-off effect of the customer value co-creation related task and social characteristics by examining the underlying opposing mechanism of motivation and work overload. Second, this research provides a deeper understanding of contingency factors that systematically strengthen the relationships under consideration. Third, this study may indicate that companies seek to promote the creativity of their industrial customers and should design the tasks and social characteristics of their industrial customers in a way that maximizes their creativity. But, companies should be aware of the negative impact of specific tasks and social characteristics that may minimize the creativity of industrial customers

Incorporating service quality tools into Kansei Engineering in services: A case study of Indonesian tourists

Due to market dynamics and challenges, it is imperative for companies to put their concern on strategic marketing orientation. In facts, products and services of similar quality are ubiquitous in today’s global market. Basically, functionality and usability alone are no longer prominent success factors in product and service innovation because customers today concern themselves more on satisfying their emotions than merely their cognition. Kansei Engineering (KE) has shown its superiority in investigating and modelling customer emotion (“Kansei” in Japanese) for product development. In dealing with customer needs, service quality tools such as quality function deployment (QFD) and the Kano model, have been applied extensively. But none have been able to incorporate and model customer’s emotional needs. Some attention has been given to investigate this but, thus far, there is no formal methodology that can account for customer emotional needs in service design. To fill this niche, this study proposed an integrative framework of KE incorporating the Kano model and QFD applied to services. This study extended the work by Hartono and Tan (2011) and Hartono et al. (2012) and presented a survey on luxury hotel services involving more than a hundred Indonesian tourists as the subject of study. Luxury hotels are reported to have greater strength of emotion than any other hotel segment. This work confirmed that emotion is to be more important than cognition in impacting overall customer satisfaction. Practically, it gives insight on which service attributes deserve more attention with regard to their impact on customer emotion. Indonesian tourists shared a common response to the Kansei word “elegant” which correlates with their common cultural dimension of “power distance”. Performing a Kansei evaluation to understanding cultural backgrounds may yield valuable insights for international tourist marketing strategies and companies’ business sustainability

Diversification in the international construction business

Economic globalization has created an interdependent market that allows companies to transcend traditional national boundaries to conduct business overseas. In the international construction market, companies often adopt diversification as a strategy for growth, for risk management or for both. However, the diversification patterns of international construction companies (ICCs) as a group are barely clear. The primary aim of this research is to cover this knowledge void by mapping ICCs’ diversification patterns in both business sectors and geographical dispersal. It starts from a literature review of diversification theories. Based on the review, a series of hypotheses relating to ICCs’ diversification are proposed. Data are gleaned from Engineering News-Record, i.e. Bloomberg and Capital IQ, ranging from 2001 to 2015. By testing the hypotheses, it is found that larger ICCs prefer to diversify than their smaller counterparts. Most of the ICCs tend to diversify to geographical markets with similar cultural or institutional environment. Market demands drive ICCs to diversify to different geographical markets while they are more prudential in venturing into new business sectors. The research provides not only valuable insights into diversification patterns of ICCs, but also a solid point of departure for future theoretical and empirical studies