The Culture of Social Science Research

[Excerpt] This paper is valuable to any social scientist, whether he or she studies culture or not, because it empirically investigates the extremely important question of the linkage of theory and practice. Barley, Meyer, and Gash are deserving of considerable praise for their effort to take the question beyond the realm of ideological positions, into the domain of testing patterns of change and influence. They employed an innovative methodology to compare the pragmatics (connotative meanings) of language usage in academics\u27 and practitioners\u27 articles. However valuable this methodology might be for subsequent research, I will concentrate on the results themselves, and use them as an opportunity to reflect on how organizational researchers do social science

Student-Based Examples: Do They Help or Hinder Instruction?

[Excerpt] Many professors, myself included, have for years operated under the impression that examples from the current experiences of students’ lives are helpful, useful and relevant for illustrating complex ideas or theories. We seek to use examples from the students’ realm of experience. We discuss conflict and perceptions in the context of roommate interactions. The university’s procedures and goals are presented as a foil for discussions of organizational designs, bureaucracy, and goal setting. We rely on the football and basketball teams for discussions of leadership and cooperation. The experiences of job interviews are used to discuss corporate culture and socialization. Finally, we bring home the nuances of performance appraisal, feedback and reward structures by discussing the operation of the very class we teach

The Measurement of Perceived Intraorganizational Power: A Multi-Respondent Perspective

This study found substantial divergence between a general measure of perceived departmental power and an issue-specific measure, and indicates a conceptual distinctiveness between these two common perceptual measures. Using the assessments of three different respondent groups allowed for the cross-validation of the power measures while highlighting differences in perceptions based on group membership. The findings of this study raise the possibility that different dimensions of power (enacted versus potential power) are not equally reflected in the two perceptual measures when departmental members and top managers are the groups assessing each subunit’s power. Measurement distinctiveness was not found to exist when other departments’ members evaluated each subunit’s power. This investigation suggests that future studies of power would benefit from utilizing more than one perceptual measure and more than one group of respondents

The Commoditization of Starbucks

[Excerpt] Is the coffee empire that Starbucks built beginning to fall? In a memo sent to the senior management of the company in February 2007, Howard Schultz warned that Starbucks was in danger of losing its romance and theater, which he believes are fundamental to the Starbucks experience. He noted, “Over the past ten years in order to achieve the growth, development, and scale necessary to go from less than 1,000 stores to 13,000 stores and beyond, we have had to make a series of decisions that, in retrospect, have led to the watering down of the Starbucks experience, and, what some might call the commoditization of our brand.” Calling the memo subject “The Commoditization of the Starbucks Experience,” Schultz questioned corporate decisions to use automatic espresso machines and eliminate some in-store coffee grinding. He worried that store design decisions to gain scale efficiencies and higher sales-to-investment ratios had turned stores into sterile cookie-cutter properties, without the warmth of a neighborhood cafe. Streamlining store design was a financial decision, but the result was that stores no longer have the soul of the past. Schultz envisioned the cafes as a “third place” where people gather between home and work and feel some of the romance of the European cafe, but this feature may have disappeared, to be replaced by a chain store feel versus a neighborhood store

Issues of Concern for Restaurant Owners and Managers

Human resources continues to be the most troubling issue for U.S. restaurant owners and operators. When448 restaurateurs were given the chance to state their top concerns, they chose finding and keeping competent employees, closely followed by a constellation of concerns relating to government regulation, taxation, and legal liability. Other issues that respondents cited were ensuring safe food handling, finding effective marketing strategies, and staying ahead of competitors in a tight economic environment

The Physical Safety and Security Features of U.S. Hotels

The physical attributes or features that signal safety and security are a critical part of the overall “servicescape” of a hotel and help to define the service experience. An investigation of the safety and security features of 5,487 U.S. hotels revealed significant differences in the distribution of these key amenities in various hotel price segments. Differences in these physical attributes were also found among hotels of various sizes, ages, and locations (e.g., urban, airport, small town). Analyzing hotel scores across several different categories revealed an average safety index score of 70 and a security index score of 64 out of a possible score of 100. Overall luxury and upscale hotels, newer hotels, larger hotels, and those located in urban and airport locations recorded the highest scores for safety and security. Using partial correlation analysis, safety and security scores were positively correlated with the published rate of the hotels, even when controlling for hotel size, age, location, and price segment, suggesting that offering more comprehensive physical safety and security features is associated with the advertising of a higher rate

Building Capabilities at the Westward Hilton

[Excerpt] Sitting in the fashionable Cafe Lupe, an upscale restaurant owned by the company Peter Green worked for, were the company’s owners, investors, and top corporate personnel. Hiller Hotels, a wholly owned subsidiary of the parent Hiller Enterprises, was headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, with a portfolio of more than a dozen midscale and upscale hotels and three trendy, upscale restaurants. The hotel group was gathered for one of its irregular, informal celebrations of success. As Green, the executive vice president of operations, raised his glass to join in the merriment, he wondered whether his facial expression gave away the feelings he was suppressing. Green was torn—earlier in the day this same group discussed the possibility that the Westward Hilton and Towers, the only property in the Hiller portfolio he had personally ever run as a general manager, might be sold. An inquiry from a REIT (real estate investment trust) as to the property’s availability had prompted the discussion

Multibranding at Yum! Brands Inc.: Thinking Outside the Bun

[Excerpt] Multiple branding is likely to be a part of the future for all of the major players as they rethink their strategies. While McDonald’s strategy has been to develop its brands separately, the company could capitalize on cobranding in the future. In contrast, Yum! Brands Inc. is betting on a multibranding strategy, in which the firm puts more than one of its brands into the same store in the hope of raising sales and leveraging operating efficiency. This Fortune 300 company, based in Louisville, Kentucky, is able to execute a multibranding strategy easily because it operates five well-known brands: A&W All-American Food, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC), Long John Silver’s, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell. Sales for the global system totaled $24.2 billion in 2002, up from$22.3 billion in 2001

Creating a Competitive Advantage by Building Resource Capability: The Case of Outback Steakhouse Korea

The case of Outback Steakhouse Korea provides almost a textbook example of a five-point framework for competitive advantage. The framework suggests that companies must manage and blend resources in the following five categories: (1) financial resources, (2) physical resources, (3) human resources, (4) organizational knowledge and learning, and (5) general organizational resources (including brand names and relationships with stakeholders). Outback Korea has deftly combined resources in these five categories for considerable advantage and must continue to do so

The Relationship between Organizational Value Sharing and Influence Over Strategic Decisions

This study examines the relationship between influence in the strategic decision-making process and the sharing of organizational values. Findings from a quick service restaurant chain indicate that perceptions of value sharing are associated with the ability to influence critical strategic issues. The assessed ability of various corporate departments to influence specific strategic decisions differs according to the type of value shared and the degree of value sharing. Few differences in results exist as a function of value sharing with the top management team (vice presidents) versus value sharing with the founder/CEO. Implications of the results and the need to continue empirical exploration of value-based explanations for strategic decision making are discussed