Entrepreneurial co-creation: a research vision to be materialised

Purpose There are increasing influences of stakeholder relationships in the contemporary entrepreneurial knowledge stream to co-create value, in order to jointly confront the market competition. However, current research implies a dichotomy to exist between the awareness of the necessity of stakeholder-centred strategic thinking and the actual implementation of strategies in entrepreneurial practice. The purpose of this paper is to close this gap, in order to understand how entrepreneurs could, strategically and operationally, enhance their stakeholders’ relationships to reinforce entrepreneurial co-creation. Since, co-creation propels innovation; entrepreneurs’ and their stakeholders’ well-being calls for urgent materialisation of the entrepreneurial co-creation concept. Design/methodology/approach A constructivist approach is applied to support findings to evolve a synthesis from literature to kick-off an academic debate on future research avenues on how to develop a co-creating entrepreneurial mindset. Findings The findings conceptualise the significance of relevant traditional and contemporary issues of stakeholder relationships and entrepreneurship to structure the entrepreneurial co-creation concept. Ten issues are recognised from the conjoint literature influencing the conception. Practical implications These insights will be useful for entrepreneurs to better align their entrepreneurial propositions with their stakeholder relationships to underpin value co-creation. Academics will be able to use these insights as a basis for future research towards entrepreneurial co-creation and are invited to join the debate. Originality/value The findings represent an innovative strategic direction towards a better understanding of the significance of stakeholder relationships, pertaining to entrepreneurial development in the contemporary marketplaces, and holistically conceptualise the entrepreneurial co-creation concept

Factors Affecting Consumers’ Green Purchasing Behavior: An Integrated Conceptual Framework

In this modern era of societal marketing business ethics and social responsibility are becoming the guiding themes for marketing strategies and practices. Within the field of ethics and social responsibility environmental and green marketing topics are the central topics, which are closely related to biodiversity and sustainability. This paper suggests a different approach to assessing the variables of consumers’ green purchasing behavior. Based on thoroughly researched secondary data, this conceptual paper suggests a framework integrating the so far incoherent frameworks as proposed by previous authors. Emanating from this eclectic and chronological literature review, the paper will also propose further missing links that need to be included in the proposed integrated framework. Based on this holistic framework, in a future study, the authors will explain a sustainability index of green consumer behavior, which will be tested empirically in the study. In fact, from the proposed integrated framework, in total eight vital factors/aspects of green/environmental issues are likely to have an impact on consumer green purchasing behavior. Demographic variables will play an intervening or mediating role in the framework.pro-environmental consumer behaviour, sustainability, green consumer behavior, green purchasing

Acquisition effects in private banking: avoiding client losses

The credit crunch of 2009 has had significant impact on financial services, and the effects on customer service are only now becoming apparent. Private banks offer a custom-made and individual financial service with a close personal relationship between customer and bank. During a process of acquisition a significant percentage of an acquired private bank's client base is lost and, therefore, client retention is important in this context. This paper takes notice of this circumstance during the credit crunch when unplanned acquisitions were occurring. It uses a qualitative content analysis and interview data. Although the owners of the bank have changed, the bank is urgently advised to design sustainable client relationships based on the knowledge of their clients' perceptions. The paper proposes a new model of private banking consumer perception that identifies determinants of client migration. This model will be of use for researchers and practitioners in this area of management

Internationalization, Market Forces, and Domestic Sectoral Institutionalization

This paper investigates the influence of micro environmental international entrepreneurship and the macro-environmental market forces on domestic institutionalization of the industrial sector. In doing so, the paper examines the moderating effect of the degree of internationalization on the relationship between domestic market forces and domestic sectoral institutionalization

The development and validation of a consumer cosmopolitanism scale: The polar opposite of xenophobic attitudes

Consumer cosmopolitanism is defined as world citizenship, open interaction with foreigners and the polar opposite of xenophobic attitudes. Although it is the opposite of consumer ethnocentrism, to date, cosmopolitanism has been primarily perceived as the virtue of not seeing foreigners as a threat, not being hateful towards foreigners, and embracing cultural diversity. Based on this conceptualization, our main objective is to develop and test an alternative pilot scale for consumer cosmopolitanism. Fifteen scale items were developed as a result of a literature review and consultation with academic experts. A survey was administered to 484 people in Turkey. Exploratory factor analysis showed that the scale items were grouped in three factors. To measure the validity of this consumer cosmopolitanism scale, Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) indicated that second-order-factor-model was a more rational measurement configuration to determine consumer cosmopolitanism with three factors

FRAMING THE TEMPORAL DIMENSIONS OF A BRAND

Drawing on existing research dealing with time in brand and brand management, this paper aims at providing a comprehensive and coherent framework of some time-related concepts, with a special emphasis on what happens when a brand reaches the senescence stage. In addition, it strives to consider what happens when a brand becomes long-lived enough, looking at the brand\u2019s customer base. While undoubtedly time affects customers\u2019 age and generations, the demand side of the brand-customer relationship is actually under-researched. Finally, a research agenda is developed, in order to improve what is currently known about such an important but neglected topic as the effects that the passing of time has both on the brand and on the consumers it addresses to

Corporate branding and transformational leadership in turbulent times

Purpose: Environmental changes require higher levels of corporate authenticity when communicating with stakeholders. This is achieved by a congruence of stakeholder and brand identities. Focusing on employee identity, the purpose of this paper is to explain the relationships of factors predicting brand-building behaviour.Design/methodology/approach: The study pursues a triangulation approach, applying case studies and surveys as research methods and telephone interviews and questionnaires as research techniques in the respective exploratory and explanatory research stages. Findings: Confirmed by exploratory and explanatory research, the antecedent factors of behavioural branding have been elicited. Interestingly, marketing control reflected differentiated results compared to previous research. It showed the highest level of contribution to explain R square followed by role identity salience and value congruence. This factor also had the highest correlation value. Research limitations/implications: Additional qualitative and quantitative research with increased sample size is suggested to validate the findings in diverse cross-cultural research settings. Practical implications: The findings enable global marketing managers to more effectively relate to stakeholders by a holistic, empathetic and authentic corporate branding strategy execution. Originality/value: The interdisciplinary study validates and further develops recent pioneering research by using different measurements, scales and sample scopes. This multidisciplinary research delineates innovative and integrated conceptualizations on corporate branding, identity and leadership and supports the call to upgrade the branding concept within the marketing discipline

Application of COMPOCHIP Microarray to Investigate the Bacterial Communities of Different Composts

A microarray spotted with 369 different 16S rRNA gene probes specific to microorganisms involved in the degradation process of organic waste during composting was developed. The microarray was tested with pure cultures, and of the 30,258 individual probe-target hybridization reactions performed, there were only 188 false positive (0.62%) and 22 false negative signals (0.07%). Labeled target DNA was prepared by polymerase chain reaction amplification of 16S rRNA genes using a Cy5-labeled universal bacterial forward primer and a universal reverse primer. The COMPOCHIP microarray was applied to three different compost types (green compost, manure mix compost, and anaerobic digestate compost) of different maturity (2, 8, and 16 weeks), and differences in the microorganisms in the three compost types and maturity stages were observed. Multivariate analysis showed that the bacterial composition of the three composts was different at the beginning of the composting process and became more similar upon maturation. Certain probes (targeting Sphingobacterium, Actinomyces, Xylella/Xanthomonas/ Stenotrophomonas, Microbacterium, Verrucomicrobia, Planctomycetes, Low G + C and Alphaproteobacteria) were more influential in discriminating between different composts. Results from denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis supported those of microarray analysis. This study showed that the COMPOCHIP array is a suitable tool to study bacterial communities in composts

Climate change alters temporal dynamics of alpine soil microbial functioning and biogeochemical cycling via earlier snowmelt

Soil microbial communities regulate global biogeochemical cycles and respond rapidly to changing environmental conditions. However, understanding how soil microbial communities respond to climate change, and how this influences biogeochemical cycles, remains a major challenge. This is especially pertinent in alpine regions where climate change is taking place at double the rate of the global average, with large reductions in snow cover and earlier spring snowmelt expected as a consequence. Here, we show that spring snowmelt triggers an abrupt transition in the composition of soil microbial communities of alpine grassland that is closely linked to shifts in soil microbial functioning and biogeochemical pools and fluxes. Further, by experimentally manipulating snow cover we show that this abrupt seasonal transition in wide-ranging microbial and biogeochemical soil properties is advanced by earlier snowmelt. Preceding winter conditions did not change the processes that take place during snowmelt. Our findings emphasise the importance of seasonal dynamics for soil microbial communities and the biogeochemical cycles that they regulate. Moreover, our findings suggest that earlier spring snowmelt due to climate change will have far reaching consequences for microbial communities and nutrient cycling in these globally widespread alpine ecosystems