How it outsourcing impacts on value creation of manufacturer?

A growing concern among the manufacturers who are actively involved in Information Technology outsourcing is post-contract management and the ensuing development of what many practitioners have coined the ‘outsourcing partnership’. Over the past few decades, information technology outsourcing has become a widely used and researched means for manufacturers to enhance their performance. Increasing attention has been paid to building successful partnerships in information systems outsourcing. This study employs strategic social positioning, customer participation, customer orientation, and communication culture to develop research model. The quantitative method will be used to validate the research model and test hypotheses developed. This study uses survey method to collect data, and analysis of the reliability, validity and test the proposed hypotheses by Smart Partial Least Squares. The purpose of this study is to use above four factors to produce value co-creation between outsourcing vendors and manufacturers. The final aim is for the future collaboration. This combination will allow manufacturers and information technology outsourcing vendors to increase their value co-creations in the fields of these factors

Sensemaking, sensegiving and absorptive capacity in complex procurements

This study explores and describes i) the nature of knowledge exchange processes at the frontline employee (FLE) level and ii) how FLE sensemaking processes affect buyer firm knowledge management practices in complex procurement contexts. The study utilizes an in-depth case analysis in the mining industry to identify a taxonomy of four buyer sensemaking investment/supplier collaboration profiles, to describe three sensegiving supplier roles (“confidence builders”, “competent collaborators”, and “problem-solvers”) and to explore how these evolve during complex procurement implementation. The study concludes with a conceptual model of the apparent linkages between sensemaking, sensegiving and buyer firm absorptive capacity in complex procurements. This study shows how micro-level (FLE) interactions influence macro-level knowledge integration (absorptive capacity) in the buyer firm. For managers, the study shows how the allocation of time and resources affects FLE-level knowledge exchange, with ultimate effect on buyer firm absorptive capacity

Corporate reputation past and future: a review and integration of existing literature and a framework for future research

The concept of corporate reputation is steadily growing in interest among management researchers and practitioners. In this article, we trace key milestones in the development of reputation literature over the past six decades to suggest important research gaps as well as to provide contextual background for a subsequent integration of approaches and future outlook. In particular we explore the need for better categorised outcomes; a wider range of causes; and a deeper understanding of contingencies and moderators to advance the field beyond its current state while also taking account of developments in the macro business environment. The article concludes by presenting a novel reputation framework that integrates insights from reputation theory and studies, outlines gaps in knowledge and offers directions for future research

New Corporate Responsibilities in the Digital Economy

Theories that relate to digital technology and CSR have been dominated by online CSR communication and disclosure practices. Almost entirely absent in such CSR research is a consideration of new areas of responsibility that are emerging from digital technologies and related online communication platforms. We argue that responsibility in the use of digital technologies requires more than just legal compliance. We therefore ask what it means to be a responsible corporation in the digital economy? We then establish an extended agenda for responsibility in the digital economy by identifying potential areas of irresponsibility and highlighting new responsibilities related to, for example: use of consumer data; service continuation; control of digital goods, and; the use of artificial intelligence. In doing so, we address a need to theorize responsibilities derived from the use of technologies that have been previously silent in CSR literature or only tangentially discussed within the domain of CSR communication, even as they are a focus in other fields (especially legal compliance, or organizational performance)

Affective organizational commitment in global strategic partnerships: The role of individual-level microfoundations and social change

The roles and commitment of employees within global strategic partnerships are imperative to their success. Whilst previous studies have addressed certain individual-level microfoundations and social change in an interpretivist manner, this study first proposes a theoretical framework consists of individual-level microfoundations, social change and affective organizational commitment—interlinked with social identity theory. We then validate the 16-item scale for individual-level microfoundations and the 24-item scale for social change based on data collected from global strategic partnerships. For testing of our conceptualization, path modeling finally confirms significant relationships between the constructs. Our findings further present the partial mediating role of social change between individual-level microfoundations and affective organizational commitment. Therefore, the study provides a new pathway in advancing our understanding of global strategic partnerships. It also validates two new constructs directly relevant to managing global strategic partnerships. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of these linkages and contributions, and conclude by providing suggestions for future research

Condoning and Contesting Colonial Narratives of Space, Identity, and Body in the Early Works of Nakajima Atsushi (1927-1932)

While Nakajima Atsushi (1909-1942) is well-known in the modern Japanese literary canon for his tales set in ancient China, this project examines six of his early works, written from 1927 to 1932, which have been disregarded in serious literary scholarship. The six short stories take place in Japan, colonial Seoul, Japanese-occupied southern Manchuria, and a frigid city in pre-colonized northern Manchuria, and include some of Nakajima’s most dynamic and diverse works. The project examines the ways in which these texts respond to hegemonic colonial narratives about space and landscape, about gendered and ethnicized hierarchy prescribed by the Empire, and about illness, hygiene, and bodily experience. The introduction situates the project in the understanding that meaning is dynamically negotiated at every instance of reading a text, that all texts are predicated on dialogue with various contexts, and that texts are hybrid spaces wherein the resistance toward and reification of one single narrative have the potential to exist as one multifaceted position. Given this knowledge, each chapter explores the short stories’ complex positions toward the hegemonic narratives in question. Chapter One traces a literary history of spatial representation in modern Japanese literature, which uncovers the privileging of the Japanese settler viewing subject. The chapter reveals the texts’ occasional challenges toward – but usually reinscription of – colonial space narratives. Chapter Two explores the texts’ hierarchical configuration of the multiethnic Empire vis-à-vis male settler desire, showing that although Nakajima’s Japanese male protagonists take a passive role in most situations, they are still privileged figures within this hierarchy, being afforded the most subjectivity. Chapter Three discusses the texts’ many instances of ill or bodily non-hegemonic characters and how their characterizations challenge the Japanese notion of fukoku-kyōhei (“rich nation, strong army”), which idealized strong and healthy male bodies to settle the colonies, and how they also assert notions of Japanese male settler privilege. This analytical project, followed by original translations of the six stories, aims to present the dynamicity of understudied stories within the realm of Japanese colonial literature