Levels of Multiplexity in Entrepreneur's Networks: Implications for Dynamism and Value Creation

© 2016 by De Gruyter. Relationships and networks are important to how entrepreneurs create value. However, many aspects about relationships and networks remain poorly understood because their characteristics are often reduced to one-dimensional variables or dichotomous measures. This paper unpacks the concept of multiplexity and proposes a hierarchy of four different levels (social, relational, strategic, and closed). Each level is associated with a different level of dynamism which governs how rapidly entrepreneurs can alter their network. The hierarchy of multiplexity and associated levels of dynamism, have implications regarding different value creation processes that are associated with these network conditions

Service experiences with other customers: a typology of customer cohort climates

Other than well-trained employees and well-designed physical surroundings, what else can service firms do to achieve that elusive customer delight? We argue that when service experiences take place with other customers, a service firm can manage the effect of other customers, an important yet overlooked aspect of a group service encounter. We introduce the term customer cohort climate (CCC) to refer to the effect of the other customers, an under-researched aspect of a group service encounter. This paper explores the research question: How do customer cohort climates vary and what are the implications for managers? This working conceptual paper proposes a 2x2 typology of customer cohort climate. The SCIT framework describes and explains four different types of CCC: social, cooperative, independent, and technical. It further identifies the implications for managing each type of CCC. In conclusion, this paper, by examining the different types of CCC, provides new insight into how other customers can be managed to enhance service experiences

Do your employees think your slogan is "fake news?" A framework for understanding the impact of company slogans on employees

Purpose: This article connects the phenomenon of fake news with company slogans. Focusing on the employee audience, the article explores how this stakeholder can perceive and be impacted by different types of slogan fakeness. Design/methodology/approach: Conceptual article. Findings: Employees attend to two important dimensions of slogans: whether they accurately reflect a company’s (1) values and (2) value proposition. These dimensions combine to form a typology of four ways in which employees can perceive their company’s slogans: authentic, narcissistic, foreign, or corrupt. Research implications: This paper outlines how the typology provides a theoretical basis for more refined empirical research on how company slogans influence a key stakeholder: their employees. Future research could test the arguments about how certain characteristics of slogans are more or less likely to cause employees to conclude that slogans are fake news. Those conclusions will in turn have implications for the morale and engagement of employees. The ideas herein can also enable a more comprehensive assessment of the impact of slogans. Practical implications: Employees can view three types of slogans as fake news (narcissistic, foreign, and corrupt slogans). This article identifies the implications of each type, and explains how companies can go about developing authentic slogans. Originality/value: This article is one of very few that draws upon the phenomenon of fake news to explore the impact of slogan veracity on stakeholders. While this work also has relevance to other stakeholders, such as customers, employees are an important audience that has been neglected by studies to date. Thus, the insights and implications specific to this internal stakeholder are novel

Managing customer-to-customer interactions in group services

This study explores the impact that customer-to-customer interaction has on how customers experience a group service encounter and what firms can do to encourage positive and prevent negative interaction. We focus on the tourism and leisure sectors and conduct three sets of interviews, with 8 managers, 12 customers, and 10 frontline employees of firms that organize services in which customers are batched together in the delivery of the service. Through our findings we identify four factors of customer-to-customer interaction that can impact the service experience: group size and composition, service design, employee prompting, and the behavior of the customer group

Attributing blame in customer-to-customer interactions in online and face-to-face environments: structured abstract

Customer-to-customer (C2C) interactions can be pivotal to business performance because they can influence customer satisfaction and other outcomes. While previous studies have largely studied non-group contexts in which C2C interactions are incidental to the service experience, this study examines a group context in which face-to-face and online C2C interactions are deliberate and core to the service being provided: graduate business education. This study compares C2C interactions between face-to-face and online graduate business education where students (whether enrolled in a face-to-face or online program) are expected to interact, engage in discussion, debate, and work with other students within the student cohort. Using semi-structured interviews and the critical incident technique, we seek new insights on how C2C interactions may affect customers’ perceptions of a group service, and how differences in their experiences of C2C interactions may make them attribute service success or failure to different parties involved in this group service (e.g. the school, the program, students in the same cohort, or themselves). Further, we compare whether and how students attribute credit or blame differently for face-to-face versus online C2C interaction. The findings may be of interest to other group services that involve heavy C2C interactions

Implications of eocene-age philippine sea and forearc basalts for initiation and early history of the izu-bonin-mariana arc

Whole-rock isotope ratio (Hf, Nd, Pb, Sr) and trace element data for basement rocks at ocean drilling Sites U1438, 1201 and 447 immediately west of the KPR (Kyushu-Palau Ridge) are compared to those of FAB (forearc basalts) previously interpreted to be the initial products of IBM subduction volcanism. West-of-KPR basement basalts (drill sites U1438, 1201, 447) and FAB occupy the same Hf-Nd and Pb-Pb isotopic space and share distinctive source characteristics with εHf mostly >16.5 and up to εHf =19.8, which is more radiogenic than most Indian mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB). Lead isotopic ratios are depleted, with ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb = 17.8-18.8 accompanying relatively high ²⁰⁸Pb/²⁰⁴Pb, indicating an Indian-MORB source unlike that of West Philippine Basin plume basalts. Some Sr isotopes show affects of seawater alteration, but samples with ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr8.0 appear to preserve magmatic compositions and also indicate a common source for west-of-KPR basement and FAB. Trace element ratios resistant to seawater alteration (La/Yb, Lu/Hf, Zr/Nb, Sm/Nd) in west-of-KPR basement are generally more depleted than normal MORB and so also appear similar to FAB. At Site U1438, only andesite sills intruding sedimentary rocks overlying the basement have subduction-influenced geochemical characteristics (εNd ∼6.6, εHf ∼13.8, La/Yb > 2.5, Nd/Hf ∼9). The key characteristic that unites drill site basement rocks west of KPR and FAB is the nature of their source, which is more depleted in lithophile trace elements than average MORB but with Hf, Nd, and Pb isotope ratios that are common in MORB. The lithophile element-depleted nature of FAB has been linked to initiation of IBM subduction in the Eocene, but Sm-Nd model ages and errorchron relationships in Site U1438 basement indicate that the depleted character of the rocks is a regional characteristic that was produced well prior to the time of subduction initiation and persists today in the source of modern IBM arc volcanic rocks with Sm/Nd>0.34 and εNd ∼9.0

Modelling spatio-temporal data with multiple seasonalities: the NO2 portuguese case

This study aims at characterizing the spatial and temporal dynamics of spatio-temporal data sets, characterized by high resolution in the temporal dimension which are becoming the norm rather than the exception in many application areas, namely environmental modelling. In particular, air pollution data, such as NO2 concentration levels, often incorporate also multiple recurring patterns in time imposed by social habits, anthropogenic activities and meteorological conditions. A two-stage modelling approach is proposed which combined with a block bootstrap procedure correctly assesses uncertainty in parameters estimates and produces reliable confidence regions for the space-time phenomenon under study. The methodology provides a model that is satisfactory in terms of goodness of fit, interpretability, parsimony, prediction and forecasting capability and computational costs. The proposed framework is potentially useful for scenario drawing in many areas, including assessment of environmental impact and environmental policies, and in a myriad applications to other research fields. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.- The authors acknowledge Foundation FCT (Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia) for funding through Individual Scholarship Ph.D. PD/BD/105743/2014, Centre of Mathematics of Minho University within project UID/MAT/00013/2013 and Center for Research & Development in Mathematics and Applications of Aveiro University within project UID/MAT/04106/2013.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Thymus transplantation for complete DiGeorge syndrome: European experience

Background: Thymus transplantation is a promising strategy for the treatment of athymic complete DiGeorge syndrome (cDGS). Methods: Twelve patients with cDGS were transplanted with allogeneic cultured thymus. Objective: To confirm and extend the results previously obtained in a single centre. Results: Two patients died of pre-existing viral infections without developing thymopoeisis and one late death occurred from autoimmune thrombocytopaenia. One infant suffered septic shock shortly after transplant resulting in graft loss and the need for a second transplant. Evidence of thymopoeisis developed from 5-6 months after transplantation in ten patients. The median (range) of circulating naïve CD4 counts (x10663 /L) were 44(11-440) and 200(5-310) at twelve and twenty-four months post-transplant and T-cell receptor excision circles were 2238 (320-8807) and 4184 (1582 -24596) per106 65 T-cells. Counts did not usually reach normal levels for age but patients were able to clear pre-existing and later acquired infections. At a median of 49 months (22-80), eight have ceased prophylactic antimicrobials and five immunoglobulin replacement. Histological confirmation of thymopoeisis was seen in seven of eleven patients undergoing biopsy of transplanted tissue including five showing full maturation through to the terminal stage of Hassall body formation. Autoimmune regulator (AIRE) expression was also demonstrated. Autoimmune complications were seen in 7/12 patients. In two, early transient autoimmune haemolysis settled after treatment and did not recur. The other five suffered ongoing autoimmune problems including: thyroiditis (3); haemolysis (1), thrombocytopaenia (4) and neutropenia (1). Conclusions: This study confirms the previous reports that thymus transplantation can reconstitute T cells in cDGS but with frequent autoimmune complications in survivors