Measuring Circularity: The Gordian Knot of the 21st Century

Organizations are currently facing substantial challenges regarding becoming circular by 2050 – also referred to as Circular Economy (CE). Subsequently, increasing complexity on all organizational levels creates uncertainty about respective organizational and technological capabilities and adequate strategies to develop these capabilities. Organizations are struggling in picking up the CE ambitions and answering the what’s in it for me question. Scholars are developing models and frameworks to enable organizations to measure CE performance. Over 125 assessment methods are available for micro level assessment – measuring up to 365 different metrics. Moreover, extant literature is available presenting barriers and opportunities for CE transformation focusing on industry, sector, region, etc. And, although a more holistic perspective is required to become circular mature, this is currently lacking. In this paper we present a multi-methodology view on approaches and how they are used (or not). Our main goal is to extend the existing body of knowledge with an eye on applicability and research directions to untie the Gordian knot of measuring circularity

Insight into consumer experience on UK train transportation services

Customers’ experiences are significant in a rapidly changing service context, and this is shaped by the quality of service provided. With social media changing the way consumers engage with service providers, experiences are shared online. This study carried out three analyses of brand-related conversations on Twitter with the aim of exploring consumers’ attitudes to and experiences of train operating companies. Firstly, Python was used for the tweet mining and sentiment analysis (n = 1,914,494 tweets) to investigate the polarity between the opinions of commuters. Secondly, tweets were thematically analysed and grouped to understand how consumers experience the service quality. Lastly, content analysis of the tweets was carried out to identify the variations in service quality. Results indicated that there is overall positive customer experience, however, there are variations in service quality dimension across the different train groups, highlight the need to improve service quality at different touchpoints, especially the tangible features of the trains and presence of responsive and emphatic staff. This study further broadens the context of customer experience through eWOM on social media for service brands, contribute towards related literature on sentiment analysis and service brands, providing significant theoretical and practical implications for researchers and managers

Service triads:a research agenda for buyer–supplier–customer triads in business services

Service triads, in which a buyer contracts with a supplier to deliver services directly to the buyer's customer, represent an emerging business model. This special issue is dedicated to this theme. To set the context, in this lead article, we first define service triads, both as a phenomenon and a research topic. We then provide a review of different strands of existing research and various theoretical frameworks that can inform our study of service triads. This culminates in an outline of a research agenda that can guide future study. As such, this paper not only introduces the articles in the special issue, but is also intended as a point of reference and motivation for further work on service triads, and on triads in general

Promotie: The performance implications of outsourcing

Bespreking van het proefschrift van N. Raassens The performance implications of outsourcing aan de Universiteit van Tilburg

Promotie : the performance implications of outsourcing

Bespreking van het proefschrift van N. Raassens "The performance implications of outsourcing"aan de Universiteit van Tilburg