Adm. Sci., Volume 8, Issue 4 (December 2018) – 27 articles

Organizational performance development and financial slack have drawn extensive attention in management research. Recent studies have indicated that financial slack has a positive effect on innovation outcomes and organizational performance. However, some other studies have proposed adverse effects. This paper aimed to explore the causal linkages between employee creative self-efficacy, learning orientation, financial slack, innovation outcomes and organizational performance. It also examined the influence of innovation performance and creative self-efficacy as mediating variables in the connection between learning orientation and organizational performance. By doing so, we used a structural equation modelling (SEM) method to test the model using data from 267 small medium enterprises (SMEs) in Vietnam. The findings illustrated that SMEs had not utilized financial slack to invest in innovation activities and improve firm performance. Furthermore, the results indicated that learning orientation had both direct and indirect impacts on innovation and firm performance. It is worth noting that employee creative self-efficacy had a positive effect on innovation performance. The findings also verified a statistically significant association between innovation and organizational performance. Finally, the results provided some managerial implications to stimulate employees to work creatively and improve innovation outcomes for sustainable development. Full article

Moving marketing strategies, which are changed through digital channels, into the social media environment, has led to changes in customer preferences in the tourism sector and is affected by the comments made in social media. Despite the fact that numerous studies have examined the impact of online customer comments on purchasing behaviour, most of these studies have used descriptive statistics and have ignored the empirical estimations. This study is aimed at examining the influence of the criteria obtained by content analysis on the star ratings given to the hotels based on the comments about the hotel on the TripAdvisor site. In this context, Mediterranean region hotels, which hold an important place in the tourism sector of Turkey, have been viewed, and the 25 hotels with the highest number of comments on the TripAdvisor site were selected, and 9000 comments from these hotels as well as the topic of the study were analysed with panel data methodology. As a result of the analyses made, it was determined that the criteria of the location and the accessibility of the hotels, the food and beverage concept presented by the hotels, the quality of the personnel–service, the cleaning elements, and the entertainment–animation programs were influential on the star ratings given to the hotels. It was also found that the architectural structure of the hotels and the other customers’ recommendation criteria are less important than the star ratings given to the hotel when compared to other specified criteria. Full article

Recently, risk assessment has become one of the most challenging issues in the areas of construction and public-private partnerships (PPPs). To address risk assessment issues, various decision-making techniques have been proposed, each with its own specific disadvantages and advantages. This paper investigates step-wise weight assessment ratio analysis (SWARA), complex proportional assessment (COPRAS), fuzzy analytic network process (FANP), fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP), fuzzy technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (FTOPSIS), simple additive weighting (SAW) and evaluation based on distance from average solution (EDAS) in order to define how various multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) methods compare when used for risk assessment in PPP projects. For this study, 5 risk assessment criteria and 10 types of risk used in Iranian highway PPP projects were selected. Four suitability and applicability tests were used to measure agreement between the rankings derived from the MADM methods. Final results show that all techniques had approximately the same rankings of risk assessment, with the SWARA, COPRAS, and EDAS methods performing slightly better. The findings of this study will help the parties in PPP and construction projects to select the best risk assessment method. Full article

This initial report of a longitudinal study of 192 English hospital nurses measured Nursing Values (the 6Cs of nursing); Personality, Self-Esteem and Depression; Burnout Potential; Work-Life Balance Stress; “Hardy Personality”; and Intention to Leave Nursing. Correlational, component, and cluster analysis identified four groups: “The Soldiers” (N = 79), with medium scores on most measures, who bravely “soldier on” in their nursing roles, in the face of numerous financial cuts to the National Health Service, and worsening nurse–patient ratios; “Cheerful Professionals” (N = 54), coping successfully with nursing roles, and a variety of challenges, in upwardly mobile careers; “High Achievers” (N = 39), senior nurses with strong profiles of a “hardy personality”, and commitment to fundamental nursing values; and “Highly Stressed, Potential Leavers” (N = 20), with indicators of significant psychological distress, and difficulty in coping with nursing role challenges. We have initiated a program of co-counselling and social support for this distressed group, by nurses who are coping more successfully with multiple challenges. We discuss the role of nurse educators in fostering nursing values, developing and supporting a “hardy personality” and emotional resilience in recruits to nursing. This study is framed within the disciplinary approach of Critical Realism, which identifies the value basis for research and dialogue in developing strategies for social change. The importance of this research is that: (a) it is part of the new thrust in nursing research, applying Critical Realist theory and methodology to research on nursing stress; (b) it has established, through network sampling, a group of nurses who can be supportive of each other in their stressful careers; (c) it establishes the reliability and potential validity of a measure of core nursing values; (d) it is among the first studies in research on nursing stress, to use the humanizing methodology of moving from data analysis (description of “things”), to describing a typology of nursing stress and career progress (description of individuals). Full article

This study aimed to explore the employment status of women in the higher educational sector and to uphold women’s productivity and commitment in executive positions of responsibility. Management tended to show preferential treatment for men in top management positions; hence, women were less engaged in the decision-making process. Women possess the potential to be transformative leaders in higher education institutions (HEI). The research purpose of this study was to speculate that some Lebanese educational institutions still practice discrimination and prefer men over women in executive positions, as well as to show that excellence in educational institutions is linked to women being in these executive positions. Currently, the higher education sector in Lebanon is under development as numerous educational developments are being implemented. The problem is that a peculiar attitude toward women in the HEI sector and specifically in top management positions still exists. In this study, the author explored women’s engagement at the top levels of higher education management and found that only 15 out of 65 Dean’s positions were filled by women and aimed to discover the factors behind the misrepresentation of women within the higher education system in Lebanon. In addition, the study found a positive relationship between the presence of women and the performance of HEIs. In this study, I aimed to focus on women’s engagement at the top management level and to emphasize the advantages of their skills and expertise, as well as to enhance the presence of women. The findings were significant and clear: There was misrepresentation, bias and stereotyping in HEIs. A clear strategic plan is needed to engage women in the decision-making process along with a well-designed incentive plan to achieve the required purpose. The aim of this study was to highlight this matter and to accentuate the benefit of women’s leadership roles in higher education in Lebanon. A qualitative strategy was used: Primary information was obtained from interviews with 12 chairpersons at six different schools. Data were gathered and analyzed to provide insightful results and recommendations. Full article

In the retail sector, the creation of shopping experiences becomes increasingly important to obtain a competitive advantage, and to meet consumers’ needs and desires. Knowing how to design and apply these experiences can stimulate consumer engagement and their intention to spend more time at the retailer. Under this premise, the objective of this research is to analyze the relationship between different shopping experience dimensions, consumers’ engagement, and their willingness to spend more time at the retailer. Using survey methodology on a sample of 527 consumers, the results show that shopping experiences stimulate the consumers’ engagement and their predisposition to spending more time at the store. In addition, a moderating effect of visit frequency to the retailer is observed, such that the higher this is, the more intense the relationship between experience dimensions and consumer engagement will be. Full article

The CSR theme has taken on an increasingly central role within financial markets. In fact, the last decade has been characterized by a rapid development of “socially responsible” investment, conventionally known as SRI. In this sense, an increasing number of listed firms have reported their non-financial information to the purpose to favor the interaction with their stakeholders. The relevance of these information tools stems from the need to protect investors against companies operating through greenwashing mechanisms. The aim of this research is to assess the effect of CSR on financial economic performance. As already happened within similar studies concerning economic entities different from Italy, the study assesses how the ability to generate income, and, thus, to distribute value towards the shareholder, are influenced by the orientation of companies in the field of sustainability accounting and the aptitude to check the environmental risk associated with the exercise of business activity. Full article

Many services are provided in the form of self-service. In self-service, customers simultaneously become the sole producer and a consumer of a service. Using a scenario-based experiment, we examine the psychology of queuing for self-service, and how inter-customer interaction affects service operation efficiency. We assumed that customers could decide how long they would use a service, and that length of usage increases the value of the service, such as in experience stores where customers try out newly released electronic products. Subjects decide how long they will use a service under different conditions of waiting time and social pressure. We found that generalized reciprocity influenced decisions on service time. Customers who had waited for service for long time chose to use the service for long time when it became their turn, and vice versa—subjects reciprocated the previous customer’s service usage behavior. We also show that the presence of social pressure affects customers’ service usage behavior. Under social pressure, customers tend to reciprocate the negative behavior of a previous customer less. Full article

Gender inequality in the division of family work is vastly corroborated and work–family balance is an important topic in the female entrepreneurship field of research. Even if work–family balance should be a necessity indiscriminately perceived by all women and men who have a paid job, it is a particularly pertinent issue for women, called to find equilibrium between work and family. This study analyses the situation of men and women entrepreneurs in order to investigate how the economic crisis affected the work–family balance. A survey was conducted on a sample of 218 men and women sole-proprietors. Findings show that the work–family balance of women entrepreneurs does not seem to have been particularly affected by the crisis. However, some differences between men and women remain. Concerning balance, as expected, only women stated that they personally take care of the house and family. Different perceptions of the crisis between men and women also emerged, as a consequence of gender stereotypes. Women entrepreneurs have greater difficulty in having an internal psychological balance of the double role than men, who are more involved in the implementation of external balance and focus on corporate and social provisions. Full article

Service organizations use quality management systems as a part of their overall strategies to improve business processes and operations management. Nevertheless, how quality management components lead to improvement and whether task conflicts influence quality management components have not yet been identified clearly. This paper examines the mechanisms that link different quality management components to improvement and the role of task conflict in the mechanisms. Data were collected from 495 employees responsible for quality management in Macao’s service organizations. Results from structural equation modeling showed that leadership i.e., the supportive behaviors of top management towards quality management has direct, significant effects on quality management components such as process approach, engagement of people, relationship management, and evidence-based decision making while customer focus has the largest total effect on improvement. On the other hand, task conflict was weakly but significantly related to relationship management. The study provides a deeper understanding of how quality management works in service contexts. Full article

This research addresses the problem of planning tourism routes and finding appropriate shopping (market place) locations for agricultural product transportation. Generally, tourists visit popular tourism attractions; and generally, unpopular tourism attractions do not stimulate the economy, trade, or local income. Popular tourism attractions that are located far away from each other require the transportation of local products, and tourists must make decisions as to which locations to visit when planning their vacation. Planning a tourism route while balancing tourism attractions and shopping markets is important for the economic stimulation of tourism. This work presents a problem-solving method for tourism route-planning for a particular case study in Chiang Rai province, Thailand, using the Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search (ALNS) method. Six main destruction and five repair cycles in the ALNS method were applied to solve the tourism route design problem and to find the best solution so that tourists can visit all of the main attractions. We found that 13 tourism routes provide the shortest travel distance for each travel route. The total distance traveled was 2538.02 km for all routes. To balance the tourism on all routes, the popular and less popular tourism attractions were combined. For all routes, the shopping market location is the best place for tourism products to be sold and where tourist relaxation occurs. The results from ALNS were compared with the results from those obtained by the exact Lingo program V11. The ALNS algorithm results were not significantly different from the Lingo results. For the computational results for all examined cases, the ALNS algorithm was shown to be competitive, with short processing times given the sizes of the problems. For the traveling distance, the ALNS result significantly differs from the exact method by approximately 1.12%, and had a better effect than the exact method by approximately 99% in terms of processing time. Therefore, the proposed methodology provides an effective and high-quality solution for tourism route planning. Full article

People’s health awareness has extended from the food industry to the personal beauty industry. Consumers have increased their interest in natural ingredients, sustainable packaging, and other green elements of cosmetics. This research explores consumer attitudes toward green cosmetics. Data were collected through qualitative research instruments (focus groups) since the research aimed to discover in-depth consumer attitudes and feelings. There were 30 British females who agreed to be respondents in five focus groups. They were divided into five focus groups. The key findings of this research were the prevailing neutral attitudes toward green cosmetics due to the lack of knowledge and confusing market standards. The majority of respondents viewed price and performance as the most important factors when choosing cosmetics instead of green elements. However, given the growing awareness of natural and organic ingredients and green production, most respondents admitted the potential change of present neutral attitudes to be more supportive in the future. Green cosmetics is a new trend in the personal beauty industry. This study ascertains the consumer attitudes toward green cosmetics and calls for clearer green standards and regulations in the industry as well as advanced biotechnology to extract natural ingredients. Full article

The spur of innovative startups has provided an unprecedented opportunity for female entrepreneurship. However, the mainstream literature on startups has elaborated a gender performance gap hypothesis. Considering the speed of technological, social, and cultural changes that have taken place in this millennium, we wonder if this gap can still be found today, with particular reference to new technology-based ventures. A financial analysis has been conducted on a sample of innovative Italian startups, and the following variables have been used to assess the company’s success: (i) size, (ii) profitability, (iii) efficiency, (iv) financial structure, and (v) financial management. Our results reveal that as far as financial performance is concerned, innovative female-led startups do not lag behind male ones in terms of dimension, company profitability, efficiency, and financial management. However, findings confirmed, even for our sample, that female businesses raise, on average, a lower amount of financial resources in comparison to men. Full article

In today’s versatile and dynamic industrial scenario more and more industries are adopting advanced manufacturing technologies and systems like flexible manufacturing system (FMS) which combines the efficiency of a mass production line and the flexibility of a job shop. Material handling equipment form an important component of FMS and using proper material handling equipment can enhance the production process, provide effective utilization of manpower, increase production and improve system flexibility. In this research the main material handling issues in a FMS are identified and further evaluated using ISM and TOPSIS approaches. The purpose of identification of these issues and their analysis is to allow researchers and practicing managers to pay proper attention to these issues which may help them in designing the material handling systems in their organisations in a better way. Full article

Over the past few decades, many governments throughout the world have promoted gender-responsive budgeting (GRB). With its focus on equality, accountability, transparency and participation in the policy-making process, GRB shares some relevant principles with public governance that call governments at national and subnational levels to rethink their roles in the whole economic system. This worldwide political and managerial interest does not find sufficient space in academic discussion, mainly in terms of public administration and management studies. Adopting an interpretative approach, the present study aims to investigate how an Italian municipality has involved stakeholders in the GRB process. The case study shows that, when GRB is fully developed, the stakeholders involved are both internal and external, and these multiple actors, in pursuing gender equality, cooperate to achieve a common, public aim. In this way, GRB gives effectiveness to the public decision-making process, contributing to greater incisiveness in the local government’s management and creation of a gender-sensitive governance process. Full article

A methodological approach to the concept of female entrepreneurship concept has not yet been treated: is female entrepreneurship an individual or collective concept? Is it considered a social or natural variable? The purpose of this research is to clear up these alternatives, which are preparatory questions for any research into female entrepreneurship that wishes to measure its features and effects. The article starts with the proposal of an identification procedure, necessary to identifying the variables of female entrepreneurship. It proceeds by classifying the concept of female entrepreneurship into four different modes and discussing their characteristics. The originality of this research consists in its fourfold classification of the concept of female entrepreneurship, intended as a preparatory step prior to the analysis of its characteristics and measures. Full article

The aim of the paper is to provide an overview of the current literature of this business phenomenon with regard to gender studies and to point out what is substantially happening and what has happened in the Italian economic context. The main research questions were RQ1: How is the phenomenon of female Startups treated from a scientific point of view? RQ2: Which is the Italian situation of this phenomenon? The methodology used is both qualitative and explorative. A bidirectional analysis has been carried out for this purpose. In order to expand the first research question (RQ1), an analysis was carried out of the articles in the EBSCO database on the topic of female startups. In order to expand the second question (RQ2), an analysis was carried out on the data concerning the phenomenon of female startups, using the register of companies held at the Chambers of Commerce which were territorially competent. Our research, carried out within the Italian economic context, demonstrates how the phenomenon of Woman Startups (WSU), even if it is widely expanding, is inherent in all the typical elements of female entrepreneurship, as reported in the literature by gender scholars. The main factors that emerge for the WSU are the small size and the undercapitalization in the startup phase. This work contributes to the expansion of studies on the topic of startups in the context of gender and can be useful to the social context, new entrepreneurs, and practitioners of the sector. Full article

In spite of the importance of the brand management in marketing studies and practice, there is a scarcity of prior research on the links between brand equity and financial performance, particularly in unlisted (unquoted) firms. The study contributes to prior research along a number of dimensions. It provides evidence on the relevance of brands for unlisted firms of several industries, by showing that brand equity is associated with financial performance even in non-quoted firms without world-recognized brands. Second, the study analyzes the association between brands and accounting-based measures of performance, across different windows and financial indicators. Finally, the evidence on earnings persistence is particularly relevant, as it potentially sheds light on the existing debate on the association between brand equity and stock markets. To the extent that firms with greater brand equity have more persistent earnings, current earnings contain greater information about future earnings, which show the relevance of brand management in the strategic planning of unlisted firms. Full article

This paper aims to investigate the three-stage theory of international expansion in the long run from the perspective of firm behavior. Although this topic has been mostly explored using data from developed countries, this paper aims to fill the research gap in an emerging market by using an extensive unbalanced panel data of 12,704 unlisted Vietnam manufacturing enterprises from the General Statistics Office during 2007 to 2012. The findings illustrated a significant S-shaped relationship between internationalization and performance. Notably, the results depict significantly moderating effects of both high-discretion slacks and low-discretion slacks on the internationalization–performance relationship across three stages of global expansion as an enterprise enhances this relationship in the first and third stage although this worsens it in the middle stage. The empirical results suggest that firms should determine the optimum level of internationalization and slacks in addition to balancing their costs with their real gains. Full article

The issue of women’s participation in top management and boardroom positions has received increasing attention in the academic literature and the press. However, the pace of advancement for women managers and directors continues to be slow and uneven. The novel framework of this study organizes the factors at the individual, organizational and public policy level that affect both career persistence and the advancement of women in top management positions; namely, factors affecting (1) career persistence (staying at the organization) and (2) career advancement or mobility (getting promoted within the organization). In the study location, Chile, only 32 percent of women “persist”, or have a career without interruptions, mainly due to issues with work–family integration and organizational environments with opaque and challenging working conditions. Women who “advanced” in their professional careers represent 30 percent of high management positions in the public sector and 18 percent in the private sector. Only 3 percent of general managers in Chile are women. Women in Chile have limited access and are still not integrated into business power networks. Our findings will enlighten business leaders and public policy-makers interested in designing organizations that retain and promote talented women in top positions. Full article

In this paper, we analyze the gender issues that are present in the accounting profession, and more precisely, on the career paths one could follow in the accounting profession and what the underlying reasons are for each option. Our conclusions show that some of the factors that influence women career paths are discrimination, motherhood, glass-ceiling, double standard and a lack of visibility. Full article

This paper analyses the strategic behaviour of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and identifies the entrepreneurial, technological, and administrative problems of the Miles and Snow typology (1978). This typology is applied to a sample of SMEs in the Canary Islands (Spain) by using a multi-item questionnaire. Then, the Rasch Measurement Theory is applied to obtain the results, with the linear continuum as a key tool. By applying the Rasch Measurement, there is a coherency between the data treatment and the new interpretation of the Miles and Snow typology (1978), which lists 4 types that are close to trends than to pure types (for example, ^{Sollosy 2013}). There are differences between the administrative and the technological problems, with their technological approach being more prospector and their administrative one, which is more defender. This shows an almost absence of enterprises with purely defender or prospector behaviours. These results show that SMEs do not follow any comprehensive framework in order to develop their strategies. Managers should analyse their strategic situation and consider the alignment of the three problems. Full article

Multiparty systems (MPSs) are defined as collaborative task-systems composed of various stakeholders (organizations or their representatives) that deal with complex issues that cannot be addressed by a single group or organization. Our study uses a behavioral simulation in which six stakeholder groups engage in interactions in order to reach a set of agreements with respect to complex educational policies. We use a social network perspective to explore the dynamics of network centrality during intergroup interactions in the simulation and show that trust self-enhancement at the onset of the simulation has a positive impact on the evolution of network centrality throughout the simulation. Our results have important implications for the social networks dynamics in MPSs and point towards the benefit of using social network analytics as exploration and/or facilitating tools in MPSs. Full article

Cross-boundary collaboration, both multiprofessional and interorganizational, is needed when providing integrated care for people with multiple problems, who need services at the same time from diverse care providers. Multiple problems of clients also pose extra challenges for interaction between care professionals and clients. Emotional dynamics are always present in everyday interaction between human beings, but seldom explicitly addressed in research on integrated care. The aim of this reflective paper is to illustrate the emotional dimensions of integrated care in light of the experiences of care professionals in the context of care for people with multiple complex problems. The paper draws on a Finnish study on integrated care reflecting its findings from the perspective of emotional labor. The difficult life situations of people with multiple complex problems form an emotional burden, which is mirrored in the interaction between clients and professionals and affects relational dynamics among professionals. Professionals’ fear of emotions and the different ‘feeling rules’ of care professions and sectors pose extra challenges to professionals’ collaboration in this emotionally loaded context. Alongside the structural and functional aspects of integrated care, it is important that emotions embedded in everyday cross-boundary collaboration are recognized and taken into account in order to ensure the success of integrated care. Full article

New master’s degrees in computer engineering, designed according to Spanish government requirements, include both technical and business subjects to provide advanced knowledge compared to undergraduate studies. In spite of acquiring this advanced knowledge, our students are not always aware of the significant added value and the positive elements the master’s degree provides for their future professional careers. Moreover, we have observed that students regard the different subjects as isolated blocks of knowledge. To tackle these problems, we have carried out a learning experience based on the creation of a technology-based enterprise (TBE) through the development of a common project (CP). Drawing on project-based learning (PBL) methodology, the CP consists of the identification, development, and final oral presentation of a business model. It aims to utilize sensor data and analysis in different domains. The experience has been highly positive, reducing the gap between studies and business practice, and increasing coordination among teachers. A key issue is that all the subjects of the master’s degree are involved in this learning experience. In addition, results show a high level of satisfaction with the master’s degree, compared to other similar courses. Full article

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a voluntary competitive strategy that is based upon social, economic, and environmental improvement in which the organisation is involved. Internationalisation, a type of corporate strategy, is a set of processes that help companies to expand globally to achieve the aim of improving their competitive position. Both of the strategies have become more important due to ever increasing globalisation, whose consequences modify economic and business environments, thus causing them to be more dynamic and competitive. This directly affects business management, thus companies increasingly consider the opinion of society, attempting to gain stakeholders’ trust through effective CSR management. In this context, this paper aims to analyse CSR and internationalisation strategies and their possible connection from a theoretical viewpoint. From a practical viewpoint, the relationship between both strategies is analysed while using a sample of Spanish listed companies. Full article

With a dearth of research on international entrepreneurship pedagogy, there is a gap in knowledge on the effectiveness of educational programs, courses, and teaching methods in stimulating and promoting international entrepreneurship practice. To address the gap, this study evaluates an experiential teaching innovation in the area of international entrepreneurship, the Global Board Game project. Designed as a Community of Practice (CoP), the project provides students the opportunity to participate in the construction of their knowledge through interactions with their counterparts in other countries. A qualitative analysis of student essays indicates that the Global Board Game project is effective in helping students achieve learning outcomes, which include defining, recognizing, and evaluating international business opportunities; designing and validating a business model based on such opportunities; and creating a plan for pursuing these opportunities. Additionally, it indicates that participation in the project enhanced students’ attitudes toward entrepreneurship as a career path. Full article