Ranko Bon, Jay F. McMahan and Paul Carder
Property performance needs to be measured and monitored so as to ensurethe maintenance of a match between an organization′s business andproperty strategies. Useful measures of…
Abstract
Property performance needs to be measured and monitored so as to ensure the maintenance of a match between an organization′s business and property strategies. Useful measures of property performance need to be developed jointly by researchers and practitioners of corporate real estate management. Presents the ongoing Property Performance Measurement Study, conducted under the auspices of DEGW′s Workplace Forum and in collaboration with the Corporate Real Estate Management Research Unit (CREMRU) at the University of Reading. First, introduces the conceptual framework; then discusses the organizational framework provided by the Workplace Forum; proceeds by discussing several research findings to date; and, last, provides several conclusions about further work in this important area of collaboration between researchers and practitioners.
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Ranko Bon, Jay F. McMahan and Paul Carder
Property performance needs to be measured and monitored so as to ensure the maintenance of a match between an organization’s business and property strategies. Useful measures of…
Abstract
Property performance needs to be measured and monitored so as to ensure the maintenance of a match between an organization’s business and property strategies. Useful measures of property performance need to be developed jointly by researchers and practitioners of corporate real estate management. Presents the ongoing Property Performance Measurement Study, conducted under the auspices of DEGW’s Workplace Forum and in collaboration with the Corporate Real Estate Management Research Unit (CREMRU) at the University of Reading. First, introduces the conceptual framework; then discusses the organizational framework provided by the Workplace Forum; proceeds by discussing several research findings to date; and, last, provides several conclusions about further work in this important area of collaboration between researchers and practitioners.
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Pawan Budhwar, Andy Crane, Annette Davies, Rick Delbridge, Tim Edwards, Mahmoud Ezzamel, Lloyd Harris, Emmanuel Ogbonna and Robyn Thomas
Wonders whether companies actually have employees best interests at heart across physical, mental and spiritual spheres. Posits that most organizations ignore their workforce �…
Abstract
Wonders whether companies actually have employees best interests at heart across physical, mental and spiritual spheres. Posits that most organizations ignore their workforce – not even, in many cases, describing workers as assets! Describes many studies to back up this claim in theis work based on the 2002 Employment Research Unit Annual Conference, in Cardiff, Wales.
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David Solnet and Jay Kandampully
This paper aims to address the concept of customer advocacy through storytelling, urban legends and folklore. The main purpose of the paper is to identify firms that are frequent…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to address the concept of customer advocacy through storytelling, urban legends and folklore. The main purpose of the paper is to identify firms that are frequent subjects of positive customer storytelling, and to examine these firms for common practices.
Design/methodology/approach
Following an assessment of various literature, this paper incorporates a two‐stage design. The first stage identifies a set of companies that are frequently the subject of customer service storytelling. The second stage takes a grounded theory approach, utilizing a thematic analysis of data collected in relation to the exemplar firms.
Findings
Ten exemplar firms were identified. Themes and sub themes were drawn from data about the firms and categorized into ten theme clusters. A single theme – related to customer and employee obsession – was determined to be the common thread. An assessment of customer and employee practices from the exemplar firms is provided to give illustrations of specific practices and beliefs.
Practical implications
When customers and non‐customers engage in positive dialogue, narrative and storytelling about a business, it is seen as the ultimate marketing outcome. By understanding some of the practices of firms that are subjects of customer service folklore, managers can gain insights into how customer and employee treatment strategies can be incorporated into their businesses.
Originality/value
Storytelling and myths have been examined (and utilised) from the perspective of organizational culture, communication and change – but rarely from the perspective of customer‐to‐customer communications.
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The purpose of this paper primarily contributes to the social enterprises and human resource management (HRM) literature by examining the roles of founders in shaping how workers…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper primarily contributes to the social enterprises and human resource management (HRM) literature by examining the roles of founders in shaping how workers in social enterprises are managed.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses a cross-case analysis of three social enterprises in the food and agricultural products and food and beverage industries in Thailand. The case study evidence in this paper draws on semi-structured interviews with each social enterprise’s founders, managers and employees; field visits to each social enterprise in Bangkok and other provinces in Thailand; and a review of archival documents and web-based reports and resources. This paper uses thematic analysis to pinpoint, examine and record the patterns or themes found in the data.
Findings
This paper proposes that the founders of social enterprises play a variety of roles in shaping the human resource (HR) systems and practices used in these enterprises. First, founders serve as role models for managers and employees of social enterprises. Second, founders serve as succession planners for social enterprises. Third, the founders serve as builders and enforcers of corporate culture in social enterprises. Finally, founders serve as builders and enforcers of the HR systems and practices used in these enterprises. Put simply, without the roles of founders, the corporate culture and HR systems and practices of social enterprises might not be sustainable over time.
Research limitations/implications
Because this research is based on case studies of three social enterprises located in Thailand, the findings may not be generalizable to all other social enterprises across countries. Rather, the aim of this paper is to further the discussion regarding the roles of founders in shaping the HR systems and practices used in social enterprises. Another limitation of this research is that it does not include social enterprises in several other industries, including the entertainment and media, printing and publishing and hotel and restaurant industries. Future research may explore how the founders of social enterprises in other industries shape the HR systems and practices used in those enterprises. Moreover, quantitative studies using large samples of social enterprises across industries might also be useful in deepening the understanding of a topic that is important from the perspectives of both social enterprises and HRM.
Practical implications
This paper has practical implications for founders and/or top managers of social enterprises is not only Thailand but also other countries. It also has social/policy implications for the government and/or relevant public agencies in Thailand and for several other developing countries/emerging market economies.
Originality/value
Very little research has examined the various roles of founders in shaping how workers in social enterprises are managed. In addition, there has been relatively little research focusing on the characteristics of social enterprises’ founders in developing countries, including Thailand. This paper aims to fill this gap in the literature on social enterprises and HRM regarding how the founders of small, hybrid organizations such as social enterprises in Thailand play their roles as builders and enforcers of HR systems and practices and other roles relevant to the management of workers.
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Upamali Amarakoon, Jay Weerawardena, Martie-Louise Verreynne and Julian Teicher
The purpose of this paper is to conceptualise and validate a scale to capture entrepreneurship behaviour at the human resource management (HRM) functional level.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to conceptualise and validate a scale to capture entrepreneurship behaviour at the human resource management (HRM) functional level.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing from the HRM and entrepreneurship literature, this paper first conceptualises and operationalises entrepreneurial behaviour at the human resource (HR) functional level. Second, it uses a multi-phase, systematic scale development procedure to design a two-dimensional scale of entrepreneurial HRM. Finally, the scale is validated by testing its relationship with HRM innovation.
Findings
The findings suggest that entrepreneurial behaviour at the HRM functional level is characterised by innovativeness, pro-activeness, risk-taking and consensus-building behaviour. The scale shed new light on the roles of HR professionals.
Research limitations/implications
This paper highlights the need for HR professionals to demonstrate entrepreneurial behaviour in HRM value addition. The scale development process, while providing a detailed understanding of the entrepreneurial behaviour at the HR functional level, will facilitate future research.
Practical implications
This scale provides HR professionals with the means to measure and improve entrepreneurial HRM, leading to higher levels of HRM-based value addition.
Originality/value
This is the first known attempt to capture entrepreneurial behaviour at the HRM functional level.
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Karen Brickman, Martin R.W. Hiebl, Martin Quinn and Liz Warren
Accountants are portrayed as important advisors of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). However, increasing numbers of SMEs now use software for their transactional and…
Abstract
Purpose
Accountants are portrayed as important advisors of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). However, increasing numbers of SMEs now use software for their transactional and compliance-related accounting work. This latter work is considered to be the “entry ticket” for accountants serving in advisory roles. This study aims to examine whether the relevance of accountants as advisors to SMEs has been lost.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on the resource-based view and applying a qualitative cross-sectional field study, interviews with small businesses in the European craft brewing/distilling sector are the data source.
Findings
The study’s analysis paints a concerning picture of the use of external accountants by SMEs. While not suggesting that accountants are incapable of offering value-adding advice, the findings suggest that the involvement of potentially value-adding accountants by SMEs is rare. The interviewees note that they would not approach their accountants for advice due to the existence of more cost-attractive alternatives. The study finds that external accountants are not imperfectly imitable and can be substituted, particularly by social media and community groups.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to examine the role of accountants in the craft brewing/distilling industry and one of the first to assess empirically the importance of accountants as advisors to SMEs with audit exemptions and to consider the increasing threat of substitution by software. The findings suggest that accountants have lost relevance as advisors to the businesses studied, or have never had much relevance.
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Yu Wu, Markus Groth, Kaixin Zhang and Amirali Minbashian
Although service researchers have long suggested that customer mistreatment adversely impacts service employees' outcomes, statistical integration of current empirical findings…
Abstract
Purpose
Although service researchers have long suggested that customer mistreatment adversely impacts service employees' outcomes, statistical integration of current empirical findings has been lacking. This meta-analysis aims to review and statistically synthesize the state of research on the relationship between customer mistreatment and service employees' affective, attitudinal and behavioral outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors included 221 effect sizes of 135 independent samples from 119 primary studies (N = 47,964). The authors used a meta-analytic approach to quantitatively review the relationship between customer mistreatment and service employees' affective, attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. Meta-analysis structural equation modeling was used to explore the mediation mechanism of service employees' affective outcomes on the relationships between customer mistreatment and employees' attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. Meta-regression was applied to explore the impact of contextual-level moderators (i.e. service provider type and service delivery mode) on these relationships. Furthermore, we compared the effects of customer mistreatment with the effects of other organizational-related factors on some commonly measured employee outcomes.
Findings
The results show that customer mistreatment has a significant negative impact on service employees' affective outcomes (i.e. negative emotions), attitudinal outcomes (i.e. job satisfaction, organizational commitment, work engagement and turnover intention) and behavioral outcomes (i.e. job performance, surface acting and emotional labor). Additionally, service employees' negative emotions mediate the association between customer mistreatment and employees' job satisfaction, turnover intention, surface acting and emotional labor. Furthermore, the relationships between customer mistreatment and service employees' negative emotions and job performance are influenced by a contextual-level moderator (i.e. service delivery mode).
Originality/value
The authors contribute to the literature by providing robust meta-analytic estimates of the effects of customer mistreatment on a variety of service employees' affective, attitudinal and behavioral outcomes, as well as the different magnitudes of the effect sizes between customer mistreatment and other job-related and personality-related factors by quantifying the true variability of the effect sizes. The authors draw on current theories underpinning customer mistreatment to test a theoretical model of the mediation mechanism of service employees' affective outcomes (i.e. service employees' negative emotions) on the relationships between customer mistreatment and employees' attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. The authors explore the effects of two contextual-level factors (i.e. service provider types and service delivery mode) related to the service delivery context that may account for the variability of effect sizes across empirical studies.
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Christine Weigel and Martin R.W. Hiebl
Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) carry huge economic importance worldwide. At the same time, SMEs face specific challenges, some of which may be alleviated by employing…
Abstract
Purpose
Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) carry huge economic importance worldwide. At the same time, SMEs face specific challenges, some of which may be alleviated by employing accountants. However, research on the role and impact of accountants in SMEs has long remained fragmented and scarce. This paper aims to encourage more research on accountants in SMEs by providing the first comprehensive and systematic review of relevant research.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on systematic review methods, the authors critically examine 68 research articles dealing with accountants in SMEs.
Findings
The review identifies three dominant roles for accountants in SMEs: providers of reporting services, sources of SME owners’ self-validation and translators between capital providers and SMEs and advisors. Implicitly, many studies assume a value-enhancing effect of employing accountants in SMEs regardless of these specific roles. At the same time, available studies seldom make use of existing theoretical frameworks to more closely analyze the value-enhancing potential of human resources such as accountants. The authors, thus, propose the resource-based view as a robust theoretical framework to improve theory building in research on accountants in SMEs.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first systematic review of accountants in SMEs. In addition, the authors develop a resource-based model on accountants in SMEs to guide future research on this topic.