Jen Chun Wang, Yi-Chieh Wang and Yang-Fei Tai
The purpose of this paper is to study the components and service standards of delightful service by conducting a comprehensive literature review and applying the Delphi survey…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to study the components and service standards of delightful service by conducting a comprehensive literature review and applying the Delphi survey method.
Design/methodology/approach
This study conducted a three-round Delphi survey to consolidate the experience of 11 experts in implementing delightful service. To ensure the recruitment of experts who were knowledgeable in delightful service delivery, the panellists were chosen from service- and hospitality-related industries; the respondents were hotel managers, senior frontline service personnel and academic educators who were knowledgeable in both the service industry and service innovation.
Findings
By integrating professional experiences from both academics and hotel practitioners, we conclude that hotel facilities and amenities, environment and ambiance design and service personnel’s service delivery practices are essential elements for creating a unique and unforgettable consumer experience. Distinctive hotel facilities and ambiance provide a unique experience, which can leave memorable impressions on customers. Being able to detect customers’ emotional conditions and hidden needs through attentive and proactive service practice and providing attentive and customized service are pivotal for service personnel. Advanced service performance enables attending to customers’ personal well-being and caring for their unique needs effectively. The proposed standard for service provision exceeds customer expectations.
Research limitations/implications
First, the number of panellists was low, limiting the generalizability of the results. Future studies should increase the number of panellists. Second, this study focused only on the hotel industry in Taiwan. The results may not be generalizable to other hospitality industries or other countries. Future studies can duplicate this study in other hospitality industries and in other countries to broaden the understating of the elements and service standards of delightful service.
Practical implications
The results of this study provide a practical guideline for implementing delightful service. Hotel practitioners are advised to increase the degree of refinement, variety and attentiveness of their facilities and amenities; use sensory elements in their hotel environment and ambiance design; and advance staff members’ service skills to be more proactive, attentive, empathetic and customer-oriented. Carefully designing the core product and advancing the service delivery style can provide hotel guests with an exceptional and unique lodging experience, thus achieving delight.
Originality/value
This study provides a comprehensive understanding of the implementation of delightful service.
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Chun-Sheng Chen, Hai Wang, Yung-Chin Kao, Po-Jen Lu and Wei-Ren Chen
This paper aims to establish the predictive equations of height, area and volume of printed solder paste during solder paste stencil printing (SPSP) process in surface mount…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to establish the predictive equations of height, area and volume of printed solder paste during solder paste stencil printing (SPSP) process in surface mount technology (SMT) to better understand the effect of process parameters on the printing quality.
Design/methodology/approach
An experiment plan is proposed based on the response surface method (RSM). Experiments with 30 different combinations of process parameters are performed using a solder paste printer. After printing, the volume, area and height of the printed SAC105 solder paste are measured by a solder paste inspection machine. Using RSM, the predictive equations associated with the printing parameters and the printing quality of the solder paste are formed.
Findings
The optimal printing parameters are 175.08 N printing pressure, 250 mm/s printing speed, 0.1 mm snap-off height and 15.7 mm/s stencil snap-off speed if the target height of solder paste is 100 µm. As the target printing area of solder paste is 1.1 mm × 1.3 mm, the optimized values of the printing parameters are 140.29 N, 100.52 mm/s, 0.63 mm and 20.25 mm/s. When both the target printing height and area are optimized together, the optimal values for the four parameters are 86.67 N, 225.76 mm/s, 0.15 mm and 1.82 mm/s.
Originality/value
A simple RSM-based experimental method is proposed to formulate the predictive polynomial equations for height, area and volume of printed solder paste in terms of important SPSP parameters. The predictive equation model can be applied to the actual SPSP process, allowing engineers to quickly predict the best printing parameters during parameter setting to improve production efficiency and quality.
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Yi-Shun Wang, Timmy H. Tseng, Yu-Min Wang and Chun-Wei Chu
Understanding people’s intentions to be an internet entrepreneur is an important issue for educators, academics and practitioners. The purpose of this paper is to develop and…
Abstract
Purpose
Understanding people’s intentions to be an internet entrepreneur is an important issue for educators, academics and practitioners. The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate a scale to measure internet entrepreneurial self-efficacy.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on an analysis of 356 responses, a scale of internet entrepreneurial self-efficacy is validated in accordance with established scale development procedures.
Findings
The internet entrepreneurial self-efficacy scale has 16 items under three factors (i.e. leadership, technology utilization and internet marketing and e-commerce). The scale demonstrated adequate convergent validity, discriminant validity and criterion-related validity. Nomological validity was established by the positive correlation between the scale and, respectively, internet entrepreneurship knowledge and entrepreneurial intention.
Originality/value
This study is a pioneering effort to develop and validate a scale to measure internet entrepreneurial self-efficacy. The results of this study are helpful to researchers in building internet entrepreneurship theories and to educators in assessing and promoting individuals’ internet entrepreneurial self-efficacy and behavior.
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Ying-Tzu Lin, Timmy H. Tseng, Ariana Chang and Chun-Chi Yang
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have urged retail companies to transform by adopting more sustainable practices. One of the key goals is to motivate…
Abstract
Purpose
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have urged retail companies to transform by adopting more sustainable practices. One of the key goals is to motivate responsible consumption and production. How to facilitate sustainable consumption of retail consumers is a research question of high theoretical and practical relevance. This research investigates the drivers of less examined sustainable consumer behaviour (reuse) from the perspective of consumers by integrating a value-based adoption model and the theory of planned behaviour (TPB).
Design/methodology/approach
Two samples of data were collected by using offline and online surveys. The offline survey was conducted at a university in northern Taiwan emphasizing sustainability practices. The online survey was implemented by a market research firm. A total of 518 useable questionnaires were obtained for data analysis by using the structural equation modelling.
Findings
Consistent with TPB, perceived behavioural control, subjective norms, and attitude, generate reuse intention in retail stores. Furthermore, the results also show the validity of the value adoption approach in predicting reuse intention in retail stores. Economic benefits and identity expressiveness are key facilitators and perceived inconvenience is a key barrier to perceived value and perceived value influences reuse intention in retail stores.
Originality/value
This research contributes by moving beyond TPB and proposing a value-based adoption approach to explain sustainable consumer behaviour in retail stores from the consumer perspectives. Based on the findings, value adoption strategies for retailers to facilitate sustainable consumer behaviour are proposed.
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Elaine Quintana Borazon, Yi-Chun Huang and Jen-Ming Liu
Green sustainability has become a critical challenge for businesses to execute green supply chain management (GSCM). Most of the literature on GSCM emphasizes regulations as…
Abstract
Purpose
Green sustainability has become a critical challenge for businesses to execute green supply chain management (GSCM). Most of the literature on GSCM emphasizes regulations as drivers and few pieces of research are conducted from an internal organizational culture view. This study aims to use the cultural perspective of market orientation (MO) and draws on both the natural resource-based view (NRBV) and dynamic capability view (DCV) to explore the relationships among green market orientation (GMO), GSCM capability and organizational performance.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 1,000 survey questionnaires were distributed to the Taiwanese electronics industry and 207 valid questionnaires were collected. Data was analyzed using structural equation modeling.
Findings
The results show that GMOs have a significant positive impact on GSCM capability, environmental performance and economic performance. Moreover, GSCM capability is positively related to environmental and economic performance. The results also show that GMOs have a significant indirect influence on environmental performance and economic performance through GSCM capability.
Practical implications
The findings of this study suggest how Taiwan’s electrical and electronic manufacturers, while faced with pressure from competitors, customers and regulations (i.e. waste electrical and electronic equipment directive, Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive and energy-using products directives), should efficiently and effectively implement GMO and enhance GSCM capability to improve organizational performance.
Originality/value
This study fills up the gap between MO and performance indistinct relationships. It has also integrated two perspectives, namely, NRBV and DCV, to explain GSCM capability as a mediator between GMO and organizational performance relationship and to examine the relationships among GMO, GSCM capability and organizational performance.
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This chapter examines how the breakthrough of Zhang Ziyi's depiction of a female kung fu master in The Grandmaster (2013) transforms the figure of the heroine in Chinese action…
Abstract
This chapter examines how the breakthrough of Zhang Ziyi's depiction of a female kung fu master in The Grandmaster (2013) transforms the figure of the heroine in Chinese action films. Zhang is well known for her acting in action films conducted by renowned directors, such as Ang Lee, Zhang Yimou and Wong Kar-wai. After winning 12 different Best Actress awards for her portrayal of Gong Ruomei in The Grandmaster, Zhang announced that she would no longer perform in any action films to show her highest respect for the superlative character Gong. Tracing Zhang's transformational portrait of a heroine in The Grandmaster alongside her other action roles, this analysis demonstrates how her performance projects the directors' distinctive gender viewpoints. I argue that Zhang's characterisation of Gong remodels heroine-hood in Chinese action films. Inheriting the typical plot of a daughter's use of martial arts for revenge for her father's death, Gong breaks from conventional Chinese action films that highlight romantic love during a woman's adventure and the decisive final battle scene. Beyond the propensity for sensory stimulation, Gong's characterisation enables Zhang to determine that women can really act in action films – demonstrating their inner power and ability to create multi-layered characters – not merely relying upon physical action. This chapter offers a relational perspective of how women transform the action film genre not merely as gender spectacles but as embodied figures that represent emerging female subjectivity.
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Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American…
Abstract
Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American preemptive invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the subsequent prisoner abuse, such an existence seems to be farther and farther away from reality. The purpose of this work is to stop this dangerous trend by promoting justice, love, and peace through a change of the paradigm that is inconsistent with justice, love, and peace. The strong paradigm that created the strong nation like the U.S. and the strong man like George W. Bush have been the culprit, rather than the contributor, of the above three universal ideals. Thus, rather than justice, love, and peace, the strong paradigm resulted in in justice, hatred, and violence. In order to remove these three and related evils, what the world needs in the beginning of the third millenium is the weak paradigm. Through the acceptance of the latter paradigm, the golden mean or middle paradigm can be formulated, which is a synergy of the weak and the strong paradigm. In order to understand properly the meaning of these paradigms, however, some digression appears necessary.
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Yi-Chun Huang, Elaine Quintana Borazon and Jen-Ming Liu
Environmental sustainability is one of the most pressing issues faced by the electric and electronics industry today. Industries are being challenged to incorporate environmental…
Abstract
Purpose
Environmental sustainability is one of the most pressing issues faced by the electric and electronics industry today. Industries are being challenged to incorporate environmental initiatives in their corporate strategies. Thus, this study aims to investigate the impact of stakeholder pressures (regulatory, internal and market) on green supply chain management and green corporate resources as well as their effects on the economic and environmental performance of Taiwan's electric and electronic industry.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 194 valid questionnaires were collected out of the 1,000 questionnaires distributed to Taiwan's electric and electronic product manufacturers. A structural equation modeling, using Amos 22.0, was used to test the hypotheses.
Findings
The results of the analyses show that stakeholder pressure has a significant positive impact on corporate green resources and green supply chain management practices while green supply chain management practices have a significant and positive impact on organizational performance. Moreover, corporate green resources provide a mediation between organizational stakeholder pressure and green supply chain management.
Practical implications
The results may be of value and interest to supply chain managers and policymakers on the push factors for implementing green supply chain management practices and their consequences.
Originality/value
This paper shows the complementarity of stakeholder and resource-based theories in influencing organizational performance in the electric and electronic industry in the context of sustainable development. This also enhances the understanding of the antecedents and consequences of green supply chain management and provides robust findings on the relationship between environmental and economic performance.
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HsiuJu Rebecca Yen, Paul Jen-Hwa Hu, Yi-Chun Liao and Jiun-Yu Wu
Ambidextrous frontline service employees (FSEs), capable of delivering quality services and carrying out sales responsibilities too, are crucial to service firms. This study seeks…
Abstract
Purpose
Ambidextrous frontline service employees (FSEs), capable of delivering quality services and carrying out sales responsibilities too, are crucial to service firms. This study seeks to extend ambidexterity research by examining how a manager's goal orientation could influence FSEs' ambidextrous conversion. The authors draw on achievement goal theory and conceptualize a link between a manager's achievement goal orientation and employees' service–sales ambidexterity (SSA). The authors then apply conservation of resources theory to complement this high-level conceptualization, hypothesize mediating roles of important resources that can facilitate employees' SSA, and the authors test them empirically.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts a questionnaire survey design. The empirical test relies on multilevel path analyses of dyadic data from 341 FSEs and 39 managers of a major logistics service company in Taiwan.
Findings
Managers with a prominent learning goal orientation can facilitate and foster FSEs' SSA through developmental inducements and change-related self-efficacy, two important resources for their ambidextrous conversion. Managers with a strong performance-avoid goal orientation instead might hinder employees' SSA conversion, due to a negative impact on developmental inducements. Furthermore, SSA enhances FSEs' service delivery value and sales performance.
Originality/value
By analyzing and empirically testing the influence pathways of essential resources perceived by FSEs, which channel the effects of a manager's goal orientation to employees' SSA conversion, this study offers insights about how managers can support and foster FSEs' service–sales ambidextrous conversion.
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Drew Martin, Arch G. Woodside and Ning Dehuang
To demonstrate how brand netnography is useful in showing how visitors interpret the places, people and situations that they experience when traveling.
Abstract
Purpose
To demonstrate how brand netnography is useful in showing how visitors interpret the places, people and situations that they experience when traveling.
Design/methodology/approach
Through analysis of online consumer stories about their travel experiences, this paper probes how visitors interpret their experiences while visiting cities in Asia. Deconstructing texts written by consumers via Heider's balance theory provides the method of analysis for samples of both positive and negative travel experiences of foreign visitors.
Findings
Mapping consumer experiences shows immediate and downstream positive and negative associations of concepts, events, and outcomes in visitors' stories. These maps include descriptions of how visitors live specific destination's unique promises.
Research limitations/implications
The population of bloggers who report their experiences may not be representative of the population of all visitors.
Practical implications
Blog‐journal stories provides the opportunity to collect emic interpretative data unobtrusively. These stories have the potential to influence substantial numbers of future visitors who go online in search of first‐person unbiased, unrehearsed reports of others' destination experiences. First‐person (emic) reports enable managers of places (brands) to learn and talk in dialects of customers.
Originality/value
This paper provides a revisionist proposal to Holt's five‐step strategy for building destinations as iconic brands and suggestions for tourism management. The revisionist view includes interpreting consumers' own interpretations of their place experiences.