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Banks and financial services providers are increasingly delivering their services via electronic banking, also known as e-banking. Yet even though this type of delivery is now common, the degree of personalization in the services provided via this channel exhibit considerable variation. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of service personalization on consumer reaction to the e-banking service. Based on research of information and communication technology (ICT) service innovation and the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model, this study further examines one contingent factor, compatibility with previous experience with e-banking. This study focuses on the interactions effect of personalization and technology compatibility on customer e-banking service usage.

A survey was conducted to investigate the impacts of personalization on e-banking usage decision process and the interactions between personalization and compatibility with past e-banking experience. Quota sampling was applied and different type of customers were approached in 30 branches of the commercial bank. Data were collected from a sample of 181 banking customers in a metropolitan region in southern China.

The results indicated that personalization leads to increased performance expectancy and decreased effort expectancy, which in turn lead to increasing intention to continue to use e-banking services. In addition, compatibility with previous e-banking experience and personalization produces an interaction effect on both performance expectancy and effort expectancy.

The theoretical contribution of this study is to demonstrate how the contingent factor of compatibility moderates the impact of personalization, thus extending the UTAUT model in the area of e-banking service adoption. Implications are twofold: personalization influences evaluations of both utility and ease of use, and the effect is magnified when compatibility with prior e-banking experience is factored into the model. This is an important extension and future research should examine whether the same relationship holds in other industries using new technologies to deliver services. The UTAUT model, after extension by including the moderating impact of compatibility, works well in demonstrating the impact of various factors on the adoption of a new technological delivery system for a service.

This study has two significant implications for managerial practices. First, the study sheds lights on the segmentation of e-banking customers. Modern marketers know that the best way to engage with consumers is through personal messaging strategies and should make great efforts to identify customers before trying to reach them. In the e-banking realm, consumer banking preferences keep changing. With a clear understanding of the different consumer banker segments, financial institutions can identify which channels appeal to them. For example, some users are more likely than average to use e-banking. Second, this study helps e-banking service provider design different personalized e-banking service for different customers.

This study sheds light on social value of personalization, particularly among those new to a delivery platform.

This study provides evidence demonstrating that personalization increases customer perceptions of performance expectancy and decreases effort expectancy, and that the effect is most profound for customers with limited level of perceived compatibility with past experience with e-banking. This paper extended the UTAUT model and research on ICT service innovation by providing more insights on the impacts of e-banking service personalization and the contingency impact of user’s background in e-banking context.

This paper assesses to what extent the workplace union power has been built under the Professional Union Leader and Organizer Program (PULOP) in China in the local community-based private workplaces. Data obtained from in-depth interviews with union leaders, rank-and-file members, and data from documentary sources are deployed. Findings show that, for the purpose of stabilizing labor-management relations in these community-based workplaces, the PULOP attempts to reinforce implementation of existing labor law and regulations regarding wages and working conditions by organizing community-based private employers. However, without workers’ support from the bottom up, the power of the newly established workplace union associations are rather precarious. The PULOP union leaders are still distant to the organized workplaces and to the workers at these workplaces; and the organized employers are still reluctant or even hostile towards PULOP activities. The paper, therefore, concludes by drawing out the implications of the finding that, without genuine worker participation in union formation and operation processes, the administrative power held by the union bureaucracies cannot be effectively translated into workplace union power via the PULOP initiative.

Malicious attacks extremely traumatize knowledge networks due to increasing interdependence among knowledge elements. Therefore, exposing the damage of malicious attacks to knowledge networks has important theoretical and practical significance. Despite the insights being offered by the growing research stream, few studies discuss the diverse responses of knowledge networks’ robustness to different target-attacks, and the authors lack sufficient knowledge of which forms of malicious attacks constitute greater disaster when knowledge networks evolve to different stages. Given the irreversible consequences of malicious attacks on knowledge networks, this paper aims to examine the impacts of different malicious attacks on the robustness of knowledge networks.

On the basic of dividing malicious attacks into six forms, the authors incorporate two important aspects of robustness of knowledge networks – structure and function – in a research framework, and use maximal connected sub-graphs and network efficiency, respectively, to measure structural and functional robustness. Furthermore, the authors conceptualize knowledge as a multi-dimensional structure to reflect the heterogeneous nature of knowledge elements, and design the fundamental rules of simulation. NetLogo is used to simulate the features of knowledge networks and their changes of robustness as they face different malicious attacks.

First, knowledge networks gradually form more associative integrated structures with evolutionary progress. Second, various properties of knowledge elements play diverse roles in mitigating damage from malicious attacks. Recalculated-degree-based attacks cause greater damage than degree-based attacks, and structure of knowledge networks has higher resilience against ability than function. Third, structural robustness is mainly affected by the potential combinatorial value of high-degree knowledge elements, and the combinatorial potential of high-out-degree knowledge elements. Forth, the number of high in-degree knowledge elements with heterogeneous contents, and the inverted U-sharp effect contributed by high out-degree knowledge elements are the main influencers of functional robustness.

The authors use the frontier method to expose the detriments of malicious attacks both to structural and functional robustness in each evolutionary stage, and the authors reveal the relationship and effects of knowledge-based connections and knowledge combinatorial opportunities that contribute to maintaining them. Furthermore, the authors identify latent critical factors that may improve the structural and functional robustness of knowledge networks.

First, from the dynamic evolutionary perspective, the authors systematically examine structural and functional robustness to reveal the roles of the properties of knowledge element, and knowledge associations to maintain the robustness of knowledge networks. Second, the authors compare the damage of six forms of malicious attacks to identify the reasons for increased robustness vulnerability. Third, the authors construct the stock, power, expertise knowledge structure to overcome the difficulty of knowledge conceptualization. The results respond to multiple calls from different studies and extend the literature in multiple research domains.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between learning orientation (LO), entrepreneurial orientation (EO), and firm growth in small- and medium-sized firms (SMEs). The authors theoretically argue for a mediation effect of EO on the relationship between LO and growth. The study considered how companies that value learning enact actions to affect firm outcomes. This is particularly important for small firms that may not be capable of withstanding significant shocks in the marketplace.

The research design employed the survey method for data gathering and resulted in 105 completed responses from CEOs/presidents of SMEs. To examine the construct validity of the measurement dimensions the authors used a multistage process. Additionally, the authors employed a competing models analytic design to determine the presence and strength of mediating effects of the EO construct.

The findings empirically demonstrate the notion that firm cultural values embodied in a LO and translated into action behaviors by an EO is positively related to SME growth and adaptation. The research also supports the notion that learning is an important element in opportunity recognition insofar as opportunity recognition is entrepreneurial or reflecting an EO. SMEs that are open to learning may identify opportunities to exploit through an EO that facilitates growth. In the face of dynamic external environments and competitive conditions SMEs are well served by being more creative and entrepreneurial.

The design of the study is limited by single source, key respondents in SMEs, and has the potential for common method bias even though the authors tested for this effect successfully.

The study contributes to the literature by examining how learning and an orientation toward entrepreneurial behavior affect the growth of firms. These findings will be of value to both scholars and entrepreneurs.

In light of increasingly tight buyer–supplier relationships, opportunism is a problem of increasing relevance. So far, opportunism has mainly been researched as a detrimental action by suppliers and interpreted with an institutional economics lens. Recent conceptual work, however, has argued more for a behavioral approach to operations management, suggesting benefits of taking a social capital perspective on opportunism. Based on a large empirical sample of buyer–supplier relations, this paper aims to provide an empirical study using social capital as theoretical lens. Further, it analyzes both supplier and buyer opportunism at the same time.

The paper, through following a quantitative approach, considers the interacting dyad of buyer and supplier opportunism, its antecedents as well as its performance implications.

Findings did not support the expectation that supplier opportunism will be countered by buyer opportunism in a single relationship. However, social capital in the form of cognitive and relational capital has been found as a good predictor of opportunism. This study proposes new measures for structural capital. Further the study confirms the detrimental effect of opportunism on performance of the buyer–supplier relationship, highlighting the mediating role of innovation as building block of relational competitive advantage.

Previous studies on opportunism in buyer–supplier relations were mostly transaction cost-oriented, thus neglecting the behavioral aspects of exchange processes. Introducing social capital theory revealed to be a rewarding amplification of the perspective. Next, most research up till now was focused on explaining supplier opportunism only. This study contributes by analyzing both sides of the interacting dyad. Finally, this research closes a research gap by not only explaining the occurrence of opportunism but by also testing its performance outcomes. Accordingly, this study contributes to the opportunism literature, social capital theory development and to the management of buyer–supplier relations.

Building up cognitive and relational capital is likely to be a tool to reduce the danger of opportunism – both with the partner firm, as well as inside the own organization. As such, firms need to make sure that both forms of social capital are present to a higher extent. If this is not the case, opportunistic actions on both buying and supplying side might occur which have damaging impacts on the generation of innovation as well as the achievement of strategic advantages.

While previous studies have focused on explaining supplier opportunism, an analysis of both sides of the interacting dyad between buyer and supplier opportunism is missing. Not only does this research provides further insights with regard to the latter, but further considers the role of social capital as underlying factor explaining both buyer and supplier opportunism. Also, this research answers the call on more research about the relation between opportunism and performance, specifically focusing on innovation and strategic advantage generation.

What is strategy? Countless books, MBA programs, executive education initiatives, and consultants are available to answer this question in excruciating detail. But let’s cut to the chase. Strategy is what a company does, or doesn’t do, to fulfill its vision in a competitive marketplace.

As a contribution to the social ties and dynamic capabilities literature, the purpose of this study is to examine the boundary role of the industrial factors (competitive intensity, dependence on suppliers and demand uncertainty) on the relationship between small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) social ties (business ties and political ties) and firm performance.

Data were collected from 1,077 SME top-level managers in Turkiye. The proposed model is analyzed using partial least squares (PLS) path modeling in SmartPLS 4.0 software.

The results elucidate how demand uncertainty serve to moderate the influence exerted by both business and political ties upon the performance of SMEs. However, the moderating effects of competitive intensity and dependence on suppliers, although initially hypothesized, were not found to have a significant impact on the relationships.

The relevance of social ties of SMEs may depend on the industrial factor. Although both political and business ties are effective on the customer side, these ties may become irrelevant when it comes to competition and supplier relations. In competitive SME settings, where businesses are vying for similar markets, the effectiveness of ties might be questionable. In such cases, SMEs might invest in building in-house capabilities and competencies, rather than relying on their relational networks.

This study contributes to the understanding of how relational networks, which are considered as dynamic managerial capabilities, impact SMEs performance. It also fills an important gap by testing the boundary role of industrial factors on this relationship. The empirical data is collected from the Turkish context, which is also an original aspect of the study, considering most of the social ties literature has a limited focus on a few contexts. The results also indicate new areas for discussion and exploration, indicating potential avenues for further research.

This paper aims to analyze the inhibitory effect of non-controlling shareholders governance mechanism on the retention of self-interest management, which provides theoretical support and practical basis for standardizing the control transfer behavior of listed companies and improving the governance mechanism of non-controlling shareholders.

Taking A-share listed companies with control transfer from 2000 to 2017 as sample, this paper investigates the strategy, path and retention consequence of the target company’s market selected top management who collude with the new controlling shareholder to avoid the risk of being taken over by control transfer.

This research explores that negative earnings management behavior may reduce the real premium of control transfer after deducting the “shell value”. The lower the real premium of control transfer after deducting the “shell value”, the higher the probability of management retention after control transfer. This paper also reveals that the real premium of control transfer after deducting the “shell value” plays complete mediation role between the negative earnings management behavior of the management and their own retention. The mediation effect of “collusion and price reduction” in the control transfer will be inversely moderated by the governance mechanism of noncontrolling shareholders including the old shareholders of the seller.

This paper not only constitutes a supplement to the existing literature but also provides empirical evidence for standardizing the control transfer behavior of listed companies, and making good use of the old shareholders of the seller to improve corporate governance and alleviate agency conflict after control transfer.

The purpose of this paper is to examine mentor teachers’ approaches to mentoring preservice teachers in a yearlong teacher residency program (TRP).

This multiple-methods study examined 15 mentor teachers’ approaches over the course of a year in an urban TRP through the lens of Wang and Odell’s (2002) framework for mentoring. Data sources included mentors’ self-assessments over three points in time across one academic year. These self-assessments included numerical ratings of practice (quantitative) as well as open-ended rationales and goal setting (qualitative).

Mentors predominately provided support and technical assistance to the residents learning to teach, drawing on humanistic, and situated apprentice perspectives on mentoring. They worked to develop residents’ self-confidence and exposed residents to a range of practices and school contexts. Glimmers of a more critical constructive approach were apparent in some mentors’ discussions of reflection and collaboration.

This study informs the work of teacher education programs as they develop mentoring structures that align with program visions, expand notions of mentoring, and consider the many roles of a mentor teacher.

Increased emphasis on clinical experiences for preservice teachers highlights the need to attend to the practices of the mentor teachers with whom they work. These mentors, as field-based teacher educators, play a critical role in teacher education, and teacher education programs need to support their professional development as mentors. Understanding mentors’ approaches to mentoring is necessary in order to provide this support.

Drawing from social exchange theory, this paper aims to examine the role of five mediating mechanisms between the relationships of critical constructs of frontline employees’ performance, and both transformational leadership and proactive personality to find out which mediating mechanism highly boosts frontline performance in 3-star hotels, Pakistan.

By testing parallel mediating linkages, this study used a structural equation modeling (SEM) technique using partial least square-SEM. This empirical investigation used a quota sampling technique to collect data from the frontline employees of 3-star hotels from the top five big cities of Pakistan. The study administered online survey questionnaires among 500 frontline workers in 3-star hotels.

The results of the study supported a substantial direct influence of transformational leadership and proactive personality on employees’ performance. Nevertheless, it was observed in the findings of this investigation, significant mediating relationships between frontline employees’ performance and the key constructs of transformational leadership and proactive personality. However, the construct of work engagement was not found to have a significant mediating relationship between front-line employees’ performance and both constructs of transformational leadership and proactive personality. Moreover, leader-member exchange was identified as the highest mediating mechanism among the five. It is noteworthy, the results of this study highlighted that the notion of leader-member exchange is extremely embedded in transformational leadership to enhance the frontline performance than proactive personality.

The empirical evidence of this study insinuates that the management may establish a system of collaborative learning and social exchange between leaders and followers. This approach might be the essence to improve the work outcomes of frontline employees specifically within the 3-star hotels and hospitality organizations at large.

This study contributes to novel findings particularly to determine the five mediating mechanisms, i.e. work engagement, job satisfaction, organizational citizenship behavior, organizational commitment and leader-member exchange between frontline employees’ performance and the constructs of transformational leadership and proactive personality. It might be noteworthy, the empirical and anecdotal pieces of evidence of this study indicated a social exchange system within transformational leadership optimizes the frontline employees’ performance that ultimately contributes to the overall organizational outcomes.