Smitu Malhotra and Venugopal Pingali
The purpose of this paper is to review Indian management-school programs that integrate social and environmental concerns in the curriculum.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to review Indian management-school programs that integrate social and environmental concerns in the curriculum.
Approach
The paper analyses the data provided in the form of reports submitted by students after the rural immersion program and draws inferences from the written material.
Findings
This paper illustrates the usefulness of the rural immersion program in sensitizing students about the social divide that exists in India; thus, it helps inculcate an inclusive mind-set.
Practical implications
This paper emphasizes the usefulness of creating a management curriculum that integrates societal issues in the learning process.
Originality/value
The paper discusses how a top Indian business school is attempting to develop socially-responsible managers.
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Parthasarathi Das and Venugopal Pingali
The purpose of the study is to propose a framework for understanding the dynamism of the human self-system from evolutionary and socio-psychological perspective. The study aims to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the study is to propose a framework for understanding the dynamism of the human self-system from evolutionary and socio-psychological perspective. The study aims to help scholars interested to use an evolutionary lens for examining consumer behaviour.
Design/methodology/approach
Relying on the principle of self-cybernetics, the study proposed a general framework explaining the operating mechanism of human self-system. The proposed framework incorporates the socio-psychological and the evolutionary perspective of the human self-concept.
Findings
The framework may help consumer scholars to integrate socio-psychological and evolutionary theories to produce novel and testable hypotheses.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to propose a framework based on the principle of cybernetics to facilitate the use of an evolutionary lens in consumer research.
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Pingali Venugopal and Divya Agrawal
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been in practice in India even before it was mandated by the Companies Act, 2013. While the objectives of CSR varied from philanthropy…
Abstract
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been in practice in India even before it was mandated by the Companies Act, 2013. While the objectives of CSR varied from philanthropy, being socially responsible to improving the corporate image, the relationship between financial performance and CSR has not been established. Also only a few companies are aligning their CSR activities with their corporate goals. This chapter builds a framework for integrating business with its CSR activities. The first part of the chapter describes how the concept of CSR evolved over years in general and specifically in India. It also discusses the current status of CSR in India. The second part of the chapter uses a well-known CSR model of e-Choupal to build a framework to integrate CSR with business.
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Indranil Roy Chowdhury, Sanjay Patro, Pingali Venugopal and D. Israel
The aim of this paper is to study the factors affecting the customer’s “Intention to Adopt TFS” (I-TFS), and a conceptual model has been proposed, while most previous studies have…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to study the factors affecting the customer’s “Intention to Adopt TFS” (I-TFS), and a conceptual model has been proposed, while most previous studies have focused on the study of self-service technology (SST). Interactions between customer and service provider during delivery of a service is termed as “service-encounter”. The technology that enables service delivery without customer having a face-to-face service-encounter is known as “self-service technology” (SST). Froehle and Roth described five different ways in which technology can be used in service-encounter. One of the ways, known as technology-facilitated service (TFS), requires the simultaneous existence of three entities – customer, technology and service provider – during a service-encounter. Unlike SST, in TFS customer, technology and service provider must co-exist for the completion of the service.
Design/methodology/approach
The factors affecting I-TFS can be divided in two categories: human – technology interaction (H-TI) and human–human interaction (H-HI). Although, existing literature has dealt with factors related to H-T I, e.g. “ease-of-use” and “perceived-usefulness”, the author tries to draw attention to H-H I variables, e.g. “facilitating-conditions”, which are potentially significant but have remained fairly untouched. For the study, participants were drawn from a target market where a TFS was operational. A scientifically developed survey was used to collect data from 222 participants. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to analyze the conceptual model.
Findings
The results strongly suggest that while H-T I factors are important, H-H I factors are equally critical during service delivery. H-H I factors become especially more relevant than H-T I in developing countries.
Research limitations/implications
The study strongly suggests that attitude towards the human element, i.e. service provider/front-line employee is an important factor that impacts the customer’s I-TFS. In the context of emerging economies where organisations provide innovative technology services to suit the needs of the respective populations human representatives are a must to support the service. We conducted this research within one TFS context. Additional studies with more diverse TFS with other consumer groups should be conducted to provide additional support and increase the generalisation of both the research framework and findings.
Practical implications
The findings of the study are useful to all those firms that are considering the implementation of other TFS such as tele-medicine or distance education programmes. By investigating the main causal variables that have an impact of adoption of TFS, we provide an actionable set of factors to help firms understand and influence TFS adoption behaviour.
Originality/value
Research on factors affecting adoption of services has traditionally focused either on interpersonal interactions between customers and service providers (H-HI) or non-interpersonal interactions of customer with technology (H-TI). However, very few have studied dimensions of H-HI and H-TI together to understand their impact on customer’s adoption of a service. Considering the need for more research, this study examines the relationships between H-HI, H-TI and their simultaneous impact on consumer adoption of services.
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Rakesh Singh and Pingali Venugopal
This study aims to address the need to study salesperson’s customer orientation and its effectiveness to explain the efficacy of predispositions and skills at individual level…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to address the need to study salesperson’s customer orientation and its effectiveness to explain the efficacy of predispositions and skills at individual level. This study is set in the Indian context and, therefore, offers a detailed insight from an Indian sales force perspective. Also, this study introduces self-leadership into sales literature.
Design/methodology/approach
A model was tested using survey data collected from salespeople within a print media company located in India. A structural equation model was used to test the hypotheses.
Findings
The results suggest an interesting interplay between salesperson’s customer orientation and his/her sales performance. The relationship between customer orientation is fully mediated by salesperson’s emotion regulation ability and his/her salesmanship skills. Results support the role of natural rewards strategies as driver of individual level customer orientation which will be of great interest in future research in this area.
Research limitations/implications
The research suggests that a salesperson’s customer orientation relates positively with sales performance through two process variables – emotion regulation and salesmanship skills. Within an Indian sales force, individual salesperson’s customer orientation is significantly influenced by his/her natural rewards strategies which have important implication for sales force recruitment. Moreover, sales training and other interventions targeted toward building salesmanship skills and emotion regulation abilities may actually enhance effectiveness of customer-oriented sales force. Theoretical and managerial applications are also discussed.
Originality/value
This study extends the literature through its examination of an Indian sales force, the incorporation of self-leadership construct (natural rewards strategies) and its argument for an alternative approach toward salesperson’s customer orientation effectiveness.
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Sowmya Karunakaran, Venkataraghavan Krishnaswamy and Sundarraj Rangaraja P
This study aims to investigate the decisions related to business aspects of cloud computing and discuss the research density, models/techniques used and identify opportunities for…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to investigate the decisions related to business aspects of cloud computing and discuss the research density, models/techniques used and identify opportunities for future work.
Design/methodology/approach
In this paper, 155 research articles shortlisted through a systematic review were analyzed and a classification framework was developed. Using this framework, the research density is discussed and a detailed review of four widely researched decision themes is provided.
Findings
It was found that current research on business aspects is spread across 23 decision themes. The distribution, however, is skewed with 50 per cent pertaining to just four themes, namely, pricing, markets, sourcing and adoption. Simulation appears to be the preferred modeling approach. Decision themes in consumer behavior, sustainability, auditing and culture offer opportunities for future research.
Research limitations/implications
The classification framework organizes extant research on applied models and allows researchers to identify potential avenues for application, improvement and development of models to support business decisions. The review is limited to academic articles and does not include industry reports.
Practical implications
Practitioners can readily understand various perspectives relevant to a decision theme such as pricing or sourcing, seek and use associated models such as simulation, optimization and game theory to support their decision-making.
Originality/value
Most of the extant review paper deal with cloud computing technology. This study is the first systematic review on the models applied to business aspects of cloud computing. This study provides a classification framework and explicitly lists associated decision themes, models/techniques and opportunities.
In part-I of this review series, research from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka was reviewed. The purpose of this paper which is part-II of the…
Abstract
Purpose
In part-I of this review series, research from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka was reviewed. The purpose of this paper which is part-II of the series, is to review management research from India and Pakistan over a 25-year period from 1990 to 2014.
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic review approach was adopted for this research. As a quality standard for inclusion, articles were restricted to journals rated A*, A, or B by the Australian Business Deans Council in 2013 and either Q1 or Q2 in the Scopus/Imago classification system. The divisions and interest groups of the Academy of Management were used as framework to organize the search results.
Findings
A total of 1,039 articles related to India (n = 930) and Pakistan (n = 112) emerged from the search process, with three articles being related to both countries. The research was published in 163 different journals that met the quality criteria. The period under review coincides with the advent of economic liberalization in India and this emerged as a major theme in the India-related research. Other context-specific insights for these two countries are also derived from an ecological and institutional theory perspective.
Originality/value
This research represents the first comprehensive and systematic review of management research in India and Pakistan. As in part-I, the unique review approach allows for strict adherence to a predetermined quality standard while including a wide variety of journals and research traditions.