Anupama Sukhu, Soobin Seo, Robert Scharff and Blair Kidwell
This services marketing research provides a theoretical framework for experiential and relationship marketing and extends the theory of transcendent customer experience (TCE)…
Abstract
Purpose
This services marketing research provides a theoretical framework for experiential and relationship marketing and extends the theory of transcendent customer experience (TCE). Specifically, this paper aims to identify how the drivers (emotional intelligence [EI]), outcomes (customer loyalty, willingness to pay and word of mouth [WOM] intentions) and influences (openness to experience) of TCE are integrated. The research contributes to the theoretical debate regarding ability-based and self-reported EI measures by examining their influence on TCE.
Design/methodology/approach
Students and general consumers provided data through structured online surveys in three survey-based experiments. Linear and multiple regressions, mediation analyses and simple effects tests were used for data analysis.
Findings
Findings suggest that self-reported and ability-based measures of EI influence TCE differently. Participants who had high self-reported EI evaluated positive service encounters as more transcendent than they evaluated negative service encounters. Participants who had high ability-based EI evaluated positive service encounters as less transcendent than they evaluated negative service encounters. TCE experiences evoked higher loyalty, willingness to pay (WTP) and WOM recommendations. Furthermore, dispositional factors were significant in forming TCE: participants who were highly open to experience and had high ability-based EI interpreted their service encounter as less transcendent than did participants who were more closed to experience and had low ability-based EI.
Research limitations/implications
TCE, a relatively new concept, offers theoretical advancement in context and constructs. The student-provided data gave high internal validity; the general consumer-provided data gave external validity. Ideally, a future field study in an actual consumption setting should replicate the findings. A self-reported questionnaire used to measure constructs may have introduced common method variance that biased the results.
Practical implications
By understanding that EI affects perceptions of transcendence in positive/negative service encounters, marketers can better implement consumer-oriented marketing strategies that will enhance TCE, customer loyalty, WTP and WOM.
Originality/value
Despite considerable research in experiential and relationship marketing, room remains for theoretical and practical enhancement in the under-researched concept of TCE. This research is the first attempt to extend TCE theory to marketing by identifying the drivers, outcomes and moderators of TCE in service encounters. The research also provides theoretical advancement in EI research. The results contradict previous research claiming that ability-based and self-reported measures are equally valid. Instead, using the two EI scales interchangeably leads to potentially different outcomes.
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Anupama Sukhu and Robert Scharff
The purpose of this research was to identify the drivers of customer loyalty in the context of green marketing. In particular, the extended theory of reasoned action model…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research was to identify the drivers of customer loyalty in the context of green marketing. In particular, the extended theory of reasoned action model specified here added crucial constructs in consumer behavior, namely, consumers’ trust and beliefs about corporate social responsibility, to increase the predictability of the model. Additionally, the moderating role of level of education in predicting customer loyalty to hotels was also examined.
Design/methodology/approach
A mixed methodology was used for the study. A structural mixed methodology was used for the study. A structural model was developed to understand the theoretical relationships between identified constructs. Additionally, multiple regression analyses were used to identify the moderating role of level of education in predicting consumer loyalty. Data collected through an online survey from 446 hotel guests were used for the analyses.
Findings
The results indicated that in addition to attitude and subjective norms, consumers’ trust in hotels’ intentions to be green influence their loyalty to green hotel enterprises. Further investigation also showed significant moderating influence of levels of education in their choice to be loyal to green hotels.
Research limitations/implications
Even though the majority of the study’s sample has extensive travel experience, the data were collected from university employees, which might have limited the findings of this study.
Practical implications
Consumers need to trust ethical claims in adopting green practices to become loyal customers. Hence, it is imperative for marketers to convey that their business believe in proenvironmental activities. Additionally, marketers should not neglect their level of education because it influences their loyalty to green hotels. Green marketing should target not only an individual customer but also his/her ties to significant others, because subjective norms influence customer loyalty to green hotels.
Originality/value
This research developed a comprehensive model to understand customer loyalty to green hotels, thus providing insights to marketers and academics about a timely subject, namely, green behavior. In doing so, this research added crucial constructs to extend the traditional model of theory of reasoned action as well as examined the moderating role of level of education in the identified model.
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Tom Schultheiss, Lorraine Hartline, Jean Mandeberg, Pam Petrich and Sue Stern
The following classified, annotated list of titles is intended to provide reference librarians with a current checklist of new reference books, and is designed to supplement the…
Abstract
The following classified, annotated list of titles is intended to provide reference librarians with a current checklist of new reference books, and is designed to supplement the RSR review column, “Recent Reference Books,” by Frances Neel Cheney. “Reference Books in Print” includes all additional books received prior to the inclusion deadline established for this issue. Appearance in this column does not preclude a later review in RSR. Publishers are urged to send a copy of all new reference books directly to RSR as soon as published, for immediate listing in “Reference Books in Print.” Reference books with imprints older than two years will not be included (with the exception of current reprints or older books newly acquired for distribution by another publisher). The column shall also occasionally include library science or other library related publications of other than a reference character.
Koray Caliskan and Michael Lounsbury
This paper contributes to a growing literature that examines entrepreneurship with a critical perspective, arguing for a research agenda that makes entrepreneurialism as discourse…
Abstract
This paper contributes to a growing literature that examines entrepreneurship with a critical perspective, arguing for a research agenda that makes entrepreneurialism as discourse visible. We define the discourse of entrepreneurialism as a style of thinking and economic intervention that invites actors to pursue their interests by drawing on a limited notion of agency that locates itself in an imaginary economic universe independent of institutions, broad social contexts, and identity considerations. Associated with the global rise of neoliberalism, entrepreneurialism provides actors with tools and competences to imagine organizations in narrow, instrumental terms and with an idealized notion of agency. We argue that seeing entrepreneurial capacity in such a limited way makes it impossible to fully understand entrepreneurship as a phenomenon. Highlighting the adverse consequences of entrepreneurialism, we map areas of inquiry that can contribute to the emergence of a more effective and comprehensive critical research agenda concerning entrepreneurialism.
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This survey covers civil, electrical and electronics, energy, environment, general, materials, mechanical, and traffic and transportation engineering. Areas such as biomedical and…
Abstract
This survey covers civil, electrical and electronics, energy, environment, general, materials, mechanical, and traffic and transportation engineering. Areas such as biomedical and chemical engineering will be dealt with in future issues. Readers may find that the classifications included in this survey are not mutually exclusive but do occasionally overlap with one another. For instance, the section on environmental engineering includes a review of a book on the environmental impact of nuclear power plants, which might as easily have been part of the section on energy technology. Before we go into a discussion of data bases and indexes, I would like to note in this introductory section some recent bibliographic aids published during the period surveyed. Most engineering libraries will find them very valuable in their reference and acquisition functions. Since normal review sources will cover these books, I am merely listing them below: Malinowski, Harold Robert, Richard A. Gray and Dorothy A. Gray. Science and Engineering Literature. 2d ed., Littleton, Colorado, Libraries Unlimited, 1976. 368p. LC 76–17794 ISBN 0–87287–098–7. $13.30; Mildren, K. W., ed. Use of Engineering Literature. Woburn, Mass., Butterworths, 1976. 621p. ISBN 0–408–70714–3. $37.95. Mount, Ellis. Guide to Basic Information Sources in Engineering. New York, Wiley, Halsted Press, 1976. 196p. LC 75–43261 ISBN 0–47070–15013–0. $11.95 and Guide to European Sources of Technical Information. 4th ed., edited by Ann Pernet. Guernsey, Eng., F. Hodgson, 1976. 415p. ISBN 0–85280–161–0. $52.00.
Lynn Weber and Deborah Parra-Medina
Scholars and activists working both within and outside the massive health-related machinery of government and the private sector and within and outside communities of color…
Abstract
Scholars and activists working both within and outside the massive health-related machinery of government and the private sector and within and outside communities of color address the same fundamental questions: Why do health disparities exist? Why have they persisted over such a long time? What can be done to significantly reduce or eliminate them?
Nicole Jones, Milorad M. Novicevic, Mario Hayek and John H. Humphreys
This paper aims to trace the historical roots of African American management by examining managerial practices and experiences described in the letters of Benjamin Thornton…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to trace the historical roots of African American management by examining managerial practices and experiences described in the letters of Benjamin Thornton Montgomery, a former slave who eventually became manager and, ultimately, owner of the Hurricane plantation.
Design/methodology/approach
The method used is the historical archival method of analysis, primarily the examination of a series of letters written by Montgomery during the 1865‐1870 time periods. These letters, which document the foundation and emergence of African American management during the Emancipation age, are for the first time presented as a source of management history.
Findings
Contrary to traditional thoughts of the insignificance of the plantation era to the history of management, the analysis indicates that Montgomery's management practices were quite sophisticated as they incorporated classical management principles of planning, delegation, leadership, and control.
Practical implications
This paper provides insights concerning the historical roots of management practices during the African American Emancipation period which could provide contemporary managers with a more realistic foundation of management practice.
Originality/value
The principal contribution of this investigation is the historical awareness of the documented roots of African American management represented by Montgomery's competence and perseverance to manage effectively while withstanding impeding racial attacks.
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THE scientist and philosopher will tell us that the mind of man cannot in a lifetime fully grasp and understand any one subject. Consequently it is unreasonable to expect that the…
Abstract
THE scientist and philosopher will tell us that the mind of man cannot in a lifetime fully grasp and understand any one subject. Consequently it is unreasonable to expect that the librarian—who, in spite of popular belief, is but man—can have a complete understanding of every department of knowledge relative to his work. He must, in common with his fellows in other callings, content himself with a more or less general professional knowledge, and may specialize, if he be so disposed, in certain branches of that knowledge. The more restricted this particular knowledge is, the greater will be its value from a specialistic point of view.
Robert A Smith and Helle Neergaard
This paper aims to explore the “Fellowship-Tale” as an alternative tale type for narrating entrepreneur stories. The authors illustrate this by telling the Pilgrim business story…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the “Fellowship-Tale” as an alternative tale type for narrating entrepreneur stories. The authors illustrate this by telling the Pilgrim business story. It is common for the deeds of men who founded businesses to be narrated as heroic entrepreneur stories. Such fairy tales are dominant narratives in Western culture but do not resonate with everyone, particularly women. Consequentially, many businesswomen do not engage in the rhetoric of enterprise.
Design/methodology/approach
The qualitative, analytic approaches adopted in this study include narratology, semiotics and aesthetics. This complementary triage helps us appreciate the complexity of entrepreneur stories while unravelling the nuances of the tale. It also permits triangulation of the data gathered from an in-depth interview of the respondent with newspaper and Internet research.
Findings
The research indicates that “fellowship-tales” provide a viable and credible alternative to the fairy-tale rendition common in entrepreneur and business stories.
Research limitations/implications
An obvious limitation is that one merely swaps one narrative framework for another, albeit it offers dissenting voices a real choice.
Practical implications
This study has the potential to be far reaching because at a practical level, it allows disengaged entrepreneurs and significant others the freedom to exercise their individual and collective voices within a framework of nested stories.
Originality/value
A key contribution is to challenge the hegemony of a dominant and embedded social construct allowing new understandings to emerge via a novel combination of research methodologies.