Jan Hendrik Blümel, Mohamed Zaki and Thomas Bohné
Customer service conversations are becoming increasingly digital and automated, leaving service encounters impersonal. The purpose of this paper is to identify how customer…
Abstract
Purpose
Customer service conversations are becoming increasingly digital and automated, leaving service encounters impersonal. The purpose of this paper is to identify how customer service agents and conversational artificial intelligence (AI) applications can provide a personal touch and improve the customer experience in customer service. The authors offer a conceptual framework delineating how text-based customer service communication should be designed to increase relational personalization.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper presents a systematic literature review on conversation styles of conversational AI and integrates the extant research to inform the development of the proposed conceptual framework. Using social information processing theory as a theoretical lens, the authors extend the concept of relational personalization for text-based customer service communication.
Findings
The conceptual framework identifies conversation styles, whose degree of expression needs to be personalized to provide a personal touch and improve the customer experience in service. The personalization of these conversation styles depends on available psychological and individual customer knowledge, contextual factors such as the interaction and service type, as well as the freedom of communication the conversational AI or customer service agent has.
Originality/value
The article is the first to conduct a systematic literature review on conversation styles of conversational AI in customer service and to conceptualize critical elements of text-based customer service communication required to provide a personal touch with conversational AI. Furthermore, the authors provide managerial implications to advance customer service conversations with three types of conversational AI applications used in collaboration with customer service agents, namely conversational analytics, conversational coaching and chatbots.
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Thomas Walker and Sherif Goubran
In recent years, sustainability considerations in the real estate sector have moved from being a niche market phenomenon to a mainstream trend. The movement has been accompanied…
Abstract
In recent years, sustainability considerations in the real estate sector have moved from being a niche market phenomenon to a mainstream trend. The movement has been accompanied by a shift in the industry’s perception of sustainable buildings. Traditional cost-saving goals are now complemented by a growing interest in the potential for sustainable buildings to tackle broader economic and social sustainability challenges as well as issues related to health and well-being. The real estate industry is increasingly expected to adapt its strategies to incorporate new and more stringent environmental and urban development requirements, to cater to shifting demographics, and to utilize new advancements in construction processes and materials. This chapter explores recent research on sustainable real estate and highlights some of the newest trends in the market. The chapter then examines how policy and technological advancements can enable real estate developers to tackle environmental, social, and economic sustainability challenges. This will be exemplified through a focus on carbon taxation and timber construction. Based on these case studies, the chapter illustrates how today’s sustainable real estate sector – marked by its move beyond a focus on cost savings – requires for building practices to be strongly rooted in global, sustainable development policies.
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Philip Balsiger and Simone Schiller-Merkens
Moral struggles in and around markets abound in contemporary societies where markets have become the dominant form of economic coordination. Reviewing research on morality and…
Abstract
Moral struggles in and around markets abound in contemporary societies where markets have become the dominant form of economic coordination. Reviewing research on morality and markets across disciplinary boundaries, this introductory essay suggests that a moral turn can currently be observed in scholarship, and draws a direct connection to recent developments in the sociology of morality. The authors introduce the chapters in the present volume “The Contested Moralities of Markets.” In doing so, the authors distinguish three types of moral struggles in and around markets: struggles around morally contested markets where the exchange of certain goods on markets is contested; struggles within organizations that are related to an organization’s embeddedness in complex institutional environments with competing logics and orders of worth; and moral struggles in markets where moral justifications are mobilized by a variety of field members who act as moral entrepreneurs in their striving for moralizing the economy. Finally, the authors highlight three properties of moral struggles in contemporary markets: They (1) arise over different objects, (2) constitute political struggles, and (3) are related to two broader social processes: market moralization and market expansion. The introduction concludes by discussing some of the theoretical approaches that allow particular insights into struggles over morality in markets. Collectively, the contributions in this volume advance our current understanding of the contested moralities of markets by highlighting the sources, processes, and outcomes of moral struggles in and around markets, both through tracing the creation, reproduction, and change of underlying moral orders and through reflecting the status and power differentials, alliances, and political strategies as well as the general cultural, social, and political contexts in which the struggles unfold.
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Diane Aparecida Reis, André Leme Fleury and Marly Monteiro Carvalho
Emerging digital ventures and related breakthrough innovations result in new challenges for the development of entrepreneurial competences and demand new perspectives for…
Abstract
Purpose
Emerging digital ventures and related breakthrough innovations result in new challenges for the development of entrepreneurial competences and demand new perspectives for entrepreneurship research. In this context, policy-makers and organizations are increasingly interested in fostering entrepreneurial competences to improve the success of policies and venture capital investments. This paper aims at identifying the core relevant entrepreneurial competences, mapping the current literature and the main clusters and going beyond toward a meta-competence framework.
Design/methodology/approach
The research approach is a literature review, combining bibliometric, network and content analysis. The sampling process was conducted in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. The bibliometrics and content analysis were performed with a computer aid approach applying VosViewer1.6, Ucinet and NetDraw 2.139. The content analysis approach was performed considering a detailed coding schema developed. Finally, toward the meta-competences framework, the study applied quantitative analysis on the coding schema, particularly cross-tabulation, core-periphery and network analysis.
Findings
The results show the state of the art concerning entrepreneurial competences. The research identified a list of 98 entrepreneurial competences. Finally, the study proposes a meta-competence framework and clusters the 33 core entrepreneurial competences previously identified.
Originality/value
The proposed conceptual framework exploring meta-entrepreneurial competences offers an original contribution with implications for theory and practice. The research contributes to broadening the understanding of the entrepreneurial competences, helping on the creation, design, development and improvement of entrepreneurship educational initiatives, which are important to entrepreneurs' educators. The proposed framework contributes by providing relevant knowledge for the policy-makers' strategy formulation processes. As implications for the practice, the proposed framework can allow better assessment process for incubators and accelerators, besides more robust ventures considering learning trails based on meta-competences frameworks.
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It often becomes necessary to analyse a grease for a variety of reasons:
Charlene L. Nicholls-Nixon and Dave Valliere
Although business incubators are widely used support mechanisms for innovative entrepreneurship, the literature still lacks theoretically based explanations of how the incubation…
Abstract
Purpose
Although business incubators are widely used support mechanisms for innovative entrepreneurship, the literature still lacks theoretically based explanations of how the incubation process creates value for stakeholders. This study aims to address this gap by developing a conceptual model, and related research propositions, that explains how the entrepreneurial logic in use by an incubator influences the incubation process (selection criteria and service offering) and performance.
Design/methodology/approach
Integrating the effectuation and entrepreneurial opportunities literature, which shares common conceptualizations about how the predictability of the future affects entrepreneurial action, the authors posit two archetypes of entrepreneurial logic that are associated with different incubation processes (causal or effectual) and two archetypes of opportunity attributes (discovery- or creation-based) that affect the incubation process needed to support their development.
Findings
Juxtaposing these archetypes, the proposed cross-level conceptual model specifies four levels of fit (ideal, surplus, deficit and mismatch) between the incubation process and the opportunity attributes of individual ventures, which directly influence venture performance (high, moderate and low). In turn, an incubator's performance is largely shaped by the overall performance of ventures in its portfolio.
Originality/value
This paper responds to the call for theory-building that links the antecedents and outcomes of the incubation process across levels of analysis. In addition to developing a conceptual model and research agenda at the intersection of entrepreneurship and business incubation, the proposed model also has implications for incubator directors deciding how to allocate limited resources, and for public/private sector administrators interested in leveraging investment in business incubators.
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Lawyers and political scientists focus upon explicitly religious components of American political polarization. A robust scholarship illuminates the nation's religious history…
Abstract
Lawyers and political scientists focus upon explicitly religious components of American political polarization. A robust scholarship illuminates the nation's religious history. Nevertheless, we fail to appreciate the extent to which conflicting policy preferences are rooted in religiously shaped normative frameworks, or the extent to which scholarship in religious history, sociology, social psychology and culture might be synthesized to inform our understanding of contemporary policy disputes. Like the blind men and the elephant, we encounter different parts of the animal. We see a tree, a wall, a snake – but we fail to apprehend the size, shape and power of the whole elephant.
Nikdokht Ghadiminia, Mohammad Mayouf, Sharon Cox and Jan Krasniewicz
Building information modelling (BIM) creates a golden thread of information of the facility, which proves useful to those with the malicious intent of breaching the security of…
Abstract
Purpose
Building information modelling (BIM) creates a golden thread of information of the facility, which proves useful to those with the malicious intent of breaching the security of the facility. A cyber-attack incurs adverse implications for the facility and its managing organisation. Hence, this paper aims to unravel the impact of a cybersecurity breach, by developing a BIM-facilities management (FM) cybersecurity-risk-matrix to portray what a cybersecurity attack means for various working areas of FM.
Design/methodology/approach
This study commenced with exploring cybersecurity within various stages of a BIM project. This showcased a heightened risk of cybersecurity at the post-occupancy phase. Hence, thematic analysis of two main domains of BIM-FM and cybersecurity in the built environment led to the development of a matrix that illustrated the impact of a cybersecurity attack on a BIM-FM organisation.
Findings
Findings show that the existing approaches to the management of cybersecurity in BIM-FM are technology-dependent, resulting in an over-reliance on technology and a lack of cybersecurity awareness of aspects related to people and processes. This study sheds light on the criticality of cyber-risk at the post-occupancy phase, highlighting the FM areas which will be compromised as a result of a cyber-attack.
Originality/value
This study seeks to shift focus to the people and process aspects of cybersecurity in BIM-FM. Through discussing the interconnections between the physical and digital assets of a built facility, this study develops a cyber-risk matrix, which acts as a foundation for empirical investigations of the matter in future research.
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John Hyland, Maeve Mary Henchion, Oluwayemisi Olomo, Jennifer Attard and James Gaffey
The aim of this paper is to better understand European consumers' behaviour in relation to Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs), so as to provide insights to support their development…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to better understand European consumers' behaviour in relation to Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs), so as to provide insights to support their development as part of a sustainable food system. Specifically, it aims to analyse consumer purchase patterns, motivations and perceived barriers and to identify patterns of behaviour amongst different consumer groups.
Design/methodology/approach
An online consumer survey was conducted in 12 European countries (n = 2,419). Quantitative data analysis, including principal component analysis (PCA) and cluster analysis, was undertaken using SPSS.
Findings
Four consumer clusters are named according to their behavioural stage in terms of SFSC engagement: Unaware Unengaged, Aware Unengaged, Motivationally Engaged and Executively Engaged. Unaware Unengaged and Aware Unengaged are in the non-engagement phase of behaviour. Motivationally Engaged are motivationally activated to engage in the behaviour but fail to do so consistently. Executively Engaged is the fully engaged cluster, being motivated to act and purchasing local food on a frequent basis. The results show an interesting interplay between motivations and barriers, i.e. higher scores for motivations and lower scores for barriers do not necessarily translate into higher purchase frequency.
Originality/value
The research gleans insights into the contextual factors that may inhibit SFSC purchases in different consumer segments. It offers practical implications for policymakers and others seeking to develop SFSCs as part of a sustainable food system.