Darin W. White

The Impact of Marketing Strategy Creation Style on the Formation of a Climate of Trust in a Retail Franchise Setting

Purpose – It is the purpose of this study to demonstrate theoretically and empirically how the marketing strategy creation style implemented by a channel leader in a franchise system impacts the overall climate of trust within the channel system. Specifically, this study seeks to answer two important research questions: should franchisors direct franchisees in prescribed behaviors, or should the franchisees be allowed to play a more fundamental role in the strategy‐making process? How does this decision affect the overall level of trust within the franchise system relationship?Design/methodology/approach – The paper investigates the impact of four common strategy‐making styles in a study of 244 fast food franchise businesses and compares the findings with those previously obtained in other settings.Findings – Support was found for the hypotheses, which stated that the channel climate of franchise systems implementing the symbolic, generative, or transactive modes of strategy‐making would be characterized ...

Academic Performance in MBA Programs: Do Prerequisites Really Matter?

Many researchers have examined criteria used in Master of Business Administration (MBA) admissions decisions. However, prior research has not examined predictive ability of undergraduate prerequisite courses in core business disciplines. The authors investigated whether undergraduate prerequisite courses predicted MBA success by analyzing the outcomes of 491 MBA graduates. The results revealed students who lacked business prerequisite courses performed better in MBA grade point average (GPA) than students who took prerequisites. Additionally, performance in undergraduate written composition is positively correlated with MBA GPA. Moreover, performance in undergraduate marketing, economics, and business statistics courses are significant predictors of MBA GPA. Finally, the authors found undergraduate GPA predicted MBA success.

The Effects of Hardiness and Cultural Distance on Sociocultural Adaptation in an Expatriate Sales Manager Population

International corporations are increasingly concerned about expatriate executive attrition. There is an urgent need to develop methods for identifying the antecedents to successful expatriate performance. In choosing sales managers for international assignments, special attention should be paid to the candidate’s psychological hardiness and cultural distance between the home and host countries. An empirical study was conducted based on 544 responses from expatriate sales managers originating from 62 countries who are serving in 77 different countries around the globe. Using hierarchical regression, the authors tested main effects of both cultural distance and psychological hardiness on the sales manager’s ability to adapt to a new cultural environment. In addition, psychological hardiness was tested as a moderator of the relationship between cultural distance and sociocultural adaptation. Results suggest that practitioners now include both scales as determinants for justification when selecting expatriate sales assignments. Practically speaking, with both global cultural distance and hardiness scores in hand, companies can better select appropriate personnel who will be able to cope with cultural differences in international placements. Finally, this research provides the first known scholarly study of psychological hardiness in the marketing and sales literature.

From the Follower’s Viewpoint: A Configurational Approach to the Ideal Academic Leader

These studies examine the context-specific differences in implicit leadership theory (ILT)—based conceptualizations (i.e., perceptual configurations) of the ideal academic leader in two contexts: private and public universities. Specifically, the authors measured the perceived importance of leadership abilities and traits among university faculty followers (i.e., non—department heads and non-deans) to reveal the ILTs of academic followers and how the ILTs influence these faculty perceptions depending on university context (i.e., private vs. public university context). The studies were conducted within academic business units, and they examined the faculties’ conceptualizations of the ideal academic leader (e.g., department head or dean) among more than 500 business school members from more than 220 universities. Conceptualizations of the ideal academic leader varied substantially across private and public contexts, indicating that the leadership characteristics desired by faculty followers are context specific. Implications of the findings and directions for future research are discussed.

The Impact of Environmental Uncertainty on Strategy Creation Style in a Franchise Channel Setting

It is the purpose of this study to demonstrate theoretically and empirically how various macro environmental variables interact to impact on strategy-making styles in the highly dynamic franchise channel segment. Drawing on an integrative strategy-making process typology, the author argues that the use of particular strategy creation styles by upper management is likely to be partially driven by variables outside the firms direct control. Additionally, it is argued that certain strategy-making processes are used more commonly in franchise channel settings than in more traditional contexts. The author investigates the pervasiveness of each of the four strategy-making styles in a study of 188 fast food franchise business and compares the findings to those previously obtained in other settings. Findings pertaining to the studys hypotheses provide insights into the relative effectiveness of the four strategy creation styles (in terms of channel partner satisfaction and business financial performance) and th...

Service Performance and Procedural Justice: The Mediating Roles of Family Life Cycle and Culture

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine how service performance and procedural justice are related and how this relationship is moderated by family life cycle (FLC) and culture. While it has long been assumed that customer perceptions of fair treatment by service providers are related to service quality perceptions, there has been little research that explicitly examines this relationship. Previous research has established that justice is an influential antecedent of behavior and attitudes in many different settings.Design/methodology/approach – Using a 42‐item survey instrument combining the SERVPERF scale, a procedural justice scale and several demographic measures, responses were obtained from 717 individuals from Central and Eastern Europe and the USA. A 2×2 factorial design was used to evaluate the relationship between service performance and justice perceptions, and the moderating impacts of FLC position and culture on these perceptions.Findings – Strong evidence was found to support the n...

Red Devils, Royals, and the River Thames The ambassadorial role of sports in heightening country-of-origin image

Purpose – Previous research has solidly demonstrated that successful sports teams and athletes can sway purchase behavior and other critical outcomes (Braunstein-Minkove et al.; McEvoy; Bush et al.). The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact that a globally prominent sports team can have on perceptions of the country by foreigners. The importance of a countrys image as a cue in consumer choice behavior is well recognized in the business literature. However, relatively little empirical research has been done in determining what factors influence the formation of country-of-origin (COO) image in the minds of potential consumers and tourists. The paper theorizes that loyalty and viewership of a countrys sports team will be a significant predictor of COO image. Design/methodology/approach – In all, 951 individuals from four different countries were surveyed to determine their loyalty and viewership of Manchester United Football Club and their perceptions of the geographic home of the team. Findings...

In the Eye of the Beholder: A Configurational Analysis of Followers’ Conceptualizations of the Ideal Academic Department Leader at Private Universities

This paper examines followers’ conceptualizations of the ideal business department leader within private universities. Using an internet survey of 273 faculty members and 31 department leaders from 59 private, non-ivy league universities, this paper examines how faculty members and department leaders conceptualize the ideal leader in terms of abilities and traits, and investigates the measures by which they define departmental success. A principal components analysis is utilized to identify the underlying cognitive framework of these abilities, traits, and success measures from both the faculty member and department leader perspective. The results indicate that faculty members desire equity rather than personalized treatment, and the measures by which business faculty and administrators define departmental success reflect the best interests of the institution in which they are employed. Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.

Trends in sport sponsorship evaluation and measurement: insights from the industry

With sponsorship spending surpassing

Personal Cultural Orientation, Destination Brand Equity and Revisit Intention: Implications for Destination Branding in Latin America

60 billion on a global basis, more emphasis is being placed on the application of advanced methodological approaches to improve understanding of the returns firms receive from their investment in sponsorship. To that end, within this issue are several innovative, novel papers that break new ground on the topic of sponsorship return on investment (ROI). The papers featured in this issue utilize several cutting-edge experimental and quantitative approaches in investigations of sponsorship ROI across various international perspectives, including Germany, Norway, Spain, and the US. For example, electroencephalogram and eye tracking were utilized by researchers in Spain and Germany to evaluate the influence of color and congruence. Innovative experimental designs were employed by researchers in the US to better understand the impact that implicit memory and identification have on the effectiveness of sponsor exposure on television. Advanced quantitative approaches were used to ascertain the impact that doping scandals and ambush marketing have on returns for sponsors. Given the journal’s focus of bridging the gap between academia and industry, we also thought this was an opportune time to empanel a distinguished group of industry experts to provide the latest perspectives on sponsorship measurement, evaluation, and ROI, including: