Filipe Almeida

The Influence of Culture on Negotiati on Styles of Brazilian Executives

Culture profoundly influences how people think, communicate, and behave. Successful cross‐cultural negotiations require an understanding of the negotiation style of those on the other side of the table, and the acceptance and respect of their cultural beliefs and norms. The focus of this paper is to identify the styles of negotiation that tend to be adopted by Brazilian negotiators. Participants were 683 experienced negotiators from 22 Brazilian states. The Brazilian style of negotiation is described based on seven culturally sensitive dimensions that are present in negotiations: the nature of the activity, the role of the individual, uncertainty and time, communication, trust, protocol, and outcomes.

A Ética dos Alunos de Administração e de Economia no Ensino Superior

Academic fraud committed by higher education students is a problem with institutional and social ramifications, with undesired effects on labor market efficiency and compromising societal trust in organizations, and is especially serious for future managers. This paper studies the attitudes business and economics students have towards academic fraud, their perceptions of the frequency and gravity of the various types of fraud by committed by fellow students, and their opinions on factors that motivate or inhibit it. The paper proposes a new four-dimensional framework for analyzing fraud and proposes two new indicators to evaluate predisposition to commit fraud (PCF) and to evaluate predisposition to denounce fraud (PDF). Empirically, 1,276 students from Portuguese universities were surveyed using a new projective questionnaire, which was answered in person in the classroom. Results show that the highest incidence of fraud is associated with written exam assessment and that denunciation is almost non-existent. Buying and selling academic work is seen as the most condemnable fraudulent behavior. Higher PCF is found among the worst students and those less committed to their course or university. The primary reason for ethical misconduct is related to academic achievement and the main factor preventing it is dissuasion.

Emoções, inteligência e negociação: um estudo empírico sobre a percepção dos gerentes portugueses

The research on negotiation in business environment has been focused mainly in the negotiation processes and decision making issues, neglecting the role of personal characteristics. Recent research has drawn attention to the impact of the negotiator intelligence on negotiation outcomes. This paper aims to analyze the importance of Cognitive Intelligence and Emotional Intelligence on business context negotiations. For this purpose, it was conducted an empirical research on the perceptions of top management executives of the 500 largest Portuguese companies, inquiring about the importance of personal characteristics and emotion on negotiation outcomes. Results show that managers emphasize cognitive over emotional aspects. It is also suggested that the control of emotions and their visibility have a positive impact on negotiators success, even though emotional manipulation is disapproved as a negotiation tactic. This study has descriptive and exploratory purposes, contributing to develop foundations for future research that explores the role of emotion and intelligence in negotiation.

The Psychological and Structural Determinants of Technology Integration in Organizations: An Empirical Study

The integration of information and communication technologies in a business context is currently an unquestionable strategic demand; however, companies do not always reveal identical information technology (IT) adoption levels. This paper addresses the manager’s attitude toward technology and the organizational structure as factors that may influence technological integration in a business context. The relationships among these variables are tested with a sample of Portuguese companies. Results support the hypothesis of manager’s attitude toward technology having an influence over the IT adoption level. However, the organizational structure adaptability seems not to have any influence on that same level. The results are discussed in light of current theory. This paper aims to highlight the important role of psychological and structural determinants in new technologies adoption processes in modern organizations.

Sustainability Skills: The Case of a Portuguese University

Based on the state of the art on universities and sustainability, an attempt was made to understand the development of a Portuguese university on the perspective of sustainability, by analyzing the necessary skills for such sustainability. The design used for this research was the case study design. The data collection occurred between September and November 2014, and a data collection protocol elaborated from the theory on sustainability in universities was used. Through observations, interview and analysis of documents as evidence sources, the most expressive results highlight that the University of Coimbra—UC uses sustainability concepts that go beyond teaching and learning. The institution aims to develop, through programs, contests to gather ideas from students and business consultancies, a philosophy that would emerge from the sustainability skills inside the campus, curriculum and community. Through the environmental management of the campus, UC promotes energy savings, preservation of resources, waste reduction, preservation of the property, gas and water as to the energy efficiency plan, and the creation of new courses for sustainable development. It is observed that the university has the efficient sustainability skills as to the analyzed dimensions, and they were monitored as to its goals and programs. With lower emphasis, due to the secular characteristics, the sustainability actions occur on the structures that require alternatives to meet new sustainability concepts, which have been introduced into green universities.

Effective managerial performance and education: towards closing the gaps

Desired performance-related characteristics for entry-level managers are studied from the perspective of 106 Portuguese executives. The results indicate that soft characteristics and skills, such us leadership, entrepreneurship and organisational learning skills, appear to be more important than technical skills. While these skills and characteristics are valued by todays business organisations, the educational system does not appear to be preparing its graduates accordingly. The resulting educational gaps have important performance-related implications to both the business organisations and the higher education institutions.

RUMO A UM MARKETING CONTRATUAL

Este artigo aborda as praticas de administracao de produtos e desenvolvimento de novos produtos na pequena empresa. Ele discorre sobre as formas de identificacao de produtos, estrategias de marca, grau de diversificacao de produtos, sistematica de controle da qualidade, embalagem, servicos de apoio ao produto, atividades de desenvolvimento de produtos e metodos de analise do desempenho de produtos. A populacao-alvo da pesquisa foi constituida de 22 empresas de pequeno porte, do setor industrial, do ramo de confeccao, fornecedoras de bens de consumo, da cidade de Joinville/SC. Notadamente no que se refere a administracao de produtos e desenvolvimento de novos produtos, a pesquisa revelou que as pequenas empresas, em sua maioria, praticam marketing, embora muitas vezes o facam de maneira informal, nao planejada, nao consciente, nao estruturada e nao utilizem integralmente todas as possibilidades que o marketing lhes oferece para melhorar seu desempenho.A fidelizacao dos clientes tornou-se a prioridade das estrategias de marketing. O marketing relacional preocupou-se em construir relacoes fortes e duradouras com seus clientes, com base numa perspectiva pessoal e emocional. A teoria dos custos de transacao criou o cenario para o aparecimento de uma nova abordagem de marketing. O marketing contratual e proposto como uma nova perspectiva que proporciona todo um conjunto de praticas suscetiveis de criar barreiras a saida dos clientes e de conduzir a relacoes tendencialmente contratuais. O mercado de bens industriais continua a revelar-se pioneiro nestas praticas, onde a certificacao e as auditorias de qualidade constituem uma nova via para alicercar as estrategias de marketing e garantir a solidificacao das relacoes fornecedores/clientes