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Examines how Activity‐based Management (ABM) counters the root causes of the failure of quality initiatives. Claims the failures could be largely mitigated by the additional visibility of the costs and benefits of doing things in a TQ way, provided by the use of activity‐based management techniques. Contends that great care is required in the design of an activity database. Considers the development of activity‐based techniques. Concludes that total quality and activity‐based management are derived from different origins to meet different needs but that they are highly complementary. Contends that together they can make a major contribution to the removal of barriers to success in the implementation of quality improvement initiatives.

To augment sales revenue, B2B digital start-ups aim to create and sustain commercial relationships with industry incumbents. However, since these incumbents have traditionally struggled with implementing disruptive digital artifacts, most studies have almost exclusively concentrated on their challenges, leaving the digital start-ups' side underexplored. Therefore, this study seeks to understand how digital start-ups navigate digital implementation (DI) hardships to ultimately achieve digital entrepreneurship success.

An abductive explanatory multi-case study of four industries that pose a variety of implementation challenges for B2B digital start-ups (agriculture, insurance, real estate and construction, and healthcare) was conducted using data collected from 40 interviews with Israeli experts and relevant digital data observations.

This study articulates two main observations. (1) Throughout their journeys, digital start-ups have utilized newly created and/or refined dynamic capabilities (DC) to successfully implement their digital artifacts. Simultaneously, successful DI has enabled digital start-ups to create new DC or sustain and evolve current DC. (2) We provide empirical evidence outlining how digital start-ups using continuous learning have combined causation and effectuation logic throughout their DI journeys.

This study answers a call to explore more explicit digital-related drivers (i.e. DI) for digital entrepreneurship success by studying a highly-ranked country on the Global Entrepreneurship Index (GEI) to achieve this. Moreover, it illustrates how digital start-ups evolve throughout their commercial relationships with industry incumbents, thereby enabling an effective approach for successful DI. Such an approach can be considered very valuable for both practitioners and policymakers. Consequently, it advances digital entrepreneurship as an independent research topic.

The objective, sustenance and reward of research is information. But information does not yet grow on trees nor through the agency of monoclonal antibodies. It requires careful harvesting, winnowing and dissemination, albeit with electronic tools.

This study was concerned with relationships between selected candidate characteristics and both candidates' immediate reactions to interviews and interviewers' evaluations of them. Candidates' self‐reported academic performance was unrelated to their immediate reactions to interviews. Candidates whose academic performance was poor were judged to be weak candidates by interviewers. Interviewers also saw these candidates as less intelligent. Candidates who came from working class background were more highly motivated to succeed and also tended to be more anxious before interviews. However, social class background was unrelated to interviewer judgments. There were a number of relationships between candidates' recollections of their affective responses during past interviews and their immediate reactions to the interviews studied here. Compared with other candidates, those who had disliked being interviewed in the past were more anxious and less confident about their interviews and also liked interviewers less personally. These negative affective responses were also associated with poor evaluations from interviewers.

This chapter analyses the marketing management practices for the video games industry in Turkey. To identify the extended value chains and define the critical success factors in this local environment, we invited the members of OYUNDER – Game Developers, Designers and Publishers Association in Turkey – to participate in an online survey. The following three main research questions guided this survey: (1) How video game developer companies resolve marketing decisions, decide on their marketing mix and create marketing plans; (2) how they perceive the importance given to marketing in their industry and (3) how they measure and judge the success of their marketing activities. Results indicate that Turkish video game developers are predominantly male and young. They organise and work in small teams. They lack marketing planning as indicated by actualised versus expected revenues and marketing spendings. Only 23.7% of the participants report employing marketing-related staff and their opinions of marketing-related business partners – such as advertising and PR agencies – are negative due to these institutions’ perceived lack of industry experience. The developers mainly use social media channels and digital advertising for their marketing needs. Above-the-line advertising is the least used channel, with content, influencer and below-the-line marketing channels ranging in the middle. They report confidence in managing campaigns for social media, digital marketing and content marketing. However, they believe that they lack the skills to manage above-the-line and below-the-line marketing activities, reporting lack of capital and human resources as the main barriers. Although they believe that marketing can help them reach new customers, they are also afraid to take risks and admit to being conservative in marketing practices.

While the much‐maligned saying, “Business as usual,” has its imperative and very necessary application to the upholding of our commerce and financial position during the war, one is inclined to ask those patriots who day in and day out decry the loyalty of thousands who are carrying a double and sometimes even a treble burden to keep business going, what is to be done if the country is exhausted by the drying up of her resources, and the ruin of her industries, we cannot but feel that the time has come for all of us to put to ourselves the enquiry as to where our own duty lies? Many who have not the physical fitness or strength for the actual fighting line might yet, we believe, find room in the direct service of the State. We have a splendid list of men who, greatly loving home and honour, have sacrificed position and given themselves for service abroad. Are there not others who are great enough to follow in their train? The large places may be already filled, but the strain on the country intensifies month by month, and we can only come to full self‐realisation as the very thought of self is slain, and the splendid spirit in the line, “Who dies if England lives?” enters into our own hearts.

Services are inherently intangible, and high on experience as well as credence quality. To promote services effectively, a service provider must go beyond mere creation of awareness. There is a need to induce trial so that consumers are able to assess the experience and credence qualities. In addition, the notion of timing in the consumption process also plays a key role, i.e. pertinent information about the service at the appropriate time. These issues are empirically investigated in a higher educational setting, with a focus on learning augmentation services. The results indicate that although consumer interest increases with awareness, the increase in interest is even higher when awareness is coupled with trial. This study also indicates that interest in a service is a function of timing in the overall service consumption cycle. Finally, interest in service items offered is positively associated with the overall interest in the service provider. Promotion planners and brand managers need to take these into account for an efficient and effective promotional plan.

SMEs could achieve their innovation goals, either through exploitation, exploratory, or ambidextrous learning strategies. This study presents ambidexterity as a more effective and efficient strategy that offers superior innovation advantage to SMEs. We also present the role of openness in this relationship.

Empirical analysis was based on 388 SMEs in Ghana. Various validity and reliability checks were conducted before the presentation of the actual analysis, which was conducted using Ordinary Least Squares approach, run using SPSS (v. 20).

Findings indicate that although exploitative and exploratory learning strategies individually had a positive significant effect on SMEs' innovation performance, organizational learning ambidexterity was found to have a greater positive impact on innovation performance among SMEs. High levels of openness further boosted the effect of organizational learning ambidexterity on SMEs’ innovation performance.

This study was conducted without recourse to some specific factors that could influence organizational learning ambidexterity among SMEs. Future studies should thus pay particular attention to the determinants of organizational learning ambidexterity among SMEs.

Innovation performance is very critical for the sustainability of firms, and SMEs in particular. Management of SMEs must therefore seek to simultaneously adopt both learning strategies, as that gives firms greater advantage, compared to the adoption of only one strategy.

The study demonstrates that organizational learning ambidexterity had a superior effect on SMEs' innovation performance. High levels of openness further boosted the effect of organizational learning ambidexterity on SMEs' innovation performance.

EVERY OTHER MONTH the Institute of Directors writes to a representative section of its membership, 200 in all. They are asked their opinion of the economy in general and how the immediate future looks to them.