Recent interest in the growth of subcontracting, as part of a broader trend towards greater 'flexibility' in forms of employment relationship, has not as yet been matched by a full consideration of its organizational and managerial implications. In particular, the question of whether or not...

Purpose - Although dysfunctional behaviors by customers is increasingly being recognized by both scholars and practitioners, "illegitimate" complaining, in the form of fraudulent returns by customers, is under-researched. The aim of this study is to address this gap in extant knowledge through...

Science Parks (adjacent to universities) provide an important resource network for technology-based firms. To ascertain the 'added value' of a Science Park location the innovativeness (with regard to a variety of 'input' as well as 'output' measures) of independent technology-based Science Park...

Studies of small firms tend to assume either that models derived from large firms can be applied directly or that small firms are uniformly distinct from large ones. A recent framework, based mainly on low-wage family-owned firms, has identified an analytical space to identify different types of...

This thesis examines graphic trade cards in eighteenth-century consumer cultures in Britain, France and North America. Trade cards were single-sheet commercial notices promoting the names and locations of individual trades-people alongside the goods and services they supplied. They formed part...

The influence and role of time in consumer behaviour is a domain that has recently received increasing – albeit incomplete – attention in the consumer research literature. Such acknowledgement of the growing appreciation of a time dimension in a range of consumer-related phenomena clearly...

With companies being exhorted to become more strategically agile and internally connected,this article examines the role of the Senior Strategy Director, the executive tasked specifically with internal strategy. In particular, it explores what they do, what specific capabilities they deploy to...

While many frameworks of service dynamics assume that consumers will not intentionally disrupt service encounters, a growing body of studies argues that dysfunctional customer behaviors are far from rare. Although a number of studies have explored such behaviors, deliberate fraudulent returning...

Purpose - The creation of a target market strategy is integral to developing an effective business strategy. The concept of market segmentation is often cited as pivotal to establishing a target market strategy, yet all too often business-to-business marketers utilise little more than trade...

Relationship marketing (RM), the idea of establishing, maintaining and developing long-term customer relationships, is considered as one of the most important aspects for business success. This study focuses on the upper-end of relationship management, which is primarily concerned with...