Entrepreneurial and Small Business Operations Commons^™

Good Governance, Bad Governance: A Refinement And Application Of Key Governance Concepts, Scott L. Mitchell, Mark D. Packard, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Understanding what makes governance 'good' or 'bad' has been impeded by construct ambiguity. Contemporary governance research has struggled to define 'governance' and related constructs such as 'ownership', 'agency', and 'management' in a way that clearly separates and distinguishes them. Often, the line between governance and management is so blurred that it is impossible to say what is good or bad 'governance' versus 'management'. Here we provide a systematic classification of key governance concepts in terms of their distinct economic functions. 'Governance', for instance, is the economic function of behavioural constraint. This allows us to state what 'good' governance is and …

Seeming Ethical Makes You Attractive: Unraveling How Ethical Perceptions Of Ai In Hiring Impacts Organizational Innovativeness And Attractiveness, Serge P. Da Motta Veiga, Maria Figueroa-Armijos, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

More organizations use AI in the hiring process than ever before, yet the perceived ethicality of such processes seems to be mixed. With such variation in our views of AI in hiring, we need to understand how these perceptions impact the organizations that use it. In two studies, we investigate how ethical perceptions of using AI in hiring are related to perceptions of organizational attractiveness and innovativeness. Our findings indicate that ethical perceptions of using AI in hiring are positively related to perceptions of organizational attractiveness, both directly and indirectly via perceptions of organizational innovativeness, with variations depending on the …

Rogue Entrepreneurship, Russ Mcbride, Mark D. Packard, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

We suggest a new category of “rogue entrepreneurship,” that describes entrepreneurial activity where the core business idea violates established or expert consensus, to be contrasted with “conforming entrepreneurship,” where it does not. There are large entrepreneurial rents hidden behind a bulwark of expert consensus that predicts doom for a venture based upon a rogue and unlikely claim. The “rogue” cases, where the predominant assessment context is different from the entrepreneur’s, result in broad skepticism against the entrepreneurial claim. We explain what rogue entrepreneurship is and how it works.

“What important truth do very few people agree with you on? A …

Overcoming The Challenge Of Exploration: How Decompartmentalization Of Internal Communication Enhances The Effect Of Exploration On Employee Inventive Performance, Lin Jiang, Brent B. Clark, Daniel B. Turban

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Drawing upon the notion of boundaryless organizations and upon the information processing perspective of organizational design, we investigate the decompartmentalization of internal communication as a unique organizational context that moderates the relationship between R&D employees’ exploration behaviors and their individual inventive performance. We test our hypotheses using a novel combination of survey and archival data. We find that R&D employees who explore more generate inventions that are more valuable only when in workplaces characterized by high communication decompartmentalization. Such workplaces have more frequent communication between R&D and other units, more employee mobility via cross-unit project rotations, or greater managerial support …

Decentralizing Corporate Governance? A Praxeological Inquiry, Scott L. Mitchell, Mark D. Packard, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

The theory and practice of corporate governance has been in something of an arms race with corporate malefactors—as corporate governance mechanisms have incrementally advance, so too have the strategies of malefactors who skirt those governance practices to engage in costly misconduct. Modern centralized governance approaches appear inapt to filling the gaps caused by agency and knowledge problems. Here, we start afresh using the atypical ‘praxeological’ method to reconstruct governance theory anew from basic foundations. The resultant theory is distinctive from prevailing corporate governance theorizing in several key ways. One of the more important conclusions from our reconstructed theory is that …

Ethical Perceptions Of Ai In Hiring And Organizational Trust: The Role Of Performance Expectancy And Social Influence, Maria Figueroa-Armijos, Brent B. Clark, Serge P. Da Motta Veiga

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) in hiring entails vast ethical challenges. As such, using an ethical lens to study this phenomenon is to better understand whether and how AI matters in hiring. In this paper, we examine whether ethical perceptions of using AI in the hiring process influence individuals’ trust in the organizations that use it. Building on the organizational trust model and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology, we explore whether ethical perceptions are shaped by individual differences in performance expectancy and social influence and how they, in turn, impact organizational trust. We collected primary …

Distinguishing Unpredictability From Uncertainty In Entrepreneurial Action Theory, Ryan W. Angus, Mark D. Packard, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

The traditional view that perceived and archival uncertainty measures are substitutable proxies for “true” environmental (entrepreneurial) uncertainty presumes an “all-seeing eye.” Adopting a representationalist epistemology, we distinguish environmental (objective) unpredictability from entrepreneurs’ subjective uncertainty, which has so far been theoretically confounded. It is, in fact, possible for an entrepreneur to be highly certain despite excessive unpredictability and vice versa. Theoretically distinguishing these constructs has fundamental implications for entrepreneurial action theory. For example, because intentional action is consciously originated, unpredictability influences action only indirectly, while uncertainty has direct effects. Outcomes, on the other hand, are directly affected by the complexity and …

Best Practices For And Outcomes Of Implementing Live Cases In Marketing Courses, Jeff S. Johnson, Shannon Cummins

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose of the Study: This study aims to improve the implementation of live cases (client-based projects) in marketing classrooms. Live cases involve direct interaction between companies and students and can be valuable pedagogical tools improving student learning and skill development. However, live cases can be difficult to implement, creating uncertainty for faculty and possibly tipping the risk-reward balance away from this approach. At present, the preponderance of live case research in marketing has been constrained to small sample sizes, leaving faculty to question whether the implementation insights provided will generalize across different contexts and faculty. Method/Design and Sample: This paper …

So, You Want To Start A Sales Center? An Organizational Learning Approach To Sales Center Formation And Growth, Cindy B. Rippe, Shannon Cummins, Olivia J. Degeorge

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Growth in demand for qualified salespeople has resulted in an increase in both university sales programs and the number of schools that want to transition their programs into sales centers and institutes. Despite this interest, few published articles provide direction on how to plan and launch a sales center. This research examines the views and experiences of existing and aspiring sales center directors to gain deeper insights into the tactics and techniques used for sales center creation and management. Leveraging an organizational learning theory approach, this work uses a mixed-method design to compare aspiring centers’ concerns with the experience and …

Status Consumption And Charitable Donations: The Power Of Empowerment, Sona Klucarova, Xin He

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Status consumption, the act of consuming market offerings aimed at conferring status on the consumer, has often been portrayed as the opposite of charitable donation behavior. In a departure from prior works, this study examines the connection between these two seemingly contradictory behaviors. The results of seven studies (including one in the Supporting Information Appendix) demonstrate that status consumption, considered a self-centered behavior, leads to increased charitable donations, a prosocial outcome. This effect is driven by a process of empowerment (i.e., increase in the sense of power that consumers derive from status consumption). The underlying mechanism of empowerment is examined …

Selling For The Social Good: A Commentary And Extension To Pedagogy Place, Shannon Cummins

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

This paper describes an adaptation of “Social Marketing, Consumer Behavior, and the SDGs” available from the Pedagogy Place website to an introductory sales class. The extension provides an example of how the structure of a macromarketing project can be adapted to every part of the marketing curriculum—even personal selling. The project details how sales skills can be developed using experiential learning while simultaneously providing an opportunity to discuss macromarketing principles and use sales techniques toward sustainability goals and societal good.

Objection Practice Using A Live Appointment-Setting Call With Professionals, Shannon Cummins

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Getting students comfortable with responding to customer objections is a challenge. This assignment introduces students to objection response using a live role-play conducted with professionals over the phone. The project typically takes 3 weeks to complete and is an excellent way to deliver value to professional partners or involve alumni in a time-efficient and location neutral manner. The project works equally well in-person or online. Results show that students participating in the live role-play call have higher actual and perceived learning regarding objection response techniques. Additionally, students who participate are more likely to receive a job or internship offer due …

Research Productivity Of Management Faculty: Job Demands-Resources Approach, Chet E. Barney, Brent B. Clark, Serge P. Da Motta Veiga

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose

The main purpose of this study was to examine which job resources are most valuable for research productivity, depending on varying teaching demands.

Design/methodology/approach

Data was collected from 324 management faculty at research, balanced and teaching (i.e. respectively low-, moderate- and high-teaching demands) public universities in the United States.

Findings

Results showed that no single job resource predicted research productivity across all three types of schools. At research schools (i.e. low-teaching demands), productivity was positively associated with job resources including summer compensation, level of protection for untenured faculty and number of research assistant hours, while negatively associated with travel …

Do Masks Matter? Consumer Perceptions Of Social Media Influencers Who Wear Face Masks Amid The Covid-19 Pandemic, Sona Klucarova

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

The rapid spread of COVID-19 brought about an increased use of face masks among the general public. Focusing on disposable surgical masks in particular, this article examines consumer perceptions of and intentions toward social media influencers who wear such masks amid the pandemic. Drawing on the theory of product symbolism, this research experimentally demonstrates that masked (vs. unmasked) influencers remind consumers of highly competent healthcare professionals, leading in turn to greater competence inferences about and more favorable behavioral intentions toward these influencers. Additional analysis demonstrates that this effect might not hold for other groups of professionals who are considered relatively …

The Effects Of Political Ideology And Brand Familiarity On Conspicuous Consumption Of Fashion Products, Ganga S. Urumutta Hewage, Sona Klucarova, Laura Boman

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

From the lens of conspicuous consumption, this research examines the interactive effect of brand logo size and political ideology on consumers’ intentions toward fashion products. Specifically, in a series of four studies, we address how consumer political ideology influences intentions toward items displaying smaller, inconspicuous logos versus larger, conspicuous logos for unfamiliar and familiar brands. We show that liberal consumers are more likely to prefer a large (rather than small) logo when a brand is unfamiliar. We suggest that liberals’ greater desire for product uniqueness elevates their risk propensity, which in turn increases preference for conspicuous consumption when familiarity with …

The Impact Of Live Cases On Student Skill Development In Marketing Courses, Shannon Cummins, Jeff S. Johnson

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Live cases, where students work directly with an outside organization to solve real-world problems, can be an immersive learning experience for marketing students. Current scholarship on live case usage in marketing is limited to small samples from a handful of live case devotees. This article draws from a large, international sample of 169 marketing educators to investigate the perceived educational impacts of live cases on student skill development. Specifically, the paper explores student teamwork, conflict handling, time management, presentation, communication, and critical thinking skills. Additionally, the article explores how student skill development is affected by the amount of course time …

Keynes And Knight On Uncertainty: Peas In A Pod Or Chalk And Cheese?, Mark D. Packard, Per L. Bylund, Brent B. Clark

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

For many years, the ideas of Knight and Keynes have been widely understood to overlap greatly and they are presumed to have developed notions of uncertainty that deeply intersect, both describing a state where outcomes have non-probabilistic likelihoods. Furthermore, even their political philosophies are historically somewhat homogenised, both considered ‘liberals’. We critically review the historical records and writings of these key scholars with the purpose of dehomogenising their political philosophies, scientific epistemologies and their famous works on uncertainty, published in the same year—1921. We show that neither Keynes nor Knight has been considered fairly by history. Keynes, far from a …

The Oversharenting Paradox: When Frequent Parental Sharing Negatively Affects Observers’ Desire To Affiliate With Parents, Sona Klucarova, Jonathan Hasford

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Modern-day parents increasingly engage in sharing of their children’s information and photos on social media. However, when parents post about their children on social media with high frequency, the phenomenon of “oversharenting” occurs. This research explores the impact of oversharenting on others’ desire to affiliate with parents. While parents post about their children to socialize with others, three experimental studies conducted with U.S. residents recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk demonstrate that parents who oversharent are viewed as less desirable acquaintances than parents who do not. This effect is mediated by observers’ perception that oversharenting constitutes a social norm violation (Study …

Understanding Students’ Decision-Making Process When Considering A Sales Career: A Comparison Of Models Pre- And Post-Exposure To Sales Professionals In The Classroom, Shannon Cummins, James W. Peltier

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Businesses face a challenge recruiting and maintaining a high-quality salesforce. Increasingly, recruiting focus for entry-level sales positions has turned to university business students and sales centers. Unfortunately, research shows that most students have persistent negative misconceptions about professional sales careers and there is little research examining comprehensive and structured decision-making frameworks used by students when evaluating a sales career. This paper develops and tests an integrative framework that maps students’ decision-making process to their intention to pursue a sales career. Specifically, we examine how perceived sales knowledge, perceptions of selling ethics, perceptions of salespeople, and perceptions of the selling profession …

Why Do Many Consumers Prefer To Pay Now When They Could Pay Later?, Arvind Agrawal, James W. Gentry

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Payment timing is conceptualized as a payment characteristic useful in explaining motivations to prefer payment types. Cash, debit cards, and online banking represent consumers' preferences to pay now, while credit cards and loans represent the inclination to pay later. Based on a grounded theory study, a payment‐timing model is developed to theorize consumers' choices of payment types with differences in payment timing. The model presents four motivations for payment‐timing preferences: (1) the extent of rewards salience, (2) the perception of financial stress, (3) adopting heuristics for money management, and (4) the influence of perceived financial ability. Consumers choose payment‐timing options …

Should Donation Ads Include Happy Victim Images? The Moderating Role Of Regulatory Focus, Yael Zemack-Rugar, Sona Klucarova

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

We examine how victim imagery interacts with ad messaging’s regulatory focus to determine the effectiveness of donation appeals. We predict and show that ads that combine a happy victim image with a promotion-focused message uniquely increase donation intentions. We demonstrate that this occurs because the combination of promotion-focused messaging, which makes gain goals salient, and a happy victim image, which signals gains are occurring, increases consumers’ perceived response efficacy. Four studies test the interaction of victim imagery and regulatory focus showing the predicted effect. We also test the mediating role of perceived response efficacy and rule out several alternative explanations. …

Recruiting Sales Students: The Value Of Professionals In The Classroom, Blake Nielson, Shannon Cummins

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

It can be difficult for employers to recruit sales students because of the supply/demand gap. This is true despite increases in university sales education programs. This study investigates the impact of a sales organization representative giving an in-class presentation about student intent to pursue employment at the organization. The results indicate that a quality in-class presentation can improve students’ desire to work for the organization, but an average in-class presentation or shorter extracurricular presentation had no positive effect. These results imply that an in-class presentation should be taken seriously and done well in order to positively impact the recruitment process.

Congruence Between Course Modality And Professor Communication: A Study Of Pedagogical Impact Using Sales Techniques, Cindy B. Rippé, Suri Weisfeld-Spolter, Shannon Cummins, Yuliya Yurova

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose of the Study: Given the similarities between influencing others when teaching and when selling, this work explores student perceptions of selling techniques used by professors. This work investigates faculty instructional methods informed by the prospecting and follow-up sales process’s steps to positively affect student perceptions, and to attract and retain students in online and traditional formats. Selling efforts are developed, described, and examined to see how prospecting and follow-up can be used to increase course learning, retention, and subsequent course enrollment.

Method/Design and Sample: The study used a 2 (Professor Communication Type: Face-to-face vs. Virtual) by 2 …

Using The Sales Process As An Instructional Tool To Improve Student Perceptions Of Instructor Responsiveness, Pedagogical Affect, And Likelihood To Enroll: An Abstract, Cindy B. Rippe, Shannon Cummins, Suri Weisfeld-Spolter, Yuliya Yurova

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Using Sales Competition Videos In A Principles Of Marketing Class To Improve Interest In A Sales Career, Shannon Cummins, Terry Loe, James W. Peltier

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose of the Study: This study describes an easily conducted teaching innovation to enhance introductory marketing students’ perception of sales and selling. Sales jobs are plentiful; yet, many marketing students do not pursue sales courses or sales careers. Our purpose is to describe a classroom intervention that improves students’ intent to pursue a sales career.

Method/Design and Sample: This study tests the classroom inclusion of an actual student sales competition video from the National Collegiate Sales Competition (NCSC) to provide visual as well as verbal learning stimuli. Following a 45 minute lecture on sales, students were exposed to …

Tons: A Guide To Teaching On-Line Sales Courses, Cindy B. Rippé, Suri Weisfeld-Spolter, Shannon Cummins, Barbara Dastoor

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose of the Study: This study describes a creative solution to teaching on-line sales(TONS). On-line education is increasingly in demand; yet, many sales instructors are unsure of how to transfer this interactive, skills-based course from face-to-face to an on-line format. The on-line course is described in detail, with weekly topics, assignments, rubrics, and teaching materials available. The skills-based active learning format develops student knowledge and know-how while building to a final project. Importantly, the technological and time considerations for instructors are kept to a minimum.

Method/Design and Sample: This study tests the use of the on-line TONS teaching …

Omni-Channel Research Framework In The Context Of Personal Selling And Sales Management: A Review And Research Extensions, Shannon Cummins, James W. Peltier, Andrea Dixon

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Purpose

This paper aims to develop an omni-channel framework in the context of sales and sales management related to six areas: sales contexts, impact of technology, stages in the sales process, impact on relationships, impact on firm performance and the role of various communication tools and platforms. The paper also offers future reach needs in each of these areas.

Design/methodology/approach

Literature review and research needs development.

Findings

Research in omni-channel marketing in the context of sales and sales management is virtually silent. The authors identify key research gaps and offer recommended future research opportunities.

Originality/value

To date, little research in …

Evaluating Educational Practices For Positively Affecting Student Perceptions Of A Sales Career, Shannon Cummins, James W. Peltier, Nadia Pomirleanu, James Cross, Rob Simon

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Despite demand for new graduates seeking a sales position, student reticence toward pursuing a sales career remains. While all students will not choose a sales career, diminishing the existence of sales-related misconceptions among the student population should establish sales as a viable career path for a larger number of students. We test six educational interventions in large Principle of Marketing classes from three different universities (n = 1,355) to help identify educational practices for reducing student reticence toward a career in sales. Our results show that while all six educational approaches raise students’ perceptions and interest in a selling …

The Ranking Of Contractors To The U.S. Department Of Defense According To Integrated Power Blocs Among The Contractors, F. Gregory Hayden, Elliot G. Campbell, Shannon Cummins

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

Knowledge about the power and misbehavior of defense contractors is substantial; yet their power continues to grow in full view of a record of waste, fraud, corrupt activity, and the failure to perform contracts. The knowledge base about defense contractors has not been sufficient to effectively oppose their extensive power. Knowledge is needed about how the boards of directors of the defense corporations are interlocked. That work is initiated in this article by ranking the top defense contractors in terms of the number of power blocs to which the corporations belong in the defense contractors' power-bloc network.

Consumer Behavior In The Online Context, Shannon Cummins, James W. Peltier, John A. Schibrowsky, Alexander Nill

Marketing & Entrepreneurship Faculty Publications

The purpose of this article is to review the consumer behavior and social network theory literature related to the online and e-commerce context.

Design/methodology/approach

To conduct the review, the authors draw on a sample of 942 articles published from 1993 to 2012 addressing consumer behavior or social network issues in the online or social media context. The sample is analyzed by both era (incubation, expansion and explosion) and primary topic.

Findings

Eight categories of online consumer behavior research are described. In the order from largest to smallest, these are: cognitive issues, user-generated content, Internet demographics and segmentation, online usage, cross …