Investigaciones Europeas de Direccion y Economia de la Empresa最新文献

Due to the continuous growing of information exchange in the Internet, commercial web sites have started to include online tools to allow consumer interaction in them. Thus, when visiting these commercial web sites, consumers may consider not only e-retailer information (marketing communication) but also purchase and use experiences shared by other consumers (electronic word-of-mouth). This study focuses on the role of information included in a commercial web site in the improvement of the relationship with customers and the promotion of the e-retailer's products through electronic word-of-mouth. The results of the structural equations model based on commercial web sites’ users suggest that marketing communication and electronic word-of-mouth positively affect the levels of affective commitment, whereas trust can only be affected by the degree of marketing communication. Finally, trust influences on commitment, and this in turn would directly affects the level of electronic positive word-of-mouth.

In the current economic crisis accurate assessment of the efficiency of the online strategy implemented by companies is a crucial issue. This paper proposes a number of indicators for the evaluation of the websites of companies all over the world.

Our research examines the manual and automatic evaluation of a series of objective variables concerning website. To obtain the indicators we applied a factor analysis to the relevant variables.

The Quantitative Web Quality Index is a versatile tool that permit us to compare any kind of organizations and detect the strong and weak points of the company's website.

e-Government development requires a good knowledge of both users’ expectations and all the factors that may strength users’ adoption of the technology. Chan et al. (2010) proposed several variables that could act as antecedents of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model's components in the context of compulsory use environments. The present research addresses the validity of such antecedents when one is dealing with a free use environment instead that with a compulsory one. The methodology is based in building up a structural equation model by means of the PLS technique. Our findings show that the expectations about the result to be obtained and the effort expectations held by the user affect significantly the intention of use of the e-Government platform. In turn, the intention of use and the facilitating conditions have an influence on actual use of the platform. Furthermore, we found that convenience, assistance, trust and avoidance of personal interaction play important roles in terms of UTAUT model's antecedents.

The relationships between different types of cooperation and rivalry and product innovation are examined in this article, differentiating between new and established companies. The hypotheses proposed suggest different patterns of cooperation. For new companies, the most effective types of cooperation are those which can lower costs and reduce risks (small and medium size companies, other new companies, financial bodies and knowledge centres). On the other hand, established companies may benefit more by cooperating with other established companies. Furthermore, the relationship between intense rivalry and product innovation is stronger for established companies than for new ones. The results obtained, using a sample of 3,528 companies in geographical clusters of 32 European countries, confirm the established hypotheses in general terms. These results have interesting implications for research into entrepreneurship, cooperation and competitive dynamics.

The design of qualifications around professional profiles and steering teaching towards the acquisition of competences are 2 major challenges targeted by the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). This study analyses the importance given by teachers to knowledge of a second language in Business Organisation matters in Business Management and Administration (BMA) and Engineering studies in the European context. As its basis, the study takes answers from teaching staff in 20 European countries given in an online survey. The results lead to the conclusion that mastery of a second language is a specific competence considered by teachers to be crucial for the training of university BMA and Engineering students, although Spain is behind other countries in the region with regard to how the importance of a second language is perceived as a curricular and professional competence.

This article collects and analyzes the results of a research project¹ that deals with possible synergies between the tourism sector and the audiovisual sector in Spain. Through the qualitative technique of in-depth interview, experts and representatives of those sectors were interviewed. The interviewees (20 in total), from Spanish, Venezuelan and Mexican nationality, belong to both the public like private sphere, being all them pioneers in the field of cooperation between the tourism and the audiovisual sectors. The objective of this research is to verify the possible use of the audiovisual sector, especially audiovisual series, such as promotional tools for tourist destinations and thus foster greater cooperation between the audiovisual and tourism. In the Spanish case there are destinations that already make use of audiovisual series as a promotional tool, and they are visited by viewers. But partnerships between producers and tourist destinations are still limited, despite the favourable results.

Nowadays the reduction or elimination of waste has become a major environmental concern among industrialized countries and a priority for companies. In this work it is carried out a review of the postulates of the classical economic model, existing until a few dates, in connection with the variable environment and waste generated by firms. It is also examined the literature about the potential of the waste management and possible alternatives for obtaining of advantages or benefits derived from an efficient treatment of waste. This paper is completed with an empirical analysis of the waste management in companies of the Basque Autonomous Community. The motivations that drive firms to implement a waste management system and the advantages or benefits which derive from this fact are analyzed among other factors.

This paper aims to examine the relationships between different types of cultures and effectiveness in Total Quality Management (TQM) implementation. Using Cameron's framework, we have tested the connection between a quality culture taxonomy and TQM programme performance using data from a survey carried out with 113 Spanish companies that have implemented TQM systems. A structural equation modelling is proposed to assess the links between both types of constructs using the Partial Least Squares (PLS) technique. The most substantial results confirm, in the sample analysed, the relationship between quality culture types and the TQM programme performance, and there being different influence levels of the quality cultures.

The aim of this work focuses on analyzing the effect, both immediate and delayed, of Market Orientation (MO) on organizational outcomes. A longitudinal study has been done over a time horizon of 3 years in the Spanish financial sector. Regarding the methodology, we have developed a qualitative method to measure the degree of OM of the entities considered, through a content analysis. After obtaining an indicator of this analysis, we applied a quantitative methodology of structural equation modeling for testing hypotheses of the proposed model. From the results, we highlight, first, banks that implement a MO approach are likely to maintain that approach in subsequent periods. Secondly, immediate effects of MO on results were not found. And finally, MO does not record deferred effects on the considered indicators of profitability.

The design of the new study plans adapted to the guidelines of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) attempt to bring business reality closer to the students, involving them into their learning process adopting an active model and participation and providing them a favourable framework in order to gain different skills. This requires designing more active teaching methodologies and setting up a capable assessment model to assess the skills obtained by students. The purpose of this paper is double, the first one, it is expected to identify the learning methods to achieve skills acquisition defined for the Production Management field in the EHEA framework, and the second one, explaining a capable skills assessment model. The empirical analysis developed has proved the teaching methods effectiveness used in the lecture rooms, but also show the importance of the skills assessment properly, what permit to gain the EHEA basic purpose.