Retail brand orientation, positional advantage and organisational performance

This study adopts a resource-based view of branding referred to as brand orientation. Despite the importance of branding in retail, relatively little empirical research has been conducted to understand the degree to which retailers can be considered brand oriented. The purpose of the present research is to establish a conceptualisation of brand orientation that is applicable in a retail context across countries. Moreover, we seek to empirically validate a model of the retail brand orientation–positional advantage–organisational performance relationship and to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the factors driving retailer performance. A mail survey was used to collect data from retail firms in Australia, USA and UK. The unit of analysis is the retail firm. Confirmatory factor analysis was employed to assess the measurement properties of the study constructs and structural equation modelling was performed to test the research model. The findings suggest that four elements of retail brand orientation (functionality, distinctiveness, augmentation and symbolism) play different roles in relation to certain aspects of positional advantage, which highlights the importance of developing strength in all four areas. Similarly, a position of superiority in only one aspect of a retailer's offer is insufficient to assure both financial and strategic returns.

On the governance of public education

Private schools in Australia receive significant public funding, but their determination to concentrate social and cultural capital and consolidate positional advantage ‘denies the possibility of their serving the public interest’. A 1998 study of Victorian private schools has confirmed that they produce above-average academic results and are also concentrated in high socioeconomic geographic areas. The few private schools outside this pattern serve mainly provincial areas or ethnic minority groups. High academic credentials depend at least in part on their scarcity, and ‘the selective function of schools, directed towards establishing a hierarchy of performance, overwhelms the pedagogical function of universal learning and social justice,’ especially at transition points in the education system. The governance procedures of schools typically encourage high academic standards ‘through mechanisms of exclusion’. Private schools in particular, at the secondary level, tend to ‘export failure’ through ‘predatory recruitment and selective dumping practices’, and by arrangements with universities for early placement of high performers into preferred tertiary courses. The broader education system reinforces the competitive processes within schools though competitive examinations. A range of steps can address these equity problems. Curriculum should be made more sensitive to disadvantaged social groups. Secondary schools should be aligned more closely to the social, cultural and economic development of their communities through mechanisms such as VET in schools, linkages with TAFE colleges, and a broadened curriculum that addresses community problems.

Brand orientation: another explanation of retailer performance

This paper postulates that organisational capabilities, particularly brand orientation, may provide an appropriate theoretical framework to explain variations in organisational performance among retailers. Brand orientation is viewed as a strategic capability, just like innovation. This allows for a distinction to be made with such core antecedent (However, it is important to distinguish between strategic capabilities (innovation orientation and brand orientation) and antecedent core) capabilities such as market orientation, operational orientation and human resource orientation which all organizations must have to some degree. This distinction is made to emphasise that all organisations operate with some degree of market, operational and human resource orientation, whereas organisations can choose to operate without either innovation or brand orientation. We argue that it is the inclusion of organisational capabilities with positional advantage and organisational performance that provides an holistic conceptual framework for the empirical investigation we are currently undertaking. The propositions discussed in this paper link the various relationships in the conceptual model within the context of Australian retailing organisations.

Brand orientation : conceptualisation, operationalisation and explanatory power

This study contributes to the brand management literature by providing a conceptualisation of brand orientation from a resource based theory perspective. Moreover, the study advances seminal brand conceptualisations through operationalising the construct and empirically testing its psychometric properties and explanatory power. The construct was explored within a services context focusing on Australian retail organisations, thereby extending brand management research beyond the manufacturing domain. Building on the work of leading brand authors four reflective dimensions of brand orientation are operationalised including distinctive, functional, value adding and symbolic capabilities. The results of this study suggest that brand orientation is a robust construct with strong explanatory power in regards to dependent constructs; positional advantage and organisational performance.

CSR orientation and organisational performance in the Australian retail industry

This paper aims to contribute to current business ethics literature by conceptualising the relationship between organisational culture, corporate strategy, and target stakeholders and the formation of a CSR orientation. The paper will further explore whether corporate social responsibility policies and practices will result in an overall improved positional advantage for the firm and, as a consequence, positively enhance organisational performance. These relationships will be examined within the context of the retail industry in Australia, focusing on the food, clothing and textiles, and footwear sectors.

Do positional concerns destroy social capital : evidence from 26 countries

Research on the effects of positional concerns on individuals' attitudes and behavior is sorely lacking. To address this deficiency, we use the International Social Survey Programme 1998 data on 25,000 individuals from 26 countries to investigate the impact of relative income position on three facets of social capital: horizontal and vertical trust as well as norm compliance. Testing relative deprivation theory, we identify a deleterious positional income effect for persons below the reference income, particularly for their social trust and confidence in secular institutions. Also often a social capital-lowering effect of relative income advantage occurs, while a rise in absolute income almost always contributes positively. These results indicate that a rise in income inequality in a society too large is rather detrimental to the formation of social capital. (JEL Z130, I300, D310)

Linking resource acquisition and development processes to resource-based advantage : bricolage and the resource-based view

We investigate the relationship between bricolage – an approach to a firm’s resource development – and the firm’s strategic resource position as depicted by the resource-based view (RBV). The RBV is concerned with the resource characteristics of firms that lead to sustainable competitive advantage. Alternatively, bricolage is a process of resource use and development characterised by using resources at hand, recombining resources and making do. Based on a sample of approximately 700 nascent and 700 young firms we find that higher levels of bricolage behaviour tend to lead to more advantageous strategic resource positions.

Linking resource acquisition and development processes to resource-based advantage : bricolage and the resource-based view

We investigate the relationship between bricolage – an approach to a firm’s resource development – and the firm’s strategic resource position as depicted by the resource-based view (RBV). The RBV is concerned with the resource characteristics of firms that lead to sustainable competitive advantage. Alternatively, bricolage is a process of resource use and development characterised by using resources at hand, recombining resources and making do. Based on a sample of 1,329 entrepreneurial start-ups we find that higher levels of bricolage behaviour tend to lead to more advantageous strategic resource positions.

The knowledge advantage (K-Adv): unleashing creativity and innovation

The K-Adv has been developed around the concept that it comprises an ICT enabling infrastructure that encompasses ICT hardware and software infrastructure facilities together with an enabling ICT support system; a leadership infrastructure support system that provides the vision for its implementation and the realisation capacity for the vision to be realised; and the necessary people infrastructure that includes the people capabilities and capacities supported by organisational processes that facilitates this resource to be mobilised.

Individual firms and regional business clusters : the HRM advantage in rent generation

Much of the literature on clusters has focused on the economic advantages of clusters and how these can be achieved in terms of competition, regional development and local spillovers. Some studies have focused at the level of the individual firm however human resource management (HRM) in individual clustered firms has received scant attention. This paper innovatively utilises the extended Resource Based View (RBV) of the firm as a framework to conceptualise the human resource processes of individual firms within a cluster. RBV is argued as a useful tool as it explains external rents outside a firm’s boundaries. The paper concludes that HRM can assist in generating rents for firms and clusters more broadly when the function supports valuable interfirm relationships important for realising inter-firm advantages.

Realising competitive advantage through HRM in New Zealand service industries

An emerging source of competitive advantage for service industries is the knowledge, skills and attitudes of their employees. Indeed, achievement of a 'service quality' culture, considered imperative for competitive advantage in service organisations, supposedly results from the use of best practice human resource management (HRM), and from a strategic approach to their implementation. This paper empirically explores the use of these dimensions of HRM as a source of competitive advantage. It finds high-performing service organisations actively engage best practices across the areas of recruitment and selection, training and development, communication and team working. Evidence of a strategic approach to the implementation of these practices is also found.