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The organization's effectiveness can be measured based on sales, market position, customer satisfaction, and profits, relative to competition and internal objectives. Effectiveness is a summary assessment of the sales organization's outcomes, and may be determined for the entire organization or for smaller units such as regions and districts. Sales unit effectiveness is a composite assessment of the unit's performance. Importantly, effectiveness and salesperson performance are distinct although closely related constructs. The salesperson contributes to unit effectiveness along with other determinants including the sales manager, business competencies, and the market and competitive environment. This article proposes and examines a conceptual framework for analysis and decision-making concerning sales organization effectiveness. It discusses important determinants of effectiveness including sales management control, salesperson performance, and sales unit design. Sales management is a core determinant of effectiveness, including management processes, design of the organization, and manager performance. Each salesperson also contributes to effectiveness.

This article considers the importance of job stress in the sales force to be an important management concern in many sales organizations. The complex business environment faces salespeople with escalating demands and expectations. There is continuous pressure to perform in the sales forces of most organizations. Stress is further compounded as salespeople regularly face non-routine situations, and often must work without the support that comes with supervision on a daily basis. The objective of this article is to examine the antecedents and consequences of job stress and to consider initiatives for reducing job stress among salespeople. While eliminating job stress in most sales organizations may be unfeasible, impractical, or even undesirable, the major negative effects of job stress require management initiatives to gain a reasonable level of control over salespeople's job stress. Finally, this article also develops a framework of salesperson job stress including antecedents, role stressors, and consequences.

The evolution of luxury retailing in the airport has followed the growth in air travel resulting from globalisation, the privatisation, and the deregulation of air transport and the rise of low-cost airlines. Airport luxury retailing serves a resilient global market and it is an important source of sales for luxury-brand companies. Moreover, luxury brands have recognised the commercial significance and public relations value of an international airport location where they deploy a sophisticated visual language to promote their global brand identity. The distribution of luxury goods in international airports through luxury-brand stores and multibrand duty-free outlets is investigated and consideration is given to the future of luxury in the airport.

Brokerage roles in creative industries have been widely recognized but rarely studied systematically. In the research that has been done, the term gatekeeper has been used to define actors at many different positions in the networks that connect creative producers with audiences for their products. Using the concept of brokerage from social network theory, we clarify existing research on gatekeepers and cultural intermediaries by distinguishing among different structural positions, functions and motivations of brokers in creative industries. In addition to the familiar tertius gaudens and tertius iungens orientations identified by Burt (1992) and Obstfeld (2005), we add a third tertius transferens (‘the third who translates’) brokerage motivation which captures the translation and symbolic work of intermediaries in creative industries. We offer several empirical examples from the music industry and new service professions that highlight unanswered questions about the operation of modern cultural brokers.

The purpose of this article is to provide a general summary of the key value propositions evident in the research on the business case for corporate social responsibility (CSR), described as four general ‘types’ of the business case, or four modes of value creation. It then presents a critique of these approaches (including identifying some problems inherent in the construct of CSR itself) and offers some principles for constructing a ‘better’ business case. Its intent is not to conduct a thorough review of studies analyzing the relationship between CSR and financial performance, as that has been well done elsewhere. Rather it seeks to unearth assumptions underlying dominant approaches in an effort to build a more robust business case for CSR that can move beyond existing limitations.

This article reviews the rapidly changing business environment, and highlights it as an important and challenging influence on sales organizations. It examines the dynamic environment impacting the sales organization. A core characteristic of the changing sales environment is its complexity. Dimensions of the environment include globalization, changes in channel delivery and information provision, customer co-production and de-massification of the marketplace, hyper-competition and buyer concentration, sales force automation, customer expectations, ethics expectations, and increased emphasis on wellbeing in the workplace. Each of these environmental forces interacts with the others, significantly compounding analysis of the effects on the sales organization. This article examines a number of key changes in the contemporary business and social environment and discusses their implications regarding sales and sales management research and practice. It also considers psychological levels of analysis from the perspective of the individual salesperson or sales manager, possible dyads, teams, and stakeholder or wider society.

This chapter examines collaboration—the shared commitment of resources to the mutually agreed aims of a number of partners—and innovation management. Very few organizations, if any, can innovate alone, and collaboration with a select number of partners creates the complementarities necessary for innovation, encourages learning, and better equips organizations to deal with uncertainty and complexity. The chapter explores collaborations between firms and between businesses and universities, government policies for collaboration, the role of brokers, and collaboration and technical standards. The management of collaboration has to deal with the instabilities and tensions inherent in this organizational form. Critical tasks include partner selection and structuring and organizing the collaboration. The chapter argues the advantages of managing collaboration as part of the architecture of innovation ecosystems.

This chapter takes a critical look at concepts for measuring the perception and evaluation of luxuries by consumers. After a short clarification of the multifaceted relationship between consumers and luxury brands, the first focus lies on the presentation of relevant and much-noticed measurement concepts. The critical discussion of these approaches reveals three challenges that need to be mastered by future research: (1) the relevant points of reference for the perception and evaluation of luxury goods need to be identified in a more differentiated and systematic way; (2) the interplay between conscious and unconscious perception and appraisal must be considered; last but not least (3) the resulting perceived value of luxury brands should be recorded in a much more differentiated manner. Subsequently, the chapter mainly offers first proposals to close the highlighted research gaps.

Counterfeit goods are perceived to be a substantial threat to various industries, especially those in the luxury sector, and the globalisation of trade and communication has offered incomparable opportunities for criminals to engage in such illicit trade. Demand for counterfeit products/brands has grown immensely in terms of variety, market size, geographical dispersion, and sophistication. To contain the proliferation of counterfeits and the relative negative impact on society, a deeper understanding of consumer behaviour is needed. An updated literature review on counterfeiting from the demand side, particularly analysing determinants of consumers’ buying decisions and counterfeit product consumption habits, provides such an understanding. Considering that fake products have no context without the originals’ existence, contributions highlighted here adopt a joint perspective in analysing the phenomenon, especially in the consumption domain. An examination of the actual counterfeit supply chain rounds out our view.

International business research is probably more influenced by various forces of the economic and political climates than its domestic (or generic) counterpart. The emergence of new market economies in Eastern Europe, China, India, and Brazil, the consolidation of the European Union, as well as a decade of economic stagnation and recent resurgence in Japan's economy has given global competition greater significance. This article looks at research in international marketing to see if the discipline has overcome the deficiencies outlined in the previous studies. It examines the state of the art in international marketing research, with particular emphasis on conceptual frameworks and theory development. Its primary focus is on studies published since the year 2000 because the first decade of the twenty-first century has been characterized by changes in virtually all aspects of businesses and personal life.

Building on socio-structural explanations, this article elaborates on the tension between individual actors’ positions along the core-periphery continuum of the social field and their ability to gain legitimacy for their creative work. Peripheral actors are less constrained by the field’s normative pressures and free to experiment with un-conventional ideas and solutions, but they may struggle to mobilize attention and harness the symbolic and material resources needed to legitimate their work. By contrast, core players are more effective at leveraging networks to build consensus, but they often exhibit a propensity toward more incremental work due to their higher levels of assimilation into the conventions of the field. To resolve this tension this article advances a strategy which we term optimal network structuration strategy. This strategy implies forming ties that link the two ends of the core-periphery spectrum, in the attempt to increase the likelihood of generating novelty while also enhancing the ability to make such novelty manifest and visible to the field. The theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

Critical theory is a central concept in the study of society, politics, history, and business as an innovative academic field and intellectual tradition. This chapter offers readers an encounter with critical theorist Theodor Adorno’s crucial writings on an important philosophical debate of the twenty-first century: the dual character of luxury. In exploring Adorno’s ideas concerning luxury and their possible impact on ‘the singular instant of luxury’, the chapter traces Adorno’s engagement with other key thinkers of luxury such as Thorstein Veblen. Investigating a significant business text on luxury by Wided Batat, the chapter presents an in-depth understanding of contemporary conceptions of luxury customer experience from the perspective of critical theory.

This article examines the role of the direct sales force as a core enterprise strategy and capability relative to the organization's customer relationship management (CRM) system. It discusses the CRM models implied by product leadership, cost leadership, and customer intimacy strategies. These CRM models provide a basis for defining the role of the sales force compared to alternative go-to-market channels in accessing and relating to customers. This article examines the role of the sales force for four customer archetypes: transactional, solution selling, relationship selling, and strategic partnerships. Market-driven companies are likely to be more competent in organizational learning about markets and customers compared to internally-oriented competitors. In examining this issue, this article discusses the role of the direct sales force concerning four specific CRM processes: market sensing, customer sensing, customer linking, and cross-functional spanning.

This article synthesizes current knowledge in the area of customer management, and encourages the organization to be proactive in this essential role, which is an important contributor to business success. It addresses the necessary task of how the organization should identify the right customers from the existing customer base. It reviews the available metrics used for customer analysis and decision-making. Furthermore, it also examines the relevant measurement issues associated with the composite profitability measure, customer lifetime value (CLV). CLV can contribute important insights in selecting the right customers to include in the organization's portfolio. This article also discusses customer portfolio analysis. Significant value is gained from systematic customer assessment for acquiring, growing, and retaining the best mix of customers to generate the strongest return on investment. The process of managing the customer portfolio guides the firm in directing the right marketing efforts to the most appropriate marketing strategies.

Luxury business developed alongside department stores, which created a new market for luxury brands and proved to be a crucial marketing channel for two reasons. First, the highly respected image of department stores enhanced that of their luxury-branded in-house boutiques for a wider range of consumers. Second, department stores used the good reputation of luxury brands to upscale their offering and include high-fashion merchandise. Some department stores have now become tourist attractions for luxury shopping. However, a new trend has appeared in emerging countries: shopping malls have largely taken over the former role of department stores. This chapter examines, from a historical perspective, the major role that department stores have played in the development of luxury business.

The digital revolution that began slowly at the end of the last century has increased in pace, creating global connectivity and changing the way we live, work, and do business. The luxury industry, based largely on quality physical products and notions of heritage and craftsmanship, coupled with a high level of personal service, could be seen as incompatible with the digital economy and was slow to adapt. Taking the luxury personal goods area, especially fashion, as its focus, this chapter discusses the ways in which the digital shift has impacted luxury business and transformed the way luxury is accessed and consumed. Examples of emerging concepts for the digital and virtual experience of fashion are discussed. The intrinsic values of luxury (longevity, quality, and craftsmanship) can be aligned to sustainability, and we discuss the potential for digitalisation to transform the luxury experience. Can experiential luxury be the next frontier for digital luxury and provide a net sustainability benefit?

Economic inequality is often associated with luxury. This is because an individual’s ability to acquire luxury goods and services depends on their access to economic resources. However, it is necessary to recognise that luxury can take marketised and sociocultural forms. Access to sociocultural forms of luxury is not dependent on the individual consumer’s economic resources. This chapter adopts a critical luxury studies approach to explore the relationship between luxury, manifest primarily in the form of luxury goods and services, and economic inequality. However, by recognising sociocultural and marketised forms of luxury, an understanding of the complexity of the relationship between luxury and economic inequality is achieved. Furthermore, it is argued that economic growth, while increasing the scale of inequality, has also lifted many people out of poverty and into the ranks of luxury-brand consumers. Importantly, it is suggested that focussing on luxury as a signifier of economic inequality is a distraction that conceals a lack of political will to address the causes of poverty and deprivation that are embedded in the neoliberal market economic system.

This article examines the opportunities and constraints for entrepreneurship offered by the evolving institutional environment and the characteristics of the people who stepped up to the challenge. It places the concept of entrepreneurship in a transition context, before identifying in the third section the unique features of entrepreneurship in transition economies. The article discusses the evolving business environment, and reports the scale and nature of entrepreneurship in transition economies. The personal characteristics and the business strategies of entrepreneurs in transition economies are also discussed. The article concludes by outlining directions for future work.

This article covers the role of marketing for the natural environment in catalyzing environmentally sustainable consumption. It outlines the four decades of “green” marketing. Environmental disasters continued to amplify public awareness during the 1980s and 1990s. During the 1990s, environmental problems were increasingly reframed as economic problems. A smattering of academic papers addressed managerial issues in environmental marketing. The opportunism and reactivity of green marketers in the twentieth century gave way to the beginnings of a more mature and sophisticated approach in the new century. The article discusses the definition of marketing, its dominant logic, and the role of the marketing mix, all of which raise unresolved issues. The sustainable levels of consumption and the need for systemic integration in marketing for the natural environment are explored. Finally, specific directions for future work are given.

From the Stoics into Christian teaching and on into the Renaissance, luxury belonged in a moralised vocabulary of virtue, characterised by living the simple natural life and rational control of bodily desires. This framework was overturned; luxury was demoralised. Though the product of many causes over at least a couple of centuries, two background conditions or developments stand out. The first is the post-Galilean “revolution” in physics and the associated but fundamental rethinking of epistemology and ethics. Reason’s controlling and motivating force was rejected in favour of that role being played by passions or desires. The second development was a defence of commerce. This was defensive because it too had to combat the assumptions and prejudices of the Greek and Roman moralists who saw implicit in commerce conduct and values antipathetic to virtue. The defence had begun in the seventeenth century in pamphlets on “trade”, but what was decisive was a philosophical demoralisation of luxury as a source of individual and social corruption. Though begun earlier, this reevaluation achieved its definitive expression in the eighteenth century. At the heart of this shift was a defence of the modern world of commerce in which luxury was a positive force because it served to enhance social well-being, including the rightful enjoyment of material benefits by all.