Volume 14 (2022): Issue 1 (March 2022)

Objective: In this article, the methods used to simplify the business modelling and founding of new companies are presented and critically reflected. Furthermore, it is discussed to what extent a specific method is advantageous, disadvantageous, applicable, not applicable, or even contradictory.

Methodology: The theoretical analysis is underpinned by a qualitative interview study asking company founders about applying the methods mentioned above. The work is based on scientific papers and books and is complemented by the data originating from a specially designed study.

Findings: The results conclude that business model founding instruments provide strategic guidelines favouring entrepreneurs, yet they turn out to be minor in its real-life significance as numerous factors rooted in different fields of expertise play in.

Value Added: The added value of this paper is in the elaboration of efficiency bringing and risk-minimizing components of the methods, respectively. Accordingly, managers and entrepreneurs of all industries are intended to be equipped with sufficient information content that eases the decision for or against one of the methods as realistic expectations considering the application are likely to emerge.

Recommendations: The limitations of this study are rooted in the chosen qualitative research since every interviewee is a subject to their individual perception.

Objective: Many research claim that Millennials value work ethic much lower and leisure time much higher than older generations. Most of them are based on cross-sectional analyses of data collected at one time. This design confounds the COHORT effect (born in the same time period and thus exposed to the same cultural forces during their formative socialization period) and biological AGE, and it makes it impossible to separate them. Our goal is to demonstrate how to empirically separate the confounded effects of APC (biological AGE – PERIOD of measurement – COHORT) in a simple way.

Methodology: Three generations (Baby Boomers, X-ers and Millennials) from the representative Polish samples of the World Value Survey, were cross-sectionally compared, and a cross-lagged comparison was made between BB in 2005 vs X in 2020, and between X in 2005 and Millennials in 2020.

Findings: It was shown that significant cross-sectional differences in attitudes toward work between the 3 generation (with the highest score for Baby Boom-ers and the lowest for Millennials) cannot be explained by age differences. Over the period of 15 years, the importance of leisure time has increased for all generations (PERIOD effect).

Value Added: The paper highlights significant methodological problem: the confounding effect of APC in most generational findings. It promotes the idea of using nationally representative samples from publicly available data like World Value Survey, instead of collecting convenience samples.

Recommendations: Greater methodological rigour in generational studies is recommended, as their results can create/support stereotypes that tend to generate individual expectations (e.g. every Millennial is computer literate or lazy), ignoring the fact that intra-generational variability is very high.

Objective: The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of social media on customer experience and how companies can use social media to enhance the experience of customers.

Methodology: Literature synthesis method was followed to trace out and analyse the data. The EBSCO Discovery of Science and Google Scholar databases were used to find the articles. Over thirty articles were produced from the total (190) search query results after applying limiters, deleting duplicates, and enforcing non-business settings.

Findings: Social media has a considerable impact on customer experience due to its widespread and easy access by customers. It enabled companies to classify customers, get a lot of information about them, and get very fast feedback about their impressions related to their product or services. Social media may have a positive or negative impact on customer experience, so the role of management is important to manage these media in a way that will benefit the company and support it to achieve its objectives.

Value Added: This article provides a clear picture on exploring the impact of social media on customer experience. The results of the research can be used to guide companies on how to use social media to enhance the experience of customers.

Recommendations: Companies should smartly manage social media and employ qualified staff to improve the customer’s experience and avoid the side effects that this type of media may have on customer experience. In addition, customer experience should be a strategic goal because it helps the company meet its overall goals.

Purpose: The concerted effect of national culture and risk-taking behaviour of individuals on decision-making has not been given much attention in the literature. This paper, thus, attempts to investigate how the two variables, separately and jointly, affect the decision-making of firms.

Methodology: The review pursues systematic literature review methodology. The keywords constituted in a series of search queries include risk-taking, or risk-taking behaviour, risk taking propensity, risk aversion, uncertainty avoidance, uncertainty avoidance national culture, fear of unknown or future, and uncertainty avoidance culture and risk-taking. The review of the studies addresses more than thirty-five countries over the years 1975–2021.

Findings: The review result re-boosts the existing negative relationship between a high uncertainty avoidance culture and risk-taking behaviour. When the level of risk-taking is increased, the effect of uncertainty avoidance culture gets decreased, which thereof helps to reduce resistance to change in firms. The latter institutes a greater fear of failure, lower level of ambition, and less tolerance for ambiguity that result in low risk-taking appetite. Their concurrent effect is realized in various decision-making contexts including firms’ entry and investment decisions, customer buying decisions, self – versus group decisions, and policy decisions.

Value Added: As a result, firms may need to consider the risk-taking behaviour and uncertainty avoidance culture of employees for certain jobs, consumers for marketing, managers for an international assignment in risky positions, and of individual countries for business expansion. The study claims to have added significant value to the practical and theoretical discourse of uncertainty avoidance national culture and risk-taking behaviour in business decision-making scenarios.