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​​​​​​Now more than ever, marketing is assuming a key boundary-spanning role-a role that also redefined the composition of the marketing organization. In this Brief, the marketing organization's integrative and mutually reinforcing components of marketing activities, customer value-creating processes, networks, and stakeholders are delineated within their boundary-spanning roles. Expanding upon his article published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science in 2011, Tomas Hult draws thematic marketing insights from the integration of thirty-one organization theories to advance knowl

ABSTRACTThis study examines the effects of market‐driven organizational learning on a select set of strategic sourcing outcomes involving the sourcing function of a Fortune 500 multinational corporation. The focus is on the dyadic activities and relationships between the domestic and international strategic business units (SBUs) and the corporate buying center. The hypothesized relationships are tested on the overall sample and based on a two‐by‐two matrix framework defined by international versus domestic settings and frequent versus infrequent sourcing scenarios. Based on a sample of 179 domestic and 167 international SBUs, the results suggest that market‐driven organizational learning in the strategic sourcing units influences customer satisfaction, relationship commitment, and cycle time of the sourcing process. However, while the set of learning orientations appears to be strategically robust across the four quadrant scenarios (moderator settings), the sourcing situations differ somewhat in the specific tactical learning orientations preferred.

ABSTRACTWhat are the current intellectual clusters in the sourcing literature? How do these clusters relate to each other? How has sourcing‐related research changed over the last 10 years? We respond to these questions by examining the intellectual structure of research in the sourcing literature across 21 journals during the last decade (1998–2007). Multidimensional scaling is used to analyze cocitation data involving 72,003 citations from 1,960 sourcing articles. The results indicate that 10 different sourcing clusters emerged in the 1998–2002 period and 6 sourcing clusters surfaced in the 2003–2007 period. Five of the intellectual clusters in 1998–2002 disappeared in 2003–2007, five clusters remained, and one new cluster materialized in 2003–2007 that did not exist in the earlier period (Managerial Behavior and Upstream Decision Making).

ABSTRACTThis research presents the development of behavioral scoring models to predict future customer purchases in an online ordering application. Internet retailing lowers many barriers for customers switching between retailers for repeat purchases; thus, retaining existing customers is a key challenge for achieving profitability. Survey data were collected from 1,089 online customers of two companies. The subjective survey data were then used to predict purchases over the ensuing 12 months based on data from the company databases. The analysis illustrates the general applicability of predictive models of future customer purchases while also demonstrating the need to develop specific models tailored for an individual company's operating and marketing environment. The models provide insight on how companies can target marketing dollars more effectively and allocate investment across multiple operational areas for maximum return. The research answers a call for rigorous research in the area of predictive marketing, an area in which many companies are excelling but where there is a scarcity of detailed knowledge regarding application of such models.

ABSTRACTWe draw on extant literature on strategic sourcing and supply base rationalization to anchor our argument that measuring supplier performance diversity is germane to executing an effective supply base rationalization strategy. We explicate how a novel approach to data envelopment analysis (DEA) efficiency assessment can be utilized to measure this performance diversity. More specifically, our methods are anchored in cross efficiency analysis in DEA that allows for evaluating the efficiency of a supplier with respect to the optimal weights (strengths) of its peers. This methodology is applied to an actual supplier dataset of a large multinational telecommunications company in categorizing their supply base into groups for effective supplier rationalization. We conclude that measuring and analyzing the performance diversity within the framework of DEA provides a mechanism for firms to better balance a rationalized and diversified supply base with unique skills.

ABSTRACTThis article investigates whether international operations of service firms increase performance while reducing risk. The article draws on a longitudinal dataset of 584 internationally operating service firms from the United States. Analysis indicates that international diversification is negatively related to risk‐adjusted performance. However, it is established that international diversification interacts with internationalization and positively influences risk‐adjusted performance. This finding offers significant promise for firms, as it indicates that international operations (if managed well), through exposure to varied foreign markets coupled with adequate global scope, can lead to firms' increased risk‐adjusted performance. The results provide a mechanism for decision‐makers to better understand international operations of service firms and present a strategy for achieving success in international markets by effectively managing two important levers: internationalization and international market diversification.

ABSTRACTDespite the importance of supply chain security (SCS), there is significant variance regarding the level of deployment of SCS practices across firms and little is known about the efficacy of these practices. This study examines the role of external (coercive pressure) and internal (top management involvement) factors that potentially explain SCS practice deployment and its effect on SCS performance. It also examines the moderating role of organizational culture. In essence, this inquiry examines the role of external and internal forces in a context where organizational action is perhaps effectively mobilized only when both external and internal pressures are salient. Using data from 166 U.S. manufacturing firms, we found that the effects of coercive forces on SCS practice deployment are transmitted via top management involvement. In addition, the effect of top management involvement on SCS practice deployment is more salient for firms with high security‐oriented organizational culture, although a diminishing return was detected. SCS practice deployment was found to be strongly related to SCS performance. We discuss the theoretical contributions and managerial implications based on our findings.

ABSTRACTSupply chain risk uncertainty can create severe repercussions, thus it is not surprising that research interest in supply chain risk has been growing. While extant inquiry is informative, there is a lack of investigations that center on supply chain investment decisions when facing high levels of risk uncertainty. Given the potential dollar value involved in these decisions, an understanding of how these supply chain decisions are made is of significant theoretical and practical importance. Real options theory, with its focus on decision making under conditions of uncertainty, is an appealing theoretical lens for this endeavor. In essence, real options theory asserts that managerial decisions center on creating and then exercising or not exercising certain opportunities. To date, theorizing about and investigations of real options have used firms as their focus. Not yet examined are real options within supply chains that cross firm boundaries and drive much of the competitive activity in the modern economy. Accordingly, we extend real options theory to the supply chain context by examining how different types of options are approached relative to supply chain project investments. Specifically, we theorize how the options will be related to perceived value under conditions of high supply chain risk uncertainty. Overall, our investigation builds knowledge by extending real options theory to the supply chain context and by providing evidence suggesting some options operate differently in supply chains than they do in firms.