Service Providers’ Willingness to Change as Innovation Inductor in Services: Validating a Scale
Journal Title: BAR: Brazilian Administration Review - Year 2016, Vol 13, Issue 4
Abstract
This study explores the willingness of service providers to incorporate changes suggested by clients altering previously planned services during its delivery, hereby named Willingness to Change in Services [WCS]. We apply qualitative research techniques to map seven dimensions related to this phenomenon: Client relationship management; Organizational conditions for change; Software characteristics and development; Conditions affecting teams; Administrative procedures and decision-making conditions; Entrepreneurial behavior; Interaction with supporting organizations. These dimensions have been converted into variables composing a WCS scale later submitted to theoretical and semantic validations. A scale with 26 variables resulted from such procedures was applied on a large survey carried out with 351 typical Brazilian software development service companies operating all over the country. Data from our sample have been submitted to multivariate statistical analysis to provide validation for the scale. After factorial analysis procedures, 24 items have been validated and assigned to three factors representative of WCS: Organizational Routines and Values – 12 variables; Organizational Structure for Change – 6 variables; and Service Specificities – 6 variables. As future contributions, we expect to see further testing for the WCS scale on alternative service activities to provide evidence about its limits and contributions to general service innovation theory.
Authors and Affiliations
Moreira, Marina Figueiredo; Guimarães, Tomás de Aquino; Philippe, Jean
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP40629
- DOI -
- Views 221
- Downloads 0
Leadership, Personal Values, and Cultural Context in Brazil, China, and the USA
This research examines the association between configurations of personal values and managerial incumbency among professionals in Brazil, the US, and Asia. Our research is different from classical leadership research as...
Factors Affecting Mobile Users’ Switching Intentions: A Comparative Study between the Brazilian and German Markets
In the competitive wireless market, there are many drivers behind customer defection. Switching barriers, service performance, perceived value in carriers’ offers, satisfaction and other constructs can play a pivotal ro...
Dynamics of Competition and Survival
Along time, increasing competitiveness is said to have shortened firms’ life spans; however, for those who managed to survive, the question relies on what are the best competitive positions. The question is whether firm...
How Informative Are Interest Rate Survey-based Forecasts?
This paper studies the information content of survey-based predictions for the Brazilian short-term interest rate. We perform vector autoregression analysis to test for the dynamic relationship between market expectatio...
Contribution of Expatriates in the Management of Subsidiaries to the Corporate Governance of International Firms: the Case of Vale
In the current context of globalization, where firms are increasingly operating in networks of relationships with international subsidiaries, the relevance of their corporate governance has become evident. By the same t...