London Business School

About: London Business School is a education organization based out in London, England, United Kingdom. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Portfolio & Equity (finance). The organization has 1138 authors who have published 5118 publications receiving 437980 citations. The organization is also known as: LBS.

Impact of Product-Harm Crises on Brand Equity: The Moderating Role of Consumer Expectations:

Abstract: Brand equity is a valuable yet fragile asset. The mounting frequency of product-harm crises and ill-prepared corporate responses to such crises can have profound consequences for brand equity. Yet there is little research on the marketing impact of crises. The authors employ the expectations–evidence framework to understand the impact of firms’ responses to crises on customer-based brand equity. The results of a field survey and two laboratory experiments indicate that consumers interpret firm response on the basis of their prior expectations about the firm. The interaction of expectations and firm response is shown to affect postcrisis brand equity. The authors draw implications for the expectations–evidence framework and for the outcomes of different types of firm response (i.e., unambiguous support, ambiguous response, and unambiguous stonewalling) on brand equity.

Customer loyalty and customer loyalty programs

Abstract: Customer loyalty presents a paradox. Many see it as primarily an attitude‐based phenomenon that can be influenced significantly by customer relationship management initiatives such as the increasingly popular loyalty and affinity programs. However, empirical research shows that loyalty in competitive repeat‐purchase markets is shaped more by the passive acceptance of brands than by strongly‐held attitudes about them. From this perspective, the demand‐enhancing potential of loyalty programs is more limited than might be hoped. Reviews three different perspectives on loyalty, and relates these to a framework for understanding customer loyalty that encompasses customer brand commitment, customer brand acceptance and customer brand buying. Uses this framework to analyze the demand‐side potential of loyalty programs. Discusses where these programs might work and where they are unlikely to succeed on any large scale. Provides a checklist for marketers.

The Role of Accruals in Asymmetrically Timely Gain and Loss Recognition

Abstract: We investigate the role of accrual accounting in the asymmetrically timely recognition (incorporation in reported earnings) of gains and losses. Timely recognition requires accruals when it precedes complete realization of the gains and losses in cash. We show that nonlinear accruals models incorporating the asymmetry in gain and loss recognition (timelier loss recognition, or conditional conservatism) offer a substantial specification improvement, explaining substantially more variation in accruals than equivalent linear specifications. Conversely, conventional linear accruals models, by omitting the loss recognition asymmetry, exhibit substantial attenuation bias and offer a comparatively poor specification of the accounting accrual process. Linear specifications also understate the ability of current earnings to predict future cash flows. These findings have implications for our understanding of accrual accounting and conservatism, as well as for researchers estimating discretionary accruals, earnings management, and earnings quality.

Strategy as a field of study: Why search for a new paradigm?

Abstract: The fundamental structural transitions in a wide variety of industries brought about by major catalysts such as deregulation, global competition, technological discontinuities, and changing customer expectations are imposing new strains on managers around the world. Old recipes do not work anymore. Managers, concerned with restoring competitiveness of their firms, are abandoning traditional approaches to strategy; they are searching for new approaches that give guidance in a turbulent environment. Many academics, confronted with the same reality, are reexamining the relevance of the concepts and tools of the strategy field. In the absence of a consistent and useful strategy paradigm that they can use, managers appear to have embraced attention to ‘implementation’ as their saviour, more or less abandoning strategy as either unimportant or uninteresting. Academics continue to search for new approaches. This special issue of the Strategic Management Journal presents creative and new thinking dealing with substantive issues and methodologies that can lead to the evolution of a new paradigm(s).

Strategy as stretch and leverage

Abstract: Global competition is not just product versus product or company versus company. It is mind-set versus mind-set. Driven to understand the dynamics of competition, we have learned a lot about what makes one company more successful than another. But to find the root of competitiveness--to understand why some companies create new forms of competitive advantage while others watch and follow--we must look at strategic mind-sets. For many managers, "being strategic" means pursuing opportunities that fit the company's resources. This approach is not wrong, Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad contend, but it obscures an approach in which "stretch" supplements fit and being strategic means creating a chasm between ambition and resources. Toyota, CNN, British Airways, Sony, and others all displaced competitors with stronger reputations and deeper pockets. Their secret? In each case, the winner had greater ambition than its well-endowed rivals. Winners also find less resource-intensive ways of achieving their ambitious goals. This is where leverage complements the strategic allocation of resources. Managers at competitive companies can get a bigger bang for their buck in five basic ways: by concentrating resources around strategic goals; by accumulating resources more efficiently; by complementing one kind of resource with another; by conserving resources whenever they can; and by recovering resources from the market-place as quickly as possible. As recent competitive battles have demonstrated, abundant resources can't guarantee continued industry leadership.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)