CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – April 29^th, 2025 | 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“”Are we good? Or do we need to keep going?”: Unravelling auditors’ evidence sufficiency determinations”

Lisa Baudot – HEC Paris (France)

Abstract:

“Determining when sufficient appropriate evidence has been gathered is a critical aspect of audit judgment, with public regulators frequently citing insufficient evidence as a key deficiency in audits. Drawing on interviews with 45 auditors across firms of varying sizes and using a theoretical framework that integrates both the structured and affective dimensions of professional judgements, our study explores how auditors approach evidence sufficiency determinations. Our analysis reveals the dynamic, cyclical decision-making process auditors employ while assessing evidence sufficiency. Initially, auditors rely on established guidelines, which provide a structured approach. When these guidelines prove insufficient or mismatch the specific scenario, discomfort prompts auditors to engage in deeper evaluation. This might include revising evidence thresholds, adapting rules for evidence comparison, or forming mental models to better understand the situation alongside the collective inputs gathered throughout the process. This iterative process can either resolve the initial discomfort or lead auditors to accept some residual discomfort. As auditors navigate a variety of stopping rules and feelings of (dis) comfort, they continuously recalibrate their sufficiency determinations based on prior experiences, establishing a feedback loop that informs perceptions of comfort, and the evidence required to attain it.”

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – April 8^th, 2025 | 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“Transformative Service Research and Well-Being at the Intersection of Consumers with Organizational Frontlines”

Steven Rayburn – Texas State University (U.S.A.)

In this session, Dr. Rayburn will explore the origins of the Transformative Service Research initiative as well as some of the ongoing developments focused on the emergence of the Organizational Frontlines Research as a key focal area within Service Research. The intersection of Transformative Service Research, the Organizational Frontline, and Individual Wellbeing will be explored drawing, on examples from Dr. Rayburn’s consumer and employee research. During this session, he will discuss his focus on consumer and employee wellbeing as a key outcome. Specifically, from the consumer perspective he will discuss Service Captivity, a concept he developed in his dissertation to help researchers understand consumers’ loss of voice, choice, and power in service interactions. This discussion will highlight service design elements integral to diminishing consumer perceptions of service captivity. Dr. Rayburn will also discuss employee prosocial motivation and impact, employees’ desire and ability to positively contribute to the wellbeing of others. This discussion will expose the positive tripartite impact on the employee, organization, and customers that is present when prosocial motivation is facilitated.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – April 1^st, 2025 | 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“Rethinking the Service Profit Chain: A Revised Framework for the Digital Era”

Jens Hogreve – Ingolstadt School of Management, Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt (Germany)

Abstract:

“Over the past 25 years, the service–profit chain (SPC) has become a key framework for service managers and researchers. This talk will reflect on and synthesize published research to clarify what is well understood about the SPC and what remains less explored. Based on an in-depth discussion of the field, the talk will present a revised SPC and highlight multiple areas for further research, including internal service quality as a system of human resource management practices, the roles of employee and customer well-being as additional mediators, different targets of employee and customer loyalty, key contingencies, and the potential for non-linear and feedback effects. The talk will conclude by reimagining the SPC in light of digital and artificial intelligence–driven transformations, followed by a discussion of ongoing research on AI at the service frontline.”

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – March 18^th, 2025 | 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“Management control and agility: Temporal anchor practices and the (re-)production of temporal asymmetries between waterfall mainland and agile islands”

Sebastian Becker – HEC Paris (France)

Abstract:

Based on qualitative data collected in an organization attempting an ‘agile transformation’, this paper studies the emergence and (re )production of temporal clashes between temporally asymmetric worlds – between agile islands and the waterfall mainland. We argue and empirically demonstrate how temporal asymmetries and concomitant clashes between temporally asymmetric worlds may stem from the existence of different and seemingly incompatible temporal anchor practices, specifying the normatively expected and accepted temporal performance across the nexus of practices within these communities. Our analysis emphasizes the role of management control practices, central for intra-organizational cooperation in (re )producing and manifesting such temporal anchor practices and in bringing tensions between the temporally asymmetric worlds to the fore. Moreover, we outline two particular strategies that the members of the temporally asymmetric worlds resorted to in their attempts to address existing temporal clashes that jeopardized productive cooperation.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – March 11^th, 2025 | 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“Home-delivery subscription services and their impact on omnichannel grocery retailing revenue and operating costs”

Rui Soucasaux Sousa – Católica Porto Business School, Catholic University of Portugal

We examine transaction-level data from an omnichannel grocery retailer to study the impact of home-delivery subscription service on retail revenue and operating costs across online (home-delivery and click-and-collect) and offline channels. We further quantify the consumer heterogeneity of these effects to identify determinants of subscription profitability and derive a minimum order value that guarantees this profitability. We find that consumers decrease their weekly spending on home-delivery fees by 6.70% post-subscription. However, they also increase their average total weekly spending on groceries by 30% (combining all channels). This is driven primarily by increases in product spending through the home-delivery channel at the expense of other channels. We identify changes in order frequency and the value and number of SKUs and total items per order as the mechanisms behind this cannibalization. These mechanisms also increase the retailer’s order picking and delivery costs, resulting in an average 3% residual gross margin. Nevertheless, our analysis of individual consumers reveals that for many of them, these increases in costs exceed the revenue gains obtained by the retailer post-subscription. To correct for these imbalances, we contribute a procedure to identify a minimum order value required for home deliveries in the subscription program. Overall, our results show that the economic impact of delivery subscription programs is rooted in behavioural drivers leading consumers to increase their consumption and offset the sunk costs they incur from the upfront fees they pay when joining these programs. This impact is also reflected in consumers’ behavioural changes to reduce the costs of transacting with the retailer post-subscription.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – February 25^th , 2025 18:30h – 20:00h | Room 631 | Online

“Risk Management in Solar Power Plants with Storage: A Comparative Study”

Fernando Siciliani Oliveira

Using risk-averse stochastic programming, we study the management of solar power plants considering trading in the spot and future markets, together with storage systems and a novel weather derivative based on solar radiation. We compare the performance of two main solar-based technologies: a concentrated solar power plant with thermal storage (CSP) and a photovoltaic power plant with electrical batteries (PV). The methodological contribution is the study of the interaction between en- ergy trading, weather derivatives and storage under risk aversion. The managerial contributions are the following. First, we analyze the interaction between optimal trading and storage. Second, we unveiled how the value of the put and call options depends on solar radiation, generation, and storage levels. Moreover, we have shown that the optimal strategy is to sell calls and buy put options and that generators with a storage system sell significantly more call options. Third, we proved that the higher the risk aversion, the more the generator sells in the futures market and the higher the number of purchased put contracts. Finally, by using numerical analysis to compare CSP and PV plants, we show that PVs are more profitable under the considered conditions and that batteries create more value.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar

Monday – January 13^th, 2025 | 18:30h | Room 305

“Disruptive Technologies and Innovation as Drivers of Sustainable Business Practices in SMEs: The Role of Business Model Compatibility”

Antonio Revilla Torrejón – University Carlos III of Madrid (Spain)

Alicia Rodríguez Márquez – University Carlos III of Madrid (Spain)

Abstract:

“The rapid adoption of advanced digital technologies, along with the pressing need for the transition to a greener economy, are disrupting most industries and posing significant challenges to SMEs. In this study, we analyze how disruptive digital technologies and innovation may contribute to developing sustainable business practices in SMEs in two ways. First, the utilization of these technologies may directly reduce negative environmental impacts, enabling greater resource efficiency, waste reduction, and optimization of processes and operations. Second, as an indirect effect, these technologies may facilitate innovations that in turn may result in more sustainable business practices. Additionally, we introduce the concept of business model compatibility and analyze its role in moderating both relationships. The arguments above are captured in a moderated mediation model tested on a sample of 11,309 European Firms. The results provide empirical support for direct and indirect hypothesized relationships. Our findings also show that business model compatibility strengthens the direct relationships between disruptive technologies and sustainability. We conclude that digitalization brings significant opportunities for more environmentally-friendly businesses. We also conclude that the ability of SMEs to seize such opportunities and contribute to the transition to a greener economy partially depends on their innovation activities and the design of their business models.”

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Monday – July 8^th , 2024 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. | Room 631 | Online

“Fifteen years of customer engagement research: a bibliometric and network analysis“

Linda D. Hollebeek – Sunway University (Malaysia)

Abstract:

“Purpose – In recent years, customer engagement (CE) with brands, which has been shown to yield enhanced firm sales, competitive advantage and stock returns, has risen to occupy a prominent position in brand management research and practice. Correspondingly, scholars have explored CE’s conceptualization, operationalization and its nomological networks as informed by different theoretical perspectives. However, in spite of important advances, the knowledge structure of the overall corpus of CE research remains tenuous. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to explore the intellectual structure of CE research.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Monday – June 17^th , 2024 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. | Room 631 | Online

“Developing and Publishing Systematic Literature Reviews in Premier Business Outlets”

Michael Christofi – School of Economics and Management – Cyprus University of Technology (Cyprus)

The seminar will briefly explain what a systematic literature review is, as well as the various categories of systematic review articles. Continuing, it will mainly focus on the basics steps for developing such type of articles, with practical examples of systematic review papers published in premier business outlets. Finally, the seminar will provide tips and recommendations when it comes to submit such manuscripts for publication in premier business journals, by analysing what editors and reviewers see when it comes to review such papers.

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – June 4^th , 2024 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. | Room 631 | Online

“Peer pressure and manager pressure in organisations”

Tom Kirchmaier – LSE – London School of Economics and Political Science (England, United Kingdom)

Abstract:

“We study the interaction between horizontal (peer) and vertical (manager) social factors in workers’ motivation. In our setting, individuals work using open-plan desks. Using a natural experiment, we identify a sharp increase in workers’ productivity following the occupation of adjacent desks. We link this peer pressure effect to two key aspects of the worker-manager relation. First, we find stronger peer pressure when managers monitor workers less. Second, we find stronger peer pressure among workers performance-evaluated by the same manager. In a set of counterfactual exercises, we illustrate how organisations could take advantage of these interdependencies to increase worker productivity. ”

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar

Tuesday – May 28^th , 2024 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. | Room 631

MEET THE EDITORS

This seminar is an opportunity to meet and talk with the editors of selected journals, all of them affiliated with FEP – School of Economics and Management of the University of Porto.

Editors will answer questions about the journals, discuss the submission and review processes, and provide attendees with advice on how to increase the likelihood of publication.

• João Oliveira (Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management)
• Luísa Pinto (Journal of Global Mobility)
• Amélia Brandão (International Journal of Consumer Studies)
• Dalila Fontes (Journal of Combinatorial Optimization)

Moderator: Teresa Fernandes (Services Marketing Quarterly)

CEF.UP – MaR Seminar/Webinar

Tuesday – May 21^th , 2024 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. | Room 631 | Online

” Understanding the complexity of ethics, moral blindness and designing an ethics experience that inspires ethical behaviour“

Ana Roque – FEP – School of Economics and Management, University of Porto

Abstract:

“Organisations positioning regarding ethics is still, in general terms, reactive and compliance oriented. When we look at companies reports, we see that very few include people from the ethics office in core management committees, such as marketing, product development, or innovation. However, ethics is nowadays fundamental from the perspective of internal culture and climate, organizational development, reputation, and is a necessary condition for a true and consistent path towards sustainable development.There are many obstacles preventing ethics from being present in the daily lives of organizations, which would be important. The name itself can be intimidating; some people might think we’re talking about morality, but ethics and morality are not the same thing. There are many myths, starting with the idea that being ethical is easy, that bad practices are essentially a matter of a few bad apples, and that an ethics program can be unilaterally created, almost just a code (as we see in many organizations), and that this has power over culture.”