Trust In Firms Research Articles

Blockchain Based Crop Insurance: A Decentralized Insurance System for Modernization of Indian Farmers

Conventional crop insurance systems are complex and often not economically feasible. Farmers are often reluctant to be covered for their crops due to lack of trust in insurance firms and the fear of delayed or non-payment of claims. In this paper, a blockchain based crop insurance solution is suggested. The solution suggested in this paper is an affordable, efficient, low cost crop insurance solution which will ensure many farmers are insured and benefiting from timely crop insurance. Currently the cost of administering insurance is an essential barrier to accessing this facility. With the proper use of blockchain based on ethereum this expense can be reduced dramatically. We have conducted various tests on platforms such as Google Cloud and found that the least throughput is 165 transactions. Upon analysis we have found that the time taken by the block formation is directly proportional to the timing of processing. The end-to-end average latency of the system was achieved as 31.2 s, which was quite effective for the infrastructure what we are using. Upon conducting acceptance testing, we found that the system suggested in the paper is effective and we are planning to release the application on open source platforms for future improvements.

Mission and Principalities and Powers Reconsidered

This article examines the implications for public witness of the Pauline notion of principalities and powers with reference to Bosch, Newbigin, Bevans and Schroeder, Acolatse, Wink, Barth, and Moltmann. It critiques popular contemporary ideas of “spiritual warfare” in light of the relevant Pauline texts and theological arguments. It examines the theological idea that the source of evil lies in godlessness and how this idea illuminates the concept of principalities and powers for contemporary Christian practice. It argues that it is the mission of the church to publicly bear witness and to evangelize the principalities and powers in both personal and systemic forms while maintaining a humble but firm trust in the liberating work of Christ.

Does CSR Engender Trust? Evidence From Investor Reactions to Corporate Disclosures

We investigate whether a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities engender investor trust. Motivated by the observation that investor trust facilitates greater informational price efficiency, we address our question by examining the relation between CSR and three dimensions of stock price discovery: (1) the speed with which stock prices reflect earnings news, (2) the level of investor uncertainty around earnings announcements, and (3) earnings response coefficients. We find robust evidence that CSR enhances investor trust in firms. Specifically, we find that firms with more CSR enjoy faster incorporation of earnings news into stock prices, lower investor uncertainty around earnings announcements, and higher earnings response coefficients. Using a regression discontinuity design, we identify the causal effect of CSR on the speed with which stock prices reflect earnings news. Our inferences are robust to controls for characteristics of reported earnings and firms' information environment, as well as alternative measures of CSR.

Brand outcomes in sales channel relationships: a guanxi theory perspective

PurposeGuanxi is the foundation of business success in Chinese and other Eastern cultures, but little is known about the extent to which guanxi influences brand outcomes in channel relationships. The purpose of this study is to propose a novel theoretical framework of interpersonal and interorganizational guanxi relationships in a sales channel context and how these relationships influence brand outcomes.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conceptualize, develop and validate new scales measuring interpersonal and interorganizational guanxi and test the proposed model with a field study to validate the effects of guanxi on brand loyalty. The causal relationships between interpersonal guanxi and brand attitudes and affect are confirmed in a separate field experiment.FindingsFindings show that interpersonal guanxi is antecedent to interorganizational guanxi, and these two constructs have significant and differential direct and indirect effects on brand attitudes, brand affect and brand loyalty.Originality/valueNew multidimensional scales measuring both interpersonal and interorganizational guanxi were developed. Both interpersonal and interorganizational guanxi are conceptualized as second-order reflective constructs measured by the reflective first-order guanxi elements of personal and firm trust, personal and firm long-term orientation, xinyong (integrity), reciprocity, interaction and face.

Attention-Based LSTM Network for Rumor Veracity Estimation of Tweets

Twitter has become a fertile place for rumors, as information can spread to a large number of people immediately. Rumors can mislead public opinion, weaken social order, decrease the legitimacy of government, and lead to a significant threat to social stability. Therefore, timely detection and debunking rumor are urgently needed. In this work, we proposed an Attention-based Long-Short Term Memory (LSTM) network that uses tweet text with thirteen different linguistic and user features to distinguish rumor and non-rumor tweets. The performance of the proposed Attention-based LSTM model is compared with several conventional machine and deep learning models. The proposed Attention-based LSTM model achieved an F1-score of 0.88 in classifying rumor and non-rumor tweets, which is better than the state-of-the-art results. The proposed system can reduce the impact of rumors on society and weaken the loss of life, money, and build the firm trust of users with social media platforms.

Firm social networks, trust, and security issuances

We observe that public firms are more likely to issue seasoned stocks rather than bonds when theirs boards are more socially-connected. These connected issuers experience better announcement-period stock returns and attract more institutional investors. This social-connection effect is stronger for firms with severe information asymmetry, higher risk of being undersubscribed, and more visible to investors. Our conjecture is this social-network effect is driven by trust in issuing firms. Given stocks are more sensitive to trust, these trusted firms are more likely to issue stocks than bonds. Trustworthiness plays an important role in firms’ security issuances in capital markets.

Introduction to Special Issue: Trust in Doubt: Consuming in a Post-Truth World

Introduction to Special Issue: Trust in Doubt: Consuming in a Post-Truth World

Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety through Access to Human Contact

It is a well-established result in social psychology that when people feel anxious, they seek advice from others. However, increasingly companies that operate in high-anxiety settings (like financial services, health care, and education) are deploying self-service technologies (SSTs), through which anxious customers transact without human contact. The impact of customer anxiety on service relationships is neither well understood, nor consistently factored into service design. In this paper, two laboratory experiments and one field experiment, conducted in financial service contexts, document the negative effects of anxiety on customer choice satisfaction, firm trust, and long-term engagement, and explore the impact of giving self-service consumers the option to interact with a person. Participants engaged in an online investing simulation who are made to feel anxious due to market downturns are less satisfied with their choices and report lower levels of trust in the firm. Providing participants with the opportunity to interact with an expert, or even another participant, dampens anxiety’s negative effects on choice satisfaction and, by extension, firm trust. Interestingly, we find that very few participants who are offered the option to interact with a person take advantage of the opportunity, which is consistent with the idea that it is the mere availability of human contact that mitigates anxiety’s deleterious effects. Finally, in a field experiment conducted with a credit union’s self-service term loan approval process, the incorporation of access to human contact increased customer loan acceptance by 16%, suggesting that access to human contact can improve long-term service engagement.

How democratic decentralisation facilitates, sustains, and interrupts market-driven development in India

ABSTRACTDemocratic decentralisation has emerged as an instrument to implement market-driven development, and elected bodies now extend commercial inputs for commodity production and link households to firms. However, the nature of market-driven development under this condition is understudied. This article focuses on an Indian case where, while access to market inputs was shaped by political capital with elected leaders, narrowing market participation, leaders – now market intermediaries – fostered trust in firms, helping sustain market participation. Conflicts over electoral politics interrupted market production. Markets rely on state institutions and are intertwined with politics, contrary to market proponents’ claims that markets stand above society and are unmediated spaces of exchange.

How to regain public trust in audit firms? The case of the Financial Reporting Council

PurposeThis study aims to provide a better understanding of the role of the Financial Reporting Council (FRC), as the unified regulator of the audit profession in the UK, in restoring public trust in audit profession in the UK. It further analyses the views of partners in the Big 4 audit firms on this role.Design/methodology/approachThe research data were gathered by conducting 17 semi-structured interviews with the top management of FRC’s members and executive partners of the Big 4 firms in the UK. The interviews were complemented by analysing data available on the web pages of the Big 4 firms and published reports related to the FRC’s projects.FindingsThis study identified three main strategies followed by the FRC to promote the trust and enhance the choice of auditors in the UK audit market. These strategies are improving the audit quality, increasing the transparency of the big audit firms and reducing the barriers to compete in the big audit market.Practical implicationsAn analysis of the FRC’s efforts may help auditors to identify what they are expected to do to improve the reliability of information provided in the capital market. Audit committees can get a better understanding of the criteria that they need to improve the process of auditors’ choice. Auditors will also better understand how and why current audit regulations have been issued. This may improve their satisfaction with regulations and standards, and their efficient implementation. Furthermore, it is believed that audit regulators need to get feedback additional to the formal feedback they receive to improve their performance and current regulations.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the literature by discussing the auditors’ criticism to the Audit Inspection Unit’s inspectors and the way the inspectors defend themselves. The findings suggest that partners of the Big 4 believe that the FRC’s projects effectively participate in improving the audit quality, as well as providing wider information about the audit firms to the public. However, different actions need to be taken to enhance the choice of auditors and increase the number of big audit firms that compete in the market.

Creating particularized trust in e-retailers through experiential value and generalized trust

Although practitioners-based survey indicated that trust in businesses and other societal institutions wane simultaneously whilst academic literatures support the view that externally sanctioned beliefs drive consumers’ trust in specific firms, the relationship between broad-level generalized kind of trust and trust in specific firms is an understanding that is yet to be empirically investigated. This paper examined the relationship between generalized trust and particularized trust as well as the mediating role of experiential value in that relationship. Data generated from 268 informants through a snowball sampling procedure indicates that generalized trust is directly related to components of particularized trust whilst components of utilitarian and hedonic value mediate the relationships between generalized trust and components of particularized trust. The implicit proposal is that e-retailers must look beyond the primary responsibility of enhancing profits and strengthen trust in their market offerings by taking managerial actions that not only ensure consistent delivery of valuable services but are consistent with public interests and opinions in the environment where they operate.

Why the family business brand matters: Brand authenticity and the family firm trust inference

Studying branding strategies of family firms gives rise to a striking observation: an increasing number of family firms nowadays communicate the “family” nature of their organizations. We therefore see a need for controlled empirical tests to determine whether this strategy of using a family business brand does influence consumers brand perceptions. Drawing on inference theory, we test the influence of a family business brand on perceptual and intentional variables in a series of two experimental online studies (N = 382; N = 126) and one field experiment (N = 54). The findings reveal that consumers infer higher brand trust from the communication of the firm's family nature, resulting in stronger purchase intentions. Furthermore, we identify brand authenticity as mediating variable for the family firm trust inference: consumers perceive brands that communicate their family nature as more authentic, leading to higher brand trust, and thus revealing brand authenticity as cognitive process of the family firm trust inference.

International regulations related to naval mines and protection of navigation

The free movement of people and goods is one of the fundamental values of the European Union. Nowadays, the security environment out of Territorial waters is changing its characteristics. The statute of any military action in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) becomes more sensitive than ever. The use of naval mines is demanding adequate responsibility so that to correspond to trends in maritime security. It is vital, the perception for laying off mines at sea to be placed impartially between international legislation and military morale inspired by inherent civilization values, adequate to requirements of Geneva Conventions and United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS-82) in respect with human rights. The Convention relative to the laying of automatic submarine contact mines (Hague VIII) is an example that there are some needs for regulation of the use of naval mines at sea. Moreover, the significance of the Hague VIII Convention released in 1907 is more or less melting. UNCLOS-82 doesn`t treat the use of naval mines in details, so there is certain vacuum in regulation of those security aspects. The existence of sound and transparent principles is extremely important for building firm trust and mutual understanding between coastal states.

Does Consumer Empathy Influence Consumer Responses to Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility? The Dual Mediation of Moral Identity

The present study examined consumer responses to strategic corporate social responsibility (CSR) from the perspectives of consumer moral emotions (empathy) and cognition (moral identity), and investigated charitable activities conducted by convenience stores in Taiwan from theoretical and practical perspectives. The research method involved a comparison between two actual charitable activities conducted by convenience stores, namely “donation platform services” and “cause-related marketing”. A questionnaire was distributed into four regions spanning southern to northern Taiwan by using a convenient sampling method, and 332 valid responses were collected. The present study employed structural equation modelling to verify its hypotheses. In terms of theoretical contributions, the present study constructed two theoretical models and subsequently verified that empathy influences moral identity; this constitutes a major contribution to investigations of the causal relationship between moral emotions and cognitive theory. In practice, the present study recommends that convenience stores implement more cause-related marketing to reduce consumer suspicions that firms are motivated purely by profit and increase consumer trust in firms. Subsequent studies are recommended to conduct in-depth investigations of the underlying causes of moral identity internalization and symbolization generating different responses in consumers, as well as other possible situational variables.

External growth strategies and organizational performance in emerging markets

PurposeInter-organizational trust has a vital role in any external trade relationship. However, there are not many studies relating to growth strategies and inter-organizational trust in firms in emerging markets. The purpose of this paper is to identify and compare the effect of external growth strategies on the organizational performance of companies and to examine the mediating role of inter-organizational trust between growth strategies and organizational performance.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 240 senior managers from public listed companies (PLCs) in Malaysia and were analyzed using analysis of a moment structures.FindingsThe findings indicate that growth strategies have a significant effect on organizational performance. Strategic alliances and acquisitions also have significant effects on organizational performance. Moreover, inter-organizational trust fully mediates the effect of growth strategies on organizational performance.Research limitations/implicationsAs purposive sampling was used, selecting only managers with experience of the issues concerned, any common findings are likely to be generalizable to managers in similar situations.Practical implicationsBuilding inter-organizational trust among companies and relying on strategic alliance and acquisition, rather than merger, will sharpen their competitiveness and enable them to survive and thrive.Social implicationsThe increase in organizational performance of PLCs will have a significant effect on employment and on gross domestic product (GDP), which will have a beneficial effect on citizens.Originality/valueStudies that are related to these variables in emerging economies are still in their infancy. This study compared the effect of external growth strategies and contributed to the literature in the area of trust and external growth strategies.

Veterinary herd health management–Experience among farmers and farm managers in Swedish dairy production

A preventive herd health approach will most likely reduce incidences of clinical and subclinical disease. Swedish veterinary organizations offer specific veterinary herd health management (HHM) programs, but these services are not used to a large extent.The aim of this study was to investigate dairy farmers’ experience of HHM and the conditions for collaboration with veterinarians in HHM.Six focus group discussions were conducted in March 2015 in West Sweden. In total, 33 dairy farmers participated. The recordings were transcribed and coded using thematic analysis, and the transcripts were reviewed to identify potential factors indicating barriers for farmers to engage a veterinarian in HHM. The participants reported HHM to be important, but they had difficulty defining the actions included in the concept. They described a wide range of their work duties as preventive. The farmers’ list of potential contributions by the veterinarians in HHM was strikingly short compared to the considerable number of preventive measures they performed themselves. Four main obstacles for farmers and farm managers to engage a veterinarian in HHM on their farm were identified in the analysis: “costs”, “veterinary knowledge, skills, and organization”, “farmer attitudes”, and “veterinarian-farmer relationships”. Costs were proposed as the main reason against engaging a veterinarian in HHM and included a high veterinary bill, low cost-benefit of veterinary services, and high costs to implement advice. Poor veterinary competence in HHM and poor knowledge about effective measures, practical farming, and farm economics were other important obstacles. Veterinarians were perceived to insufficiently describe their services and their benefits, and several participants felt they had never been offered veterinary HHM. Although veterinary HHM may be initiated by the farmer, the participants expected the veterinarian to have special responsibility for the initiation. A firm trust between farmer, staff, and veterinarian was considered crucial for veterinary HHM, but such trust takes a long time to build and can easily be disrupted by, for example, a veterinarian’s poor communication skills or lack of time.Our findings suggest that Swedish dairy farmers and herd managers find disease prevention important and that they perform a wide range of tasks to prevent disease in their animals. However, they do not see what role the veterinarian can play, and veterinarians were mainly associated with treating unhealthy cows. In order to increase the use of veterinary HHM programs the services and potential benefits of such programs need to be communicated more proactively.

서비스기업에서 내부마케팅요인이 조직신뢰 및 조직시민행동에 미치는 영향 연구 : 여행기업 종사원을 중심으로

본 연구는 서비스기업 중에서 여행기업을 선정하여 내부고객인 종사원에 대한 마케팅 활동이 어느 정도 이루어져 있는가를 평가하고자 하였다. 이에 총 350매를 배부하여, 불성실하게 응답했거나 연구목적에 적합하지 않다고 판단되는 설문지를 제외한 총 301매를 분석에 사용하였다. 본 연구는 SPSS Win ver.18.0 통계패키지 프로그램을 이용하였다. 본 연구는 내부마케팅의 실행 요소가 종사원의 태도를 보여주는 조직시민행동에 어떠한 영향관계로 미치는지에 대한 실증분석을 바탕으로 본 연구의 주요 연구결과를 요약하였다. 첫째, 내부마케팅의 하부요인인 권한위임, 보상제도, 교육훈련, 내부 커뮤니케이션의 네 가지의 요인들은 조직신뢰에 긍정적으로 유의한 영향 관계를 보였다. 둘째, 조직신뢰는 조직시민행동에 긍정적으로 유의한 영향 관계를 보였다. 셋째, 내부마케팅의 하부요인인 권한위임, 보상제도, 교육훈련, 내부 커뮤니케이션은 조직시민행동에 긍정적으로 유의한 영향 관계를 보였다. 즉, 여행기업에서도 내부 구성원에 대한 전략적인 도구인 내부마케팅요인들을 어떻게 구사하느냐에 따라 서비스를 전달하게 되는 여행기업 종사원의 태도를 고객중심적으로 변화시킬 수 있음을 의미한다. 이는 여행기업에서 내부마케팅을 강화하는 노력을 통해 종사원들의 고객에 대한 조직시민행동 의식을 고취시킴으로서 고객지향적인 종사원으로 양성시킬 수 있다는 점을 시사하였다. 결국 서비스 지향성이 강한 여행업의 특성을 고려할 때, 종사원의 고객만족도를 증가시키고자 한다면 종사원의 조직시민행동을 높여야하며 그 방안으로 내부마케팅의 실행이 매우 중요한 요인이 된다는 것을 확인할 수 있었다. 이상과 같은 연구의 의의에도 불구하고 본 연구가 갖는 한계점은 본 연구의 변수측정을 위해 자기보고식 설문지를 사용하였기 때문에 동일한 방법으로 측정함으로써 발생하는 오류가 있을 가능성이 높다.

Corporate social responsibility: a boon or bane for innovative firms?

In today’s dynamic business landscape, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is considered as an important strategic initiative for attaining sustainable competitive advantage. The present study aims to examine (i) the influence of consumer’s perceived firm innovativeness (CPFI) and consumer trust on perceived CSR activities of the firm and (ii) the mediating role of perceived CSR in the relationship between (iia) consumer’s perceived firm innovativeness and purchase intention (iib) consumer trust and purchase intention. Four hypotheses were tested with the primary data (n = 287) collected through a structured questionnaire. The regression analysis revealed that CPFI and consumer trust have direct positive impacts on the perceived CSR. Further, perceived CSR mediates the relationship between CPFI and purchase intention. However, perceived CSR does not play a mediating role between Consumer Trust and Purchase Intention. Overall, the findings of this study indicate that engagement in the CSR activities tend to reduce the perceived risk associated with innovation and consequently, influence the purchase intention among consumers. Theoretical and managerial implications are further discussed.

Economic Relationship among Partnering, Trust and Organizational Efficiency in selected Construction Firms in North-East, Nigeria

This study was prompted by the desire to assess the relationship among partnering, trust and organizational efficiency in selected construction firms in North-East, Nigeria. It sought to:(i) ascertain the nature of the effect of partnering on organizational productivity in selected construction firms in North East, Nigeria; (ii) ascertain the extent of the relationship between partnering and trust in the selected construction firms in North East, Nigeria. The population of the study was 1662 staff of the selected construction firms in North East Nigeria. The sample size of 553 was obtained using freund and William formula. Proportionate Stratified sampling technique was used to select respondents in each of the construction industry. Data were collected using content validated questionnaire. The reliability was test using a test retest method and Cronbach’s alpha was adopted, giving a coefficient of 0.94, indicating a high degree of items consistency. It was found that Partnering had a positive effect on organizational productivity in selected construction firms in North East, Nigeria (r = 0.772, p < 0.05); Partnering had a significant positive relationship with trust in selected construction firms in North East, Nigeria. (r = 0.948, p < 0.05). Based on the findings the study concluded that trust is simply indispensable for long term strategic relationships like partnering; however, successful partnering in contracting firms has certain pre-requisites that must be fulfilled before implementing the concept. Based on the conclusion, the study recommends that Management should continually and continuously design effective partnering that will achieve organizational productivity. This will ensure that these organisations are equipped with the requisite rules and regulation of Agreement. Trust should be targeted to ensure that it is focused on achieving organizational profitability; The Partnering Agreement of construction firms should be focused to enhance organizational market share and appropriate partnering that suit the uniqueness of the organization should be adopted, to ensure that growth is achieved.

The Role of Buyer Trust in Outsourced CRM: Its Influence on Organizational Learning and Performance

ABSTRACTPurpose: Company outsourcing of customer relationship management (CRM) functions is increasing (Kalaignanam and Varadarajan 2012). Although outsourcing CRM may provide financial benefits, the tasks of developing and utilizing the complex, cross-functional processes needed to gain enhanced customer knowledge from CRM may be more difficult when some or all CRM activities are outsourced. Trust in the information provided by the outsourced CRM supplier is vital. In this study, the authors examine the influence of buyer trust in its outsourced CRM supplier on cross-functional learning processes and firm performance within the buyer firm.Methodology: Data were collected from a survey of marketing managers in 221 firms. LISREL 9.2 was used to assess convergent, discriminant, and nomologic validity using the two-step approach (Anderson and Gerbing 1988). Convergent and discriminant validity were evaluated in the measurement model phase, whereas the structural model provided an appraisal of nomologic validity.Findings: The results provide evidence of buyer firm trust in the outsourced CRM supplier playing a critical role in the buyer firm’s success with information sharing, and both trust and information sharing strongly influencing information interpretation and information access in the buyer firm. All three organizational learning processes positively influence buyer firm customer satisfaction/retention and market performance.Research implications: An important area for future research is the possibility of varying levels of trust needed for success with outsourced CRM depending on the buyer firm’s goals for its CRM system. It is possible that the simpler CRM functions could be outsourced effectively through efficiency strategies that do not require significant levels of trust, whereas the more complex CRM activities that affect organizational learning require more stringent coordination and inter-organizational development. Varadarajan’s (2009) cost versus quality classifications of outsourcing could be a useful starting point for this type of analysis. Considering the finding in this study that information sharing is critical for information interpretation and information access in the buyer firm, another area for future research is possible differences in the extent of information sharing required by firms that are outsourcing CRM versus those that conduct the CRM function in-house. One starting point could be possible differences in relevance among Maltz and Kohli’s (1996) factors affecting information dissemination.Practical implications: For effective use of CRM data, it is important for buyer firms to develop trust in their outsourced CRM supplier. Managers can assist in this by communicating qualifications of the outsourced CRM supplier, such as any trade-specific certifications, awards, information about the supplier’s number of years in business, and examples of other companies the supplier has assisted. Managers can also help employees develop confidence in the supplier’s integrity by sharing the supplier’s code of ethics and serving as a champion for the supplier. In addition, firms engaged in outsourced CRM are encouraged to develop reward systems that motivate employees to build relationships with their counterparts in the supplier firm, and it would be useful for the buyer firm to help its employees understand the importance of the CRM outsourcing relationship to the buyer firm’s success. Finally, it is important for management to provide opportunities for interaction between the outsourcing partner and key buyer firm employees who will use the CRM data, to encourage effective processes in information sharing, information interpretation, and information access.Contribution of the article: This article addresses the significance of outsourcing the CRM function and provides evidence that buyer trust in its CRM supplier is a critical factor in its utilization of CRM data for organizational learning and firm performance. It also demonstrates that effective sharing of information, cross-functional integration of customer data, and CRM information accessibility are critical for firm success.