Guest editorial

Citation

Brashear, T. (2012), "Guest editorial", Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, Vol. 27 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/jbim.2012.08027gaa.001

Guest editorial

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, Volume 27, Issue 7

This Special Issue of Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing presents papers from the CBIM Academic Workshop in Atlanta, Georgia. The workshop theme was: “Business-To-Business Marketing Strategy: Innovation, Execution and Competition”. The Workshop had a special session focused on the resource advantage theory of competition.

The first paper, by Medlin, provides an interesting focus on human relations in networks and organizational roles in “Peter Drucker’s ontology: understanding business relationships and networks”. The paper provides a perspective on Drucker’s ontology whereby managers may better understand individual’s roles throughout the organization. Insightful linkages between current marketing with a relational or networked theme are connected to the Drucker’s work related to timing, partner integration and network elements such as embeddedness, sensing, and identity. These elements of management have practical application in a globally networked management environment.

Next, in a case study of a global manufacturer, Biggemann’s “The essential role of information sharing in relationship development” delves into the underlying structure of information sharing. The findings show that in the case specific context information sharing can be described with a two-dimensional construct with sub-dimensions of mutual disclosure and multi-contact. These sub-dimensions are fundamental to the collaborative communication role rather than a mere transmission of persuasive messages. The manufacturer has a key responsibility in the promotion of trust and business growth by opening the information channels.

Salo looks at mobile information technology’s role in business relationships in the study “The role of mobile technology in a buyer-supplier relationship”. This in-depth case study shows how mobile solutions can be deployed within industrial buyer-supplier relationships to enhance processes, coordination and overall value creation. The research also presents examples of the possible uses of mobile technology in a buyer-seller relationship and the effects of the overall usage has on the relationship. The author provides some insights for future research.

A multi-method approach was used in the fourth paper, “Helicopter view: an interpersonal relationship sales process framework”. In it, Wiatr Borg and Freytag present a framework of interpersonal relationships in a sales process that enables businesses to understand and optimize the interpersonal relationship strategy in their selling processes. By adopting a cross-paradigm philosophy and a multi-method approach, this paper offers a new, comprehensive framework for understanding a B2B selling process. The presented framework suggests that interpersonal relationships are comprehensible from four perspectives or levels in a sales process: environment, firm, sales cycle, and sales characteristics.

In “Customer-focused and service-focused orientation in organizational structures”, Gebauer and Kowalkowski link discussions of service and customer orientations in the context of organizational structures. Their findings provide a unique view of four different patterns of how capital goods manufacturers have moved from a product-focus to service-focused. The analysis also provides insights into how organizational structures move from a geographic-focus to a customer-focused. Four patterns identified from the cases are explained with guidance for managers to restructure their companies towards service and customer orientations.

In the sixth paper, Kindström, Kowalkowski, and Nordin’s research shows that firms use distinct visualizations strategies across their life-cycle stages. “Visualizing the value of service-based offerings: empirical findings from the manufacturing industry” is a multi-case study which focuses on manufacturing firms strategies for visualization in their new offerings. Visualization enables firms to illustrate, demonstrate and communicate the value of their offerings. These strategies provide a view of the value created prior, during and post service interaction.

The advancement of various forms of qualitative research in the B2B context has been seen in recent years. In the paper “A structural guide to in-depth interviewing in business and industrial marketing research”Granot, Alejandro and Mottaprovide a step-by-step guide on the initial data collection in a participant-oriented, B2B context. The three-stage interview process follows the work of Seidman and is presented along with key issues on how to plan, structure, and execute a B2B interview-based hermenuetic ethnographic study.

In this Special Issue, there are three papers that focus on the resource advantage theory of competition (R-A theory). Arnett and Madhavaram, in “Multinational enterprise competition: grounding the eclectic paradigm of foreign production in resource-advantage theory”, explicate a dynamic theory of competition, R-A theory, with the aim of developing a theoretical foundation for the eclectic paradigm of foreign production. The paper develops a set of five criteria that should be met by any theory that attempts to ground the eclectic paradigm. In addition, it demonstrates that the R-A Theory meets all of these criteria. The grounding of the eclectic paradigm enhances the paradigm’s usefulness.

“Managerial action and resource-advantage theory: conceptual frameworks emanating from a positive theory of competition” illustrates that conceptual frameworks developed from a general theory of competition, R-A theory, can facilitate managerial action. Hunt and Madhavaram review various conceptual frameworks and the framework from resource-advantage theory, i.e. Firm Resources and External Environment (FREE). The theoretically based framework can replace frameworks that are currently in use for managerial action.

In the final paper, Bicen and Hunt present the first conceptual study to extend the concept of market orientation into inter-organizational new product framework. In “Alliance market orientation, new product development, and resource advantage theory” the role of alliance market orientation in NPD alliance success is presented as a relationship property at the inter-firm level. The articles main objectives are the defining alliance market orientation and argue that this orientation is important to new product development alliance success. A third objective is to use resource advantage theory of competition as a theoretical foundation for the concept and how it contributes to NPD success.

Special thanks go to Debi McPartlan for logistical support, Professor Sreedhar Madhavaram for the organization and management of the special session, and the participants of the CBIM Academic Workshop who represented 15 countries. Lastly, this would not be possible if not for the work of Professor Wesley J. Johnston, the CBIM Executive Director, who has provided a forum for researchers to share and expand their B2B work for more than 20 years.

Thomas Brashear