This short case covers the recent strategic developments of Barnes & Noble, the largest US book chain, and puts them in the context of its peers worldwide (in the UK, Canada, Germany and France). The perspective of the case is the one of James Daunt, CEO of Barnes & Noble since August 2019. Readers are put in his shoes and are asked to analyze Barnes & Noble's response strategy to an increasingly digital book market. This short case is intended to serve as part of a course session on digitalization strategies or strategic change responding to macro trends. The case can support a full 45-minute class session, or can be integrated into a 90-minute session that also includes theory input by the lecturer. The case questions are open-ended but intended to introduce frameworks to assess strategic change and response strategies to exogenous shocks.
The top management team (TMT) structure, which comprises the size, role structure, and hierarchy of a TMT, has received increasing attention of late. However, despite the literature’s potential to complement research on strategic leadership (in particular, TMT composition and the heterogeneity of TMT members’ experiences and psychological characteristics), the fragmented insights have complicated the task of assessing this promising research area. The purpose of this article is to review the empirical research on TMT structure and to identify gaps, patterns, and future research opportunities. Based on our review, we synthesize the research on the TMT structure into a framework and propose avenues for future research in the following areas: (1) studying TMT structures jointly, (2) exploring new dimensions of the TMT structure, (3) applying new perspectives and approaches, (4) understanding the antecedents, and (5) combining the TMT structure with other strategic leadership research.
We begin by arguing that the quality of forecasts consists of two aspects: accuracy and timing. Existing conceptualizations and operationalizations of the quality of forecasts, however, appear to focus more on the accuracy and do not incorporate sufficiently the timing of forecasts. To improve the so-called Accuracy Score of Cultivate Labs (the backend of GJopen and our St. Gallen Forecasting platform), we propose what we call the “Quality Score”, which also considers the timing of bad forecasts. We believe that Cultivate Labs should consider adopting a Quality Score instead of its current Accuracy Score. Building on Merkle et al. (2017), we then move into a second important proposal by noting that research is frequently interested in measuring as precisely as possible the forecasting skills of persons. We argue that IRT models should be the preferred tool for measuring the forecasting skills of persons as they usually allow researchers to measure the forecasting skills more accurately than the Accuracy Score or Quality Score. To allow researchers to estimate forecasting skills, we refine an earlier IRT model to implement our definition of the quality of forecasts in the context of forecasting tournaments. Unlike earlier IRT models, which only captured the timing of one forecast per tournament question, our proposed model makes it possible to assess the timing of multiple forecast per tournament question, as is common on the GJopen and St. Gallen forecasting platforms. With our refined IRT model one can analyze experimental settings in which forecasters are encouraged to update their probability forecasts every time they obtain relevant new information.
Purpose – This study aims to explore an exemplar of the design and application of a systemic framework for higher education. The field of application is in the social sciences and the perspective long-term, covering three generations of faculty and many generations of students.
Design/methodology/approach – This study is exploratory. It contains a conceptual component and an empirical component with a long-term case study from a European university.
Findings – A cybersystemic approach to higher education has been shown, at the focal university, to be a powerful amplifier of individual and institutional capabilities, and it still has great potential. The crucial prerequisite is that the approach is virtuously designed and implemented.
Originality/value – A case study ranging over 50 years is presented. The respective university has been a role model for other educational institutions for many years. Its influence in the German-speaking countries, and more recently also internationally, has become significant.
Schwaninger, Markus & Grösser, Stefan N.: System Dynamics Modeling: Validation for Quality Assurance. In Dangerfield, Brian (ed.): System Dynamics.Theory and Applications. A Volume in the Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science. New York : Springer, 2020, S. 119-138.
Schwaninger, Markus: System Dynamics in the Evolution of the Systems Approach. In Dangerfield, Brian (ed.): System Dynamics.Theory and Applications. A Volume in the Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science. New York : Springer, 2020, S. 21-39.
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