• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.93-100
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• 2015

Purpose - The objective of this research is to investigate whether national culture influences consumers' service evaluations. The services industry is receiving increasing attention from academia and practitioners as its position grows in global markets. Standardization or localization is a traditional managerial decision in global business. As the boundaries of services expand across national borders, firms are required to decide whether to standardize services or adjust to local needs. Though it is imperative to reflect global perspectives in marketing theories, these perspectives are mostly based on Western conceptualization of the world. Through a comparison of consumer groups from two culturally remote countries, service quality evaluation mechanisms are examined based on similar stimuli. The study tries to expand service marketing perspectives across national borders. Research design, data, and methodology - Eastern and Western countries are known to be culturally distinct. One Eastern and one Western country were chosen: an Anglo-Saxon country (the U.S., England, and Australia) and South Korea. In Hofstede's cultural dimensions, the differences between the two are pronounced. The Anglo-Saxon based countries share many similarities. Samples of the same sites are targeted. Questionnaires using a service quality scale (SERVQUAL) and a customer satisfaction scale were distributed. Utilizing Hofstede's typology of culture, the service evaluation mechanisms of the respondents from the two groups are evaluated. Three hypotheses are proposed from the review of the literature. These are service evaluation habits, importance of service quality dimensions for the individualistic/collectivistic countries, and strong/weak uncertainty avoidance cultures. Consumers from the individualistic countries are considered to care about themselves and demand a higher level of responsiveness and assurance. On the other hand, consumers from high uncertainty avoidance cultures are assumed to rely more on tangible questions of service quality, as these are the only predictable service quality indicators. A t-test and regression analysis are applied to validate the constructs. Results - The respondents from the Anglo-Saxon countries are more generous on service evaluations than Koreans. Researchers have indicated that Americans tend to give higher service evolution scores than European, Mexican, and Korean counterparts. The tendency is the same here. The sample from Anglo-Saxon countries demonstrated higher service evaluation scores on every dimension of SERVQUAL. For the second hypothesis, the respondents from the collectivistic culture rely less on core service dimensions (assurance and responsiveness) due to their tendency to place more value on group harmony than individual interest. However, the third hypothesis was not validated. Conclusions - The study attempted to expand the scope of service marketing to reflect cross-national perspectives. Service quality is known to have a strong influence on customer satisfaction and loyalty behavior. However, this research demonstrated that individuals from different cultural territories respond heterogeneously to the same stimuli. Scholars argue that national cultures are main factors in such deviated behavior. Scholars and global managers should be aware of differences in consumer value judgment mechanisms such as satisfaction, expectations, and perceptions.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.227-235
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• 2014

The change from people's work-centered values to their leisure-centered values leads into the change in their life styles. In the circumstance, people's participation into sports activities seems to be an important means to improve their quality of life. Along with the change of the times, more people take part in water leisure sports including kayak. As a result, people's needs for various designs of water leisure goods are on the rise. In this sense, it is necessary to come up with strategies to actively respond to such a change. In this paper, we proposed a user decision-making support system for designing kayaks for leisure. Based on the previous studies and literatures and a questionnaire survey with consumers, it chose the sensitivity related to design. By conducting factor analysis and evaluation, it drew sensitivity and proposed kayak design layouts in the aspect of customer sensitivity preference. It is expected that the result of this study will be used not only for kayak design, but as a design guide for the equipment of water leisure sports, and will be applied for user-friendly design.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.153-161
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• 2014

This study is to contribute to the policy decision of cosmetic industry through analyzing marketing mix factors which affects customers' buying intention. For this study, marketing mix factors that impact on cosmetic customers purchasing intention were collected and chi-square independence analysis of SPSS and qualitative analysis technology of Kano & Timko were used. Analysis reached one conclusion, which factors were maximizing customers satisfaction, shows the price discount policy and recommendation from family and colleague. Product's effectiveness, usefulness and skin compatibility were rated as an one-dimensional quality as those factors were linearly affected when customers needs were satisfied. However product's containers, package design, colors, brand reputation, low and middle price, distribution channel and advertising medias were investigated as an indifferent quality and they were rated as low satisfaction/dissatisfaction coefficient of Timko. Therefore they do not need to invest to those factors too much budget for attaining customers' buying intention.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.14 no.8
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• pp.431-441
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• 2014

In order to maximize customer's satisfaction, high-value service needs to be created by reducing service delivery errors and miscommunications. Employee's job rotation experience will help them to reduce errors and develop their career. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of job rotation on employability and subjective career satisfaction. The results clarifies the hotel's job rotation system and examine the relationship among job rotation, employability and subjective career satisfaction. Taking samples from full-time workers in hotel, total 370 participants were used in the analysis. The SEM approach was used to analysis the data with AMOS 20.0. The results show that job rotation has a positive influence on employability and subjective career satisfaction. Moreover, employability has a partial mediation effect between job rotation and subjective career satisfaction. Therefore, the study contributes to generate theoretical and practical implications in hospitality industry.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.17 no.11
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• pp.81-92
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• 2019

Purpose: The salesperson, the core of the operating activities, plays the role of connecting the inside and outside of the company, representing the company to the consumer and identifying and responding to the customer's needs. The department store industry is the most representative retail industry in South Korea, and competition among its peer group and industry is intensifying, requiring differentiated service sales activities and performance from its employees. This study divided the sales force system into activity control(process-oriented control) and output control(performance-oriented control) and verified the differential impact on the job attitude of the salesperson (e.g., job satisfaction and burn-out), respectively. In addition, the effect of job satisfaction and burn-out of the salesperson on the job performance were checked. Research design, data, and methodology: The survey was conducted on 200 sales people working at five branch stores of Hyundai department store in Seoul, and 194 of them were analyzed. The reliability and validity of the variables were analyzed and hypotheses were verified through the SEM. Results: Results have shown that activity control has a greater impact on burn-out compared to output control, and output control has a greater impact on job satisfaction compared to activity control. It has been shown that the salesperson's burn-out does not affect sales performance, but that job satisfaction has a positive effect on sales performance. Conclusions: This study examines the effect of sales force management system such as activity control and output control, on the job attitude and sales performance in department stores. According to the results of this research, each of two control systems have a discriminatory effect on the job attitude variables. For the sales managers of department store, it is recommended to increase the efficiency of sales management by increasing the use of outcome control compared to activity control.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.37-45
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• 2016

Control chart is representative tools of statistical process control (SPC). It is a graph that plotting the characteristic values from the process. It has two steps (or Phase). First step is a procedure for finding a process parameters. It is called Phase I. This step is to find the process parameters by using data obtained from in-controlled process. It is a step that the standard value was not determined. Another step is monitoring process by already known process parameters from Phase I. It is called Phase II. These control chart is the process quality characteristic value for management, which is plotted dot whether the existence within the control limit or not. But, this is not given information about the economic loss that occurs when a product characteristic value does not match the target value. In order to meet the customer needs, company not only consider stability of the process variation but also produce the product that is meet the target value. Taguchi's quadratic loss function is include information about economic loss that occurred by the mismatch the target value. However, Taguchi's quadratic loss function is very simple quadratic curve. It is difficult to realistically reflect the increased amount of loss that due to a deviation from the target value. Also, it can be well explained by only on condition that the normal process. Spiring proposed an alternative loss function that called reflected normal loss function (RNLF). In this paper, we design a new control chart for overcome these disadvantage by using the Spiring's RNLF. And we demonstrate effectiveness of new control chart by comparing its average run length (ARL) with ${\bar{x}}-R$ control chart and expected loss control chart (ELCC).

• Journal of Dairy Science and Biotechnology
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.81-85
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• 2011

Recently, antimicrobial resistance of microorganisms has been a major concern of its relation to food safety and national health, therefore, customer's needs to organic animal food is still increasing. In this study, we reviewed the usage of antimicrobials in animal farms and antimicrobial resistance of microorganisms isolated from organic dairy farm environments. The isolates from dairy farms were Acinetobacter sp., A. lwoffi, A. johnsonii, A. towneri, Aerococcus viridans, Aeromonas media, A. veronii, Bacillus pseudofirmus, B. pumilus, B. licheniformis, Corynebacterium glutamicum, Escherichia coli, Enterococcus faecium, Lysinibacillus fusiformis, Paenibacillus illinoisensis, Staphylococcus epidermidis, S. hominis, Streptococcus equinus, S. lutetiensis, and Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Indicator microorganisms isolated from organic dairy farms were tested for susceptibility to 20 types of antimicrobials. E. coli (ATCC 25922) isolated from dairy farm fence showed resistance to 8 types of antimicrobials, such as oxacillin, penicillin, vancomycin, etc., and E. faecium isolated from feces showed resistance to 9 types of antimicrobials, such as cephalothin, oxacillin, streptomycin, etc., respectively. However, these results showed less antimicrobial resistance compare with customary dairy farm.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.91-107
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• 2023

Lean startup is a concept that combines the words "lean," meaning an efficient way of running a business, and "startup," meaning a new business. It is often cited as a strategy for minimizing failure in early-stage businesses, especially in software-based startups. By scrutinizing the case of a startup L, this study suggests that lean startup methodology(LSM) can be useful for hardware and manufacturing companies and identifies ways for early startups to successfully implement LSM. To this end, the study explained the core of LSM including the concepts of hypothesis-driven approach, BML feedback loop, minimum viable product(MVP), and pivot. Five criteria to evaluate the successful implementation of LSM were derived from the core concepts and applied to evaluate the case of startup L . The early startup L pivoted its main business model from defecation alert system for patients with limited mobility to one for infants or toddlers, and finally to a smart bottle for infants. In developing the former two products, analyzed from LSM's perspective, company L neither established a specific customer value proposition for its startup idea and nor verified it through MVP experiment, thus failed to create a BML feedback loop. However, through two rounds of pivots, startup L discovered new target customers and customer needs, and was able to establish a successful business model by repeatedly experimenting with MVPs with minimal effort and time. In other words, Company L's case shows that it is essential to go through the customer-market validation stage at the beginning of the business, and that it should be done through an MVP method that does not waste the startup's time and resources. It also shows that it is necessary to abandon and pivot a product or service that customers do not want, even if it is technically superior and functionally complete. Lastly, the study proves that the lean startup methodology is not limited to the software industry, but can also be applied to technology-based hardware industry. The findings of this study can be used as guidelines and methodologies for early-stage companies to minimize failures and to accelerate the process of establishing a business model, scaling up, and going global.

• Journal of Korean Ophthalmic Optics Society
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.353-363
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• 2012

Purpose: To establish basic data for effective clinical practice program by investigating the clinical practice importance and needs for ophthalmic optics students and optical shop owners. Methods: 263 students and 100 optical shop owners who had experience in clinical practice were surveyed in importance and needs of clinical practice and analyzed the results. Results: In general importance for clinical practice, realized the optician's job aptitude $4.29{\pm}0.72$ was highest among students and understanding the work of optician $4.48{\pm}0.52$ was highest among shop owners. Importance of specific duty for clinical practice, communication strategy & customer service was highest in both students $4.46{\pm}0.70$ and shop owners $4.18{\pm}0.86$ each. Importance of time & optical shop for clinical practice, supportive guide and education by opticians & shop owner was highest in both students $4.53{\pm}0.66$ and shop owners $4.35{\pm}0.59$ each. Importance of school support for clinical practice, administrative support for optical shop and students was highest among students $4.10{\pm}0.78$ and orientation from the school before clinical practice $3.98{\pm}0.68$ was highest among shop owners. In general needs for clinical practice, expanding the clinical practice field $4.43{\pm}0.73$ was highest among students and needs of clinical practice in the curriculum $4.39{\pm}0.65$ was highest among shop owners. Needs of specific duty for clinical practice, spectacle fitting $4.40{\pm}0.71$ was highest among students and ophthalmic dispensing $4.12{\pm}0.83$ was highest among shop owners. Conclusions: For effective clinical practice, clinical practice program should be develop which is reflecting the importance and needs of students and optical shop and also cooperation and interest of school and optical shop are required.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.113-125
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• 2013

Every company wants to know customer's requirement and makes an effort to meet them. Cause that, communication between customer and company became core competition of business and that important is increasing continuously. There are several strategies to find customer's needs, but VOC (Voice of customer) is one of most powerful communication tools and VOC gathering by several channels as telephone, post, e-mail, website and so on is so meaningful. So, almost company is gathering VOC and operating VOC system. VOC is important not only to business organization but also public organization such as government, education institute, and medical center that should drive up public service quality and customer satisfaction. Accordingly, they make a VOC gathering and analyzing System and then use for making a new product and service, and upgrade. In recent years, innovations in internet and ICT have made diverse channels such as SNS, mobile, website and call-center to collect VOC data. Although a lot of VOC data is collected through diverse channel, the proper utilization is still difficult. It is because the VOC data is made of very emotional contents by voice or text of informal style and the volume of the VOC data are so big. These unstructured big data make a difficult to store and analyze for use by human. So that, the organization need to automatic collecting, storing, classifying and analyzing system for unstructured big VOC data. This study propose an intelligent VOC analyzing system based on opinion mining to classify the unstructured VOC data automatically and determine the polarity as well as the type of VOC. And then, the basis of the VOC opinion analyzing system, called domain-oriented sentiment dictionary is created and corresponding stages are presented in detail. The experiment is conducted with 4,300 VOC data collected from a medical website to measure the effectiveness of the proposed system and utilized them to develop the sensitive data dictionary by determining the special sentiment vocabulary and their polarity value in a medical domain. Through the experiment, it comes out that positive terms such as "칭찬, 친절함, 감사, 무사히, 잘해, 감동, 미소" have high positive opinion value, and negative terms such as "퉁명, 뭡니까, 말하더군요, 무시하는" have strong negative opinion. These terms are in general use and the experiment result seems to be a high probability of opinion polarity. Furthermore, the accuracy of proposed VOC classification model has been compared and the highest classification accuracy of 77.8% is conformed at threshold with -0.50 of opinion classification of VOC. Through the proposed intelligent VOC analyzing system, the real time opinion classification and response priority of VOC can be predicted. Ultimately the positive effectiveness is expected to catch the customer complains at early stage and deal with it quickly with the lower number of staff to operate the VOC system. It can be made available human resource and time of customer service part. Above all, this study is new try to automatic analyzing the unstructured VOC data using opinion mining, and shows that the system could be used as variable to classify the positive or negative polarity of VOC opinion. It is expected to suggest practical framework of the VOC analysis to diverse use and the model can be used as real VOC analyzing system if it is implemented as system. Despite experiment results and expectation, this study has several limits. First of all, the sample data is only collected from a hospital web-site. It means that the sentimental dictionary made by sample data can be lean too much towards on that hospital and web-site. Therefore, next research has to take several channels such as call-center and SNS, and other domain like government, financial company, and education institute.