Departament de Ciències Econòmiques i Empresarials

Purpose: This paper examines the engagement of business practitioners with academic business research. The main purpose is to assess whether there is a gap between academic research and business people, and, if so, how to bridge this gap.  Design/methodology/approach: Over 150 senior business practitioners were surveyed, in order to capture their views on the usefulness of academic research to them in their roles as practicing managers. Survey questions covered both their current access and reading of business related publications and what the ideal academic business journal should be, in terms of access and contents.  Findings: Academic journals are not very well known among business professionals. If these professionals could choose, they would like academic journals to be written by experienced business people, to contain business cases and to be accessible on line. Existing academic business journal ‘repositories’, such as Google Scholar, are not mentioned in the survey results.  Practical implications: The findings indicate that potential solutions to bridge the gap between academic journals and business practitioners should not be overly complicated to implement, and would greatly help bring these two communities closer, with mutually enriching results.  Originality/value: This article takes a very pragmatic view of the gap between academic journals and business practitioners, and seeks to assess this gap in terms of how it can be bridged on an everyday basis, rather than take a theoretical approach. It begs for the definition of actionable next steps.

This article is an empirical study to analyze the oral production in English by simulation as a teaching instructional strategy among college students of Business Management at the University Abat Oliba CEU. A design group pre-test and post-test in the overall assessment of oral expression variable is used. Quantitative data on progress and contribution to learning English with the simulation were collected in a questionnaire online. The results show how the instructional simulation and the use of new technologies are effective tools in the acquisition of language skills in English.

La formación en el arte y la belleza mejora la capacidad social y emocional de las personas. La educación de la sensibilidad y el sentido estético es muy necesaria en la actualidad para todo el mundo. En humanidades es algo sabido y de gran importancia, pero también lo es para los estudiantes de todos los ámbitos, tanto de ciencias puras como de ciencias sociales, incluyendo a los estudiantes de empresa y economía (Zander, 2000). La educación en la belleza es importante por varias razones. En primer lugar, la belleza es una parte integral de nuestra experiencia humana, y puede tener un impacto significativo en nuestra calidad de vida (Kaimal et al., 2016). La apreciación de la belleza puede mejorar nuestro bienestar emocional, reducir el estrés y mejorar nuestra capacidad de concentración (Leder et al., 2004).

Students’ academic and social adaptation is linked to factors such as their initial study moti- vations, the atmosphere of the academic environment and their perception of academic wellbeing. This paper analyses the initial adaptation of first-degree students in their first semester through a quantitative ex post facto study with a descriptive-exploratory approach, using a questionnaire as the information-gathering instrument. Findings shed light on the concept of initial adaptation itself (through the creation of an index) and validate the study of the construct through three factors: initial motivation, the academic environment and per- ception of academic wellbeing. Also, the influence on initial adaptation of the academic and social context of the degree course taken is demonstrated:, as the constitutive features of the degree contribute information predicting how students will integrate into the institution. Therefore, it is suggested that institutional means and actions should be designed and put in place in accordance with measurements that indicate how students function best in a spe- cific context (the bachelor’s degree), in order to boost motivation and the perception of aca- demic wellbeing.

El marketing de influencia se ha convertido en una herramienta efectiva para que las marcas conecten con sus consumidores en las redes sociales a través de los influenciadores. Aunque esta forma de marketing ha generado en los últimos años un mayor interés en la comunidad científica, se sabe relativamente poco sobre el contenido y la estrategia de los influencers y los vínculos con los comportamientos que generan en sus seguidores. En este contexto digital, cabe destacar un tipo de influencer relacionado con la literatura: los bookstagrammer. Usuarios que comparten su pasión por los libros, reseñan noticias de editoriales y fomentan el hábito de la lectura. Este estudio analiza cómo la estrategia de contenido y engagement de los bookstagrammers (medida por el número de seguidores, volumen de contenido y publicaciones de interés) se asocia con el engagement de los seguidores de estos influencers culturales en Instagram, tanto de forma independiente como interactiva. El estudio analiza un conjunto de datos recopilados de booskstagrammers analizando el contenido generado por estos influencers para probar las hipótesis propuestas. Los hallazgos muestran que las publicaciones que incluyen fotografías del autor o portadas de libros se asocian positivamente con la participación de los seguidores en las cuentas de Instagram, mientras que las publicaciones emocionales que expresan sentimientos se asocian negativamente con la participación de los seguidores. Estos hallazgos demuestran que los elementos analizados y la estrategia de contenido de los influencers literarios contribuyen al compromiso de los seguidores en Instagram.

Purpose: This article presents a maturity model for the evaluation of the information-driven decision-making process (DMP) in small and medium enterprises. This model is called “Simplified Holistic Approach to DMP Evaluation (SHADE)”. The SHADE model is based in the “Circumplex Hierarchical Representation of the Organization Maturity Assessment” (CHROMA) framework for characterizing the information-driven DMP in organizations Design/methodology/approach: The CHROMA-SHADE provides a competency evaluation methodology regarding the SME’s use of data for making better-informed decisions. This model groups the main factors influencing the information-driven DMP and classifies them into five dimensions: data availability, data quality, data analysis and insights, information use and decision-making. It addresses these dimensions systematically, delivering a framework for positioning the organization from an uninitiated to a completely embedded stage. The assessment consists of interviews based on a standardized open-ended questionnaire performed to key company personnel followed by an analysis of the answers and their scoring performed by an expert evaluator. Findings: The results of its application indicate this model is well adapted to the SMEs resulting useful for identifying strengths and weaknesses, thereby providing insights for prioritizing improvement actions. Originality/value: The CHROMA-SHADE model follows a novel, holistic approach that embraces the complexities inherent in a multiplicity of factors that, at the technological and management level, converge to enable more objective and better-supported decisions to be made through the intelligent use of information.

The purpose of this study is to analyze policies related to women promoted by the social media platforms TikTok and Instagram. A qualitative research has been conducted using documentary analysis complemented with a focus group study to female university students in order to incorporate their point of view on the regulation and accountability in the contents published on these platforms. One of the aims is to see how it affects the sexist attitudes they contain. The results highlight important shortcomings of the social network platforms analyzed in relation to the role that women play on these platforms.

The decision-making process (DMP) is essential in organizations and has changed due to multidisciplinary research, greatly influenced by the progress in information technologies and computational science. This work’s objective is analysing the progressive interaction between DMP and information technologies and the consequent breakthroughs in how business is conducted since 1950 to recent times. Therefore, a chronological review of the information-driven DMP evolvement is presented. The major landmarks that defined how technology influenced how information is generated, stored, managed, and used for making better decisions, minimizing the uncertainty and gaining knowledge, are covered. The findings showed that even if current data-driven trends in managerial decision making have led to competitive advantages and business opportunities, there is still a gap between the technological capabilities and the organizational needs. Nowadays, it has been reported that the adoption of technology solutions in many companies is faster than their capacity to adapt at managerial level. Aware of this reality, the “Circumplex Hierarchical Representation of Organization Maturity Assessment” (CHROMA) model has been developed. This tool makes it possible to evaluate whether the management of organizations is making decisions using the available data correctly and optimizing their information systems.

En el marco de la respuesta a la COVID-19, categorizada por la OMS como pandemia, el concepto de distanciamiento social se ha perfilado como clave en la gestión de esta bioemergencia. Este artículo discute el distanciamiento social desde una perspectiva sociológica, partiendo de los conceptos de proximidad y distancia de Simmel, Cantó-Milà y Sabido Ramos. Queremos mostrar los sentidos y dimensiones implícitos y explícitos otorgados a los conceptos de distancia y distanciamiento sociales durante los primeros meses de pandemia, así como su impacto en las relaciones, las interacciones y los vínculos. Abrimos una reflexión sobre el rol del encuadre de toda relación social entre distancias y proximidades, diferenciando analíticamente entre los conceptos de relación, interacción y vínculo.