Central European Business Review

15-23

Authors: Md. Hasebur Rahman

Delivering superior service quality to customers in today’s business environment is very crucial and important due the stiff competition in the local and international markets. The ability to provide high service quality will strengthen the image, enhance retention of customers, attracting new potential customers through customer satisfaction and loyalty. This study investigates the customer satisfaction and loyalty relationship in terms of basic service, advanced service employed by Jamuna Bank Limited and customer perceptions regarding cost and prestige of receiving banking service of the concerned bank. The study reveals that there is a significant relationship observed among advanced service, cost & prestige and customer satisfaction. There is an insignificant relationship observed between basic service and customer satisfaction and finally a positive significant relationship observed between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty relationship.

30-38

Authors: Gina Cook

This paper discusses the increasing importance of emerging markets, particularly those in Africa, in terms of international business opportunities in the post-financial crisis period; while BRIC economies have received a lot of attention in the preceding decade, other emerging markets – especially in Africa – show indications of taking on more prominence in the upcoming period. In fact, at present, the continent of Africa represents one of the fastest growing markets in the world. This paper focuses on growth indicators and trends in the African markets as well as potential future international business opportunities; specifically, it examines the competitiveness of African nations, the business environments of countries in Africa, the continent’s international trade situation and urbanization in Africa. The paper concludes with a brief discussion on existing business opportunities together with some challenges which remain on the continent.

50-53

Authors: Petr Kolar

The forthcoming research characterises and analyses the key market players (shipping lines), their customer service policy together with the implications the container transport bottlenecks have for the market in the Czech Republic with customer orientation being one of these. Evaluating companies´ customer orientation and analyzing container shipping dimensions in the market of transport and logistics is a highly complex task, especially in the times of the changes in the market. To obtain the data necessary for an informed analysis, open interviews with selected customer service managers will be made and questionnaires distributed in the Czech Republic. Due to the concentration of container and logistics activity within a relatively small number of global shipping lines present in the countries with substantial market share, the approach of market characteristics will be case study based. It must be stressed this is a conceptual paper only, the data has not been collected yet; therefore, there is no conclusion on the research. It is focused primarily on methodology applied and a literature review.

15-21

Authors: Petr Král

Central Europe, due to its history, is not perceived as a region from which a luxury brand could originate while luxury is traditionally connected to Western European countries (such as France, Italy or Switzerland). Country of origin (COO) plays an important role in perception of any brand but for luxury brands the COO is usually even more important than for mainstream brands because it is an important part of the brand´s heritage. But despite their unfavorable origin we could observe in the last years that brands which originate from CEE region position themselves on the luxury market. The goal of this article is to investigate the COO effect for luxury brand originating in the Czech Republic- namely the watchmaker Prim- and its impact on the marketing strategy of this brand. The main research method used in this article is the case study method which combines the findings of in- depth interviewing and observations together with findings of the secondary research. The managerial implications mainly target brand managers of luxury or premium market brands originating from the Czech Republic and other countries in Central Europe.

30-35

Authors: Carmen Giorgiana Bonaci, Jiří Strouhal, Libuše Müllerová, Jaroslava Roubíčková

Paper focuses on the particular case of professional ethics in the context of the accounting profession. After briefly discussing recent events that made us reconsider our understanding of corporate governance, accountancy and ethics, we try to delimit the state of the art by looking at ethics from the accounting professions’ perspective. When aiming to clarify professional ethics, we closely analyze integrity based on the latest developments undertaken by European professional bodies. Findings are used in identifying ways to contribute to the endeavor of aligning the profession’s performance with society’s reasonable expectations.

43-50

Authors: Květa Olšanová

The working paper provides an overview of key stakeholders involved in the food marketing to children in Europe and in the Czech Republic. It analyzes the role of the legislation as well as of voluntary codes of conduct in the food industry. The industry part of the issue is also covered by explanation of their role and position in the obesity issue. The form of food industry cooperation at the Food Chamber through a working group of involved companies is analyzed and an example of the corporate responsibility program is shown. The paper is going to serve as a review of the issue for further exploration needs.

19-24

Authors: Ivan Tomek, Václav Stříteský, Radek Tahal

Understanding current and potential customers´ behaviour is one of the key factors of marketing efficiency and it brings competitive advantage. Companies usually classify their customers and create client groups with similar characteristic features. Such grouping activity is called segmentation or typology. There are many possibilities how to obtain data for segmentation process (e.g. data mining, demographical segmentation, analyzing shopping behaviour, media behaviour or their combination). This paper concentrates on financial behaviour of the Czech population and brings a survey based on primary data. It takes into consideration aspects like attitude towards risk and savings and even aspects like money ethic and money role in the society. Seven consumer segments that differ in attitudes towards money were identified and described.

31-44

Authors: Chandru Nagarajan Sathiyabama, Pramod Dasan

This article seeks to allocate optimum resources for wrapping section and suggesting a suitable method that need to be in place for successful elimination of waste inside the food industry wrapping section. It also includes identifying the main reasons for various types of wastages inside wrapping section and cost of all the wastages. The paper is based on the observation and research using the approach of lean tools and techniques. The methodology used for evaluating data is value stream mapping and some statistical SPSS tools for analysis. Data’s are real and are gathered from three different production shifts inside a food industry wrapping section. The main reasons for wastages inside the wrapping section are highlighted. Finally, the paper was concluded by estimating total cost of wastages and recommended suitable way to save the wastage costs. The need of change of jaws inside the wrapping machines, regular maintenance of all machines throughout the industry and training the personnel are recommended. The possible methods along with its benefits to reduce waste, operators, improve productivity and business growth was also highlighted.

51-60

Authors: Elżbieta Kawecka-Wyrzykowska

Situation of Poland's public finances has been improving. Helped by solid economic growth in 2011, Poland has reduced its budget deficit in line with the Commission's recommendations. Contrary to earlier forecasts, in 2012 it was slightly above the ceiling of 3% of GDP. It should be further reduced to reach in 2015 the level of 1% of GDP in terms structural deficit. The slowdown of the economy in 2012 and probably in 2013 will not make this task easy, however. Public debt has risen steadily over the past few years but level has been in recent times still well below the 60% of GDP ceiling. The national reform programme and the convergence programme were adopted by Poland’s Council of Ministers on 25 April 2012. The convergence programme outlined in an integrated manner the fiscal consolidation efforts, the key structural reforms and the reforms that underpin macroeconomic stabilisation. In the medium to long term, Poland is faced with a number of challenges. A very low labour force participation rate, in particular of women, and the poor quality of vocational training and education are major concerns given an ageing population. The low level of public and private R&D spending, weak links between science and industry and the poor innovation performance call for improvements. Apart from programme of national reforms, crucial for future sustained economic growth and good performance of public finances, an additional factor stimulating activities towards fiscal improvement should be Poland’s participation in a strengthened economic governance architecture recently introduced in the EU. Euro adoption remains an important goal of Polish government. The uncertain situation in the euro zone has, however, postponed adoption of a clear timetable of joining the euro zone. The government decided that an additional condition to join the euro zone, apart from meeting the nominal convergence criteria (and legal conditions not discussed here), is stabilisation of the euro area situation.

15-20

Authors: Denisa Kasl Kollmannová

This article analyses the emergence of a new trend in local marketing communication and PR in the Czech Republic. After the decline of public trust after the economic crisis in 2008 many state officials and politicians were blamed for corruption and fraud (Edelman, 2013). Anti-corruption attitudes emerged in government communication, media, NGO´s and also within the business sector. The term “anti-corruption” became an often-used marketing claim. Anti-corruption claims and values were used by a wide range of companies and institutions in their corporate communication or PR. Often, main business leader serve as personalities and opinion leaders in anti-corruption activities, such as Karel Janeček, Stanislav Bernard or Radim Jančura. The article analyses and discusses embedding anti-corruption attitudes within the marketing communication and PR strategy and possible impacts on reputation management of the company.

28-34

Authors: Peter Jurečka

With ongoing globalization and thereof derived growing competitiveness on most markets, companies are under constant pressure to increase the effectiveness and efficiencies of their operations. This article focuses on one of the core business management processes – on planning, namely on Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) and its latest development stage represented by the concept of Integrated Business Planning (IBP). It aims to extend the traditional concept of S&OP for selected topics from business strategy and portfolio management, which structured inclusion into planning represent one of key factors distinguishing IBP from conventional S&OP. Implementation of IBP, which constitutes significant step towards operational excellence, is applicable for almost all business and thus can be used broadly as effective tool for facing the challenges of economic and financial crisis.

43-48

Authors: Martin Šikýř

Based on summarizing the results of the global research on human resource management and the author’s dissertation research on best practices in human resource management, the paper attempts to explain the essence of the positive relationship between best practices in human resource management and organizational performance and competitiveness. It supports the assumption that the essence is the optimal system of human resource management, based on proven best practices in job design, employee selection, performance management, employee compensation or employee training, that enables managers to achieve expected organizational performance and competitiveness by achieving desired employee abilities, motivation and performance. The author's dissertation research verified the theoretical assumptions about application of best practices in human resources management and through a questionnaire survey examined the views of executives and HR managers from Czech TOP 100 companies or the best employers in the Czech Republic.