In recent years, the practitioner literature in operations management has seen a dramatic surge in articles on quality management. It reflects the increased emphasis on quality by U.S. firms, which has been attributed largely to increased competition faced by them. The question of how quality is influenced by competitive intensity, however, has not received much attention, either in the practitioner or the academic research literatures. The notion of competitive intensity itself has not been defined precisely. In this paper, we develop formal models of oligopolistic competition to investigate whether equilibrium levels of quality increase as competition intensifies. We consider three different competitive settings: (i) asymmetric duopolistic competition where the dominant firm's intrinsic demand potential decreases; (ii) a symmetric duopoly where the firms are precluded from cooperating in setting quality levels; and (iii) symmetric oligopolistic competition where the number of firms increases. We find that the relation between equilibrium quality and competitive intensity depends on what is understood by increased competition and, in addition, the relation is contingent on the values of parameters describing the cost and demand structure for the industry.quality, competition, cooperation, oligopoly, investment

T he design of work has been and will continue to be a central problem challenging organization theory and practice.The system of arrangements and procedures for doing work affects all workers every day throughout the world. Work is changing dramatically. In an increasingly global and knowledge-intensive economy, work design is no longer contained within an organization; it often transcends the boundaries of organizations and countries. These changes call for a renewed research focus on work design. Building on configuration and complexity perspectives, we propose a framework for studying work design. We argue that three issues require attention to advance the knowledge of work design: (1) defining the boundaries of work systems, (2) examining how the system is nested in a hierarchy within and between organizations, and (3) determining interactions between the elements of a work system. We propose a method of frontier analysis for identifying equifinal designs-the set of equally effective work designs for different combinations of inputs (situations or contexts) and outputs (performance criteria). When work designs are examined longitudinally, these methods permit an examination of adaptation processes on changing fitness landscapes, suggesting how work systems may increase, decrease, or sustain their relative performance over time.

Medical devices play an increasingly significant role in the delivery of health care today. However, persistent quality problems with medical devices and the associated recalls present potential health risks to patients and personnel using these devices. This study addresses three key issues in this regard. First, it empirically assesses the financial implications of medical device recalls to understand if these consequences are severe enough to deter firms from introducing potentially hazardous medical devices into the market, as can be inferred from the literature. Second, the study considers a cross section of medical device manufacturers to examine the effect of firm characteristics on the costs of poor quality. Third, in an attempt to explore the sources of recalls, this study investigates firm characteristics that are likely to be associated with device recalls. The econometric analyses in the study are based on data from manufacturers in the medical device industry over a four-year period (2002-2005). Contrary to our expectations, the findings of the study indicate that at an aggregate level, the market penalties for medical device recalls are not significant, i.e., at the aggregate level, the costs of poor quality are not severe. Furthermore, we find that the magnitude of financial consequences of device recalls is affected by the product scope, sales, growth prospects, and the capital structure of a firm. In our analyses exploring the sources of device recalls, we find that firms with a research and development focus, developing broader product portfolios, have a higher likelihood of device recalls. Also, we find that the likelihood of recalls decreases with prior recall experience, indicating the presence of learning. Implications of the study findings, limitations, and directions for future research are identified. This paper was accepted by Sampath Rajagopalan, operations and supply chain management.medical device, recalls, quality, econometric analyses, performance, learning

This paper focuses on the proverbial ''last mile'' of the retail supply chain -i.e., delivering products to the end-customerand highlights the need for recognizing product type differences in configuring order fulfillment processes in electronic business-to-customer (B2C) transactions. The following two questions serve as the motivation for the study: Do customer expectations of order fulfillment processes vary across product types? Should the product type matter in configuring order fulfillment processes? From the studies in the marketing literature, we infer that customer satisfaction assessments are based on customer expectations of order fulfillment processes, and that these expectations systematically vary across the three product types: convenience goods (e.g., groceries, home and office supplies), shopping goods (e.g., ready-to-wear men, women, and kids' apparel), and specialty goods (e.g., desktop and notebook computers, and wedding dresses). In particular, we posit that ceteris paribus, customer satisfaction with order fulfillment will decrease moving along a continuum of product types, from convenience goods to specialty goods. The empirical analysis for this study is based on data collected on dimensions of customer satisfaction with order fulfillment from a sample of 256 firms engaged in electronic B2C transactions. Firms included in our study sample are such that their products can be classified into only one of three product types: convenience, shopping, or specialty goods. In essence, each firm in the study sample is a proxy for one of three product types. The results of the empirical analysis indicate that, on average, customers tend to have higher satisfaction levels with the order fulfillment process of convenience and shopping goods than with the order fulfillment process of specialty goods. We discuss the managerial implications of our results, contributions of the paper to the literature, limitations, and directions for future research. #

The relationship between customer loyalty and the order procurement and order fulfillment processes of electronic retailers is empirically examined in this paper. The study sample contains data from 52 electronic food retailers. After controlling for the retailers' product categories based on design flexibility, our regression analysis results indicate that three order procurement variables---website navigation, product information, and price; and three order fulfillment variables---product availability, timeliness of delivery, and ease of return have significant association with customer loyalty. In terms of their relative contributions toward improving customer loyalty, these variables can be ordered in a descending order as follows: ease of return, timeliness of delivery, website navigation, product availability, price, and product information.Order Procurement, Order Fulfillment, Electronic Retailing, Empirical Analysis, Customer Loyalty