Better Marketing for a Better World (BMBW) Proseminar – Session 1
In our first Better Marketing for a Better World proseminar, faculty leads Rajesh Chandy of London Business School and Christine Moorman of Duke University are joined by Ajay Kohli of Georgia Institute of Technology, to help scholars develop skills in generating research ideas for the study of how marketing can have a more positive impact on the world.
Session Summary
The objective of this seminar is to help scholars develop skills in generating research ideas for the study of how marketing can have a more positive impact on the world. The seminar will be composed of an introduction, the first hour focused on how to approach ideas and tools in the BMBW area, a
break, and a second hour focused on generating ideas.
In the first hour, we will discuss papers (1) and (2) below, with the goal of offering deep examples of scholarship that links marketing activities to a better world. Problem selection, research design, data collection and analytical methods, and practical insights will be discussed to help scholars seeking to engage in this type of research with the crafting of their work.
In the second hour, participants will explore how core topics in marketing can be studied from a BMBW perspective. As a case study of one such topic, we will take a deep dive into one very traditional area of marketing—the role of the salesperson. Although we selected it as the context for sharing ideas and approaches on how to generate BMBW research ideas, we believe these approaches will easily transfer to other areas of marketing. As one example of how to approach BMBW, paper (3), participants will review a short excerpt of the Habel, Allavi, and Lisenmeyer article on “Variable Compensation and Salesperson Health,” published in the Journal of Marketing Special Issue on “Better Marketing for a Better World,” and watch a brief video of the authors presenting their ideas.
Finally, participants will read a set of short popular-press articles listed in (4) about the impact of salespeople and their management on the world.
Readings:
- Jensen, Robert (2007), “The Digital Provide: Information (Technology), Market Performance, and Welfare in the South Indian Fisheries Sector,” The Quarter Journal of Economics, CXXII (August), 879-924.
- Anderson, Stephen J., Rajesh Chandy, and Bilal Zia (2018), “Pathways to Profits: The Impact of Marketing vs. Finance Skills on Business Performance,” Management Science, 64 (December), 5559-5583.
- Habel, Johannes, Sascha Alavi, and Kim Lisenmayer (2021), “Variable Compensation and Salesperson Health,” Journal of Marketing, 85 (3), 130-149.
– Scholarly insight (managerial summary) of article
– Video of authors presenting article
– Complete article