Faculty and Research | Research Highlights

The ability of businesses to understand all the nuances of poverty settings in emerging economies, create trusted connections within these communities, and support development and service at every level, is the key to global success now and for the future. “For firms to succeed in making the world more sustainable while making a profit in settings of poverty, the firms’ products and services must consider local customers’ needs, the networks among those customers, and ecosystems that affect any business effort,” Management Professor and Fehmi Zeko Faculty Fellow Dr. Garry Bruton said.  Read more

Finance Professor Dr. Mauricio Rodriguez has spent more than a decade devising analytical models to help prevent erroneous valuations from wreaking havoc in the housing market. “Some of the main reasons for the recent housing bubble were low interest rates, loose underwriting standards, ethical lapses and high price estimates for homes all across the country,” Dr. Rodriguez said. “These high valuations were supported by the demand from over-extended borrowers as the bubble formed and grew larger. When that unsustainable support vanished, the table was set for the housing price-crash that followed.”  Read more

At the request of Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price and the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, Dr. Stacy Landreth Grau and Dr. Susan Kleiser, both professors of professional practice in marketing, conducted a two-year survey of young professionals in Fort Worth, Dallas, Austin, Atlanta, Denver, Portland, Charlotte, Cincinnati and Kansas City to gather information on their perceptions of Fort Worth and key city attributes that young professionals look for in a city.  Read more

Research by Neeley Supply Chain Professors Morgan Swink and Nancy Nix found that firms with resilient supply chains weather economic turbulence far better than their competitors. “A firm’s ability to endure economic downturns, deal with volatility and manage costs under shrinking demands depends in large part on the resiliency of its supply chains,” Morgan Swink, Supply Chain Professor and the Eunice and James L. West Chair of Supply Chain Management, said.  “The results of our study shed light on important differences in the leading firms’ policies and performance, especially those that made them more resilient,”Nancy Nix, Supply Chain Professor and Executive Director of the TCU EMBA program, said. Swink and Nix provide key steps to get companies started on the road to resilience.  Read more

In a February 2012 article in the Journal of Product Innovation Management, Dr. Morgan Swink, Professor of Supply Chain and Executive Director of the Supply and Value Chain Center, is ranked No. 19 out of 1,718 innovation management scholars for number of articles published in 10 leading journals for the past 20 years, and No. 13 for articles he coauthored. The article states that research in innovation, described as “the overall process whereby an invention is transformed into a commercial product that can be sold profitably,” yields critical economic insights. Articles published in top academic journals are one of the most important measures for high-quality intellectual research.  Read more

 On the political front and in the media, much is being made about whether the issuer-paid credit rating model encourages a conflict of interest between the issuers and the rating agencies. "When Moody changed from the investor-pay to the issuer-pay model in the 1970s, Moody’s rating was higher than S&P’s rating for the same bond,” said Dr. Mary Stanford, Professor of Accounting at the Neeley School of Business at TCU. “After S&P adopted the issuer-pay model in July 1974, S&P’s ratings increased to match Moody’s ratings for the same bond.”  Read more

Imagine all the thousands upon thousands of parts that make up a naval warship. Now think of all the thousands of people and projects it takes to put all those parts together to build the ship on time, on budget and in perfect working order. Dr. Tyson Browning came up with a technique to use a tool called the design structure matrix (DSM) to master critical information required to understand, design and improve naval ship-building systems. His research, “DSM Methods and Applications for Naval Ship Design,” garnered him a grant of $302,230 from the Office of Naval Research.  Read more

In her research, Dr. Nancy J. Sirianni, Assistant Marketing Professor at the Neeley School of Business at TCU, found out that when it comes to cars, computers, bicycles, and firearms, the way people treat their possessions can look a lot like love. People nurture relationships with their beloved possessions, investing time and money into improving them and becoming fluent in understanding their details.  Read more

“Often, value to customers is not contained solely within the product itself. It can be more about the people and capabilities the company brings to bear on the customer’s requirements,” explains Dr. William L. Cron, professor of marketing in the Neeley School of Business at TCU in Fort Worth.  Read more

Professor Dr. Robert Leone found that companies can successfully fight back against declining profits and eroding market share through a pair of powerful positioning strategies: “just good enough” and “altered amortization.” Brands not decisively marketed as offering the best value, either by being just good enough or presenting altered amortization, risk fading from the marketplace.  Read more

Nearly $1.5 billion was spent in 2008 by companies on cause-related marketing, but not all are endorsed by the non-profit cause they promote. Associate Professor of Professional Practice in Marketing, Dr. Stacy Landreth Grau, found that an explicit seal-of-approval statement was not necessary for consumers to assume a seal of approval from the nonprofit organization. The mere presence of a nonprofit logo was enough to infer endorsement.  Read more

 It’s a time honored tradition that buying an experience brings more happiness than buying an object. But what if the experience is a bad one? According to new research by Dr. Leonardo Nicolao, assistant professor of marketing, a recreational experience gone wrong will cause much more unhappiness than the purchase of poor-quality goods.  Read more

 Are movie studios taking the easy way when they produce a sequel to a blockbuster? Is it assured of success just because the first movie was successful? While movie sequels have two advantages over other movies – higher average box office returns and less financial risk - a new research model by Dr. Mark Houston, professor marketing, finds that four factors directly impact the success of a movie sequel.  Read more

Finance professors Dr. Steven C. Mann, Dr. Vassil Mihov, Dr. Mauricio Rodriguez and Dr. Christopher B. Barry found that corporate managers shouldn't believe that they can foresee the future of the debt market. "Some past research showed that managers were able to anticipate when interest rates were going to change. However, we found that managers, overall, are not successful in anticipating when interest rates are going to go up or down."  Read more

Ads touting emotional enticements rather than tangible benefits can dramatically shape customers’ perceptions of value.  And the ads have staying power.  A study by marketing professors Dr. Julie Baker, Dr. Susan Kleiser, and Dr. Eric Yorkston showed the major impact of a transformational ad’s message kicks in during the experience and transforms the experience, an effect called delayed persuasion.  Read more

Apple CEO Steve Jobs made the right decision, but it should not have been his to make. The Securities and Exchange Commission should directly classify the health of a firm’s CEO as a material fact requiring disclosure, argues Assistant Management Professor Dr. Alexa A. Perryman and her colleagues. The SEC lacks guidelines for executive health disclosures, leaving companies to decide whether to tell. Yet, the SEC requires disclosure of other events and conditions that can potentially impact the firm’s future or market value.  Read more

Dysfunctional behavior can substantially harm work team functioning and diminish organizations’ success. A recent study by Management Professor Michael S. Cole shows dysfunctional behavior creates negative emotions among team members which, in turn, diminishes team performance. These consequences disappear, however, if team members refrain from expressing their negative feelings. Thus, the effective management of members’ emotions is key to preventing team performance detriments.  Read more

A study by Management Professor Dr. Charles R. Greer found that more companies are including diversity initiatives in their succession planning for key positions, and they are reaping the advantages, including: 1) access to new markets through key personnel who reflect those markets; 2) overall more creativity and insight as the diversity of the team is increased; 3) revitalized corporate thinking and innovation; 4)  improved public image; 5) elevated employee morale; 6) increased productivity; and 7) decreased turnover. “Programs that incorporate diversity into succession planning should be viewed as pipelines loaded with talent instead of special programs just for women and minorities,” says Dr. Greer.  Read more

"Most companies focus only on customer spending and don't factor in a customer's word-of-mouth value," says Dr. Robert Leone, Marketing Professor, of his new research. "We demonstrated that when companies try to ascertain how valuable individual customers are, it's not just about how much the customer spends but whether that individual can bring in new business." Knowing which customers can potentially add the most to the bottom line is vital to the firm, he says.  Read more

Online customers often miss the type of human connection they have with sales personnel in brick-and-mortar stores. “On a website, just the existence of a virtual character serving as a shopping guide can increase shoppers’ intentions to purchase by increasing their positive emotions,” says Julie Baker, Associate Professor of Marketing.  Read more