Strategic Management - International Journal of Strategic Management and Decision Support Systems in Strategic Management

The Effect of Healthcare Managers' Perceptions of Top Management Team Behavioral Integration on Strategic Change and Innovative Performance

Ismail Bicer, Oguz Isik — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0200

Background: Healthcare organizations should constantly update their strategies, follow sectoral trends, provide continuous training and development opportunities to their employees, and create an environment conducive to innovation in order to adapt quickly to changes and gain competitive advantage.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to reveal the impact of senior managers' perceptions of the behavioral integration of the top management team on their perceptions of strategic change and innovative performance.

Study design/methodology/approach: The study analyzed information obtained from senior managers of 321 private hospitals in Turkey. Multiple regression analysis was used to test the research hypotheses.

Findings/conclusions: The results show that innovative performance is significantly enhanced by collaborative behavior, a sub-dimension of behavioral integration of the top management team. Moreover, another sub-dimension, joint decision making, has a negative effect on the initiation of strategic change, while collaborate behavior has a good effect on the execution of change. On the other hand, strategic change execution is negatively affected by joint decision making. The success of strategic change initiatives and the competitive advantage of the organization may be negatively affected. The influence of some cultural factors on business practices can create resistance to change and make it difficult for the top management team to work together. Overcoming this resistance requires cultural transformation and leadership development efforts within the organization.

Limitations/future research: The study focuses only on the health sector. Further research can focus on other sectors with qualitative study methods.

Key drivers of pharmaceutical sales in OECD countries

Josipa Višić — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0200

Background: The pharmaceutical industry is constantly evolving, and the increasing growth in pharmaceutical sales has multiple economic and sociological implications. Namely, it has been a long time since prescription drugs accounted for the majority of sales in the pharmaceutical industry, which makes this industry interesting from both investor and regulatory policy perspective.

Purpose: This paper aims to analyse the determinants of pharmaceutical sales at the county level in order to identify fertile markets. A deeper insight into the issue could help managers in this growing industry to discover fruitful markets and policy makers to adjust their policies and regulations for the (online) sale of pharmaceuticals.

Study design/methodology/approach: The empirical part of the paper is based on a panel data analysis conducted for 31 OECD countries in the period from 2010 to 2022. The data was extracted from the OECD Data Explorer database and processed with Stata 13.1. Furthermore, pooled ordinary least squares models, fixed effect model and random effect model were formed, with pharmaceutical sales per person as the dependent variable.

Findings/conclusions: The results show that GDP per capita, the proportion of the population aged 65 and over and the proportion of people who have purchased online in the last 12 months have a positive impact on pharmaceutical sales, while life expectancy and the proportion of people who perceived their health as good/very good do not appear to affect it. Only the results on the effect of employment level indicate a negative influence on pharmaceutical sales.

Limitations/future research: Future analyses should provide a more detailed insight into pharmaceutical sales by expanding the sample, including additional explanatory variables and analysing the determinants of the different categories; i.e. an analysis of pharmaceutical consumption by different disease classes influenced by economic, sociological and medical reasons would be a fruitful future scientific path.

An NLP approach to skill analysis in ICT job advertisements from a gender perspective

Olivera Grljević, Tatjana Kecojević — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0200

Background: The gender gap in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector is strongly pronounced across Europe, including Serbia. Women are underrepresented in ICT education, entry positions, and throughout career trajectory. Although surveys and official statistics are commonly used to study gender disparities and skills in demand, job advertisements remain an underexplored organic data source in these studies. They can provide valuable insights into required hard and soft skills and a basis for measuring the influence of used language in job descriptions on gender distribution of applicants.

Purpose: This paper investigates whether linguistic patterns and the framing of skill requirements in ICT job advertisements correlates with the gender distribution of applicants. The aim is to understand how specific wording or skill emphasis may differently attract male or female candidates.

Study design/methodology/approach: Authors analyse 3,643 ICT job advertisements from Serbia with associated data on self-reported gender of applicants. Using a five-step methodology, the authors apply exploratory text analysis and natural language processing techniques, including n-gram analysis, feature engineering, and co-occurrence networks, to identify hard and soft skills patterns across male- and female-majority job postings.

Findings/conclusions: The results offer insights into the language characteristics used in ICT job descriptions and gender-specific keywords reflecting hard and soft skills. Job advertisements that attract more male candidates use engineering-oriented terminology, such as programming and DevOps tools. In contrast, advertisements drawing more female candidates emphasise collaboration, teamwork, and emotional intelligence. Soft skills are more frequent in female-majority advertisements, while male-majority advertisements focus on narrower technical domains. Empirical findings suggest that how job advertisements frame requirements can reinforce gendered perceptions of role suitability. This has practical implications for human resource management and recruitment strategies in the ICT industry.

Limitations/future research: Limitations include the use of percentage-based gender data and the evolving nature of the ICT labour market. Future research will expand the dataset, improve gender classification, and explore longitudinal trends to track changes over time.

Identifying segments of consumers willing to buy an electric car using Choice Based Conjoint method

Bence Vereckei-Poór, Tamás Ujházi — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0200

Background: Whatever product we buy today, we should all take sustainability into account. This applies to everyday consumer goods, the use of environmentally friendly materials, and the field of transportation. A wide range of mobility options is available to meet modern transportation demands, and the steady increase in the number of vehicles used for daily travel has become clear in recent years. The increasing diversification of mobility needs has made car ownership – typically at least one vehicle per household – nearly indispensable. Increased traffic and the ever-increasing number of vehicles are also a threat to our environment. In addition to noise pollution, air pollution has worsened in recent decades largely because of the continuous emission of carbon dioxide from transportation. If all transport vehicles were electrically powered, urban noise and air pollution would be significantly reduced, thereby contributing to sustainability and enhancing the overall liveability of cities. However, the uptake of electric cars remains challenging due to the trade-offs involved, and there is ongoing debate regarding the extent to which they contribute to cleaner transportation.

Purpose: This paper aims to examine consumer segments from the dataset of a previously conducted online survey, based on their attribute preferences related to electric vehicle purchasing decisions.

Study design/methodology/approach: In an online questionnaire survey conducted in February 2023, we collected responses from 206 participants. Their answers enabled us to apply conjoint analysis to determine the characteristics of the ideal electric vehicle. The present study aims to identify which electric vehicle attributes are considered most important in the purchase decision-making process across different consumer groups. To achieve this, we segmented the respondents into well-defined groups, examined their preferences, and estimated the utility values associated with each sub-attribute level.

Findings/conclusions: During the segmentation process, three distinct consumer groups were identified: “City Comforters”, “Long Haul Luxers” and “Eco Hatch Explorers”. Although their preferences vary in relative weight, all three segments prioritize price, driving range, and vehicle design when considering the purchase of an electric vehicle. The analysis also presents the relative importance of attribute levels within each group.

Limitations/future research: The vast majority of respondents to the online questionnaire underlying this study were individuals with a pre-existing interest in automobiles and driving. While this target group provided valuable insights, more robust and generalizable findings could be obtained through a larger and more demographically diverse sample. Additionally, analyzing the demographic background of the identified segments could yield further meaningful insights and is therefore recommended as a promising avenue for future research. A further methodological limitation is that the applied model does not account for noncompensatory decision rules – situations in which a respondent considers one attribute so essential that it overrides all other considerations. In such cases, a respondent will consistently choose the same attribute level regardless of the trade-offs. To better accommodate this type of decision-making behavior, future studies may benefit from applying the Adaptive Choice Based Conjoint method.

Influence of insurance on entrepreneurship: sector-specific evidence

Vladimir Njegomir, Dragan Stojić, Jelena Demko-Rihter — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0200

Background: Numerous authors have researched the impact of insurance on entrepreneurship and focused primarily on different aspects of health and social insurance, and their alternatives to private insurance. This paper investigates the importance of various lines of insurance on entrepreneurial performance.

Purpose: The aim of the research is to analyse how insurance affects entrepreneurship in certain sectors of activity.

Study design/methodology/approach: A linear regression model was applied on data collected through the questionnaire, which consisted of 12 questions embodying the variables included in the regression analysis. The survey was conducted on a sample of 460 entrepreneurs, which provided a confidence interval of 4.5 at a confidence level of 95%. The questionnaire was submitted to entrepreneurs in person, and it was filled in accountancy agencies that provide them accounting services, thus avoiding initial mistrust of entrepreneurs as respondents.

Findings/conclusions: The main findings included the positive impact of premium paid on business results. By using variance analysis, the existence of sectoral differences regarding the impact of entrepreneurship on insurance was also confirmed. It was found that sectoral differences exist not only in the purchase of insurance, but also in the level of realized income, whereby the highest revenues were realized in the activities of information and communication and accommodation, and food service, while the smallest revenues were realized in the manufacturing industry. These results are also crucial for directing the government's economic policies to stimulate entrepreneurship and economic growth.

Limitations/future research: Future research will be directed toward comparisons of results obtained in a developing country, with the sector specific evidence in developed countries.