Today’s educational landscape is characterized by the rapid development of technology and the growing role of social media as key communication and promotional tools. Higher education institutions, including those with a business focus, are increasingly turning to advanced marketing strategies to attract prospective students, increase engagement with the academic community and strengthen their position in the competitive education market. One of the most popular tools in this context is video marketing, which allows complex information to be communicated in an attractive and accessible way, while building an emotional connection with the audience.

This study examines the effectiveness of video marketing activities undertaken by the top Polish business universities and their impact on audience perception and engagement. The qualitative research used the case studies of five leading Polish business schools, benchmarking them against the practices of London Business School, one of Europe’s leading business schools.

The findings may be useful for universities aiming to improve their operating strategies. The article also includes practical recommendations for measures to improve the effectiveness of marketing communication efforts within educational institutions.

2. Literature review

Defining an organization’s goals in relation to customer and market needs, rather than focusing solely on the organization itself, has now become more important than ever. Marketing, as the mechanisms for achieving such alignment, has been empowered by a powerful tool: the Internet. The Internet not only facilitates the dissemination of information but also acts as a means for collaboration and interaction among users (Królewski & Sala, 2021; Berman, 2014).

E-marketing is defined as a set of informational activities aimed at meeting the needs of individuals as well as collective needs within the electronic market, using information technology to gain a competitive advantage and increase profits for businesses operating both online and offline (Chmielarz, 2007; Reed 2010). Modern e-marketing encompasses much more than just a company website and email, it also includes instant messaging platforms, blogs, online advertising, search engines, and social media (Kotler & Armstrong, 2022).

Social media marketing is a rapidly evolving branch of e-marketing that combines various elements of marketing communication, such as content marketing, user engagement, relationship building with customers, advertising, website traffic, sales promotion, video marketing, viral marketing, and public relations (Hill, 2023; Butov at al., 2020). Social media is an increasingly diverse space that encompasses categories of tools such as discussion forums, widgets, wiki pages, podcasts, blogs and digital magazines, email newsletters, crowdsourcing, photo-sharing sites, voting platforms, live streaming, presentation-sharing services, and virtual worlds (Turner & Shah, 2011; Kopera 2022). Social media platforms, with their speed and relevance of communication, stimulate innovation in companies and enable them to fully understand the needs and desires of consumers (Kotler & Armstrong, 2022; Cheung, 2019). This, in turn, allows companies to enhance their communication efforts and increase consumer engagement and activity (Grębosz at al., 2016; Hess at al.2016). Social media platforms enable companies to build dialogue with potential customers, sponsors, and investors, create brand awareness, increase sales, and provide opportunities for gathering feedback from the market (Świerczyńska-Kaczor, 2012).

One prominent trend within social media marketing is video content. The video format engages users on social media platforms and responds to the content consumption style of today’s audience (Stawarz, 2017). Video marketing can be simply described as any marketing activity conducted using the video format (Daniłoś, 2016; Tarczydło 2017). More specifically, video content marketing refers to the creation and publication of video content on a website aimed at effectively promoting a brand, product, or service (Syska at al., 2018).

An essential feature of social media, and consequently of communication through video content, is interaction – encouraging users to engage in dialogue and build relationships (Verhoef, 2021). Video marketing focuses on creating and distributing content that is useful and valuable to users, fostering close relationships with both potential and current customers (Stępowski, 2017).

The main benefits of using video for marketing purposes include the following:

• Video content is much easier for Internet users to remember.
• Video helps in building brand image.
• It can attract supporters to the brand, increasing its recognition.
• Video materials support the development of lasting relationships with customers.
• The viral nature of video allows for reaching a wide audience.
• It increases user engagement.
• It facilitates interaction between the brand and the customer.
• It generates significant traffic (Tobiasz & Szymański, 2016; Reed, 2010).

The most popular platforms for video marketing currently include Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. Depending on a company’s goals, the video format can be harnessed in various ways to showcase products or services and increase brand recognition. To differentiate advertising formats in online video advertising, various classifications can be applied. Key factors determining the categorization of online video ad formats include the placement of the ads, the surrounding context, and the timing of the broadcast (Reed, 2010).

The trends that are shaping the future of video marketing in the coming years include the following (Skwarek, 2022):

• Short videos, such as those on TikTok, Instagram, or Twitter, are gaining increasing popularity. Users often have limited attention spans, making shorter videos more engaging and attention-grabbing.
• Real-time video, or live streaming, is becoming more popular as a tool for direct audience engagement. Companies can host live broadcasts for events, product showcases, Q&A sessions, and various other interactive formats.
• User-generated video content, created and shared by internet users themselves, has the potential to build authentic engagement and trust. UGC (user-generated content) can be useful for showcasing customer testimonials, product reviews, and creating a community around a brand.
• Personalization is a key aspect of effective video marketing. Brands will increasingly strive to create video content tailored to specific target groups, which may include personalized messages, offers, or product recommendations.
• Interactive videos that engage viewers in an active way provide an advantage over passive viewing materials. Technologies such as 360-degree video, viewer-selected video options, and video quizzes allow content creators to produce more engaging and interactive films.

These trends highlight the increasing importance of video marketing as an effective tool for reaching customers, building engagement, and strengthening brand presence. Given that technology and audience preferences continue to evolve, further innovations in the field of video marketing can be expected. The current education market is marked by rapid transformations driven by technological innovations and shifting societal demands. Within this landscape, educational marketing is essential for shaping the reputation of higher education institutions and drawing in prospective students. Innovative communication methods, particularly video marketing, are emerging as highly effective promotional tools (Miller, 2011; Flannery 2021).

3. Methodology

This study investigates the effectiveness of video marketing activities undertaken by Polish business universities and their impact on audience perception and engagement.

The research problem addressed herein concerns the use of video marketing by Polish business universities in the context of strengthening their position on the higher education market. The following research questions were formulated: 1) How do Polish business schools use video marketing in their communication strategies? 2) What are the key elements of effective video marketing activities in an educational context? 3) What impact do video marketing activities have on audience perception and engagement?

The aim of the research is to identify and evaluate the video marketing activities undertaken by Polish business schools and to assess their effectiveness in terms of image building and audience engagement. The following research methods were used: a literature review to formulate the research problem and research questions, comparative analysis of case studies concerning five leading Polish business schools, and benchmarking with London Business School, one of Europe’s leading business schools.

The findings may be useful for higher education institutions aiming to improve their operational strategies. The article also proposes practical recommendations for measures to improve the effectiveness of marketing communication efforts within educational institutions.

4. Selected universities benchmarked

This study analyzes the video marketing activities of five leading Polish business universities:

1. Warsaw School of Economics (SGH)
2. Kozminski University (ALK)
3. Krakow University of Economics (UEK)
4. Wroclaw University of Business and Economics (UEW)
5. Poznan University of Economics and Business (UEP)

To provide an international perspective, a benchmarking exercise was conducted with a sixth higher educational institution – London Business School, one of Europe’s leading business schools. This comparison highlights how these institutions in Poland compare against an internationally renowned competitor in terms of the effectiveness of the video marketing strategies used. The business universities analyzed and their social media platforms activity are presented below.

The aim of the analysis is to identify how these institutions use video marketing as part of their marketing strategies on social media platforms. By comparing marketing activities, this study seeks to identify best practices and areas for improvement, which can ultimately serve as a valuable resource for universities seeking to optimize their video marketing strategies.

The following sections of this article will discuss the marketing activities of each of the selected universities, with a particular focus on their specific approach to video marketing. This examination will not only shed light on the individual strategies employed by these institutions, but also seeks to capture wider trends and challenges in the use of video for social media marketing in the education sector.

5. Evaluating the video marketing performance of selected universities

In the context of universities and colleges, video marketing serves several functions. First and foremost, it allows for effective presentation of the educational offerings, infrastructure and academic life to prospective students. In addition, it enables the university to project an image as a modern and dynamic institution capable of meeting the challenges of the contemporary educational market. Beyond recruitment, video marketing is also an important tool in building emotional ties with current students, alumni and business partners.

To provide a structured analysis, four main aspects of video marketing activities have been selected for benchmarking: 1) presentations of the campus and infrastructure, 2) interviews with lecturers and students, 3) recordings of cultural and scientific events and 4) short promotional videos presenting the unique features and advantages of the university.

5.1. Campus and infrastructure presentations

Campus and infrastructure presentations are a key element of video marketing, as they allow prospective students and other stakeholders to experience the physical environment of the university. Showcasing the ensemble of campus facilities, lecture theatres, laboratories and recreational spaces can increase the attractiveness of the university and influence decisions on where to study.

As the comparative analysis shows, most of the Polish business universities examined, including SGH, UEK, UEP and UEW, actively use video marketing to present their campuses and infrastructure. All these universities regularly update their video materials, which is crucial to maintaining an up-to-date image in the eyes of prospective students. However, only SGH offers virtual tours, which distinguishes it from other universities (suggesting an opportunity for the latter to further develop their online presentation tools).

In terms of interactivity and professionalism of production, all the universities exhibit a commendable level of quality, but SGH, KU and UEW stand out for the particularly advanced interactivity of their materials. Multilingual video content is available from most of the Polish universities, although CUE could broaden its global reach by incorporating this feature. London Business School, although it does not offer virtual tours or videos with aerial shots, compensates for this with very advanced interactivity of materials and a high level of professionalism in production, which puts it at the forefront in terms of global video marketing standards.

In sum, while all the business universities analyzed do use video marketing effectively, features such as advanced interactivity, professional production and the availability of materials in various languages determine their effectiveness on the global educational market. The Polish business universities have a strong position, but they can still benefit from further optimization of their strategies, drawing inspiration from institutions such as London Business School.

5.2. Interviews with lecturers and students

Interviews with lecturers and students are an effective video marketing tool, focusing on the human side of the university. Such videos highlight not only scientific and teaching achievements, but also personal experiences and stories. Such content can build emotional bonds with current and future students and increase the university’s credibility and appeal.

This comparative analysis indicates that all the business universities analyzed – both the Polish institutions and London Business School – regularly publish interviews with faculty members and students. Such interviews effectively highlight both scientific achievements and student experiences, a common element that helps to build the image of the university as an academic institution of high standards.

Here again, London Business School clearly stands out in terms of content quality and the multilingual nature of its interviews, which contributes to its global success and wide reach. Polish universities, such as SGH, ALK, and UEW, are also well-rated, especially in terms of content quality and the availability of interviews in English, which helps them attract international students. UEK and UEP have room for improvement, particularly in terms of enhancing content quality and expanding their reach by publishing interviews in additional languages. Integrating these elements could strengthen their position on the international stage.

In summary, although Polish business universities demonstrate solid foundations in video marketing, there is still room for improvement in terms of content and language, which could bolster their competitive position in the global educational environment.

5.3. Recordings of cultural and scientific events

Recordings of cultural and scientific events are essential for building a university’s image as a dynamic and active academic center. Coverage of conferences, open days, festivals, and other events allows the university to be showcased in the context of its activities beyond strictly educational ones, which can increase interest from students, staff, and external partners.

This comparative analysis shows that all the analyzed business universities analyzed – both the Polish institutions and London Business School – actively participate in organizing and documenting conferences, open days, student festivals, and cultural events. All the universities conduct live broadcasts and provide online recordings of these events, which increases their accessibility and reach. London Business School and most Polish universities, including SGH, ALK, UEK, and UEW, actively participate in such campaigns, which strengthens their global presence and attracts international students. UEP, although active at the local level, does not engage in international campaigns, which may limit its reach and impact in the global education market. This shows that while UEP operates effectively at the national level, its development on the international stage may require additional efforts.

5.4. Short promotional videos highlighting the unique features and advantages of the university

Short promotional videos are an important tool in video marketing as they allow for the quick and effective presentation of a university’s unique features and advantages. They can effectively capture the attention of prospective students by showcasing the educational offerings, scientific achievements, and alumni successes in an appealing way.

Comparative analysis of this data indicates that all the business universities analyzed – both the Polish institutions and London Business School – effectively use video marketing to highlight their unique features, while maintaining consistency with the university’s image and dynamic narrative. However, differences emerge in terms of effectiveness in reaching a wide audience.

LBS yet again stands out significantly in terms of number of impressions, scoring very high, indicating its strong global position and reach. Among Polish universities, ALK achieves the highest number of impressions, suggesting that its video marketing strategy is more effective than those of SGH, UEK, UEP and UEW, which score only medium numbers of impressions.

In terms of the number of shares and community engagement, all of the universities analyzed, including LBS, have relatively low levels of engagement, which may indicate a need to better tailor video content to viewers’ preferences and expectations. The Polish business universities, in particular, could focus on improving the appeal of content to better engage viewers and encourage them to interact and share videos.

6. Conclusions and recommendations

Overall, this comparative analysis of video marketing at five leading Polish business schools and the London Business School (LBS) offers certain conclusions about the effectiveness of these activities and highlights areas for further development.

First, all of the universities analyzed make effective use of video marketing to showcase their campus, infrastructure and recreational spaces, which is key to building their image and attracting prospective students. SGH differentiates itself from other Polish universities by offering virtual walk-throughs of the campus, which increases accessibility and allows students to get an in-depth look at the university without being physically present. This approach is particularly attractive to international students, who can remotely tour the campus and learn about its facilities. London Business School, while not using virtual walk-throughs or bird’s-eye shots, focuses on using advanced technology and dynamic narratives in its videos. This strategy allows LBS to capture viewers’ attention on a global level and highlight its position as one of the world’s leading business schools.

Secondly, in terms of interviews with faculty and students, all universities regularly publish this kind of content, which is an important part of building relationships with audiences and showcasing academic achievements and student experiences. London Business School stands out for the highest quality content of these materials, which underscores its global prestige. In addition, LBS publishes interviews in multiple languages, which makes them more accessible to an international audience and allows it to attract students from different parts of the world. In Poland, SGH, ALK and UEW also offer interviews in English, which increases their international appeal. However, UEK and UEP only publish interviews in Polish, which may limit their global reach and prevent them from reaching a wider range of prospective international students.

Third, coverage of cultural and scientific events is well developed at all the universities analyzed. Both LBS and the Polish institutions analyzed provide live broadcasts of these events and ensure the availability of online records, which allows them to reach a wider audience, including those who could not attend live events. This practice increases the involvement of the academic community and highlights the university’s activity in organizing various cultural and scientific initiatives. It is also worth noting that participation in international campaigns is an important part of London Business School’s marketing strategy, which contributes to building its global brand and attracting students from all over the world. In Poland, SGH, ALK and UEW are also involved in such campaigns, which strengthens their international reach and prestige. However, UEP, while active at the national level, does not participate in international campaigns, which may limit its reach and ability to reach the global academic community. In the long term, this could affect its competitiveness in the international market and limit its ability to attract international students and partners.

Fourth, in terms of numbers of subscribers and social media reach, London Business School definitely stands out as a global leader, which is a testament to its effective marketing efforts and strong position in the education market. LBS effectively uses a variety of communication channels to reach a wide audience, which translates into very high results in terms of both the number of subscribers and reach. In Poland, ALK and UEW also score high in these areas, which demonstrates their ability to run effective marketing campaigns and build an engaged community around their brands. SGH, UEK and UEP, on the other hand, are performing at an average level, suggesting the need to intensify promotional activities in social media. Better content targeting and more intensified campaigns could help increase audience reach and engagement, which could consequently improve their position in the market.

Importantly, Polish universities such as UEK and UEP should consider publishing video materials in English and other foreign languages to increase their international reach. Increasing the number of multilingual materials could help attract more international students and partners. Additionally, UEP, which does not participate in international campaigns, could strengthen its international presence by engaging in such initiatives. Developments in this area could help increase the university’s visibility in the global marketplace and build its prestige. The other Polish universities, such as SGH, ALK and UEW, should continue their activities while intensifying their social media promotion, which would allow them to achieve better results in terms of number of subscribers and reach. Strengthening their online presence and increasing audience engagement could further increase their appeal in the international market. Developing these areas is crucial for strengthening the position of Polish universities in the global education market and for increasing their competitiveness in attracting international students and academic partners.

To further enhance the effectiveness of the video marketing efforts of Polish business universities, some key strategies are recommended:

1. Introducing more interactive content, such as live Q&A sessions, could significantly increase audience engagement. Interactive content allows direct communication with prospective students, answering their questions and concerns in real time, which can increase their engagement and trust in the university.
2. Regularly publishing new video content is key to keeping the academic community and college applicants interested and engaged. Updating content, especially in the context of rapidly changing market and technological conditions, keeps audiences informed of the university’s news and achievements.
3. Expanding reach by working with educational influencers and promoting video content on international social media platforms can help increase the university’s global visibility. Educational influencers can effectively promote the university to their many followers, which increases the reach and impact of marketing efforts. International social media platforms, such as YouTube and Instagram, allow a wide and diverse audience to be reached, which is especially important for recruiting international students.
4. Creating personalized video content targeting different audiences, such as college applicants, current students, alumni and business partners, can significantly improve the effectiveness of marketing communications. It would be worthwhile to expand video marketing efforts with prominent alumni and business leaders, hailing from the business university and co-creating its brand. Personalizing content allows the message to be better tailored to the specific needs and expectations of different audiences, which increases their engagement and satisfaction.

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The evolving complexity of contemporary economic and management processes, together with the rapid advancement of technology, is propelling significant changes in management sciences, including marketing – with the emergence of new paradigms and the disappearance of old ones. The Theory of Social Practices (TSP) posits an alternative approach (a “cultural turn”) to how consumption processes are understood and explained by theories based on individualistic assumptions (Reckwitz, 2002a; Warde, 2005; 2014). Schwanen et al. (2012), for instance, advocate in favor of applying cultural explanations in researching and designing new solutions for digital-based service offerings, such as urban transport in urban transport. The objectives of this article are twofold. First, we explore the adoption of the TSP concept in management science, and second, we investigate how digital-based service offerings are changing social practices in mobility.

Previous TSP-based studies on such practices have had certain limitations. First, researchers have studied stakeholders’ interactive value formation (co-creation or co-destruction) in one particular practice (Echeverri & Skålén, 2011) or examined transformations based on the assumption that a new practice should either discourage (Christensen et al., 2019) or replace an older practice (Shove & Pantzar, 2005; Spotswood et al., 2015, Mylan, 2015). Second, prior studies have focused on predefined, intuitively identified practices, which remain unchanging from the study’s inception to its conclusion. More recent critique (Smagacz-Poziemska et al. 2020) has nevertheless challenged this conventional approach of examining practices assumed a priori, and suggest instead that that what the relevant practices are should not be taken as something intuitively understood prior to the study, but rather that identifying those practices should be recognized as a part of the research process itself. However, our review of the literature indicates that such research working to identify non-predefined practices is still scarce. This attests to a significant research gap in terms of the possible application of the Theory of Social Practices to understanding how new digital-based service offerings precipitate changes in existing consumer practices and the emergence of new practices.

Today, digital transformation solutions harness technology to generate new customer experiences, cultural norms, and business practices. This entails utilizing cutting-edge technological advances to modify corporate strategies and offerings for the digital era. For instance, changes in urban mobility, such as new offers of transport services, are based on new digital experiences whereby customers can rent cars online or arrange short-term car rental charged by the minute using their smartphones (known as “short-term car rental,” STCR, or also as “carsharing”).

Consequently, our research questions are as follows: RQ(1) How do new service offers (in our case: short-term car rental) transform current practices (in our case: commuting practices)? RQ(2) What are the resultant practices?

To explore these questions, we conducted an exploratory study analyzing two commuting services: public transport (PT) and the digital-based service of short-term car rental (STCR). Our analysis, , using TSP as the theoretical framework, focused on identifying and understanding the changes in practice elements such as contextual principles, stakeholder actions, and used assets, guided by previous work in TSP (Reckwitz, 2002a, 2002b; Holtz, 2014; Spotswood et al., 2015; Warde, 2005, 2014). Our study was exploratory and qualitative, involved interviews structured around a scenario. The questions in the scenario were constructed using various categories of social practices (policies/institutions, activities, tools, and interactions between stakeholders). The data was collected from February 10 to March 23, 2020, from 33 individual interviewees who make use of PT and/or STCR in three cities in Poland with over 500,000 inhabitants.

We offer three findings contributing to the previous body of TSP research. First, we show that consumers (commuters) form practices independently of providers, by improvising with and combining the assets the latter provide. By proposing a model for analyzing commuters’ practices, we contribute to a way of understanding practices that acknowledges the beneficiaries’ improvisations with assets when they form those practices. Second, our findings challenge the more traditional approach to practice research that assumes that practices are intuitively identifiable, predefined, and unchanging from the inception to the conclusion of research on them. We especially question that modalities are the same as commuters’ practices. We argue instead that practices cut across modalities, that commuters’ practices are not intuitive, and that scholars should seek to identify real practices as part of their research findings. Third, we show that commuters perform particular practices as mediators among other practices with rigid timetables.

2. Liturature review

2.1. Theory of Social Practices – theoretical background

Scientific research analyzing the impact of new service offers in recent years has predominantly employed three conceptual frameworks for examining service processes and value creation: (1) the “service-dominant logic” (Vargo & Lusch, 2004, 2015) and “value in use” (Grönroos et al., 2015) principles applied to the interpretation and implementation of such research, (2) concepts applied to the interpretation and study of innovations (Sinek, 2010; Luckman & Hegene 2013; Norman & Verganti 2014) and (3) the Theory of Social Practices (Reckwitz 2002a; Warde 2005, 2014) – the latter being a framework that has recently been gaining in importance. These three frameworks all concur that the creation of value within service offers should be analyzed in the context of the social practices in which they are embedded. In other words, the broad approach shared by these frameworks argues that examining value purely through individual assessments, supplier-consumer relationships, or solely through supplier actions is inadequate.

The Theory of Social Practices (TSP) (Reckwitz 2002a; Warde 2005, 2014; Shove & Pantzar 2005; Spotswood et al. 2015; Shove & Walker 2005, 2010) conceptualizes social practice as a configuration of meanings that reflects the rules (what is “right” or “inappropriate” for a given practice) and values of activities and resources used in a specific way (i.e., according to the rules, to derive value) for that practice. Practices exist only when they are performed, they are reproduced only in the activities that perform them. The Theory of Social Practices interprets each particular act of consumption or use as a “moment” of a specific collective, routine practice. In these social practices, repeated actions thus embody an understanding of mutually recognized rules and knowledge about the use of resources. However, this understanding of rules and knowledge exists only to the extent that it manifests itself in actions. Resources enable, but simultaneously limit, the performance of practices.

Changes in practices involve reconfigurations of these elements and extend beyond mere shifts in the principles whereby those practices are performed (Reckwitz 2002a; Warde 2005, 2014). Rather, TSP posits that research should focus on the practices themselves and their interconnections to understand value creation processes, and that transformations of these practices are crucial areas of concern in such research. Different practices may influence or inhibit one another and should not be studied in isolation (Spurling et al. 2013; Welch 2017). Table 1 presents a comparison of the individualistic interpretation vs the kind of interpretation posited by the Theory of Social Practice regarding consumer decisions.

Changes in practices involve reconfigurations of these elements and extend beyond mere shifts in the principles whereby those practices are performed (Reckwitz 2002a; Warde 2005, 2014). Rather, TSP posits that research on value creation processes should focus on practices themselves and their interconnections, and that transformations of these practices shold be crucial areas of concern in value creation research. Different practices may influence or inhibit each other and should not be studied in isolation (Spurling et al., 2013; Welch, 2017). Table 1 presents a comparison of the elements of the individualistic interpretation of consumer decisions vs the kind of interpretation posited by the Theory of Social Practice.

The Theory of Social Practices (TSP) proposes a “cultural turn” in understanding consumption processes, providing an alternative to theories grounded in individualistic assumptions (Reckwitz, 2002a; Warde, 2005; 2014). Schwanen et al. (2012) advocate for using cultural explanations in researching and designing new solutions for digital-based service offerings, such as urban transport in urban transport. This perspective encourages a synthesis of insights from various fields of science, fostering more interdisciplinary research and new directions of knowledge development. As noted above, we identified a certain research gap in terms of the possible application of the Theory of Social Practices to understanding how new digital-based service offerings precipitate changes in existing consumer practices and the emergence of new practices. This gap, therefore, is an incentive to look towards the Theory of Social Practices as a new research approach for management sciences.

2.2. New digital-based services offerings as assets of emerging practices

The advancement of technology enables consumers to differentiate their modes of activity on the market and to choose among the alternative services on offer. New digital technologies change the modalities, increasing multimodal options, but also transform consumers’ practices. This transformation occurs as consumers improvise with the technology, integrating it with other assets, and as other stakeholders adapt related practices.

Today, digital transformation solutions harness technology to generate new customer experiences, cultural norms, and business practices. This entails utilizing cutting-edge technological advances to modify corporate strategies and offers for the digital era. For instance, with the rise of 3G, 4G, and now 5G, clients can book by-the-minute car rental services (“carsharing” services) swiftly and easily without any human interaction, making it a seamless process from start to end without even minimal human assistance – the process has become more streamlined, faster, easier, and efficient for customers as well as very productive and efficient for the provider company to handle (Autorent, 2020). Customers are smarter nowadays, investigating and researching even minute decisions as information has become easily accessible. They also – for instance – look for car rental services integrated with a complete service value package (Autorent, 2020).

Researchers also point to limitations in interpreting the role of the Internet as a tool for coordinating urban mobility. Farag and Lyons (2010) empirically confirmed, in a quantitative study, the assumption that the intention to use information services in travel planning is a consequence of users’ consideration of modality options, and not the other way around.

Glenn (2018) argues that the Internet is not only a means of coordinating transport modalities but also an alternative to people and goods physically traveling distances (e.g., delivery of digital products). Therefore, urban mobility challenges and solutions should not be limited to physical transport modalities. In other words, by influencing how we communicate via the Internet, we can reduce the scale of physical transport, not just coordinate its modalities.

Papa and Lauwers (2015) point out that urban mobility research and design, which has so far been based on the recognition that technology is a tool for improving and optimizing transport planning, should also include the social behavior of users as a critical element of the above-mentioned research and projects.

2.3. Studying a single emerging practice, expected to replace the previous one, from a social practice perspective

The achievements of research on urban mobility are based on (1) contextual analysis of values, (2) the category of routine social practices as the subject of research, and (3) the transformation of these practices as a research problem. In this section present the two most critical studies relevant to this topic.

One crucial paper, Echeverri and Skålén (2011) – a qualitative study of value co-creation in public transport journeys in Gothenburg, Sweden – showed that the actions of bus and tram drivers contribute to the joint value creation of public transport journeys when passengers adequately understand the principles of their practice and, consequently, the actions of drivers and passengers converge in creating the value of the trip. The scholars found that (1) informing users about the rules (institutions) for implementing rides inspires a more convergent understanding of procedures and activities between providers and users, (2) helping to address difficulties in implementing the practice increases users’ participation in the practice. The main theoretical contribution of this study is the suggestion that the creation of trip value is a matter of the intersubjective alignment of how suppliers (here: drivers) and users understand the procedures and how they work in a given process, and not just a matter of the suppliers’ intentions and users’ perceptions of value considered separately. In their study, Echeverri and Skålén (2011) applied the framwork of the Theory of Social Practices (or “practice theory” – assessing principles, actions, tools, and the relationships between them) for qualitative analysis of the formation – i.e., co-creation, co-reduction, co-destruction – of the value of public transport trips. One limitation of this study is that the authors recognized one practice of the status quo of urban mobility (public transport trips, i.e., the context of a single practice) and not consider its transformation. Understanding the principles and skillful acting is not achieved automatically; instead, they are attained via repetitive interactions between service providers and users. Positive and negative valuations are based on the practice principles.

Incremental changes improve the practice from the point of view of the principles. Torkkeli et al. (2018) have contributed to the current understanding of practice elements. Despite the insights that can be gleaned from studies of a single practice (alongside Echeverri & Skålén, 2011, these include Heidenstrøm 2021; Medberg & Heinonen, 2014; Torkkeli et al., 2018; Magaudda, 2011), studying a single practice does not demonstrate that the main principle of the practice is challengeable and transformable.

In the second critical study, Spotswood et al. (2015) suggest, based on qualitative research conducted in two British cities, that cycling remains a marginal urban mobility practice (accounting for 2% of urban trips) until users gain access to new resources/tools (separate car and bicycle lanes, facilities for cyclists at destinations) that in turn inspire new practice. Despite the introduction of restrictions on entry, parking, and fees for entering city centers, the dominant practice remains using cars for daily commuting. The current information and motivational activities (information campaigns) about the possibilities of replacing commuting by car with commuting by bicycle are an insufficient mechanism to trigger such a transformation. Other stakeholders need to provide additional infrastructure tools and, as a result, to facilitate their competent use – the competencies needed for driving in separate lanes are lower than those for cycling in car lanes. The authors also suggest that incremental interventions in one practice (introducing car speed limits and increased parking fees) cause changes in other practices. Therefore, actions in the sphere of regulation (speed limits, higher parking fees at workplaces) and infrastructure (separating bicycle traffic from car lanes, providing showers and changing rooms) are the appropriate ones to be taken in seeking to transform the practices of everyday urban commuting.

Taken together, these two key studies show that the TSP framework can be used to represent both the interaction of practices in one urban modality (Echeverri & Skålén, 2011) and the transformation of urban mobility practices, understood as replacing the current practice of urban commuting by car with commuting by bicycle and, as a result, increasing the value of sustainable development (Spotswood et al., 2015).

Summarizing our literature review, we can say that previous studies on practices, such as these, exhibit several limitations. First, TSP-based studies are generally limited in scope to considering value formation in one particular practice. Second, the transformation is conceptualized as a traditional practice coming to be replaced by a newer one, as the achievement of certain predetermined values. Third, the practices being investigated were themselves predetermined in those studies. The researchers studied intuitively identified practices, assumed to be unchanging from the starting point of their research to their results. The call to identify the practices themselves as part of the findings of the studies, rather than assuming them a priori (Smagacz-Poziemska et al., 2020), here remains unfulfilled. Thus, in opposition to the focus on such technology-driven new modalities, practice theory scholars instead recommend exploring the practices (Shove & Walker, 2014; Smagacz-Poziemska et al., 2020) and focusing on how the demand for them is inspired by other practices (Shove et al., 2015).

This is how we arrived at the research questions considered in the present study: RQ(1) How do new service offers (in our case: short-term car rental or “carsharing”) transform current practices (in our case: commuting practice)? RQ(2) What are the resultant practices?

3. Method

3.1. Research design

To address these research questions, we carried out an exploratory study involving a contextual analysis of two services offered in commuting modalities: public transport (PT) and digitally-accessed short-term car rental (STCR). Our analysis focused on identifying the elements of the practices – contextual principles, (in)congruent skilled actions of stakeholders, and assets used – and their changes, as suggested by TSP (Reckwitz, 2002a, 2002b; Holtz, 2014; Spotswood et al., 2015; Warde, 2005, 2014).

We applied TSP as the theoretical framework for our study, selecting two modalities performed by the same informants, commuting by PT (1) and by STCR (2). This choice was driven by our aim to study practices without assuming that newer practices should replace older ones, counter to the assumptions made in previous studies. Our decision was also influenced by emerging trends in mobility, such as sustainability, electric mobility, and shared mobility, all of which harness digital technologies as potential solutions to urban transportation challenges.

3.2. Data collection and analysis

To understand value formation (co-creation or co-destruction) as the output of (in)congruence between the providers’ and beneficiaries’ actions (Echeverri & Skålén, 2011), we focused on how stakeholders interact within these practices. We gathered the data and coded it in line with TSP guidelines.

Our study was exploratory and qualitative, with interviews chosen as the primary data collection method. These interviews were structured around a scenario, with questions constructed to probe various categories of social practices (policies/institutions, activities, tools, and interactions between stakeholders). We followed the guidelines that a typical TSP project requires 15– 25 participants in research on generating new constructs and relations between them, and that participants should be selected for their knowledge about the questions/issues and their willingness to share their knowledge and experiences with the researcher (Zeithaml et al. 2020). The study population consisted of people using publicly accessible transport (PT and/or STCR) in three cities in Poland, who do not have their own cars and who commute to work or school.

Data was collected from 33 individual interviews with users of PT and/or STCR. The interviewees were aged from 19 to 25 (23 men and 10 women), who were either university students or had jobs and who did not use their own cars on city journeys. The interviews were conducted using a mixed-method approach: they partly consisted of in-depth interviews (IDIs) carried out both face-to-face and via teleconference, and were partly supplemented via online surveys (CAWI). Each session lasted approximately 40 minutes. In addition to responses to the interview questions, our respondents provided four self-taken photographs depicting key elements of the two practices they participated in, along with written explanations regarding Social Practice Theory. Data was collected in three cities in Poland with over 500,000 inhabitants (Warsaw, Gdansk and Wroclaw) from February to March, 2020. The interviews were conducted with the participation of the research firm IMAS International Sp. z o.o. Institute for Market and Social Opinion Research from Wroclaw, which has many years of research experience in both domestic and foreign markets. The generated data (respondents’ answers) were organized in an Excel database. Interpretations of the data were made from the standpoint of the categories of social practice theory and the logic of interactive co-creation (or co-destruction) of values within individual consumer practices.

4. Research findings

We analyzed and interpreted the data in four steps. First, we coded the data by skilled actions, assets used, and principles of practices. Second, we identified connections among the described data. Third, we identified the commuter’s practices. Fourth, we connected our theoretical contributions with existing TSP-based literature.

4.1. From using public transport (PT) and short-term car rental (STCR) to new commuter practices

We statistically analyzed the reported travel time using PT and STCR, initially treating them as observable, intuitive commuting practices. The use of STCR accounted for a small proportion of the interviewees’ city trips, with study participants generally having used this service 2–4 times in the previous eight weeks. However, four of them had used the STCR more than five times. The duration of car journeys was shorter (average = 28.2 minutes, median = 20 minutes) than for journeys by public transport (average = 32.3 minutes, median = 25 minutes), though with more significant variability (standard deviation = 18.3) than public transport (standard deviation = 16.88). The time taken to walk to a public transport stop was shorter (average = 4.09 minutes, median = 3 minutes) than that required to walk to a parked rental car (average = 5.34 minutes, median = 5 minutes), and was also less variable (standard deviation = 2.73 for PT, 4.40 for STCR). We interpret these total travel times (walking and journey) as measures of difficulty in getting to the places where our informants performed their target practices (studying, working) and, consequently, as difficulties in accessing these practices.

Initially, we interpreted the data assuming that commuting by PT and STCR are distinct practices. However, further analysis of interviews revealed insights about the use of dedicated bus lanes in both PT and STCR. Based on this, we re-interpreted the data and instead identified two other practices in our findings: first, commuting by fully electric short time-rented cars in bus lanes during rush hours, and second, commuting by short time-rented cars with combustion engines during off-peak hours. Commuters themselves shaped these two practices after a period of improvisation with available short-term rental cars (new assets of a new practice). This illustrates how commuters actively shape and transform their practices, rather than just adopting available offers.

In the following sections, we discuss these empirical findings in more detail, highlighting how they contribute to our understanding of commuter activities and service usage.

A)Passing through traffic jams: commuting by public transport (PT) or fully electric short time-rented cars (STCR) in dedicated bus lanes during rush hours

We find that commuters use both PT and STCR in their practice of minimizing time spent stuck in traffic jams. They use the fully electric STCR as a new asset in this same practice, for which they had before used PT. They also combine PT and the fully electric STCR with access to dedicated bus lanes – another asset in the practice. Selected quotes from respondents regarding this practice are presented in Table 2.

As the quotes illustrate, commuters use a combination of assets to perform the practice. Checking if bus lanes are available on the commuting route is a skillful action on commuters’ part, especially during rush hours. This is congruent with other stakeholders’ actions: (1) providers offering the fully electric cars in STCR, and (2) the city authorities creating bus lanes and allowing the new commuting modalities to access them.

B) Non-urgent commuting by public transport (PT) or short time-rented cars (STCR) with combustion engines, using regular traffic lanes in off-peak hours

We find that commuters use both PT and STCR in their practice of commuting in regular traffic lanes. They use the non-fully electric STCR as a new asset in this same practice, for which they had before used PT. They also combine the PT and non-fully-electric STCR with access to regular traffic lanes – another asset in the practice. Selected quotes from respondents pertaining to this practice are presented in Table 3.

As the table illustrates, the commuters use PT, non-fully electric cars and regular traffic lanes as assets to perform the practice. The commuters’ skillful action is to choose the practice in off peak or non-hurry situations. Otherwise the commuters spend time stuck in traffic jams.

4.2. How the short time-rented cars (STCR) change commuting?

Durng the course of our study, we identified the following commuting practices: (1) commuting by fully electric cars and direct connections of public transport in bus lanes, passing through traffic jams during peak periods, and (2) commuting by non-fully electric cars (without permission to use bus lanes) and non-direct connections of public transport in off-peak periods. Note that these practices are different than merely the use of PT vs. the use of STCR.

Our findings (Fig. 1) indicate that using a new means of transport (STCR) as a digital-based service offer is not the same as mobility practices, in which consumers avail themselves of the offer as an asset.

Users can make use of the same offer in two different practices they perform. Users combine the new offer with other assets (dedicated and regular traffic lanes) to perform their commuting practices. Our findings show that STCR operators have, in fact, provided new assets to existing practices.

4.3. Commuting mediates between consumers’ practices with rigid timetables

Although our study has focused on commuting, we can report an additional finding not visible in Figure 1. The data analysis revealed other practices, where the commuters need to be on time. As a consequence, we can state that the two mobility practices mediate other practices (living in a defined place, working, studying), which also have their own “timetables” (i.e., to perform these practices, commuters must be in a specific place at a certain time). The informants found themselves in a hurry, arrived on time, or were late because study and work schedules are rigid and distant from where users live. Commuters are over-mobile because they have to commute between time and space strict practices. Consequently, the elimination of rigid timetables in working and studying practices reduces the scale of “rushing” and “being late” in the performance of commuting. It also reduces the intensity of performing mobility practices.

It seems evident that other digital-based offers, like online work and studies, reduce mobility. However, a live online lecture every Friday at 8:00 AM is an example of time rigidity. Transferring a traditional oral exam to an online setting exemplifies cultural rigidity. Studies of the rigidities of these relatively new online practices are rare. The traffic jams during rush hours should be reduced by projects pertaining to dwelling, commuting, studying, and working practices, implemented by relevant interdisciplinary teams, rather than by mobility specialists focusing only on mobility-related data. The complexity of transforming mobility practices is not about changing the assets within those practices but about initiating interdisciplinary research and projects of a sort that typically do not emerge due to the siloed organization of city government departments.

4.4. A model for analyzing the transformation of consumer practices

Based on the insights from our research, we developed a model (Table 4) that facilitates a critical analyses of how technological advancements in new consumer offers transform consumer practices. This model embeds practical and policy implications throughout the research agenda, to guide companies and policymakers when making consumer mobility-related decisions.

This model positions consumer practices as units of research, in which consumers improvise and form their own practices independently of the providers, combining the assets the latter provide. It offers a new perspective compared to previous research, which often views consumer practices as predefined. Our approach encourages exploration of how consumers adapt and innovate in response to new offerings, providing insights into the dynamic nature of consumer activities.

5. Conclusion

Our findings make three contributions to the study of consumer practices. First, we have identified practices different than just making use of offered services – demonstrating how customers independently create values by improvising with assets provided by stakeholders. We agree with previous TSP-based research (Spotswood et al., 2015; Mylan et al., 2016) that (1) consumers use the assets supplied by various providers in their practices and (2) consumers should not be imagined as users of particular products or services but as performers of practices. Our key contribution lies in identifying that consumers shape their practices after a period of improvising with the use of new resources provided by both service providers and other stakeholders. This is a new explanation of how providers, other stakeholders, and users actively interact in co-creating value in a specific practice. Users neither just adopt the new offerings nor make individual decisions based on education or information. Instead, as the example of digitally-accessed short-term car retal (STCR or “carsharing”) examined herein shows, consumers actively shape and transform their value creation practices after a period of improvisation with available assets.

Second, our analysis challenges the traditional view that practices are static and predefined. Instead, we reinterpreted the initial, intuitive practices that we began with into new practices formulated through iterative encounters with additional data during our analysis – as Morgan and Nica (2020) suggest. Identifying practices in this way is a dynamic research task recommended by Smagacz-Poziemska et al. (2020). Previous TSP-based studies (Echeverri & Skålén, 2011; Spotswood et al., 2015; Shove & Walker, 2010; Shove & Pantzar, 2005; Mylan, 2015) have examined predefined practices from their points of departure to their findings. Our approach, in turn, highlights how the practices identified evolve from their initial conception to their ultimate realization in the study, revealing the transformative potential of consumer activities analysis.

Third, we have shed some light on how consumers use particular practices as mediators among other practices with rigid timetables. As a consequence, consumers may make excessive use of the former and may be enriched when reducing it. Our findings also suggest a new understanding of beneficiaries’ enrichment, which occurs in the repertoire of practices the beneficiaries perform to deal with the social issue. Social issues should not be reduced to differentiations of modalities in predefined practices. Previous research has focused on how consumers perform predefined practices (Hebrok & Heidenstrøm, 2019; Mylan, 2015) and bundles of practices (Castelo et al., 2021) in predefined relations, like practices performed at the same time or in the same space. Instead, we introduce the concept of mediation within practices, suggesting that studying the interconnections between mediating and destination practices can reveal mutual influences and inspirations. This perspective encourages a broader, more integrative approach to studying and designing consumer practices, moving beyond the limitations imposed by focusing solely on singular, isolated practices (Bezerra et al., 2020).

6. Study limitations

Our study has a number of limitations, which in turn provide some guidance for future research into the transformations of consumer practices. First, our findings are based predominantly on service users’ reports. Future research should strive to include a broader array of data from more differentiated stakeholders of the practices under examination. This would provide a more comprehensive view of the dynamics at play.

Second, we have studied the formation of practices in the field/domain of consumer services. Future research should verify whether our conclusions are generalizable to other fields, such as business-to-business (B2B) or e-commerce.

Third, this paper has initiated exploration into the relationship between destination and mediating practices. This intriguing aspect of consumer behavior likewise warrants further investigation in subsequent studies.

Moreover, our findings indicate that consumers utilize the same offers differently across different practices. Future research should examine how beneficiaries avail themselves of the same service offerings in various practices. Such inquiries could unveil practices that extend beyond mere usage or adoption of offers, providing insights into how offers are integrated and repurposed in everyday life.

Additionally, our research highlights the potential for changing consumer practices through the relaxation of rigid timetables. Investigating how modifications in the timing of practices could spur changes in other practices may offer new directions for understanding consumer adaptability and innovation.

More broadly, in this paper we have advocated for a shift away from studying predefined practices to identifying emerging practices as one aspect of the findings themselves. We propose that our model could serve as a tool for investigating and debating these emerging practices, inspired by new offerings, in future research. We hope our study encourages critical reflection on how consumers creatively combine new offers with existing assets to create and shape new practices.

Acknowledgements

The project was financed by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education in Poland under the programme “Regional Initiative of Excellence” 2019–2022, project number 015/RID/2018/19, total funding amount 10,721,040.00 PLN.

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Introduction
Proper communication with stakeholders is now one of the fundamentals of strategic management of enterprises. Corporate social responsibility programmes, which have been developed for many years, fit well into this trend, creating a kind of bridge for the use of certain resources at the disposal of companies in accordance with the expectations of stakeholders.

The purpose of the article is to analyse and evaluate corporate social responsibility practices as a response of enterprises to the expectations of a wide range of stakeholders. In the article, the authors perceive CSR practices as a way of conducting market activities in accordance with stakeholder expectations, with those not being a one-time act but a continuous effort to improve areas of the company’s environment
requiring support. Noticeable activity in CSR programmes is shown by entities belonging to the energy industry, including the Energa Group, which is one of the key players. There are several major electricity suppliers and sellers in Poland. These are, besides Energa Group, primary entities: Tauron Group, PGE Capital Group, Enea Capital Group and E.ON Polska S.A. There are also many other alternative players in the industry whose scale of operations in Poland is far smaller than that of the above five mentioned entities. They include Fortum Power and Heat Polska Sp. z o.o., Audax Energia Sp. z o.o., Engie Polska Sp. z o.o. and Enefit Sp. z o.o. All of the listed entities carry out activities in the area of corporate social responsibility, but their scope varies.

The entity selected for analysis is a Polish capital group of the energy industry, i.e., Energa Group. It is a large entity whose activities can significantly and, in many ways, affect the environment. The analysis was based on secondary sources available to the public, that is, reports on the activities of the Energa Group by the Board of Directors, 'Our responsibility’ reports published from 2012 to 2020 and the Energa Group’s non-financial information reports for 2020 and 2021. The results of the data analysis show the trends of changes in CSR practices in the studied company over the last 10 years (2011–2021), which can be useful in the development of the Energa Group’s CSR programmes and indicate the directions for other business entities involved in CSR programmes.

For the purpose of the research objective, the following research questions were formulated:

• With what metrics can a company’s involvement in CSR activities be analysed in the long term?
• What trends of changes in the studied CSR categories can be observed, taking into account the analysed long period?
• What are the possible reasons for changes in the dynamics of the studied values describing CSR activities over the analysed period?

Corporate Social Responsibility — The Evolution of Approaches

Table 1 shows the evolution in the understanding of activities referred to as Corporate Social Responsibility (acronym CSR) based on a review of research achievements.

As can be seen from a review of the content included in Table 1, the concept of CSR is complex and multidimensional in nature. The concept of CSR is mainly about a company 'being responsible’ for its actions and focusses more on sharing the company’s profits with the environment than on creating an economic value. A company creates social value’ by addressing the needs and problems of the society (Porter & Kramer, 2011a, 2011b). The concept of CSR 2.0, according to Visser, stands for an innovative approach to business and the use of the gains of new technologies, including social media, for dialogue. CSR 2.0 is based on five principles: creativity (creativity), scalability (scalability), responsiveness (responsiveness), glocality (’think globally, act locally’) and circularity (circularity or closed loop leading to total resource recovery). Visser points to the need for a new reading of the CSR acronym as corporate sustainability and responsibility. This formula for reading the abbreviation CSR is to emphasise that sustainability is the goal and responsibility defines how to get there (Visser, 2014; Spyra, 2022). In addition, Table 1 indicates documents standardising business responsibility practices (ISO standards) and EU regulations on corporate sustainability and CSR reporting.

To sum up, there is an evolution of the conceptual scope and role of the CSR concept in corporate strategy, which proves the validity of this approach for modern business. In order to seek answers to the formulated three research questions, the authors undertake a more detailed analysis based on quantitative data and on the CSR activity of a selected energy industry company.

Research Methodology — Criteria for Selecting data Describing the CSR Activities of the Company

For the purpose of analysing the dynamics of CSR activities, it is necessary to have data expressed in numerical terms to determine the relationship between these values in the various periods under study. The main criterion that needs to be taken into account in the selection of data is their availability. This is especially important for those data whose publication is voluntary, which leaves room for choice for entities deciding to publish the information of their choice. However, this information can be systematised through the use of standards and benchmarks (including the Global Reporting Initiative [GRI] guidelines, which provide an international benchmark for companies to report on responsible business and sustainable development).

Some entities, including the Energa Group, are subject to statutory obligations to disclose non-financial information, among which are activities relating to CSR. These include information on the entity’s policies relating to the environment, anti-corruption or respect for human rights, as well as those relating to social and labour areas. An important criterion for the selection of quantitative data is also the continuity of the publication of these data, which allows the phenomena and their changes over time to be shown reliably and as closely as possible to reality. Regularity of data publication is also an important aspect, ensuring comparability of information over time. Regularity, however, refers to data relating to those CSR activities of a company that are carried out on a repetitive or continuous basis.

In the context of the search for and selection of source materials, their reliability is important, crucial to ensuring the reliability and objectivity of the analyses conducted. Some corporate reports, particularly those of a mandatory nature, are subject to examination by external auditors. In contrast, reports published on a voluntary basis, among which are social and sustainability reports, are usually not subject to external verification. However, conducting regular, detailed examinations of non-financial information by an external entity in the way that is done for financial data would be labour intensive and difficult to implement (Matuszyk, 2018). Some of the information may be published selectively, presenting only favourable data. It is therefore also important to make the data comparable over time so that regardless of whether it presents itself in a desirable way, it is possible to view it and compare it objectively with data from other periods.

Based on the literature study, categories of CSR activities were identified, which made it possible to systematise the wide range of activities that make up socially responsible practices. The designated categories helped us to organise the activities undertaken by the studied energy industry entity. As a result of the analysis of reports published by the Energa Group, the scope of the entity’s social responsibility data included in the published documents was established.

Corporate reporting is the primary source of data on the entity’s operations. Energa S.A., as the parent company of the Group, is required to prepare periodic financial statements, reports on operations and reports on non-financial information. The Energa Group’s financial statements do not address corporate social responsibility issues. Instead, these issues are present in the Board of Directors’ reports on the Energa Group’s activities, where they were presented in a concise, descriptive manner. The most extensive and detailed CSR issues were described in the separate Our Responsibility reports published in 2012–2020 and in the Energa Group’s non-financial information reports for 2020 and 2021. Both documents were prepared in accordance with the GRI reporting standard. The frequency of publication of these reports is 1 year.

It should be emphasised that business entities are obliged to report non-financial information as defined by Directive 2014/95/EU and implemented into the Polish legal order by the Act on Amending the Accounting Act of 15 December 2016. (Journal of Laws of 2017, item 61). Significantly, on February 24, 2022, the EU Competitiveness Council adopted the so-called 'general approach’ to the draft directive on corporate sustainability reporting. The new directive is expected to replace existing EU regulations on the disclosure of non-financial information; uniform European reporting standards will be developed, as well as a simplified version for smaller entities.

In the process of in-depth analysis of the content of Energa Group’s reports, metrics were selected to indicate changes and trends in CSR activities over a 10-year period. In the case of the Energa Group, the selected metrics characterise the entity’s CSR activities quite well but do not provide a comprehensive snapshot of the activities carried out. The reason for this is the limitations of the company’s lack of use of a number of potential metrics that capture the nature of CSR in the model approach proposed in the literature. However, the metrics selected for analysis are useful in monitoring the effects of CSR practices in the Energa Group, thanks to the possibility of collecting quantitative data over a relatively long period and maintaining continuous monitoring.

Assumptions of Analysis of CSR Activities of Energa Group in 2011–2021

It should be noted that much of the information on socially responsible activities and their effects is presented by the Energa Group in a descriptive manner, while the quantitative data necessary for the analysis were finally collected in three possible categories: environment, employees and society. Table 2 presents a summary of published quantitative data that are measures of CSR for the analysed entity, taking into account the availability of data over time as a basis for determining the continuity of their publication.

Tabular visualisation of the availability of sources in the years indicated allowed us to extract data that maintain temporal continuity over specific years, as well as determine the length of the period over which the data was published. Variables can be divided into those characterising CSR in the area of environmental impact (items 1–4) and those variables relating to activities aimed at people, in this case employees (items 5–7) and communities (items 8–12). The study of the dynamics of changes in the phenomenon over time made it possible to determine the nature of these changes and to isolate trends of change.

The study included several stages, the implementation of which made it possible to answer the research questions. First, measures were selected that characterise CSR on the basis of the established criteria. Second, among the proposed metrics, those characterised by continuity over time and a sufficiently long period of data availability were extracted. Third, the dynamics of the determined variables were examined using several methods of time series dynamics analysis. These methods aim to determine what is the intensity of changes in the level of the analysed phenomenon and their direction over a certain time interval (Balcerowicz-Szkutnik, Sojka, & Szkutnik, 2014).

Given the volume of the study, in the following section, we will focus our attention on the variables of selected activities directed to the stakeholders of the Energa Group company defined as communities.

Analysis of Energa Group’s Social Activities

According to the information in Table 1, the Energa Group’s activities initiated under social responsibility and aimed at communities can be analysed using six metrics: the amount of money donated to charity, funds raised through the Active Charity campaign, the number of participants in the Active Charity campaign, the amount of blood collected through the Energy Droplet campaign and the amount of investment in communities through donations. The first CSR measure analysed is the amount of money that was donated to charity by the Energa Foundation. These amounts and their dynamic indexes are presented in Table 3.

The amounts donated to charity were at similar levels in 2012–2015, while the single-basis index values of >1 during 2016–2019 indicate higher amounts of support in this time frame than in the base year (2011). These were the highest values in the analysed period. The varying values of the chain indices indicate irregular changes.

Another variable in the social area relates to the organised Active Charity campaign, and the amount of funds raised through this campaign
was analysed. The formation of the variable is shown in Table 4.

The amount of funds raised under the initiative varied and is not characterised by a clear trend of change. The biggest change took place in 2018, when the amount of funds was 133% higher than that of the previous year. Interest in the above initiative can be illustrated by the number of participants, the dynamics of which are shown in Table 5. As for the number of participants in the initiative, there is a clear upward trend over the period under review. On average, the number of participants increased by 21% per year, which should be evaluated favourably. The highest value of the variable, which occurred in 2018, increased by 200% compared with the beginning of the analysed period (2014). It is possible to see a systematic increase in the variable from 2016 to 2018, as evidenced by small differences in the chain indexes from this period.

The next analysed measure of the Energa Group’s CSR is the amount of blood for needy patients collected during the Energy Droplet initiative. Table 6 shows the development of the variable and its dynamics.

In the first year of the Energy Drop campaign initiative and during the first period of data availability, the initiative’s effectiveness was low compared to subsequent years. In subsequent years, however, the amount of blood collected gradually increased, as evidenced by the high values of the single-base and chain indexes. The number of litters of blood collected increased by an average of 45% per year; so, the initiative was very popular.

The last variable analysed is the amount of investment in communities in the form of Energa Group donations. The development of this variable and the dynamics of change are shown in Table 7.

It can be seen that there is a clear difference between the values of the variable in the 2011–2015 periods, when the single-chain indices showed values below 1, and the values are variable in 2016–2019, when the indices were much higher and exceeded 2. This means that compared with the base year, the amounts of donations increased by >100%. The amount of donations made in 2016 increased by 267% compared with 2015, which was the largest recorded increase for the chain indexes.

Discussion of Research Results

An analysis of the dynamics of CSR activities of a social nature shows its varied course. First of all, it should be noted that 2018 saw the acquisition of the CSR Foundation, previously operating within the Energa Group, by the Energa Foundation. This may have influenced possible changes in the disposition of CSR budget funds, but to a large extent, the amount of funds at the Foundation’s disposal depended on the revenue raised from the main funder, Energa SA, which directs its 1% income tax annually to the Energa Foundation. Depending on the Foundation’s budget possibilities, it was possible to allocate these funds to projects on its own initiative and to individual support for those applying for them.

As for the Active Charity initiative, the dynamics of CSR activities was described by two measures: the amount of funds raised for charity and the number of participants. The dynamics of the two metrics developed differently. The increasing number of participants in the initiative indicates the effectiveness of the promotion of this action among employees, their relatives and friends. The amount of support provided to childcare centres and other similar institutions did not result directly from the distance covered by participants in the physical activity but depended on the stated goal of the support and the funds available for this purpose.

The dynamics of the activities of the Energy Drop campaign followed a similar pattern. The amount of blood collected and, at the same time, the number of people involved in the campaign increased markedly among all analysed variables. The Energy Drop campaign has been promoted in social media since 2016, promoting the idea of blood donation and educating people about it, while dispelling myths about the issue of blood donation. The initiative’s Facebook profile posts all information about blood donation events. This had the effect of almost doubling the amount of blood collected in 2016 compared with the previous year, when the initiative was not so actively promoted through Facebook. Communication with potential blood donors can be considered effective, given the high dynamics of the amount of blood collected.

The last measure analysed in the social area was the amount of community donations made by the Energa Group. In 2016, we saw the steepest increase in this variable compared with previous years. At that time, the Group supported numerous initiatives under the Energa for You programme aimed at local communities, and the value of donations made under the Help with Energa initiative also increased. However, the reports do not detail the amount of funds donated to communities not resulting from programmes promoted by the Group, which would explain such a significant increase in the amount of donations made in 2016 compared with previous years.

Conclusions

The year 2020 was the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, which naturally caused a number of difficulties for companies in many industries. This also affected the operations of the Energa Group, which was forced to adapt to the new reality, for example, new remote customer communication systems were implemented. Despite the difficulties associated with the pandemic, the Group did not reduce spending on support for local communities, as they are an important part of the entity’s budget policy. A large part of the pro-community projects was related to pandemic support. Among them was the Remote Education with Energy project, which provided training for school staff in effective remote teaching. Numerous donations were also made to combat COVID-19-targeting medical facilities.

In conclusion, although the Energa Group has been reporting on its corporate social responsibility activities for years, it is not always possible to make a quantifiable assessment of each area of this activity in which the CSR concept manifests itself. The Group has implemented many programmes and projects, which definitely positively affect its image among internal and external stakeholders. The Group’s reports satisfactorily and transparently show the changes in the effects of the Active Charity and Energy Drop initiatives implemented. The effects of many other initiatives could also be presented in a similar way, showing their continuity and consistency in the Group’s operations. The growing popularity of regularly organised charitable actions can have a very positive impact on the Group’s image as socially responsible.

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At the beginning of the 20th century, numerous studies were carried out showing that emotions are an inseparable element of contemporary marketing, and validation of the results of these studies led to the emergence of a new stream of knowledge — neuromarketing, which is the result of an interdisciplinary approach to marketing. It uses knowledge of medicine, physics, biology and chemistry to understand consumer purchase behaviour. However, the decisive influence on the development of neuromarketing came from the discoveries of neuroscience — a scientific discipline that emerged at the end of the 20th century, which deals with the study of the nervous system, revealing new discoveries about the structure of the brain and the functions performed by its various centres (Mruk, 2008; Gregor & Wdowiak, 2016).

Currently, support for creative marketing activities of enterprises emerges from the analysis of consumer behaviour using neuromarketing techniques, because as Fabris puts it, 'the consumer changes his views, seeking experiences more than products and sensations and emotions rather than utilitarian values’ (Fabris, 2003). These words indicate the nature of the changes in consumer buying decisions that present marketing is following. It is necessary to study not only consumer behaviour but also consumer minds — including their decision-making processes, as well as the role of emotions and perceptions triggered by brands, products, messages and advertising. Companies can therefore find new impulses, taking into account the fact that, in addition to systematic thinking, the consumer makes purchase decisions based on the emotions felt at the time of the decision. Therefore, an in-depth analysis of the surrounding reality is necessary, focussing on the hidden desires and emotions of consumers in order to predict their behaviour, and thus empower the business enterprise to adopt actions that are no longer only about the consumer as a business object that generates revenue for the company, but also about him as a human being, and his satisfaction and contentment (Gaczek, 2016).

The COVID-19 pandemic rapidly changed consumer behaviour and marketing agencies were forced to be more creative and engaging. Individual customers have increased their online shopping and, consequently, the emotions that accompany such purchases have also changed, as well as the moment and the level of perceived gratification and satisfaction with the purchase. This has inspired marketing researchers to use emotional memory, which is a combination of event memory and emotion, to build brand awareness and maintain a good and lasting relationship with customers (Pispers, Rode, & Fischer, 2021; Ziober, 2021).

Owing to the development of technology and the incorporation of techniques from medical science and psychology into the repertoire of marketing research, it is now possible to, so to speak, reach into the brains of consumers and thereby incorporate the complexity of the human mind into research. This gives a more realistic representation of the process that actually occurs within the consumer’s mind when making purchase decisions. This is what neuromarketing deals with, and its development is fostered by increased competition in the market for consumer goods and services, as well as the increasing reluctance of consumers to participate in classic research such as surveys and interviews (Disterheft, 2018).

Factors for the Development of Neuromarketing

Professor Ale Smidts — winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics — is considered to be the father of neuromarketing. In 2002, Smidts coined the term neuromarketing, defining it as 'a set of techniques for identifying brain mechanisms to better understand consumer behaviour for developing more effective marketing strategies’ (Diotto, 2020). Neuromarketing gained popularity in 2003 owing to the efforts of Read Montague, who conducted a series of experiments comparing consumer responses to two large wellknown brands, such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi, using neuroscience technologies to study brain activity in order to compare consumer preferences and the responses they had previously given regarding these brands (McClure, Li, Tomilin, Montague, & Cypert, 2004). Since then, there has been an increase in the use of biometric and neuroscience techniques for marketing purposes, fuelled by companies’ and brands’ interest in the potential of these methodologies. Over time, the variety of methods used by companies and brands also started to develop. Due to the growing interest in this new field of research, books and articles have been published on marketing, biometrics and neuroscience (Lankjaer-Bain, 2011; Dooley, 2022).

As a result, four key factors can be identified that have contributed to the rapid growth in the use of biometric and neurological methodologies by companies:

• advances in neuroscience development and technological advances in the construction of neuroscience methodologies and tools;
• marketing’s growing interest in unconscious consumers and in measuring their emotional responses to marketing messages;
• increasing market competitiveness, which requires companies to develop effective communication (including advertising) to attract as many customers as possible and generate profits;
• increasing numbers of customers as a result of using neuroscientific methods in marketing.

It should be noted here that with the rise in popularity of neuromarketing, there are potential dangers associated with unauthorised and non-ethical use of neuromarketing techniques, which will also be discussed in the paper.

The Potential of Neuromarketing Knowledge

The concept of neuromarketing, in its strict sense, refers to the use of brain imaging techniques to identify areas of the brain associated with psychological phenomena such as cognitive activities, thoughts, emotions, sensations and perceptions, considered in their biological dimension, i.e. purely chemical and neuronal (Neff, 2011). However, a definition describing neuromarketing as a discipline that uses only brain activity detection techniques is reductive. Neuromarketing practices involve measuring biometric variables that detect changes in physiological parameters such as respiratory rhythm, skin conductance, pupil dilation, heartbeat, sweating, eye fixation point displacement and facial expression. Owing to technological progress, it is possible to monitor and study these parameters in real time. The measurement of biometric parameters takes place when a subject performs a task (cognitive or emotional) or is receiving stimuli such as watching an advertisement. These findings are indirect (passive) because they do not involve a verbal response from the subject. Consequently, they are objective measurements that produce new and higher quality information because they are not subject to the filtering of the individual’s reason.

In neuromarketing methodology, three basic parameters are studied: (1) concentration, i.e. the extent to which the subject’s brain is engaged in performing a task or viewing a stimulus; (2) in measuring the impact of advertising, since it is important to understand whether the part of the brain that is associated with the ability to remember has been activated while viewing the content; and (3) detecting the emotional engagement that an advertisement or experimental task arouses in the individual.

Neuroscience applied to marketing can, among other things, help identify key aspects of a product’s appeal and its compatibility with customer needs. Neuromarketing research on a product can be carried out as early as in the project planning phase and then in the subsequent phase of product launch, e.g. together with research on the effectiveness of the campaign being introduced. Using these techniques prior to a product launch, an advertisement (or any other message from the business enterprise directed at the consumer) allows to verify in advance whether the marketers’ efforts will produce the desired results, or at least enables a preliminary understanding of the level of attention and emotional engagement the efforts will elicit from the consumer. Neuromarketing techniques can therefore be applied in the selection of marketing communication tools and in other areas where emotional involvement and individual attention are important success factors (Lindrstrom, 2009). Other areas of application of this new knowledge are prevalent in: content construction and website navigation, engaging users of computer games, advertising, product placement in games and films, and 'in store’ marketing, including observation of in-store customer behaviour and visual merchandising (Pradeep, 2012; Swida & Kabaja, 2013).

Neuromarketing Tools

To better understand consumer behaviour over time, biometric instruments have been developed that record the impact of certain stimuli at the brain and emotional level. These are research techniques that are mainly based on the belief that the body cannot lie and for this reason can definitely provide more information than the traditional tools that have always been used to observe and study consumer behaviour. There are many tools belonging to the sphere of biometric research that can be used for marketing analyses. These are new instruments useful for understanding the functioning of the human brain and that are able to determine which cortical areas are activated in conjunction with specific consumer behaviours and experiences.

The research techniques currently used by neuromarketing experts fall mainly into three groups:

1. Techniques called brain imaging, which analyse and study human brain activity, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) or electroencephalography (EEG);
2. Behavioural indicators such as eye-tracking or facial expression analysis, tools that are limited to the analysis of consumer behaviour in different situations;
3. Physiological indicators that analyse the often involuntary physical reactions of the subjects, such as galvanic skin response (GSR) or heart rate variability (HVR). These techniques aim to record the emotions that affect a person and their level of engagement and recall after exposure to a specific marketing stimulus. The greatest strength of these instruments is their ability to register even the smallest neurological and psychophysical changes: their extraordinary sensitivity in simultaneously detecting, on several individuals, parameters that also differ greatly from each other guarantees a deeper understanding of the type of emotions and the type of stimulus that is induced in consumers and makes it possible to carry out neuromarketing studies even on very large samples of the population (Chmielewska, 2013; Antoniak, 2020).

The latest, advanced neuroradiological techniques, called brain imaging, represent non-invasive research methods at the brain level, which are capable of recording areas of brain activation while subjects are making choices or performing a task. These tools allow experts to carry out mapping of the human brain, while providing information on brain function and the areas of the brain that are activated when making purchasing decisions. Brain imaging techniques differ from other tools used in neuromarketing mainly because of their optimal performance in terms of spatial resolution, millimetre accuracy and temporal millisecond precision, where the last two among these dimensions, respectively, describe the ability to understand brain activity by identifying individual elements that are even very close to each other spatially and using the shortest possible time to record the brain activity under study. The basic concept of brain imaging techniques, including, for example, fMRI or EEG, is that when one area of the brain is active, it consumes more glucose than another specific 'at rest’ area, characterised by a more intense metabolism and higher blood flow. Neuroimaging tools therefore make it possible to analyse changes in blood flow and create colour images characterised by different colours and degrees of intensity in relation to greater or lesser levels of activation of the brain area under study. By later comparing an image of a part of the brain 'at rest’ with an image of an area exposed to a stimulus, it is thus possible to identify the brain areas responsible for that precise cognitive processing activated in response to that particular stimulus. The most commonly used neuroimaging techniques according to Trenti (2019) are:

• functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI);
• electroencephalography (EEG); and
• magnetoencephalography (MEG).

Behavioural indicators are non-invasive techniques used to analyse consumers’ behaviour when they are in precise buying situations or when they are exposed to specific visual stimuli, such as advertisement or exposure to a particular brand. The following two are the most commonly used and widespread techniques in this field:

• Eye-tracking; and
• Emotion recognition.

Eye tracker is a tool designed to measure eyeball movement. More specifically, it monitors a number of factors that describe different stages of a person’s attention, including stages of eye exploration, eye fixation time, visual trajectory, pupil dilation and eyelid blink (closure). As already mentioned, eye-tracking was developed to enable an understanding of the functioning of human vision mechanisms, and it is capable of identifying what the human eye is looking at any time and with what degree of attention, by recording pupil dilation and contraction. Through eyetracking methodologies, it is possible to understand where the eye is most likely to stop, and thus understand which elements are able to attract the most attention. This technique, which is being used more and more intensively by market researchers, is based on the reflection of infrared light by the cornea: an eye tracker, mounted either on fixed positions in the laboratory or in spaces on simple glasses, directs infrared light, which is invisible to the naked eye, onto the subject’s face, and this light is reflected by the cornea itself. The reflection is then captured by cameras placed inside the instrument and analysed, allowing the position of the eye in relation to the observed object to be determined precisely at each moment of operation (Figure 1). In addition to presenting the path and direction the eye follows, the eye tracker also measures how long it takes before a person notices a product or how much time is spent observing it. Therefore, its applications are particularly relevant to the field of marketing — more and more companies are using this technology to monitor product performance and the communicative and promotional power of packaging. For example, just think of the countless applications of this technology in the area of largescale retail products — it is not difficult to imagine how useful it would be for many companies to have objective data that indicate, for example, how much time consumers spend looking at a particular product before buying it, or what the average consumer’s visual path along a supermarket shelf is before seeing the desired product and paying attention to it (Trenti, 2019).

Source: Two must methods packaging testing. Downloaded on Apr. 22, 2022 from https://medium.com/@eyesee/two-must-have-methods-for-package-testing6fea56a62883 http://eyesee-research.com/blog/two-must-methods-packaging-testing/

Understanding what emotions are evoked in consumers in response to specific stimuli or messages, such as promotional spots or price increases, is of growing importance to marketing. Recognising and analysing consumer emotions aroused by advertising messages can also be achieved through tracking the personalisation of promotional messages on a website or in social networks. In fact, focussing on people’s reactions and engagement on an emotional level seems to be an effective way for brands to stand out from the competition. It is no coincidence that the companies that are able to build solid brand loyalty today are in fact those that have historically been able to establish a kind of emotional bond with their customers.

One of the first researchers who focussed on studying facial expressions in relation to different emotional stages is psychologist Paul Ekman, who created an extensive catalogue of over 5,000 facial muscle movements, demonstrating that even a small movement of the eyebrow or nose reveals a different emotion. Following this database, he created models based on the relationship between a specific facial expression and its accompanying emotions, in an attempt to predict the different emotional reactions of the subjects. This is a thorough study that has been used in practice by many global brands (e.g. Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Apple) developing emotion recognition technology. The measurement of change in facial expression is a technique based on the high capacity of facial expressions to uniquely express the emotional states of individuals, transcending possible linguistic and cultural differences of the individuals studied (Ekman & Friesen, 1978). Today, there are well-established examples of brands using emotion recognition technology: just think, for example, of Facebook’s introduction of emotional responses to posts (Figure 2) or the use of negative facial expression recognition systems in many Japanese shops since 2014 to prevent theft (Baptista, 2016).

The techniques analysed so far in neuromarketing research can be complemented by physiological measurements, often involuntary and related to various emotional and cognitive processes, in order to conduct a more in-depth analysis of a person’s response to specific marketing stimuli, thus obtaining a more complete and reliable research result. Some of these psychophysiological indicators are represented, for example, by body sweating, heartbeat variability or changes in respiratory rhythm. All

Source: Baptista (2016). RIconoscere le emozioni dei consumatori dal volto: come cambia il marketing? Downloaded on Apr. 22, 2022 from https://www.insidemarketing.it/riconoscere-emozioni-consumatori-marketing/

signals occur after the subject is exposed to specific stimuli, and the techniques used by neuromarketing to analyse physiological signals are (Trenti, 2019):

• galvanic skin response (GSR);
• electrocardiogram (ECG); and
• electromyography (EMG).

GSR or skin conductance activity (SCA) represent one of the best known and most widely used physiological indicators, the basic principle of which is the measurement of continuous changes in the electrical characteristics of the skin, which are manifested as a consequence of the variation of the individual stages of skin perspiration. Skin perspiration is regulated by the autonomic nervous system, a system directly involved in regulating emotional behaviour, and changes involuntarily in the face of external factors that frighten or distress the individual due to the alternation between the sympathetic nervous system, which increases sweat production, and the parasympathetic nervous system, which decreases it. The guiding principle of GSR is based on the fact that sweat containing a conductive saline solution makes the skin moist and therefore better adapted to conduct electricity compared to dry skin: this phenomenon, referred to as skin conductance, is better known as the 'galvanic skin response’. The GSR signal is very easy to detect: usually only two electrodes connected to a display are needed, which, applied to the index and middle finger of the subject’s hand, pick up the flow of electrical current through the skin. If the value registered on the display increases, it means that there is more skin conductance due to the greater presence of sweat as a result of activation of the sweat glands managed by the sympathetic autonomic nervous system. By recording the reactions of subjects exposed to relaxing or stressful stimuli, it is thus easy to understand how useful it is to apply the GSR technique in marketing research to better understand subjects’ reactions when they are subjected to different tests, such as, for example, watching an advertising spot (Trenti, 2019).

The electrocardiogram is also a widely used tool in medicine, as it allows the electrical activity of the heart to be measured. There are many studies that confirm the existence of a correlation between the emotional and affective spheres and the electrical field of the heart: just think of situations of anxiety or fear, which inevitably cause changes in the rhythm of the heartbeat. Test results obtained from ECG are often used by neuromarketing experts to better understand how subjects’ emotional states change during a test — the heartbeat is actually related to an individual’s level of concentration: the lower it is, the more it indicates that the subject is in a mental state of attention and concentration (Chmielewska, 2013).

EMG is a technique that measures the state of contraction of muscles, such as those of the arms or face, as it has been found that the contraction of these muscles is strongly linked to certain emotional states. These are micro-contractions perceived by a sensor, useful in marketing research to identify changes in the emotional and affective levels of subjects under certain stimuli (Trojan & Gut, 2020).

Examples of practical application of selected methods and techniques of neuromarketing are presented in the synthetic Table 1.

EEG: Electroencephalography; fMRI, Functional magnetic resonance imaging.

The neuromarketing techniques discussed in the article are applicable to the implementation of corporate strategies for different product categories. In practice, they provide unique knowledge about consumer emotions evoked by brands, products, messages and advertisements. As noted earlier, this may pose potential risks, as evidenced by the discussion in the scientific community described below.

Source: Own study.

Discussion on the Ethics of Neuromarketing Research

Neuromarketing as an applied discipline has recently not only been the focus of industry experts debating the actual effectiveness of these methodologies, but has also raised many concerns of ethical nature. The researchers point out that the misuse of these tools by companies may be aimed at identifying consumer weaknesses, then leading to segmentation based on these, and exploiting these weaknesses for commercial purposes. The issue concerns the privacy of consumers, who are becoming increasingly aware, and wary, of the role that modern technology could play in making their data vulnerable to unauthorised sharing and usage. Therefore, companies have to pay particular attention to ethical data collection and to providing accurate information about the process to customers.

Many people believe that neuromarketing is an attempt to use our subconscious mind to force us into buying a particular product or service. Many ethical concerns focus on the use of neuroscience techniques to stimulate and promote the purchase of goods dangerous to humanity. Neuromarketing, similar to traditional marketing, can generate undesirable effects (e.g. effective alcohol advertising can lead to serious health problems for customers). However, neuroscience techniques can also encourage a range of positive behaviours, such as helping people to better understand health-promoting campaigns (Więckowska, 2019).

Doubts and concerns about the true effectiveness of neuroscientific tools used in marketing are fuelled by the secrecy surrounding the discipline. Large companies that have carried out neuromarketing research are in practice reluctant to disseminate the data and the results obtained, contributing to the misinformation of the public concerning this field. With the discovery and increasingly widespread application of neuromarketing, industry experts should commit together with companies towards making this discipline more transparent in the eyes of consumers by establishing measures that, on the one hand, protect consumers through the ethical, responsible and correct use of these techniques and, on the other, make it possible to verify their actual effectiveness.

Summary

Operating in a competitive environment, companies seek to strengthen their market position and achieve their marketing objectives by communicating the value of their products to existing and potential consumers. Marketing managers have always tried to achieve these objectives by gathering as much information as possible about the needs, preferences and expectations of customers through the traditional tools offered by marketing. Today, new methodologies have been developed to achieve these goals, taking advantage of technological advances and new discoveries in neuroscience. Nowadays, companies have access to much more information about how consumers’ minds work, and thus also about their choice processes; and as a result, the question arises as to how marketers can ethically use this body of knowledge gathered from observing consumer behaviour There are studies in the literature suggesting the need to be aware that capturing and predicting consumers’ emotional reactions and moods-in relation to products, brands or advertisements-might possibly undermine their individuality and subjectivity (Hernandez, 2017).

In order to deal with the fact that various ethical issues are associated with the extraction and use of the neuroscientific imaging data of consumers, as well as, more generally, with the application of neuroscience in marketing, an association was founded in 2012, being the first of its kind, which brought together experts in the field of neuromarketing from around the world. The NeuroMarketing Science & Business Association (NMSBA) is an international trade association for anyone with a professional interest in neuromarketing and is present in 42 countries around the world, including Poland. In order to protect the future of neuromarketing and the discoveries that will be made over the years in the field of neuroscience, as well as to protect consumers and defend the discipline of neuromarketing itself from the many criticisms raised by sceptics, the NMSBA has also developed a code of ethics regarding the use of instruments that commonly form part of the application of neuroscience to marketing (Hernandez, 2017).

The authors share the view that neuromarketing research should be treated with great caution, given the possibility of there being aspects of neuroscientific-imaging-oriented assessments of consumer behaviour that are at quite a distance from current knowledge and existing limitations characterising the process of studying, analysing and predicting human behaviour (Kahneman, Sibony, & Sustein, 2022). However, it is worth evaluating the unprecedented potential of this knowledge for further research on consumer behaviour in the marketing arena, both from the scientific and pragmatic points of view.

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Współczesne uniwersytety podlegają ważnym przeobrażeniom pod wpływem dokonujących się zmian warunków globalnego otoczenia, w tym zwłaszcza demograficznego, technologicznego, ekonomicznego i społecznego. Na przełomie XX i XXI wieku pojawiły się nowe paradygmaty dotyczące zarządzania i marketingu w organizacjach, które na nowo definiują również rolę uczelni jako organizacji usługowej i rolę uczestników w procesie kształcenia na poziomie wyższym (w tym zwłaszcza studentów, wykładowców, kierownictwa). W tym kontekście aktualnym i ważnym problemem badawczym jawi się wpływ nowych generacji studentów, przejawiających odmienne od dotychczasowych postawy i zachowania nabywcze na — najszerzej ujmując — wizerunek współczesnego uniwersytetu. Szczególnym wyzwaniem dla organizacji szkolnictwa wyższego w Polsce jest więc obecnie problem nie tylko kreowania i dostarczania oczekiwanej wartości w ramach usługi kształcenia, ale kwestia kształtowania pozytywnych doświadczeń edukacyjnych z aktywnym udziałem uczestników biorących udział w całym cyklu kształcenia. Do głównych uczestników na pewno należą studenci uniwersytetu reprezentujący obecnie nowe pokolenia określane mianem pokolenia Y i Z, którym przypisuje się specyficzne cechy. Celem artykułu jest zatem przedstawienie, na podstawie analizy źródeł wtórnych, stylów zachowań młodego pokolenia studentów na polskich uczelniach oraz własna diagnoza ich potencjału we współtworzeniu wartości usługi edukacyjnej w procesie kształcenia. Przyjmując bowiem — na podstawie badań literaturowych — paradygmat dotyczący współtworzenia usługi w oparciu o takie zmienne, jak: współprodukcja, relacje i doświadczenie, możemy określić możliwości formułowania strategii i wizerunku polskich uczelni oraz szanse na realizację koncepcji współtworzenia usługi edukacyjnej z perspektywy studenta. W artykule dokonano przeglądu dotychczasowych badań na podstawie literatury zagranicznej i polskiej oraz — na tej podstawie — opisano segmenty polskich studentów reprezentujące różne style zachowań i oceniono ich gotowość udziału we współtworzeniu usługi edukacyjnej w uniwersytecie. Analiza i diagnoza zjawiska odwołują się do wyników badań empirycznych opublikowanych przez innych badaczy, zrealizowanych w wybranych polskich uczelniach ekonomicznych. Jednak ich oryginalność i wartość w wymiarze poznawczym i metodycznym sprawia, że mogą mieć wpływ na kierunki badań i praktykę zarządzania kształceniem na poziomie wyższym we współczesnym uniwersytecie i warte są kontynuacji. Z pewnością specyfika oczekiwań i zachowań nowych pokoleń to trudne wyzwanie dla uczelni, które z jednej strony chcą nawiązywać do przeszłości i tradycji, a z drugiej strony stają przed wyzwaniami współczesnych zmian otoczenia społecznego, ekonomicznego i technologicznego.

Zmiany pokoleniowe i ich znaczenie dla badań naukowych

Problematyka artykułu odwołuje się do dwóch ważnych zjawisk, które stanowią determinanty funkcjonowanie szkolnictwa wyższego w XXI wieku, a obejmują, po pierwsze, zmiany demograficzne w otoczeniu uczelni oraz, po drugie, nowe podejście do marketingu. W kolejności wskażemy na znaczenie tych determinat dla współczesnych uniwersytetów, odwołując się do ustaleń badaczy.

Istotę zmian demograficznych można obrazowo odnieść do podziału pokoleniowego, który został zauważony w społeczeństwach zachodnich (Van der Bergh, Behrer (a), 2012; Tapscott, 2010). Badacze przedstawiają obecny podział pokoleniowy najczęściej wyróżniając pięć generacji: pokolenie wojenne, pokolenie powojennego wyżu demograficznego (Baby Boomers, Silver tsunami), pokolenie X, pokolenie Y, pokolenie Z (C). Krótką charakterystykę kolejnych generacji umieszczono w tabeli 1.

W dalszej kolejności skoncentrujemy uwagę na specyfice zachowań osób z pokolenia Y oraz pokolenia Z, pod kątem ich przynależności do zróżnicowanych grup (segmentów) studentów współczesnych uniwersytetów. Postawy i wartości wyznawane przez studentów stanowią ważne uwarunkowanie dla kierunków rozwoju strategii i wizerunku uczelni. Problem jest istotny nie tylko w świetle koniecznych przemian w zakresie oferty i organizacji kształcenia w uniwersytetach (programy studiów, formy zajęć, indywidualizacja studiów), ale już obecnie ma wpływ na zarządzanie rzeszą pracowników zaangażowanych w kształcenie, tj. pracowników badawczo — dydaktycznych (którzy łączą aktywność naukową z dydaktyczną) oraz pracowników dydaktycznych (zaangażowanych wyłącznie w proces kształcenia). W kontekście poruszanych zagadnień, obie grupy pracowników uczelni staną wobec wyzwań strategicznych dla przyszłości uniwersytetu.

Tabela 1. Charakterystyka kolejnych generacji

Źródło: opracowanie własne na podstawie: Van der Bergh, Behrer (a), 2012;
Tapscott, 2010; Gadomska-Lila, 2015; Gołąb-Andrzejak, 2016.

Specyfika pokolenia Y i Z w świetle dotychczasowych badań

Wokół pokolenia Y pojawiło się wiele mitów. Dotyczyły one zarówno życia osobistego (problemy z wejściem w dorosłość, brak samodzielności, kryzys wartości), zawodowego (duże roszczenia względem pracodawców, niska lojalność, wysokie wymagania finansowe), jak i konsumenckiego. Stereotypy te wynikały z braku dogłębnej obserwacji potrzeb i motywacji pokolenia Y oraz z faktu, iż jeszcze kilka lat temu większość przedstawicieli owej generacji nadal kształtowała swoją tożsamość. Ostatnie lata przyniosły wiele cennych wyników badań, które pozwalają lepiej zrozumieć pokolenie przełomu wieków, a przez to nawiązać z jej przedstawicielami trwałe relacje. Przytoczymy poniżej główne obserwacje badaczy tego zjawiska.

Po pierwsze, Milenialsi to atrakcyjna grupa docelowa, gdyż komunikacja z nimi jest prostsza, szybsza i tańsza niż kiedykolwiek. Wynika to z cechy wspólnej pokolenia Y jaką jest dorastanie w otoczeniu nowoczesnych technologii. Powszechny dostęp do Internetu i rozwój urządzeń mobilnych sprawiły, iż dla Millenialsów nie istnieje odrębna przestrzeń wirtualna i realna — te dwa światy silnie się przenikają, a udzielanie się w mediach społecznościowych potwierdza niejako istnienie jednostki. Natomiast zniknięcie z przestrzeni wirtualnej może przyczynić się do wykluczenia młodego człowieka, np. informacyjnego (Kisiel, 2016).

Po drugie, gwałtowny rozwój nowoczesnej technologii, a także dorastanie w warunkach otwartości (wolny przepływ ludzi, informacji, towarów) sprawiły, iż pokolenie Y stało się pierwszym pokoleniem globalnym. Opisując Milenialsów, przypisuje się im większą niż w odniesieniu do poprzednich generacji elastyczność i otwartość na zmiany, gotowość do uczenia się oraz niechęć do długofalowych zobowiązań i wiąże się te cechy z koniecznością przystosowania do szybko zmieniającego się otoczenia. Posiadanie dobrego wykształcenia, znajomość języków obcych oraz nowych technologii powoduje, że przedstawiciele pokolenia Y są świetnie przygotowani do poruszania się w obszarach związanych z gospodarką globalną i różnorodnością kulturową (Gadomska-Lila, 2015).

Po trzecie, pokolenie Y różni się od wcześniejszych generacji pod względem mentalności, spojrzenia na świat, postrzegania samego siebie, a także sposobu pracy i poczucia osiągnięć.

Mimo, iż pokolenie Y jest skupione na samorozwoju, promuje personalizację, jest również generacją bardzo zaangażowaną. Może to oznaczać chęć bycia częścią wielu społeczności, ale także wspieranie inicjatyw ekologicznych, czy aktywne uczestnictwo w ruchach społecznych (Nielsen Company 2014). Badania wskazują, że na tle poprzednich generacji, Milenialsi okazują się o wiele bardziej otwarci i tolerancyjni (Viacom International Media Networks, 2017). Milenialsi posiadają wysokie ambicje i są silnie zorientowani na rozwój, a w pracy szukają przede wszystkim możliwości zdobywania nowych doświadczeń, realizacji swoich pasji i zainteresowań oraz korzystania z nowych technologii (Rusak, 2014).

Po czwarte, Milenialsi dorastali w czasach rozwiniętego konsumpcjonizmu i od dziecka otaczały ich przekazy reklamowe. Współczesne badania wskazują, iż przyczyniło się to do wyrobienia się pewnego rodzaju „odporności” na działania marketingowe. Dlatego istotne jest tworzenie długofalowej strategii komunikacji, opartej na dialogu, zaufaniu i niestandardowych metodach przekazu (Van den Bergh, Behrer (b), 2012).

Komunikacja do pokolenia Y powinna uwzględniać zastosowanie mediów społecznościowych, marketingu doświadczeń i personalizacji, przekazów i samego produktu/usługi.

Po piąte, generacji spod znaku Y, oprócz wielu atutów, przypisuje się także pewne mankamenty, w tym między innymi trudności w przystosowywaniu się do reguł i procedur panujących w firmach. Ponadto Milenialsom zarzuca się niski poziom dyscypliny w pracy oraz brak akceptacji autorytetów przełożonych. Trudno liczyć na lojalność przedstawicieli tego pokolenia, ponieważ niechętnie identyfikują się oni z firmą i przywiązują się do miejsca pracy oraz szybko podejmują decyzję o zmianie pracy, jeśli tylko mają ku temu odpowiednią okazję. Zatem pozyskanie lojalności i zatrzymanie wartościowego przedstawiciela tej generacji to prawdziwe wyzwanie dla pracodawcy (Albrychiewicz-Słocińska, Robak, 2017).

Obecnie najmłodsze pokolenie studentów polskich uczelni obejmuje także przedstawicieli kolejnego pokolenia Z (nazywanego też pokoleniem C — Connected Generation lub generacją post-millennials lub Digital Natives), czyli urodzonych po roku 1998, w czasach dynamicznego wzrostu internetu i nowych technologii komunikacyjnych (mobilnych).

Specyfiką tego pokolenia jest to, że ich naturalnym środowiskiem są nowoczesne technologie i internet. W porównaniu z poprzednią generacją, określaną mianem generacji Y, która dopiero uczyła się świata cyfrowego, dla pokolenia Z nowoczesne technologie to coś, co istniało od zawsze.

Jak zauważają badacze, generacja pokolenia Z potrafi wykonywać kilka rzeczy jednocześnie — mogą w tym samym momencie z kimś rozmawiać, pisać wiadomości i oglądać serial. Jednak taki multitasking może być sporym kłopotem, bo nie są oni w stanie skupić się na konkretnej rzeczy. Ponadto zauważa się, że generacja Z była wychowana bezstresowo, a jej przedstawiciele mają bardzo mało pokory i są wyjątkowo roszczeniowi, co dla wielu pracodawców może być szczególnie trudnym wyzwaniem.

Nie wszyscy pracodawcy potrafią bowiem poradzić sobie z takimi niepokornymi pracownikami. (Kostyńska, 2019).
Badacze zwracają uwagę, że pokolenie Z jako młodzi e-konsumenci posiadają kilka cech charakterystycznych (Badzińska, 2010; Gracz, Ostrowska, 2014):

• są wymagający, lecz otwarci na nowości i trendy,
• kreują i krytykują nowe potrzeby, postawy i zachowania,
• interesują się innowacyjnymi produktami i usługami,
• podkreślają swoją odmienność i indywidualność, odchodzą od przyjętych standardów i stereotypów,
• ich stosunek wobec reklam i komunikacji marketingowej firm staje się bardziej krytyczny, a także coraz bardziej racjonalne są ich kryteria zakupu.

Podsumowując, w obecnych czasach mamy do czynienia z kilkoma generacjami ludzi aktywnych w wielu sferach, których postawy, wyznawane wartości i typy zachowań różnią się dość wyraźnie. Warto przyjrzeć się tym różnicom, by lepiej zrozumieć preferencje i oczekiwania młodych ludzi — obecnie studentów, którzy aktualnie tworzą społeczność akademicką polskich uniwersytetów. Dla uczelni stanowią oni wyzwanie dotyczące nie tylko wyboru środków komunikacji, dostosowania form i organizacji kształcenia, ale — w świetle opisanych cech — przedefiniowania podejścia wykładowców do studenta, przedefiniowania roli studenta w procesie kształcenia i zdobywania doświadczeń w trakcie kilkuletnich studiów.

Relacje, doświadczenie i wartość w marketingu — przegląd koncepcji

W świetle współczesnych badań koniecznym staje się stosowanie w organizacjach, w tym również w instytucjach edukacyjnych, nowych podejść do marketingu, jak: marketing relacji, marketing doświadczeń oraz marketing wartości. Marketing relacji koncentruje się na budowaniu, utrzymywaniu i rozwijaniu relacji z różnymi grupami interesariuszy uczelni, w tym oczywiście ze studentami. Z kolei marketing doświadczeń odwołuje się nie do wartości funkcjonalnych produktów i usług, ale — w przeciwieństwie do marketingu tradycyjnego — do wartości o charakterze sensorycznym, afektywnym, kognitywnym, behawioralnym i relacyjnym. W praktyce oznacza to, że doświadczenia konsumenta pojawiają się w wyniku kontaktu, doznania lub uczestnictwa w sytuacjach, które wyzwalają w nim stymulację zmysłową, emocjonalną i intelektualną (Dziewanowska, Kacprzak, 2013). Z kolei do głównych nurtów badawczych powiązanych z wartością w marketingu zaliczymy: tworzenie i dostarczanie wartości dla klienta (Doligalski, 2013), zarządzanie wartością klienta (Kumar, 2010) oraz postrzeganie przez klienta wartości (Gronroos, 2007).

W XXI wieku pojawiły się prace naukowe, których autorzy dostrzegli nową rolę klientów jako kreatorów wartości oraz źródło innowacji. W badaniach nad współtworzeniem wartości (value co-creation) cenieni badacze Prahalad i Ramaswamy (2004) wskazują na ewolucję i przemianę klientów z „pasywnych odbiorców” na „aktywnych graczy”. Co ważniejsze, nową logiką tworzenia wartości jest osadzenie jej w spersonalizowanych doświadczeniach. Szczególne miejsce w tym nowym nurcie badań zajmuje marketingowa koncepcja logiki usługowej autorstwa S.L. Vargo i R.F. Luscha (ang. Service Dominant Logic). Trzonem tej koncepcji jest idea współtworzenia wartości przez klientów (co-creation), która jest przeciwstawna logice rzeczy (ang. Goods Dominant Logic). Według tych autorów wartość wszelkich produktów dla klienta (dóbr materialnych i usług) tworzona jest w trakcie ich konsumowania, a oferty producentów są jedynie propozycjami wartości (Vargo i Lusch, 2004). Logikę usługową cechuje ponadto: orientacja na zasoby niematerialne (operant), a nie fizyczne (operand), w tym zwłaszcza docenianie wiedzy i umiejętności
a także dążenie do symetrii informacji w kontaktach z klientami i interaktywny dialog z klientem oraz przedkładanie długotrwałych relacji z klientami nad doraźne transakcje (Vargo, Lusch, 2004). Przytoczona koncepcja „odbiła się szerokim echem” w środowisku marketingu i po wielu latach doczekała się uznania a także rozwinięcia (Edvardsson i in, 2011; Vargo i Lusch ed., 2019).

Wyróżnione tutaj nowe koncepcje marketingu prowadzą do przedefiniowania roli studentów w kontaktach z uczelnią, zwłaszcza z perspektywy ich przynależności do nowych generacji Y i Z. W dalszej kolejności
w artykule wskażemy na różne sposoby postrzegania roli studenta w szkole wyższej oraz ich znaczenie dla współtworzenia wartości w procesie kształcenia. W końcowej części ukażemy segmentację polskich studentów uwzględniającą ich zaangażowanie w kształcenie oraz chęć udziału w szczególnej transformacji w trakcie studiów. Istotnym aspektem analizy będzie ocena możliwości wykorzystania koncepcji współtworzenia wartości w usługach edukacyjnych na poziomie wyższym.

Rola studenta w kształceniu uniwersyteckim — aspekt zaangażowania

W badaniach dotyczących roli studenta w uniwersytecie odnajdujemy opis tzw. metafor odzwierciedlających różne sposoby tworzenia mentalnych obrazów rzeczywistości, które kształtują zachowanie i sposób postrzegania rzeczy przez studentów. Spośród wielu spotykanych w literaturze metafor wskażemy pięć, które można uznać za inspirujące z punktu widzenia dyskusji nad współtworzeniem wartości w uczelni. Oto charakterystyka wybranych metafor:

1. Student jako klient (customer) uczelni — popularna metafora bezpośrednio nawiązująca do tradycyjnego marketingu aplikowanego do instytucji społecznych, publicznych. W świetle tego ujęcia studenci są traktowani jako główni klienci (aktorzy) w procesie kształcenia.
   W praktyce oznacza to silną orientację na klienta — studenta, co wywołuje spore dyskusje w środowisku akademickim, m.in. z powodu postępującej komodytyzacji edukacji na poziomie wyższym i przewagi
   uzyskania dyplomu ukończenia uczelni nad zdobyciem wiedzy. Podejście takie obniża poziom motywacji i zaangażowania studenta-klienta, nie uwzględnia aktywnej roli studenta.
2. Student jako produkt uczelni — kolejna metafora opierająca się na przekonaniu, że „na końcu procesu kształcenia otrzymujemy absolwentów o odpowiedniej jakości, dopasowanych do potrzeb rynku pracy i życia społecznego. W praktyce uczelnia tworzy odpowiednie programy studiów, dba o wysoką jakość edukacji, ale też ogranicza aktywność po stronie studenta.
3. Student jako klient profesjonalny uczelni — według tej metafory edukację traktuje się jako usługę profesjonalną, opartą na wyróżniającej wiedzy i kompetencjach dostawcy. Ważne są tutaj relacje między stronami, które powinny bazować na zaufaniu, szacunku, trwałości. Wymagany jest tutaj aktywny udział, zaangażowanie studenta w procesie kształcenia, osiąganie zadanych celów.
4. Student jako aspirant — metafora ta nawiązuje bezpośrednio do marketingu doświadczeń, w którym wyróżnia się nabywców doświadczeń (gości) i nabywców transformacji — aspirantów dążących do konkretnego celu. W tym podejściu mamy do czynienia z ambitnym, odpowiedzialnym i zaangażowanym studentem, zainteresowanym pożądaną transformacją w trakcie kształcenia uniwersyteckiego.
5. Student jako współproducent/współtwórca — w świetle tej metafory student pełni aktywną rolę w procesie kształcenia, korzystając z dostępnych zasobów, bezpośrednio angażując się we własną edukację, wykazując motywację do nauki. Współprodukcja jest tutaj możliwa dzięki jasności ról przypisanych studentom, ich chęci, i motywacji do pracy oraz posiadanym umiejętnościom. Muszą też być spełnione określone warunki otoczenia, zwłaszcza zapewniony skuteczny proces zarządzania na uczelni, czytelny zarówno dla studentów, jak i wykładowców, którzy mają do wypełnienia szczególne role w zakresie edukacji i socjalizacji studentów. Wątek badań poświęcony relacjom i interakcjom zachodzącym między studentami a wykładowcami należy uznać za najwazniejszy dla współtworzenia wartości w procesie edukacji na poziomie wyższym. (Dziewanowska, 2018, s. 145–158).

Podsumowując, skuteczny proces współtworzenia wartości w uniwersytecie wymaga odpowiedniego przygotowania ze strony uczestników (aktorów) procesu kształcenia. W szczególności dotyczy to dysponowania odpowiednim poziomem wiedzy, umiejętności i zaangażowania wszystkich jego uczestników. Student odgrywa w tym procesie podwójna rolę, po pierwsze, staje się konsumentem usługi edukacji na poziomie wyższym, a po drugie może być współtwórcą wartości w całym procesie edukacji. Tej kwestii poświęcony jest kolejny punkt artykułu.

Badania nad współtworzeniem wartości w procesie kształcenia — perspektywa studenta uniwersytetu
Uznani badacze marketingu wyraźnie akcentują w swoich pracach teoretycznych i praktycznych potrzebę zmiany podejścia w marketingu w stronę współtworzenia wartości poprzez wymianę wiedzy i umiejętności. Konceptualizacja współtworzenia wartości widoczna w badaniach prowadzonych w latach 1994–2016 została przedstawiona w pracy K. Dziewanowskiej i ukazuje wielość możliwych ujęć i kategorii do których się badacze odwołują w swoich definicjach. Do najbardziej znanego modelu teoretycznego należy tzw. model DART (akronim angielskich pojęć:
Dialoque, Access, Risk-benefits, Transparency) autorstwa Prahalada i Ramaswamy, który doczekał się empirycznej weryfikacji (Prahalad, Ramaswamy, 2004).

Na podstawie szczegółowej analizy tzw. modeli badawczych K. Dziewanowska zaproponowała własny model celnie opisujący wielowymiarowość współtworzenia wartości w szkolnictwie wyższym, zweryfikowany następnie w badaniach empirycznych prowadzonych na polskich uczelniach (przy istnieniu określonych ograniczeń). W skład tego modelu wchodzą następujące trzy główne wymiary współtworzenia wartości w szkolnictwie wyższym: 1. współprodukcja ( tym: dostęp do informacji, dialog między uczestnikami, kontrola nad przebiegiem studiów), 2. doświadczenie ( tym: zaangażowanie, stymulacja intelektualna) oraz 3. relacje (w tym: między studentami, interakcje z wykładowcami i administracją (Dziewanowska, 2018, s. 70–72; s. 246–247)

W niniejszej części odwołamy się do najnowszych wyników badań empirycznych innych badaczy, rezultatem których było zidentyfikowanie stylów współtworzenia wartości przez studentów polskich uniwersytetów. Badania o których mowa, zrealizowała K. Dziewanowska oraz opublikowała je w książce pt. „Współtworzenie wartości w marketingu. Przykład szkolnictwa wyższego” (Dziewanowska, 2018). Badaniem objęła ona łącznie 1027 studentów studiów stacjonarnych trzech publicznych uczelni ekonomicznych na kierunku studiów zarządzanie. Niereprezentatywna próba uczelni stanowi tu oczywiste ograniczenie dla uogólnienia wyników badań na całą populację studentów, ale przyjęta przez badaczkę metodyka badań (model i jego zmienne diagnostyczne) oraz perspektywa badawcza (studenci oraz wykładowcy uczelni), czyni wskazane wyniki unikalnymi, nie tylko w polskiej, ale i międzynarodowej skali. Przytoczone w niniejszym artykule wybrane wyniki tych badań z pewnością warte są podjęcia dyskusji w kontekście zmian pokoleniowych na polskich uczelniach, z perspektywy współtworzenia wartości przez różnych uczestników (aktorów) procesu kształcenia. Dlatego autor artykułu — poprzez pryzmat zidentyfikowanych we wskazanych badaniach pięciu segmentów studentów — podjął rozważania nad znaczeniem zmian pokoleniowych w obecnej i przyszłej dydaktyce uczelni.

Syntetyczne rezultaty badań przedstawiające perspektywę studenta zawiera poniższa tabela, w której wskazano znaczenie wymiarów współtworzenia wartości (współprodukcja, doświadczenie i relacje) dla poszczególnych segmentów studentów, by następnie odnieść wyniki do cech przypisanych nowym generacjom Y i Z.

Tabela 2. Style współtworzenia wartości przez polskich studentów — segmenty i ich specyfika pokoleniowa
Style współtworzenia wartości przez studentów

Źródło: opracowanie na podstawie badań K. Dziewanowska, 2018, s. 256–272.

Wnioski z badań

Na podstawie prowadzonych analiz i ocen można sformułować kilka syntetycznych wniosków. Odnoszą się one do postaw i zachowań studentów z jakimi mamy do czynienia we współczesnym uniwersytecie, w kontekście udziału studentów we współtworzeniu wartości w procesie edukacji:

1. Analizowana generacja Y oraz młodsza od niej generacja Z stanowią obecnie społeczność studentów polskich uczelni. Przypisane tej generacji specyficzne cechy mają wpływ na postawy wobec trzech wymiarów współtworzenia wartości: współprodukcji (w tym: dostęp do informacji, dialog, kontrola nad studiami), doświadczeniu ( tym: zaangażowanie, stymulacja intelektualna) oraz relacjach (w tym: między studentami oraz interakcje z wykładowcami i administracją).
2. Istnieje wiele metafor odzwierciedlających różne sposoby tworzenia mentalnych obrazów rzeczywistości, które kształtują zachowanie i sposób postrzegania uczelni przez studentów. Spośród analizowanych metafor można wskazać trzy, które wskazują określony poziom zaangażowania studentów w proces edukacji w analizowanych wymiarach, umożliwiając współtworzenie wartości w edukacji. Do tych metafor należą: student jako klient profesjonalny uczelni (docenia relacje, korzysta z dostępnych zasobów wiedzy), student jako aspirant
   (zainteresowany zdobywaniem wiedzy i jej stosowaniem) oraz student jako współproducent/współtwórca (korzysta z dostępnych zasobów wiedzy, silnie zmotywowany i zaangażowany, ceni relacje z innymi
   uczestnikami procesu kształcenia).
3. Studentom pokolenia Y i Z można przypisać określone style współtworzenia wartości w procesie edukacji na uniwersytecie. Segmenty studentów, które najpełniej uczestniczą w tym procesie to Maksymaliści z generacji Y i Z. Ich postawy i zachowania cechuje zaangażowanie w edukację, dbałość o relacje, lojalność wobec uczelni, skuteczne korzystanie z dostępnych zasobów. Studenci, którzy umiarkowanie uczestniczą we współtworzeniu wartości to segmenty Formalistów (generacja Z, studia licencjackie) i Intelektualistów (generacja Y, studia magisterskie). Różnią się stosunkiem do pracy w trakcie studiów, zaangażowaniem w naukę. Najmniejszy udział we współtworzeniu wartości wykazują Minimaliści z pokolenia Z oraz Networkingowcy z pokolenia Y i Z. Cenią sobie relacje z innymi studentami, pracują w trakcie studiów.
4. Koncepcja logiki usługowej Vargo i Luscha głosząca ideę współtworzenia wartości przez klientów (co-creation) ma zastosowanie w usługach edukacji na poziomie wyższym. Segmenty studentów, które najpełniej uczestniczą we współtworzeniu usługi edukacji na poziomie wyższym, czyli Maksymaliści, wykazują postawy typowe dla tej koncepcji: są zorientowani na zasoby niematerialne (wiedza), pozyskują informacje, uczestniczą w dialogu, cenią relacje, budują interakcje z innymi uczestnikami procesu edukacji. Można więc stwierdzić, że oferta edukacyjna uczelni jest dla nich propozycją kształcenia, z której aktywnie korzystają oraz wpływają tym samym na cechy własnego doświadczenia edukacyjnego.
5. Ukazane w artykule zmiany pokoleniowe polskich studentów odwołują się do wyników badań zrealizowanych w uczelniach ekonomicznych, na kierunku zarządzanie, tworząc określone ograniczenia dla wnioskowania na temat zachowań całej populacji studentów. Jednak w kolejnych projektach badawczych na ogół brakuje ciągłości, powtarzalności pozwalającej na weryfikację hipotez, przyjętej metodyki badań, weryfikacji wyników. Uważam, że metodyka badań zaproponowana w publikacji K. Dziewanowskiej (2018) jest bardzo wartościowa, uniwersalna i powinna zachęcać polskich badaczy do kontynuacji badań nad współtworzeniem wartości w kształceniu na innych kierunkach studiów oraz profilach uczelni.
6. Z pewnością kontynuacja badań naukowych nad współtworzeniem wartości w szkolnictwie wyższym jest nośnym i pożądanym kierunkiem badań w świetle rozwoju koncepcji marketingu opartego na idei współtworzenia wartości. Również rozwijająca się koncepcja logiki usługowej dominacji może być ważnym wsparciem dla kierunku dalszych badań. Warto też podkreślić, że wyniki badań w tym obszarze mogą okazać się fundamentalne dla praktyki działania uniwersytetu, zwłaszcza przygotowania skutecznej strategii kształcenia i kształtowania wizerunku uniwersytetu już w nieodległej przyszłości.

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Mirosława Pluta – Olearnik — profesor nauk ekonomicznych, specjalista w zakresie zarządzania, marketingu usług, marketingu międzynarodowego. Pracownik Uniwersytetu Ekonomicznego we Wrocławiu, w Katedrze Marketingu. Wykładowca akademicki, kierownik zespołów badawczych, recenzent prac naukowych. Współpracuje z wydawnictwami krajowymi i zagranicznymi (członek rad programowych, recenzent, redaktor). Autorka licznych publikacji, w tym książek: Marketing usług; Marketing usług bankowych; Rozwój usług edukacyjnych w erze społeczeństwa informacyjnego; Przedsiębiorcza uczelnia i jej relacje z otoczeniem; Marketing przedsiębiorstw usługowych w procesie internacjonalizacji oraz wielu artykułów naukowych. Aktywny uczestnik jako prelegent lub moderator dyskusji na wielu konferencjach naukowych znaczących dla środowiska badaczy ekonomii,
zarządzania, marketingu.