This accessible field guide covers practical steps and contributes to behavioral theory by reporting intricate details on the strategies implemented by business-to-business firms within an inter-firm context. The coverage is deep, broad, and unique - the authors of the 14 papers all adopt the understanding that researchers need direct viewing - 'eyes-on-the-context' - that goes beyond the use of paper-and-pencil 5-pont and 7-point survey items to achieve accurate descriptions of how decisions are made and progress achieved. Following the customary introductory chapter, the titles of the 13 remaining chapters promise the reader new insights and tools to apply when studying B2B contexts. This new volume in the Advances in Business Marketing and Purchasing series is a must for B2B scholars and executives.

This book examines B2B decision making processes for software application development. To learn what really happens and why it happens, this study provides a multi-level ???hermeneutic system??? starting with written accounts of decision-making associated with development and delivery of new software applications ??? these accounts are then revisited through multiple rounds of researcher and informant interpretations.
The framework and supporting analysis is applied to six application software case studies that created new Internet-based software applications which were either disruptive or supporting disruptive innovations. The findings from six case studies suggest that the hermeneutic research framework proposals provide a strong systematic platform to analyse and interpret decision-making with deep prospective, introspective, retrospective, and with imaginatively unbounded current and future perspectives.
*The author, Arch Woodside received the 1998 Living Legend in Marketing Award
*International in scope
*Provides DSA Models, event chronology maps, and cognitive maps for more comprehensive analysis
*Includes individual case study and cross-case findings for new theory development