Trick or Treat? An Examination of Marketing Relationships in a Nondeceptive Counterfeit Market

Who is most responsible for the proliferation of counterfeit goods—the illicit purveyor of such products or the consumer who procures them? This paper seeks to address this question by presenting a behavior analysis of counterfeit marketing firms in China and the interdependent relationships between legitimate retailers, consumers, and the authorities who populate these competitive environments. This is achieved via an operant interpretation of these key agents and the network of contingent relationships in operation. The results suggest that purveyors of pirate products function as “bad competitors” in the marketplace according to normative business behaviors—behaviors that are amenable to analysis in behavioral terms.     

Entreprise Management in the USSR: is there a Productivity Drive?*

Abstract. According to some neo-institutional economists, the trade-off of perestroika is between the benefits of solving economic problems via institutional changes and the costs of upsetting the nomenklatura. The “sub-institutional” analysis shows instead a series of organizational adjustments of the productive system that can render this dilemma less pressing, provide Western financial aid increases. This aid will ease the social and political tensions of the transition much more than helping the start of a productivity drive in Soviet firms.     

In the eye of the beholder? An eye-tracking experiment on emergent leadership in team interactions

Integrating evolutionary signaling theory with a social attention approach, we argue that individuals possess a fast, automated mechanism for detecting leadership signals in fellow humans that is reflected in higher visual attention toward emergent leaders compared to non-leaders. To test this notion, we first videotaped meetings of project teams and collected leadership ratings for the team members from three rating sources. Second, we provided 18 naïve observers with 42 brief, muted video clips of the team meetings and analyzed their eye gazing patterns. Observers gazed at emergent leaders more often, and for an average longer duration, than at non-leaders. Gender effects occurred such that male emergent leaders received a higher number of fixations than female emergent leaders. Non-verbal behavior analysis indicated that emergent leaders showed a higher amount of active gestures and less passive facial expressions than non-leaders. We discuss theoretical and methodological directions for emergent leadership research in teams.     

Following the Herd or Not?: Patterns of Renewal in the Netherlands and the UK

How do large firms conduct their strategic renewal journeys in an increasingly turbulent environment? Are there generic industry patterns, or are these renewal journeys country- or firm-specific? To answer these questions, we examine the relative incidence of external versus internal and explorative versus exploitative renewal actions, and their speed, in leading Dutch and UK financial service companies using longitudinal data. The context, content and process dimensions of strategic renewal are distinguished, and research questions about these attributes are formulated and investigated using new metrics. Findings show that while exploration/exploitation ratios are fairly similar for firms across the entire industry, systematic differences are evident between the external/internal renewal ratios of Dutch and UK firms, and that speed of renewal is largely determined at the firm level. Thus we find that industry-, country- and firm-specific factors all influence journeys of strategic renewal in distinctive and complementary ways.     

The effect of buyer pressure on suppliers in SMEs to demonstrate CSR practices: An added incentive or counter productive?

Those promoting the corporate social responsibility agenda to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are interested in the potential of supply chain drivers as an incentive. This paper presents results from an empirical study into the attitudes and behaviours of 103 UK SME owner/managers in response to buyer pressure to demonstrate CSR activities. Most said that the inclusion of social and environmental requirements as preconditions to supply would increase their motivation to engage in CSR (82% for environmental criteria and 55% for social criteria). However, a quarter would be put off tendering and 12% thought that such criteria would be counter productive.     

The role of the audit committee in Thailand: a mature monitoring mechanism or an evolving process?

Following the East Asia financial crisis of 1997 in common with other countries, Thailand mimicked a series of governance measures, including the mandatory formation of audit committees (AC), that were designed in western developed nations with diffuse share ownership, although evidence about the success of these measures in developed nations is mixed. This research contributes to understanding of the role of ACs in a non-English speaking developing country, where share ownership is concentrated, rather than diffuse. It examines the perceptions of audit committee members, investors and analysts about the roles ACs perform and the importance of these roles. To obtain a large number of responses we have used a questionnaire survey method. We adopt Spira’s (Corporate Governance: an International Review 6(1):29–38, 1998) model of evolutionary development of ACs in which they are characterised as developing along a continuum from an ‘infant’ to a ‘mature’ stage of development, although such development need not be linear. The majority of our participants report that ACs perform roles that are in line with international guidelines, but this appears to reflect a passive role in terms of complying with, rather than developing guidance and regulation. Our evidence reveals that the ACs placed greater emphasis on internal control systems, including internal audit and review of audit fees, than on roles associated with external audit and financial statements, indicative of an early stage in the process of evolutionary development.

Efficient or Fair? Operationalizing Ethical Principles in Flood Risk Management: A Case Study on the Dutch-German Rhine

Flood risk management decisions in many countries are based on decision-support frameworks which rely on cost-benefit analyses. Such frameworks are seldom informative about the geographical distribution of risk, raising questions on the fairness of the proposed policies. In the present work, we propose a new decision criterion that accounts for the distribution of risk reduction and apply it to support flood risk management decisions on a transboundary stretch of the Rhine River. Three types of interventions are considered: embankment heightening, making Room for the River, and changing the discharge distribution of the river branches. The analysis involves solving a flood risk management problem according to four alternative formulations, based on different ethical principles. Formulations based on cost optimization lead to very poor performances in some areas for the sake of reducing the overall aggregated costs. Formulations that also include equity criteria have different results depending on how these are defined. When risk reduction is distributed equally, very poor economic performance is achieved. When risk is distributed equally, results are in line with formulations based on cost optimization, while a fairer risk distribution is achieved. Risk reduction measures also differ, with the cost optimization approach strongly favoring the leverage of changing the discharge distribution and the alternative formulations spending more on embankment heightening and Room for the River, to rebalance inequalities in risk levels. The proposed method advances risk-based decision-making by allowing to consider risk distribution aspects and their impacts on the choice of risk reduction measures.     

CCR or BCC: what if we are in the wrong model?

The CCR model by Charnes et al. (Eur J Oper Res 2:429–444, 1978) together with the BCC model by Banker et al. (Manag Sci 30:1078–1091, 1984) are the most popular approaches of measuring efficiency among a group of decision making units, DMUs, in data envelopment analysis, DEA. The right choice of a DEA model—CCR or BCC—often, if not always, is a difficult decision. To evaluate a DMU’s efficiency for both models might be helpful, but it does not always capture the essential issues at stake. In this paper we propose a comparative analysis of both concepts: How does activity scaling under constant BCC-efficiency influence CCR-efficiency. And inversely, how does BCC-efficiency behave when activity scaling under constant CCR-efficiency is applied. Such findings of mutual effects improve a DMU’s ability to reassess upsizing and downsizing of activities. Moreover, it allows for exact calculations of the resulting economic effects, and these effects give new insights beyond classical DEA. Finally, scale efficiency turns out to be the ideal concept to control these activity changes, rather than just CCR- or BCC-efficiency. We use a little numerical example to emphasize advantages of the new concept and sketch the new findings for a theater scenery.     

Participatory Action Research in Affordable Housing Partnerships: Collaborative Rationality,or Sleeping with the Growth Machine?

Abstract

Participatory Action Research (PAR) emphasizes working with communities to develop questions that are relevant to their needs, then co-generating research to answer these questions. Typically, PAR focuses on empowering marginalized communities. Transforming Housing is a community–university collaborative partnership based in Melbourne Australia, with researchers asking developers, government, investors and community housing providers what they need to know in order to provide more and better affordable housing, then collectively generating ideas. After three years, this article takes a reflective practice lens to examine both possibilities and pitfalls arising from PAR with the rich and powerful. The article concludes that collaborate research on affordable housing can lead to outcomes intellectually honest, sustainable beyond political cycles and capable of effecting positive change at both the local and the metropolitan scales. However, this form of collaborative research can be easily derailed by politics, and does not address underlying structural inequalities.     

Can there be a domain-specific knowledge base in HRD? Reflections on the Lille symposium

A conversation recently began amongst senior human resource development scholars from around the world that focused on the prospects for theory development in human resource development (HRD). The opening event in the form of a panel discussion was held at the European HRD conference in Lille, France, in May 2008. This article summarizes and discusses contributions made by the panel participants.     

Greenfield or M&A? An institutional and learning perspective on the establishment mode choice of Chinese outward investments

We develop and test a model of Chinese greenfield investments using institutional and learning theories. Both the host country institutional context and the firm's international characteristics affect the establishment mode. Using 152 Chinese emerging market multinationals (EMNEs) with 401 subsidiaries distributed in 26 countries from 2003 to 2013, we build a database of 284 pairs of host country/Chinese firms to test two hypotheses. We find that, first, governance environment affects the establishment mode: greenfield investments are preferred over acquisitions in relation-based host markets, and M&As are preferred in rule-based countries. Second, the depth of Chinese EMNEs' international experience (i.e. the amount of previous investments in the same host market) moderates the effect of the governance environment on the establishment mode. Firms with greater international depth use more M&As in relation-based markets and more greenfield investments in rule-based markets, suggesting that previous investments in the same host country provide a type of learning that reduces acquisition uncertainty in the former case and increases the self-confidence of Chinese EMNEs in the latter.     

Trust in Risk Regulation: Cause or Consequence of the Acceptability of GM Food?

Although there is ample empirical evidence that trust in risk regulation is strongly related to the perception and acceptability of risk, it is less clear what the direction of this relationship is. This article explores the nature of the relationship, using three separate data sets on perceptions of genetically modified (GM) food among the British public. The article has two discrete but closely interrelated objectives. First, it compares two models of trust. More specifically, it investigates whether trust is the cause (causal chain account) or the consequence (associationist view) of the acceptability of GM food. Second, this study explores whether the affect heuristic can be applied to a wider number of risk-relevant concepts than just perceived risk and benefit. The results suggest that, rather than a determinant, trust is an expression or indicator of the acceptability of GM food. In addition, and as predicted, "affect" accounts for a large portion of the variance between perceived risk, perceived benefit, trust in risk regulation, and acceptability. Overall, the results support the associationist view that specific risk judgments are driven by more general evaluative judgments The implications of these results for risk communication and policy are discussed.     

Strategic planning in health care: the results are everything...or are they?

Strategic planning needs to be simple, time-limited, realistic and accurate. It cannot be the unending, purposeless exercise that many organizations experience.     

Strategic Planning in the Malawi Public Sector: Potential Tool for Progress or Regression?

The process of developing strategic plans in the public sector is regarded as one indicator of positive reform in the system. The assumption is that strategic planning ensures that (just like in the private sector) public sector organizations’ operations should cost less but deliver better service. Ultimately the argument is that public sector institutional governance and responsiveness to the citizenry is not only seen but felt. However, strategic planning has to be done in an appropriate manner for it to deliver. For instance an analysis of the underlying motives, the role of leadership in the process as well as the relevance or viability of the guiding strategic planning model significantly affect the nature of expected results. In the early 2000s, the Malawi public sector embarked on a serious drive towards strategic planning process as part of its reform package. In order to ascertain it’s potential to transform the Malawi public service, this paper focuses at critically analyzing the strategic planning process in the Malawi public sector by among other things asking: who initiated and led the process? What approach determined the process? What is the possible potentiality of the adopted strategic planning approach in enhancing the reform agenda in Malawi? Based on interviews with senior officers in key Malawi public sector institutions, the paper concludes that the strategic planning process is ‘transitional and fluid’ hence lacks the clout to effectively enhance reforms in this sector. Another finding is that lack of effective leadership has largely contributed to the status quo.     

Business Exit and Strategic Change: Sticking to the Knitting or Striking a New Path?

The purpose of this study is to examine the potential of business exit for initiating strategic change in divesting parent firms. In contrast to prior literature that mainly investigates the impact of different antecedents on the likelihood of business exit in general, this study additionally tests the influence of these antecedents on the choice between two exit types with a cross‐industry sample of divesting firms listed in the German CDAX over the time period 1999–2004. A divestiture involving strategic change is a strategic business exit; otherwise it is denoted as status quo preserving. The findings reveal that a relatively highly dissipated focus does not automatically enhance the likelihood of business exit in general and status‐quo‐preserving business exit in particular. CEO turnover and pressures exerted by institutional investors predict neither strategic nor status‐quo‐preserving business exit. Low firm performance does not nurture the likelihood of business exit per se but especially promotes status‐quo‐preserving business exit.     

What is the leanness level of your organisation in lean transformation implementation? An integrated lean index using ANP approach

We develop a lean index to assess the leanness level of the organisation in sustaining lean transformation. This ‘lean index’ is developed from theory, and is quantified using a multi-criteria approach i.e., analytic network process (ANP). This index provides a useful measure for sustainable lean performance because it adopts a holistic approach of performance measurement based on the socio-technical perspective which considers the interdynamics of human, system and technology.     

Transnational marketing joint ventures: a viable market penetration strategy in the EU?

This article investigates the performance of EU-based transnational marketing joint ventures (MJVs) through a set of case studies. The results emphasise the instability inherent in MJVs, and in most cases instability reflected poor performance rather than the evolution of a successful venture in the foreign market. Companies were found to undertake MJVs in order to protect and control existing market positions in the foreign country rather than gain access. Little attempt was made to transfer knowledge and expertise between the partners. Under these conditions instability resulted in the failure of the parent company to achieve its primary objective: the protection of marketing assets in the foreign market. Exporters should consider mechanisms through which local expertise can be transferred within the MJV.     

HRD or manpower policy? Options for government intervention in the local labor market that depends upon a foreign labor force: the Saudi Arabian perspective

The prolonged dependence on a foreign labor force in Saudi Arabia has created an ever-increasing feeling of discomfort for the government as well as for the local labor force. This paper outlines the problems associated with foreign workers against the alternatives of developing human resources locally through training and skill development. It also examines the stereotypical myths about the local Saudi workers among the private0sector decision makers. The paper later explores what policies are in practice to localize the labor force given the prevailing evidence from the local labor market. The paper then outlines a few general policy approaches to the nationalization of the local labor force, supported by more detailed implementation mechanism type of policies to effectively nationalize the labor force. The paper concludes with a few specific policy options that may well lead to the nationalization of the labor force through developing the skill profile of nationals in a concerted effort as a planned human resources development planning and selecting appropriate labor force importation policies. These policies represent the Saudi perspective on the general labor-importing countries' governments' positions, which are applicable to all the labor-importing countries given a few minor customization steps.     

Similarity,Isomorphism or Duality? Recent Survey Evidence on the Human Resource Management Policies of Multinational Corporations

There is considerable debate as to the determinants of the human resource policies of human resource management: do they reflect national institutional or cultural realities, emerging common global practices, parent country effects or the dual effects of transnational and national realities? We use an extensive international database to explore these differences, assessing variations in a range of human resource practices. We find new evidence of national differences in the manner in which indigenous firms manage their people, but also evidence of a similarity in practice amongst multinational corporations. In other words, multinational corporations tend to manage their human resources in ways that are distinct from those of their host country; at the same time, country of origin effects seem relatively weak. Whilst there is some evidence of common global practices, sufficient diversity in practice persists to suggest that duality theories may provide the most appropriate explanation.