Managing Technology for Competitive Advantage : Editors

The certification test for English teachers in a certain state asked candidates to identify the name of the frog in Mark Twain's "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." If students answered this question correctly and said, Dan'l Webster, does this mean that these students would be prepared for the teaching field? Conversely, if students answered this question incorrectly, does this mean they were ill - prepared for becoming teachers? Can such an irrelevant question really point to the knowledge and abilities of future teachers? Hardly, use of unimportant questioning such as this illustrates the main problem with using a multiple choice format when assessing students. Trivial items such as names of animals and other insignificant information are often given priority over their significance in the story simply because students are not able to demonstrate what they really know in narrative form (Smagorinsky, 2002).     

Out with Multiple Choice and In with Essays: A More Accurate Way to Measure Reading Comprehension

The certification test for English teachers in a certain state asked candidates to identify the name of the frog in Mark Twain's "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." If students answered this question correctly and said, Dan'l Webster, does this mean that these students would be prepared for the teaching field? Conversely, if students answered this question incorrectly, does this mean they were ill - prepared for becoming teachers? Can such an irrelevant question really point to the knowledge and abilities of future teachers? Hardly, use of unimportant questioning such as this illustrates the main problem with using a multiple choice format when assessing students. Trivial items such as names of animals and other insignificant information are often given priority over their significance in the story simply because students are not able to demonstrate what they really know in narrative form (Smagorinsky, 2002).     

Die Bedeutung der Zinsschranke

The German Corporate Tax Reform Act of 2008 requires an adjustment of classic valuation concepts because it limits interest deduction from taxable income depending on the operating performance of the company. By using time- and state-contingent discount rates in a risk-neutral valuation with predetermined debt levels, a theoretically sound valuation result is obtained. However, a modified APV-concept which assumes deterministic debt over the planning horizon and constant leverage in the terminal value phase also yields consistent valuation results when two types of tax shields with different levels of risk are distinguished.     

Modellgestützte Flexibilitätsanalyse von Strategien zur Ersatzteilversorgung in der Nachserienphase

An important task in after sales service is the provision of spare parts for durables. Due to its nature and dependence on earlier sales, the demand for spare parts is inherently dynamic and uncertain requiring for high procurement flexibility. During the product life cycle, inventory management of spare parts is performed efficiently under use of flexibility provided by existing production facilities. This situation completely changes once the OEM ceases production of the parent product. A prime option of procuring spare parts for the End-of-production period is to place a final order for parts when regular production ends. Besides low unit production costs, this option does not contain any flexibility, yielding a high risk of obsolescence of stored parts, and at the same time a high risk of not being able to satisfy all demand during the service period. In order to increase flexibility further options like extra production at higher unit cost or remanufacturing of components taken from used products could be used. After introducing the problem and a basic quantitative model, we evaluate flexibility properties of strategies using different combinations of the above options. In doing so we distinguish between quantity, time, and stock related flexibility. In a comprehensive numerical study it is investigated to which extent flexibility properties of the different strategies can contribute to their economic profitability.     

Personnel selection criteria in IT ventures: A policy-capturing analysis

Growing ventures need to hire new employees and thus enhance their human capital stock. Selecting the right employees is crucial for the firms’ success. This paper looks at the criteria used in the selection process, especially at applicant fit, competencies, and social capital. Using a policy-capturing approach on a sample of managers in the German informationtechnology industry, the paper provides empirical evidence of the relationship between firm age and person-organization fit in the selection process. Furthermore, it demonstrates the interaction between two sets of selection criteria: applicant competencies and applicant fit with the formal job-requirements.     

Die Auswirkungen von Neid auf individuelle Leistungen: Ergebnisse einer Panelanalyse

Relative income differences are likely to lead to envy within a reference group. Envy in turn influences social behavior and individual performance. While positional concerns are apparent in daily life, empirical evidence is rare in the economic literature. This paper investigates the impact of the relative income position on individuals’ performance or productivity. As ?performance“ is difficult to measure we turn to soccer players whose performance has been well documented. The broad sample covers eight seasons of the German premier soccer league (Bundesliga) between 1995 and 2004, and includes 1040 players, a salary proxy and several performance variables. The results show that player performance is strongly affected by relative income position. A disadvantage in the relative income position reduces productivity. The larger the income differences within a team, the stronger are the effects of positional concern. Team composition also significantly affects behaviour.     

Determinanten des Informationsgehalts von Managementprognosen – eine empirische Untersuchung anhand der DAX und MDAX-Unternehmen

In this article the characteristics and determinants of the information content of management earnings forecasts of the German DAX and MDAX companies between 2002 and 2005 are analyzed. As proxy for the information content I use the precision of the wording of a forecast. I can show that the forecasts of MDAX companies are more precisely formulated than those of DAX companies. Furthermore forecasts are formulated more precisely, when companies have, (1) a lower percentage of intangible assets, (2) lower market capitalization, (3) lower volatility of earnings and (4) a higher need for external financing.     

Duality of the improved algebraic method (DIAM)

In this note we present a variant of the improved algebraic method (IAM) using a duality analysis to solve linear programming (LP) problems where more insights to the method are presented. When the coordinates of all vertices are computed, any feasible point can be expressed as a linear combination of the vertices. The objective function is expressed as a weighted sum of its evaluation at the feasible vertices and the optimal point is associated with the highest/lowest coefficient of the weighted sum.     

Ausgelernt? Professor/innen im Prozess der Professionalisierung

Do university teachers have finished to learn, when they are hired for a position as full professor? That seems to be false, if you look at knowledge enrichment by research as learning. For Teaching and management it seems more justified. Factually full professors very seldom participate at corresponding continuing education or consulting. Learning takes place mostly on the side as learning by doing. Professionalization in a full sense however is only realized, if competences are developed also in these fields. As corresponding learning can be supported by continuous education and consulting is a very important task of academic personnel development.