Being Who I Am: Effective Teaching,Learning, Student Support,and Societal Change Through LGBQ Faculty Freedom

Framed within the context of a heterosexist society in which not all sexual minority faculty feel professionally and/or personally safe stepping out of the classroom closet, this qualitative study examines the phenomenon of non-heterosexual faculty disclosing their sexual orientation to students in their classrooms. Findings demonstrate the depth and magnitude of impact the disclosure has on teaching, learning, student support, and societal change. Overarching is that faculty do not necessarily view the experience as “coming out in the classroom,” but rather as “being who I am” in terms of freedom to present an authentic self, if so desired, to students.     

Financial Intermediaries and Markets

A complex financial system comprises both financial markets and financial intermediaries. We distinguish financial intermediaries according to whether they issue complete contingent contracts or incomplete contracts. Intermediaries such as banks that issue incomplete contracts, e.g., demand deposits, are subject to runs, but this does not imply a market failure. A sophisticated financial system—a system with complete markets for aggregate risk and limited market participation—is incentive‐efficient, if the intermediaries issue complete contingent contracts, or else constrained‐efficient, if they issue incomplete contracts. We argue that there may be a role for regulating liquidity provision in an economy in which markets for aggregate risks are incomplete.     

A test of the Maslach Burnout Inventory in three samples of healthcare professionals

Structural equation modelling with LISREL was used to investigate the factor structure of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). Emotional exhaustion was the most robust of the MBI's three factors, followed by depersonalization, while the personal accomplishment factor performed weakly. A new measurement model was developed in a sample of 197 nurses consisting of the emotional exhaustion and depersonalization dimensions, which were measured with five and two empirical MBI indicators, respectively. A test of invariance of the two-factor model across three samples (i.e. one calibration sample of nurses, and two validation samples consisting of hospital laboratory technicians and hospital managers with an effective sample size of 445) produced a good fit for the proposed two-factor model. Assessment of psychometric properties of the two-factor model produced (1) internal consistencies comparable to those reported in the literature for the MBI's originally specified emotional exhaustion and depersonalization scales, and (2) correlations with criterion variables that were all in the expected direction and magnitude, comparable to those produced by the originally specified scales. Theoretical implications for the use of the two-factor model in burnout research are discussed.     

Bringing IT Back: An Analysis of the Decision to Backsource or Switch Vendors

Whereas the decision to outsource information systems (IS) has been an important focus in IS research and practice, the decision to switch vendors or to backsource has received little attention. Evidence suggests that in practice, however, the decision to backsource or to switch vendors is becoming increasingly common as firms vie for ways to continue to cut information technology (IT) costs and improve IT service levels. This research specifically examines the factors associated with the decision to backsource or to switch vendors. Based on a sample of 160 IT managers involved with application development, we compare and contrast the perceptions of those who switched vendors, backsourced, or continued in an outsourcing relationship for application development. Our findings suggest that product quality, service quality, relationship quality, and switching costs are related to the decision to backsource application outsourcing. However, service and product quality did not influence the decision to switch vendors. Rather, firms that made the decision to switch vendors reported high levels of service and product quality but low levels of relationship quality and switching costs.     

Plots of Conditional Wait-Time Intervals Provide Better Information to Queueing System Arrivals

The management of queues is a very important aspect of service operations management. One way to enhance the queueing experience is to provide customers with the most informative and certain estimate of anticipated wait time. This paper develops such a measure—referred to as the conditional wait-time interval (CWTI)—for queueing systems with exponentially distributed service times. It is especially applicable at the operational level of an organization since it utilizes the most current information on the status of the system (number of customers in the queue at arrival). CWTI is also based on two risk factors that consider the chance a customer's actual wait time is outside of the estimated range. This paper also provides a graphical means to display multiple CWTIs.     

BARGAINING BEHAVIOR IN A BUSINESS SIMULATION GAME *

Three studies of labor-management negotiations were conducted within the context of a business simulation game. Face-to-face bargaining lasted approximately two hours and resulted in settlements that were incorporated into the simulation game parameters. A total of 56 simulated companies, each comprised of five MBA students, were studied. Results from the first study showed that extending low initial offers, extracting large first concessions, and making a high number of concessions were management bargaining tactics associated with obtaining a low wage rate. These findings were supported by study two. The third study found that an intrateam power mode of orientation was positively correlated with bargaining success and was negatively correlated with overall game success. The results support the use of a simulation game for teaching and research in bargaining.     

以能力为本位的课程创新体系的实践

灵活、创新、技能传授、再培训、就业导向是高职教育的特点,合理的课程创新体系是实现高职特点的保证。我国高职教育课程模式在培养人才职业综合素质和职业道德方面明显存在缺陷,为此我们结合中澳职业教育与培训国家项目的实践,打破传统学科体系框架,依照行业的能力标准,对课程设置、教学设计和授课方式等进行全方位的改革,得到学生、行业的认同,值得推广。     

Note on Second-Order Polynomial Regression Models

Polynomial regression models have applications in the social sciences and in business research. Unfortunately, such models have a high degree of multicollinearity that creates problems with the statistical assessment of the model. In fact, the collinearity may be so severe that it could lead to an incorrect conclusion that some of the terms in the model are not statistically significant and should therefore be omitted from the model. This note provides a simple transformation to achieve orthogonality in polynomial models between the linear and quadratic terms, thereby eliminating the collinearity problem. It also shows that the same procedure does not achieve orthogonality for higher-order terms. An example data set is analyzed to show the benefits of such a procedure.     

FINANCIAL FRAGILITY,LIQUIDITY, AND ASSET PRICES

We define a financial system to be fragile if small shocks have disproportionately large effects. In a model of financial intermediation, we show that small shocks to the demand for liquidity cause either high asset‐price volatility or bank defaults or both. Furthermore, as the liquidity shocks become vanishingly small, the asset‐price volatility is bounded away from zero. In the limit economy, with no shocks, there are many equilibria. However, if banks face idiosyncratic liquidity shocks, then the only equilibria that are robust to the introduction of small aggregate risk involve stochastic consumption as well as volatile asset, prices. (JEL: D5, D8, G2)