Beratungsforschung mit,für oder ohne die Praxis?

This article deals with the extent to which consulting research and consulting practice are pulling in the same direction or whether the gap between them still seems insurmountable. Therefore we examine the literature on consulting research, report what kind of research coaching practitioners would consider beneficial and introduce first findings from an empirical survey in which coaching practitioners were asked about their motivation for—or against—taking part in coaching research.     

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.     

How union mergers affect membership participation

Using data from a survey of union members, we explore how an amalgamation of two Swedish unions affects membership participation. The research literature on the topic is mostly anecdotal and speculative, suggesting that mergers might have detrimental effects on membership participation because they create large unions with centralized governance and administration. But in this study, we do not find a broad-based decline in membership participation measured before and after merger as well as in relation to a comparison union that did not merge. These results are discussed in terms of the national context of union mergers in Sweden and the ways that mergers are negotiated, presented, and implemented to preserve membership participation. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Third International Conference on Emerging Union Structures: Reshaping Labour Market Institutions, Canberra, Australia in December 1997. The data collection for this project was supported by funds from the National Institute for Working Life in Stockholm.     

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.     

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.     

Hierarchische Planung für industrielle Logistikdienstleister

In this paper a planning and control system for logistics service providers (called LPS system) is developed under consideration of their specific flexibility potentials. Due to the complexity of such planning decisions (different planning levels and data quality of these levels as well as time horizons etc.), a multi-stage, hierarchical planning system is proposed which minimizes the relevant costs under consideration of the flexibilities. The advantage of a hierarchical planning concept consists in a limited planning complexity because otherwise data collection and solution development would lead to unsolvable problems in practice. The results of using LPS systems for a real-life case show a significant pay-off for logistics service providers due to the remarkable cost savings by applying a hierarchical planning concept.