A GOAL PROGRAMMING MODEL FOR ALLOCATING HUMAN RESOURCES FOR THE GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE REGULATIONS

The Food and Drug Administration's final Good Laboratory Practice regulation will have a far-reaching effect on testing laboratories that are conducting nonclinical laboratory safety tests. This paper develops a goal programming decision model suitable for setting objectives, meeting budgetary and operational constraints, planning personnel utilization, and evaluating different proposals for allocating laboratory personnel to implement a program.     

ON THE COST OF NEW ISSUES OF COMMON STOCK: AN AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTANT GROWTH MODEL

Expansion decisions by corporate managements are importantly influenced by their perceptions of the firm's cost of capital and especially the cost of common equity. Their decision making is then influenced by the common perception that new issues of common stock are more costly than retained earnings because of the flotation costs inherent in new issues. Thus a rate of expansion that requires new issues is downgraded in decision making. In this paper the authors show that in actuality new issues of common equity may be less costly than retained earnings. Thus different decision-making implications are clearly involved.     

JOINT PRODUCT COST ALLOCATION IN THE CONTEXT OF COST-PLUS PRICING DETERMINATIONS WITH NON-UNIFORM MARKUPS

Companies that use cost-based pricing sometimes manufacture products that involve joint cost allocation. A problem with this is that, while product prices are a function of the full cost, joint cost allocation methods using net realizable values depend on the product prices. This paper demonstrates that when all costs and production quantities are known or can be budgeted, it is possible to simultaneously determine unique product prices (having non-uniform markup rates) and cost allocations using the net realizable value method.     

Critical Dimensions of Strategic Information Systems Planning

Strategic information systems planning (SISP) is the process whereby an organization establishes a long-range plan of computer-based applications in order to achieve its goals. A number of problems can potentially impede information systems planners as they carry out the process. A survey of 80 firms who completed the SISP process revealed that the problems constitute five factors: the organization, implementation, database, hardware, and cost. A discriminant analysis showed that three factors—the organization, implementation, and database—best distinguished satisfied from dissatisfied information systems planners. A research application of the five factors suggested that organizations with more sophisticated business planning endure significantly less severe hardware and implementation problems.