Relationships between prior experience of training,gender, goal orientation and training attitudes

Relationships were examined between prior experience with training, goal orientation, gender and training attitudes. Participants (n = 165) had a minimum of six months of work experience. Results from regression analyses indicated that mastery‐approach goal orientation had a beneficial effect on training attitudes for men but not for women. In addition, prior experience with training had a beneficial effect on training attitudes, and women had more favorable attitudes than men. The results provide initial evidence that gender moderates goal orientation effects in training contexts.     

Ecological services to and from rangelands of the United States

The over 300 million ha of public and private rangelands in the United States are characterized by low and variable precipitation, nutrient-poor soils, and high spatial and temporal variability in plant production. This land type has provided a variety of goods and services, with the provisioning of food and fiber dominating through much of the 20th century. More recently, food production from a rangeland-based livestock industry is often pressured for a variety of reasons, including poor economic returns, increased regulations, an aging rural population, and increasingly diverse interests of land owners. A shift to other provisioning, regulating, cultural, and supporting services is occurring with important implications for carbon sequestration, biodiversity, and conservation incentives. There are numerous goods and services possible from rangelands that can supply societal demands such as clean water and a safe food supply. The use of ecologically-based principles of land management remains at the core of the ability of private land owners and public land managers to provide these existing and emerging services. We suggest that expectations need to be based on a thorough understanding of the diverse potentials of these lands and their inherent limits. A critical provisioning service to rangelands will be management practices that either maintain ecological functions or that restore functions to systems that have been substantially degraded over past decades. With proper incentives and economic benefits, rangelands, in the U.S. or globally, can be expected to provide these historical and more unique goods and services in a sustainable fashion, albeit in different proportions than in the past.     

The Ethical Dilemma of Research and Development Openness Versus Secrecy

In previous research, we have argued that private companies should be more open with their scientific research findings. However, our research assumed, somewhat naively perhaps, that public institutions were quite open. Recent findings have suggested otherwise, and in this paper we explore the dilemma faced by industry, universities, and society in attempting to balance the needs of openness (to rapidly advance the body of knowledge), with secrecy (to protect the economic returns to a new innovation). G. Steven McMillan is an Associate Professor of Management at Penn State Abington. His research focuses on the management of technology, particularly how technological competence translates into economic performance. His PhD is from Temple University. Ronald F. Duska, PhD, holds the Charles Lamont Post Chair of Ethics and the Professions at The American College since 1996, and is the director of the American College Center for Ethics in Financial Services. He is the author, co-author, or editor of numerous books. His most recent books The Ethics of Accounting and Ethics for the Financial Services Professional were published in 2003. He has authored numerous articles on philosophy and business ethics and has lectured and/or taught business ethics as an adjunct at numerous universities, including The Wharton School and The Darden School. He offers workshops in ethics and serves as a consultant and expert witness on matters pertaining to ethics in financial services. Robert D. Hamilton, a PhD from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University, is Professor in the General and Strategic Management Department at Temple University, in Philadelphia. His research focuses on the management of technology as well as strategy implementation issues. Debra L. Casey, JD, MS is an Assistant Professor of Management at Penn State Abington. Her research focuses on conflict management, and in particular, the role of employee voice. She is a Law Review graduate of William and Mary, and a doctoral candidate in labor and industrial relations at Rutgers University.     

Detergents,clothing and the consumer with sensitive skin

A typical detergent formulation for domestic garment washing is a complex formulation comprising: surfactants, builders, bleaches and auxiliary agents. Repeated exposure to surfactants can cause damage to the lipid film layer of the skin. Textile constructions used in clothing are also complex. Most apparel fabrics will be subject to a laundering process containing detergent at some time in the life cycle and thus it can be surmised that the combination of clothing and detergent is likely to be the cause of some skin problems. Certain fibre types show higher absorption rates than others. If surfactants present in domestic detergents are preferentially absorbed into the fabric during laundering and inadequately removed by rinsing a build‐up of the surfactant may exacerbate skin irritation. This paper offers a review of the debate on the effects of detergents on skin disorders plus recent research on clothing and detergents.     

CONTRACTING FOR VALUE: EVA AND THE ECONOMICS OF ORGANIZATIONS

EVA becomes more difficult to apply the farther down in the company you go, especially in organizations with more traditional “functional” designs. Because centralized functions are not independent self-contained entities with direct control over their own revenues, costs, and capital, the performance measures used to evaluate them are necessarily incomplete; they reveal only part of the picture. For example, Marketing may increase sales and operating income—the measures on which it is evaluated—but at the same time drive excessive use of capital in the Manufacturing plants. Manufacturing may reduce unit cost through long production runs, thereby minimizing changeovers and setups, but create excess inventory in the process. Costreducing measures could also lead to declining quality and customer satisfaction, ultimately eroding the company's reputation. In short, each critical function influences results in other parts of the company, and focusing only on activities under a manager's direct control can result in myopic and misleading measures of performance. In organizing key processes as internal EVA Centers, joint costs and benefits shared by different corporate functions or business units can be built into financial measures in a way that encourages collaboration. As one example, a firm can attempt to replicate market forces internally by requiring each marketing region to contract for capacity with the internal manufacturing group. In a traditional management system, Marketing reserves (and relinquishes) manufacturing capacity at no cost; the consequence is excessive demand for resources. An internal pricing mechanism that requires Marketing to pay a fee for capacity will force its managers to assess trade-offs as if it were contracting with an outside party. Such a system effectively requires that functional managers take a more company-wide view of their responsibilities. By including the cost of capital, it forces managers to define costs more carefully. By including the impacts on other functions, it also forces a broader definition of costs. And by using multi-year contracts among different divisions, the framework extends the time horizon over which costs and benefits matter.     

Implications of Seasonal Climate Forecasts on World Wheat Trade: A Stochastic, Dynamic Analysis

Improvements in seasonal climate forecasts have potential economic implications for international agriculture. A stochastic, dynamic simulation model of the international wheat economy is developed to estimate the potential effects of seasonal climate forecasts for various countries' wheat production, exports and world trade. Previous studies have generally ignored the stochastic and dynamic aspects of the effects associated with the use of climate forecasts. This study shows the importance of these aspects. In particular with free trade, the use of seasonal forecasts results in increased producer surplus across all exporting countries. In fact, producers appear to capture a large share of the economic surplus created by using the forecasts. Further, the stochastic dimensions suggest that while the expected long‐run benefits of seasonal forecasts are positive, considerable year‐to‐year variation in the distribution of benefits between producers and consumers should be expected. The possibility exists for an economic measure to increase or decrease over a 20‐year horizon, depending on the particular sequence of years. Le progrès des prévisions saisonnières du climat a une portée économique pour l'agriculture internationale. Un modèle stochastique et dynamique de l'économie internationale du blé est développé afin d'estimer les effets potentiels des prévisions saisonnières du climat sur la production de blé de divers pays, leurs exportations et le commerce mondial. Les études précédentes ont généralement ignoré les aspects stochastiques et dynamiques des effets liés à l'utilisation des prévisions climatiques. Cette étude montre l'importance de ces aspects. En particulier avec le libre échange l'utilisation de ces prévisions aboutit à l'augmentation des excédents dans tous les pays exportateurs. En fait, il apparaît que les producteurs accaparent une grande part de l'excédent économique créé par l'utilisation de ces prévisions. De plus, les dimensions stochastiques suggèrent que bien que les bénéfices à long terme des prévisions climatiques puissent être substantiels, on s'attend à des variations considérables d'une année à l'autre dans la distribution des bénéfices entre les producteurs et les consommateurs. Il est possible qu'un indicateur économique varie à la baisse sur 20 ans eus fonction de la séquence de variation climatique.     

Are CSR Disclosures Value Relevant? Cross-Country Evidence

Using proprietary data that rate corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures of firms in 21 countries, this study examines how the strength of nation-level institutions affects the extent of CSR disclosures. We then examine the valuation implications of CSR disclosures and consider how the relation between CSR disclosures and firm value varies across countries. In contrast to prior studies, we separate CSR disclosures into an expected and unexpected portion where the unexpected portion is a proxy for the incremental information contained in CSR disclosures. We observe a positive relation between unexpected CSR disclosure and firm value measured by Tobin's Q. We also find that, while countries with strong nation-level institutions promote more CSR disclosures, the valuation of a unit increase in unexpected CSR disclosures is higher when nation-level institutions are weak.     

Leaving home: Food choice behavior of young German adults

Like other western countries, Germany too reports record numbers of overweight and obese individuals with young German adults in a particularly high-risk position. As such, this study sought to investigate if food choice varied by the place of residence (dependent or independent) of these young adults. Using a self-administered questionnaire, analyses of quantitative data from 305 German students between the ages of 18 to 24 years indicate that students living in the family home consume more serves of both fruit and vegetables each day in comparison to young adults living independently. Further, higher proportions of dependent students eat more serves of every food group each day in comparison to their independent counterparts. The study finds a significant difference in mood, weight concern, and attitudes towards healthy eating between students under 21 years old and those above 21 years old. This study demonstrates clear implications for a number of stakeholders. The individuals themselves must better develop skills in both food choice and food management, including budgeting. Parents can facilitate this development whilst the children are in the family home and then encouraging empowerment once the student makes the transition to college or university. The article includes implications for marketers and social marketers; the former must offer more information and guidance on food choice, for example, through better food labelling, the latter must address these message issues for future attitude and behavioural change campaigns.     

Managing for Creativity: back to basics in R&D

The author addresses the question of how to train R&D managers to encourage scientists to work more creatively. His studies of the preferences of R&D scientists show that they actually enjoy creating. He asserts that in the interests of increasing enjoyment the role of managers is to remove blocks to creativity, such as negative criticism, lack of time, lack of resources and lack of freedom. On the other hand too much freedom can attenuate the creative urge and the manager must be prepared to offer guidance and supportive consultation.
To help R&D managers towards an appropriate management style the author has devised and run creativity workshops structured around a new model that combines features of some well-known srtuational leadership models. He gives examples of how leadership styles can be adapted to address the problem of developing and leading self-directed and responsible subordinates.