Antecedents and effects of emotions in strategic decision-making: a literature review and conceptual model

Individual emotions are essential driving forces in strategic decision-making. Nevertheless, the current state of research on emotions and their effects on strategic decision-making is fragmented and inconsistent. Therefore, this paper presents a narrative literature review that aims to bring some structure into current research and to advance an agenda for a future research on emotions in the strategic decision-making context. Based on cognitive appraisal theory and affective events theory this review focuses on organizational and individual antecedents for the development of emotions in the strategic decision-making context as well as on the effects of emotions on the strategic decision-making process. The paper concludes with a conceptual framework that summarizes the findings of this review and indicates possible directions for future research.     

Collaborate at Home to Win Abroad: How Does Access to Local Network Resources Influence Export Behavior?

By drawing on the resource‐based view and on elements from social network theory, we use a sample of southern Brazilian small and medium‐sized furniture manufacturers to find evidence for the hypothesis that access to local network resources, facilitated by a firm's membership in an industry association, strongly predicts the propensity to export. Likewise, we find that a firm's local collaborative intensity is positively related to its export intensity and that both relations are moderated by the firm's distance from the local network's center. This study contributes to the literature on how local collaboration may facilitate overcoming export barriers.     

Reform der Grundsteuer

In seiner Stellungnahme vom Dezember 2010 hat der Wissenschaftliche Beirat beim Bundesfi nanzministerium vorgeschlagen, in die Bemessungsgrundlage für die Grundsteuer neben dem Bodenwert eine Geb?udekomponente einzubeziehen. Dirk L?hr h?lt den Vorschlag für verfehlt, weil er verschiedene bodenmarktpolitische Aspekte nicht berücksichtigt. Er befürchtet, dass es durch diese Reform zu einer Bestrafung der werthaltigen Nutzung kommen würde und entsprechend der angestrebte Rückgang des Fl?chenverbrauchs nicht erreicht werden kann.     

Understanding financial crisis through accounting models

This paper presents evidence that accounting (or flow-of-funds) macroeconomic models helped anticipate the credit crisis and economic recession. Equilibrium models ubiquitous in mainstream policy and research did not. This study traces the intellectual pedigrees of the accounting approach as an alternative to neo-classical economics, and the post-war rise and decline of flow-of-funds models in policy use. It includes contemporary case studies of both types of models, and considers why the accounting approach has remained outside mainstream economics. It provides constructive recommendations on revising methods of financial stability assessment and advocates an ‘accounting of economics’.     

Is Gold a Hedge or a Safe Haven? An Analysis of Stocks,Bonds and Gold

Is gold a hedge, defined as a security that is uncorrelated with stocks or bonds on average, or is it a safe haven, defined as a security that is uncorrelated with stocks and bonds in a market crash? We study constant and time‐varying relations between U.S., U.K. and German stock and bond returns and gold returns to investigate gold as a hedge and a safe haven. We find that gold is a hedge against stocks on average and a safe haven in extreme stock market conditions. A portfolio analysis further shows that the safe haven property is short‐lived.     

The Contribution of In‐house and External Design Activities to Product Market Performance

Design may be seen as one of several key factors contributing to new product development, along with research and development, marketing, manufacturing, purchasing, etc. More and more, creative design comes to the fore, and many companies believe that superior design will be the key to winning customers. It has the ability to create corporate distinctiveness and also possesses the potential to give a product an individual or new look. Furthermore, the model of open innovation suggests that firms can and should use external and internal knowledge flows in order to create valuable ideas, and also internal and external paths to the market. Also, in the design process, a common trend toward external design skills has emerged in recent years. Due to cost and control factors, firms are increasingly outsourcing design activities. By using a sample of Belgian companies, this paper explores the contribution of design activities to product market performance. While there is mounting evidence that design can be seen as a strategic tool to successfully spur sales of new product developments at the firm level, the topic of design innovation has not yet been linked to the open innovation concept. In this paper, it is empirically tested whether design activities conducted in house differ in their contribution to new product sales from externally acquired design. So, do design activities that have been developed only with internal resources lead to a greater success than those that have been carried out with external sources of knowledge? Using a large cross‐section of manufacturing and service firms, the effects on sales of products new to the market and of imitations or significantly improved products of the firm are investigated. At first glance, the findings indicate that externally acquired design is not superior to in‐house design activities: the results show that only design activities that are mainly conducted with internal knowledge sources play a crucial role regarding the product innovation's success with market novelties. Design conducted in collaboration with external partners, however, has no significant influence. This is not the case for imitations, that is, products only new to the firm. Their success is also influenced by design activities developed with external collaborators. This effect is robust for several modifications of the model specification. In contrast to earlier literature on new technological developments, this paper argues that external design may not affect the sales of market novelties as the “market news” may spill over quickly to rivals through common suppliers including external designers.