Can You Hear Me Now? Communication in Virtual Product Development Teams*

Globalization and technological advances are driving organizations to extend the boundaries of new product development (NPD) teams from traditional colocated settings to dispersed or virtual settings. Virtual NPD teams have a wide array of information and communication technologies (ICTs) at their disposal. ICTs allow team members to communicate and collaborate as they cope with the opportunities and challenges of cross‐boundary work. The purpose of this paper is to explore ICT use by members of virtual NPD teams. This study presents an exploratory test and integration of two competing perspectives of media use in virtual teams: media capacity theories and social dynamic media theories. Specifically, this paper examines the role of task type, organizational context, and ICT type as critical contingency variables affecting ICT use. It also examines how different patterns of ICT use relate to individual perceptions of team performance. The findings from this study of 184 members of virtual NPD teams in three global firms suggest that communication via ICTs in virtual NPD teams is contingent on a range of factors.     

The connectivity of infrastructure networks and the urban space of São Paulo in the 1990s

This article explores the strategic importance of information systems for social control of networked services on urban and regional scales, and the nature of the information required for that purpose. The standard indicators of infrastructure coverage – by and large based on the number and encompassment of connections – no longer respond to the real conditions of supply and consumption. The technological and managerial innovations in flow control and dispatch, along with the effects of combined access to multi‐mode networks, render the evaluation of services’ connectivity considerably more complex than it used to be in the past. Private domination over the supply structure of these services tends to make the political struggle for equitability more dependent on the technical reliability of information than it could have been under the model of state supply. Networked services’ management has evolved to a more demand‐oriented structure, but this structure has so far reproduced the structural inequalities of Brazilian society in favor of powerful stakeholders, e.g. large consumers. The potential for more democratic control associated with this new balance between supply and demand in networked services can only evolve if more vulnerable social groups have access to sound technological and managerial information. To support this idea the article shows the importance of connectivity indicators in determining the effective access to networked utilities in the Metropolitan Area of São Paulo, in contrast to the traditional indicators of services’ coverage. Cet article explore l’importance stratégique des systémes d’information pour le contrôle social des services de réseaux au niveau urbain et régional, et la nature de l’information nécessaire pour cela. Les indicateurs habituels du niveau d’information sur l’infrastructure – généralement basés sur le nombre et la compréhension des relations – ne répondent plus aux conditions réelles de provision et de consommation. Les nouveautés de technologie et de gestion dans le contrôle du mouvement et dans les expéditions, ainsi que les effets de l’accés joint aux réseaux à modes multiples, rendent l’évaluation des liens entre les services beaucoup plus complexe que précédemment. La domination de la structure de provision de ces services par le domaine privé a tendance à rendre la lutte politique pour la justice plus dépendante de la fiabilité des informations qu’elle aurait pu l’? tre dans le modéle de provision par l’état. La gestion des services de réseaux a évolué vers une structure orientée vers la demande, mais jusqu’à présent cette structure a reproduit les inégalités structurelles de la société brésilienne qui favorise des détenteurs de pouvoir, par exemple les gros consommateurs. Les possibilités d’un contrôle plus démocratique associéà cet équilibre nouveau entre la provision et la demande dans les services de réseaux ne peut se développer que si les groupes sociaux les plus vulnérables ont accés à une information technologique et gestionnaire fiable. Pour soutenir cette opinion, l’article démontre l’importance des indicateurs de rapports pour déterminer des conditions d’accés efficaces aux entreprises de service de réseaux dans la région métropolitaine de Sao Paulo, au contraire des indicateurs traditionnels de l’information des services.     

Diversity and business performance: 50 years of research

This study has carried out a review of the literature appearing on diversity in the last 50 years. Research findings from this period reveal it is impossible to assume there is a pure and simple relationship between diversity and performance without considering a series of variables that affect this relationship. In this study, emphasis has been placed on the analysis of results arrived at through empirical investigation on the relation between the most studied dimensions of diversity and performance. The results presented are part of a more extensive research.     

Fiscal adjustments,labour market flexibility and unemployment

Using a panel of 17 countries for 1978–2009, we find that tax-driven consolidations increase unemployment by 0.25 percentage points. Labour market flexibility mitigates this: a one-point rise in the flexibility index reduces youth (long-term) unemployment by 0.6–0.7 (1.8–2.2) percentage points.     

Run theorems for low returns and large banks

In this paper, we revisit the issue of bank fragility in the Diamond and Dybvig (J Polit Econ 91:401–419, 1983) model with sequential service and finite traders. We provide a precise condition under which banks are susceptible to a run when the return on investment is low, and we show that sufficiently large banks are always susceptible to a run. One interpretation of the condition is that exposure to runs occurs when desire for consumption smoothing or predictability of preference profiles are relatively high.     

Domestic and international research joint ventures: The effect of collusion

We analyze the effect of research joint ventures (RJVs) on consumer welfare in an international context when collusion can occur. Our results suggest that antitrust authorities should distinguish between domestic and international RJVs and be more benevolent with international RJVs.     

The Origins and Development of the Latin American Structuralist Approach to the Balance of Payments, 1944–1964

The paper offers an historical account of the origins and development of the Latin American structuralist approach to the balance of payments between 1944 and 1964. We focus on the contributions by Raul Prebisch, Celso Furtado and Juan Noyola, all of them members of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America (CEPAL) during the 1950s. Prebisch used the foreign trade multiplier concept to distinguish the business cycle mechanisms at the ‘centre’ and at the ‘periphery’. Noyola introduced the notion of external disequilibrium as a feature of the industrialization process. This was further elaborated by Prebisch's formula connecting the relative rates of growth to the ratio of income-elasticities of import. Furtado examined the implications of the external demand constraint for economic growth, an important element of the two-gap models of the 1960s. The main piece of empirical structuralist research was the CEPAL 1957 report about Mexican external disequilibrium elaborated by Furtado and Noyola, not published at the time; we discuss that report in the context of the Mexican devaluation of 1954.     

Reforming Budgetary Institutions in Latin America: The Case for a National Fiscal Council

Latin America's economies have made tremendous improvements in recent years. Following the lost decade of the 1980s, economic growth has resumed. But the fruits of this progress remain to be consolidated. The political consensus supporting reform is fragile, and the economies of the region are still susceptible to destabilizing shocks, as recent events have underscored. Even well-devised economic policy strategies can be thrown off course by disturbances. This article proposes an institutional reform—a National Fiscal Council—designed to allow Latin American countries to break out of this vicious circle.     

Targeted transfers and the fiscal response to the great recession

Between 2007 and 2009, government expenditures increased rapidly across the OECD countries. While economic research on the impact of government purchases has flourished, in the data, most of the increase in expenditures was in government transfers. After documenting this fact, we argue that future research should focus on the positive impact of transfers. Towards this, we present a model in which there is no representative agent and Ricardian equivalence does not hold because of uncertainty, imperfect credit markets, and nominal rigidities. Targeted lump-sum transfers are expansionary both because of a neoclassical wealth effect and because of a Keynesian aggregate demand effect.     

Citizens, Autocrats, and Plotters: A Model and New Evidence on Coups D'État

We present a model of coups in autocracies. Assuming that policy choices cannot be observed but are correlated with the short-run performance of the economy we find that: (a) the threat of a coup disciplines autocrats; (b) coups are more likely in recessions; (c) increasing per capita income has an ambiguous effect on the probability of a coup. The implications of the model are consistent with the evidence. On average, one recession in the previous year increases the probability of a coup attempt by 47 percent. By contrast, the effect of the level of per capita income is weak.