Environmental management: from ‘fit’ to ‘stretch’

Environmental management is a budding discipline that studies the development and shaping of environmental policy in business. This article discusses what progress has been made in theory building in the field of environmental management, and what priorities should be set for future research. The level of ambition of a company with respect to its environmental performance is seen as the result of the following three variables: the coincidence of increased eco-efficiency and market opportunities; the internal structure and culture of the company (including the influence of a number of important actors in it) and the pressure from the immediate and wider social environment to take environmental measures. Research in the field of environmental management can improve our understanding of the conditions under which companies will strive for higher eco-efficiencies. It is argued that such research must concentrate on the interaction of the three variables mentioned above and on how they affect the actions of companies. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Industrial use of public sector research in advanced technologies: a comparison of biotechnology and ceramics

Industrial use of public sector research (PSR) is characterised by considerable diversity: both the nature and extent of linkage varies according to, amongst other factors, firm size, industrial sector and research field. The study reported here aims to understand better some of this diversity by comparing two fields—biotechnology and advanced ceramics. It employs a methodology which focuses on the precise character of scientific and technological inputs (STI) which companies seek and obtain during new product development. The results reveal significant similarities between the technologies: the importance to innovation of a synthesis between formal knowledge and tacit firm-specific skills; and the reliance on PSR for both new knowledge and new research techniques and instruments. Variance in STI flows appears to be related to the particular character of new product development in the relevant industrial sectors; differences in the development and dynamism of the technologies; and in the availability of requisite expertise and knowledge in PSR.     

The impact of deregulation on employment discrimination in the trucking industry

Past studies of racial discrimination in the for-hire sector of the motor carrier industry find that deregulation is an effective tool for mitigating discrimination. These studies argue that regulation provides a refuge from competition that allows employers to discriminate and pass costs on to consumers. Thus, increased competition of deregulation allows less latitude to discriminate. This study reexamines the impact of deregulation on racial employment in the trucking industry. Specifically, micro-data are used to measure and decompose increased minority participation of for-hire drivers following deregulation. The findings of this paper concur that deregulation increased minority participation in the industry. However, the new findings suggest that only a fraction of this increase can be attributed to employers having less latitude to racially discriminate.     

Sources of the Persistent Gender Wage Gap along the Unconditional Earnings Distribution: Findings from Kenya

Past studies on gender wage inequality in Africa typically attribute the gender pay gap either to gender differences in characteristics or in the return to characteristics. The authors suggest, however, that this understanding of the two sources may be far too general and possibly overlook the underlying covariates that drive the gender wage gap. Moreover, past studies focus on the gender wage gap exclusively at the conditional mean. The authors go further to evaluate the partial contribution of each wage-determining covariate to the magnitude of the gender pay gap along the unconditional earnings distribution. The authors' data are from Kenya, and their empirical technique mirrors re-centered influence function regressions. The authors' results are novel and suggest that while gender differences in characteristics and the return to characteristics widen the gender pay gap at the lower end of the wage distributions, gender differences in characteristics widen the gender wage gap at the upper end of the wage distributions. Importantly, the authors find that the underlying covariates driving gender differences in characteristics and the return to characteristics are the industry, occupation, higher education and region covariates. In the middle of the distributions, however, the authors find that gender differences in the return to characteristics, fueled by education and experience covariates, exert the strongest influence on the magnitude of the gender pay gap.     

No Pain,No Gain: Rethinking the Telecoms Crash1

This paper reflects upon the boom and bust of the telecommunications industry from the late 1990s to the early 2000s. Unlike the conspicuous burst of the dotcom bubble, the telecoms crash came quietly, but turned out to be bigger and more catastrophic. This paper argues that bounded rationality, decision making under uncertainty and the focus on short-term individual interest all played a significant role in the telecoms crash. However, this painful crash also had its positive effects. Executives, specialists, regulators and government policy makers should pay more attention to the fundamentals and balance the need for both short-term and long-term interests in approaching the coming challenges in the fast-changing telecoms industry.     

Technological competence and the influence of networks: a comparative analysis of new biotechnology firms in france and britain

The objective of this paper is to examine the role of external networks not only as a resource but also as a constraint for the evolution ofthe technological competence of twenty new biotechnology firms (NBFs) in France and Britain. The analysis is bared on extensive interviews conducted with the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of twenty NBFs, ten in France and ten in Britain. The paper identifies the network structures ofthe tweng NBFs and the impact of netmorks on the evolution of their technologial competence. The paper also attempts to identify the differences between NBFs in France and Britain in terms of the framework developed. It clearly illustrates that the capacity of NBFs to construct appropriate external linkages with other firms andfinanckrs is crucial to their success.     

No Pain, No Gain: Rethinking the Telecoms Crash

This paper reflects upon the boom and bust of the telecommunications industry from the late 1990s to the early 2000s. Unlike the conspicuous burst of the dotcom bubble, the telecoms crash came quietly, but turned out to be bigger and more catastrophic. This paper argues that bounded rationality, decision making under uncertainty and the focus on short-term individual interest all played a significant role in the telecoms crash. However, this painful crash also had its positive effects. Executives, specialists, regulators and government policy makers should pay more attention to the fundamentals and balance the need for both short-term and long-term interests in approaching the coming challenges in the fast-changing telecoms industry.     

Regulation, Unionization, and Racial Wage Discrimination: An Analysis of the Trucking Industry

A bstract . This article tests the hypothesis that increased product market competition of deregulation decreased employer and union wage discrimination in the motor carrier industry. Specifically, in each regulatory period, we estimate the portion of the industry racial wage differential that is due to racial differences: in driver attributes, returns to attributes, and unionization. Our findings suggest that enhanced product market competition directly reduces wage discrimination and may have a smaller indirect effect of further reducing racial wage disparities in industries with racially exclusive unions. These findings support the use of competition to reduce wage discrimination as opposed to government intervention.     

Recent trends in pregnancy discrimination law

In 1978, Congress passed the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) to protect the civil rights of motherhood in the workplace. Since then, the act's interpretation has been altered by various court decisions. These changes, along with more working women, make PDA compliance more complex. This challenge is reflected by a 39% increase in Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaints over the past decade, and a 66% increase in plaintiff victories during the same time period. These developments are discussed in this article, which attempts to help managerial decision making by exploring legal trends and their workplace implications.