A gentle approach to corporate change

For the past half decade a planning-forecasting nucleus has been operating at Bell Northern Research based on some of the newer ideas in these arts. Designed as a supplement to the normal corporate planning activities, this group's objective was to probe the future using only unusual, but logical techniques, to inject uncertainty, and to otherwise challenge the accepted assumptions about the corporate group's future. Success at this activity demanded research to discover the essence of the principles that lay beneath the corporation's business. Finally, techniques had to be developed to ensure the meaningful diffusion of this knowledge throughout the organization and its environment.     

The practice of corporate social performance in minority- versus nonminority-owned small businesses

This study compares corporate social performance in terms of charitable contributions of minority-owned and nonminority-owned small businesses. In this sample, minority-owned small businesses are younger, have less full-time employees, and lower annual sales. Minority-owned small businesses donate more funds to religious organizations than nonminority-owned small businesses. When annual sales are accounted for, minority-owned businesses contribute more total dollars to all charitable organizations than nonminority-owned firms. Suggestions for future research in this area are delineated.Judith Kenner Thompson is an Assistant Professor of Business and Society at the University of New Mexico. Her work has appeared inResearch in Corporate Social Performance and Policy, Business Forum, and theJournal of Small Business Management.Jacqueline N. Hood is an Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior at the University of New Mexico. Her current research interests include gender issues in business, small business and entrepreneurship, and corporate social performance.     

End-of-life care in nursing homes: the high cost of staff turnover

Nursing home staff turnover results in high cost--both economic and personal--and has a negative impact on the quality of care provided to residents at the end of life. Reducing staff turnover in nursing homes would benefit both the cost to the U.S. health care system, and, most importantly, the care residents receive in the vulnerable period leading to death. There is rising pressure on nursing homes to improve their palliative and end-of-life care practices and reduce transfers to hospital for situations and conditions that can be safely managed on site. Nursing care staff deserve an investment in the specific training necessary for them to give the highest quality care to dying residents. This training should be multifaceted and include the physiological, psychological, spiritual, interpersonal, and cultural (including ethnic) aspects of dying. Empowerment with these necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes will not only result in better care for residents but likely also will reduce the burnout and frustration staff experience in caring for residents near death.     

The Economic Significance of User-Generated Feedback

This paper examines the impact of user-generated feedback on price at a price comparison site or shopbot. It employs a modified hedonic price function to explore the use made by current potential consumers of the experience of past actual consumers in evaluating quality attributes that were not observable when the product was initially launched on to the market. Using a database of daily observations on 211 digital cameras traded on NexTag.com, we find that the product’s star rating, reflecting all the available individual assessments of the product, has a significant negative impact on the discount on the manufacturer’s recommended selling price at which the product is offered.     

Development and validation of a firm-level vertical and horizontal internationalization metric

The lack of valid and reliable measures of firm-level vertical and horizontal internationalization is impeding the development and testing of hypothesized relationships between these respective dimensions of internationalization and a range of important MNE characteristics, actions, and effects. Through a series of qualitative and quantitative studies using data collected from senior MNE executives (total N?=?3,146), we develop and validate a scale to measure both vertical and horizontal firm-level internationalization. Subscales for each type of internationalization prove to be unidimensional, reliable, temporally stable, and to have predictive, cross-cultural, cross-sectoral, and discriminant validity.