Dynamic managerial capabilities: Scale development and validation

Studies on dynamic managerial capabilities still have a rather theoretical nature, and there is great difficulty in finding a valid, reliable instrument to measure this construct. The present study contributes to solving this problem: It aims to develop and validate a scale to measure dynamic managerial capabilities. In this investigation, we develop a scale for three factors related to dynamic managerial capabilities: human capital, managerial cognition (already described in the literature), and relationship networks. The prominent finding in this research is the factor that is referred to here as relationship networks.     

New Evidence from Brazil on Trade Liberalization and Productivity Growth*

This article presents evidence on the positive effect of international trade on productivity growth using industrial level data preceding and following Brazil's trade liberalization in 1988–90. Our data reveal large and widespread productivity improvement across industries after barriers to trade were drastically reduced. Econometric results confirm the association between trade liberalization and productivity growth and show that the impact was indeed substantial: The observed tariff reduction in the period brought a 6% estimated increase in total factor productivity growth rate and a similar impact on labor productivity.     

Do economic integration agreements affect trade predictability? A group effect analysis

Recent theoretical findings in the trade literature suggest that economic integration agreements (EIAs) not only increase the level of trade but also make it more stable and predictable. This paper proposes a Hausman–Taylor quantile regression approach to identify the causal effect of EIA membership on trade predictability. The proposed methodology accounts for group effects in the gravity equation and is computationally efficient. Our results corroborate the theoretical findings that EIAs make trade more stable and predictable and this conclusion is even stronger for deeper EIAs.     

Supply chain risk analysis: a shipbuilding industry case

A lack of empirical studies on Supply Chain Risk Management (SCRM) is observed, especially in the industries of large projects. Therefore, this paper conducts a risk analysis on the Brazilian Shipbuilding Industry by generating an initial risk profile. A panel was conducted with executives from major shipyards, and the primary risks were identified, assessed, and evaluated. Findings corroborate the academic literature, reinforcing that companies recognise the importance of SCRM, but the concept is incipient and far from being successfully implemented in real life. Despite the fact that the shipyards identified important risks, the focus was on internal factors. Because the industry was exposed to risks from the external environment, no risk mitigation actions existed, resulting in the bankruptcy of many shipbuilders. This research is an initial step toward investigating SCRM techniques, offering academics a novel empirical approach that can serve as a systematic risk management tool for supply chain planning.     

Antecedents of Purchase Intention in the Online Context

The understanding of the determinant factors of customer purchase intention is necessary, and it is equally important to study the online purchase context, since this context is disseminated among customers. A theoretical model has been elaborated on and tested, considering the constructs of information quality, distrust, and perceived risk as antecedents of purchase intention, and aiming to analyze the relationship among these constructs in the online purchase context. A quantitative research study has been performed by means of the application of a survey. Multivariate statistics techniques have been applied for data analyses, including structural equation modeling. This study contributes to the evolution of the empirically tested concepts by providing a greater individual understanding of each construct presented in the theoretical model, as well as the relationship among them as determinants of purchase intention; the indication is that meaningful relationships were found which may impact greater profitability and, consequently, greater competition for online retailers.     

Brazilian retail banking and the 2008 financial crisis: Were the government-controlled banks that important?

We revisit the interest rate pass-through effect using weekly retail banking data from May 2006 to March 2010. Our choice of data avoids caveats of previous studies concerning excessive data aggregation and the estimation of how fast changes in benchmark interest rates impact those charged on short-term loans in Brazil. Our analysis focuses on four large retail banks – two of them privately owned and run, two of them government-controlled – before and after September 2008. They account for 60% of the total credit supplied by retail banks. Results indicate that government control over two of the largest banks, supposedly an asset for crisis management, may have had higher welfare costs than assumed. We find no evidence of asymmetry in adjustments of retail rates charged by private and government-controlled banks.     

On the forecasting of the challenging world future scenarios

Logistic and power law methodologies for both retrospective and prospective analyses of extended time series describing evolutionary growth processes, in environments with finite resources, are confronted. While power laws may eventually apply only to the early stages of said growth process, the Allee logistic model seems applicable over the entire span of a long range process. On applying the Allee logistic model to both the world population and the world gross domestic product time series, from 1 to 2008 AD, a projection was obtained that along the next few decades the world should experience a new economic boom phase with the world GDP peaking around the year 2020 and proceeding from then on towards a saturation value of about 142 trillion international dollars, while the world population should reach 8.9 billion people by 2050. These results were then used to forecast the behavior of the supply and consumption of energy and food, two of the main commodities that drive the world system. Our findings suggest that unless the currently prevailing focus on economic growth is changed into that of sustainable prosperity, human society may run into a period of serious economical and social struggles with unpredictable political consequences.     

Brand relationships through brand reputation and brand tribalism

The academic research on branding of consumer products and services is increasingly considering the degree of connectedness between consumers and brands as a key issue of investigation. The literature in this area investigates the nature and the strength of the relationship that consumers develop with brands, as well as the trend of joining brand tribes or brand communities in order to demonstrate and share with others their feelings towards and preference to brands. However, the impact of the overall perceptions of the brands in the form of its reputation and brand tribalism on brand relationships is so far unexplored in the existing literature. Using data collected from 912 respondents, this paper explores the importance of the long term brand reputation and brand tribalism on the strength of brand relationships. The findings suggest that brand tribalism is a better predictor of the strength of brand relationships than the long term brand reputation itself.     

A new methodology for the logistic analysis of evolutionary S-shaped processes: Application to historical time series and forecasting

A new multi-logistic methodology to analyze long range time series of evolutionary S-shaped processes is presented. It conceptually innovates over the traditional logistic approach. The ansatz includes computing the residuals to an optimized multi-logistic trend curve least squares fitted to the time-series data. The elements of the residuals series are checked for autocorrelations and once detected the residuals series is further analyzed to search for eventual presence of underlying periodic structures using a truncated Fourier sine series. The method foundations ensures both a universal applicability and a capacity to disclose the existence of active clocks that can be possibly traced to the driving motors of the evolutionary character of the time series, due to the responsiveness of corresponding process to the development of economic cycles. On associating these two views, it is found that the methodology has a strong potential to improve the quality of short-term forecasts. These findings have been put to test through applications of the methodology to studying the time evolution of two commodities of strong economic and social importance (corn and steel) and good results were consistently obtained for both the analytical and forecasting aspects.     

Project Management of Production Line Automation: A Comparative Analysis of Project Management in Brazil and Colombia

This article aims to evaluate the production line automation projects developed by Brazilian and Colombian companies from the Project Management perspective, through the analysis of the application degree of PMBOK processes, to understand how formal techniques are being employed in these countries and also to identify improvement opportunities, when necessary. Data were collected through a survey. The similarity index between the ten processes, with the highest application degree in the Brazilian and Colombian samples, was 70%. For the processes with the lowest application degree, the similarity index was 60%. No similar study was found in the literature.