Managerial Incentives and Investment Policy in Family Firms: Evidence from a Structural Analysis

This paper provides evidence that CEO incentive pay mediates the effect of family preferences on corporate investment policy. Our study focuses on the option portfolio volatility sensitivity vega, which motivates the risk‐taking behavior of undiversified managers. After controlling for factors that affect incentive pay and investment policy simultaneously, we find that one‐third of underinvestment in riskier R&D projects in active family firms can be attributed to a significantly lower vega. Passive family firms allocate more capital to R&D as opposed to active family firms, and are more active in M&A deal making. In contrast to many prior studies, pay incentives and families are not associated with capital expenditures. Overall, our empirical results suggest that CEO pay incentives induce investment policy contingent on firm risk. Family CEO incentive pay manifests the family preference for lower risk, especially in firms with higher firm risk. Nonetheless, after replacing family CEOs with outside professionals, investments in both R&D and M&A increase, which is consistent with the family preference for extended investment horizons. Interestingly, such a preference seems not to be manifested in incentive pay.     

The Coevolution of Relationship Dominant Logic and Supply Risk Mitigation Strategies

How and why do risk mitigation strategies evolve? And which resources are needed for engaging in such changes? This paper contributes to the understanding of risk management in supply chains by developing theory about the interplay between supply risk mitigation strategies and the purchasing team's relationship dominant logic (RDL), which we define as the purchasing team's orientation toward and shared cognitive map of the management of its supply chain relationships. Specifically, we propose that RDL and supply risk mitigation strategies are fundamentally intertwined. Following a Straussian approach to grounded theory, this study analyzes data generated from the purchasing teams of Western green‐tech firms trying to mitigate supply risk for technically indispensable rare earth metals from China. Our findings from this context that is heavily shaped by state‐influenced supply chain members show that the firms chose their mitigation strategies in line with their RDL. Human capital, social capital, and financial capital seem to moderate the link between RDL and mitigation strategies. We link our findings with the strategic management literature in deriving theoretical propositions concerning these relationships.     

The alignment of service architecture and organizational structure

How does service modularity contribute to performance of service firms and how does organizational architecture facilitate these effects? We propose a new perspective that service modularity contributes to the service performance by increasing efficiency, broadening the service scope, and increasing the visibility of service to customers. Moreover, we bring forward the ambiguous relationship between organization integration and service modularity by holding that organization integration can influence the service modularization process so as to moderate the relationship between service modularity and performance. Our analysis of classic professional service firms (i.e. accounting firms, architecture firms, and law firms) in China, which is a typical emerging market, supports our theoretical framework.     

创建服务文化增强竞争优势

服务的特性决定服务性企业应创建服务文化。服务文化的基本内涵包括顾客导向、追求优质服务、以人为本、协作与团队精神以及服务创新。服务文化是竞争优势的一个来源,对企业的服务绩效也有影响。塑造和创建服务文化需要付出艰苦的努力,采取多方面的措施。这些措施涉及到组织再造、制度调整以及行为模式的转变等。     

Risk management in Indian venture capital and private equity firms: A comparative study

Venture capitalists and private equity funds are often considered experts at investing in high‐risk projects and firms. To be successful investors, venture capitalists and private equity funds must therefore manage the many aspects of risk associated with investing in unlisted small and medium‐sized enterprises. This study examines how Indian venture capital and private equity firms manage several dimensions of risk. We analyze risk management preferences in Indian venture capital and private equity firms. A comparison between Indian and U.K. funds is presented. The results are discussed in detail. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Asymmetric information and credit quality: Evidence from synthetic fixed‐rate financing

In this article the usage of synthetic fixed‐rate financing (SFRF) with interest rate swaps (i.e., borrowing short‐term and using swaps to hedge interest rate risk, instead of selecting conventional fixed‐rate financing) by Fortune 500 and S&P 500 nonfinancial firms is examined over the period 1991 through 1995. Credit ratings, debt issuance, and debt maturities of these firms are monitored through 1999. Strong evidence is found supporting the asymmetric information theory of swap usage as described by S. Titman (1992), even after controlling for industry, credit quality, size effects, and the simultaneity of the capital structure and the interest rate swap usage decision. Consistent with theoretical predictions, SFRF firms are more likely to undergo credit quality upgrades. When limiting the sample to firms where asymmetric information costs are potentially the greatest, the results are even stronger. These findings are important because they document that swaps serve a highly valuable service for firms subject to information asymmetries. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 26:595–626, 2006     

外资服务企业中国市场进入模式的实证研究

我国加入世贸组织以来,服务业已成为吸引外商直接投资的重要领域。本文选取2001年进入上海市的外资服务企业作为样本,采用描述性统计和列联相关分析的方法,对外资服务企业中国市场进入模式的特征进行了实证研究。研究表明,外资服务企业的进入模式选择具有更强烈的独资倾向,并对服务行业类型、经营期限、资本密集度以及文化距离因素对外资服务企业进入模式选择的影响进行了深入分析。     

事业单位国有资产管理的制度设计、治理机制及其他

对事业单位国有资产管理进行改革已越来越迫切.作为规范性的事业单位的主体社会公益型组织,评价其资产管理工作的好坏不是以它们所创造的货币收益多少为指标,而必须研究设计出一整套多元的科学指标体系;应在医院、学校等事业单位建立理事会或董事会治理结构;重建成本核算的财务会计制度.     

Female‐Led High‐Growth: Examining the Role of Human and Financial Resource Management

We integrate research on upper echelons theory, the resource‐based view, and gender to explore conditions that facilitate high growth for female‐led firms. We argue that female entrepreneurs have certain advantages that help them leverage their firms’ human and financial capital to achieve high growth. In support, using a sample of U.S.‐based entrepreneurial firms, we found evidence that having a female lead entrepreneur positively moderated the positive relationships between indicators of firms’ human and financial capital and high growth. The findings have implications for programs, policies, and practices to encourage more high growth in firms with female lead entrepreneurs.     

Investor Myopia and CEO Turnover

We find that Chief Executive Officer (CEO) turnover is significantly higher and considerably less sensitive to performance in firms with short investor horizons. Decisions to dismiss a CEO lead to worse operating performance, which is even poorer when investors have short horizons. Furthermore, new managers respond to investor short‐termism by increasing industry‐adjusted capital expenditures while maintaining R&D and patenting activity. In addition, in firms with short‐horizon investors, total risk increases around forced CEO turnovers, largely because of an increase in idiosyncratic risk. The evidence is consistent with short‐term investors distorting corporate policies of firms through their influence on top management turnover.     

Firm Characteristics as Determinants of Capital Structures in Australia

This study investigates capital structures of Australian firms in relation to firm characteristics. Using an unbalanced panel of 367 firms observed over a 15‐year period from 1992 to 2006, our panel data regression results show that debt–asset ratio is positively related to asset tangibility but inversely related to growth prospects and business risk measured by unlevered beta of equity. We also find that although levered firms are generally more profitable than unlevered firms, profitability decreases the debt ratio of levered firms. We do not find that firm size affects the capital structure of Australian firms. These results are consistent with the pecking order and the agency cost theories but contradict the trade‐off theory.     

The Rainmaker in Today's Professional Service Organizations

ABSTRACT

Professional service firms have relied heavily in the past on a small number of rainmakers-people who have influence and bring business into their firms. In today's competitive marketplace, everyone in the organization must be involved in the practice development process. This paper, based on a series of interviews with accounting professionals, identifies the roles and responsibilities for practice development inherent at every stage of the professional accountant's career path. Additionally, the roles and responsibilities of marketing professionals in professional service firms are also considered.     

Corporate environmental performance and financing decisions

We investigate the financing strategies of environmentally responsible firms to understand how they set target capital structures and make incremental financing decisions. Literature shows that firms with better environmental performance have lower risk and better access to financing. However, it is not obvious how these firms choose to finance their investments. Using an extensive data set of U.S. firms, we find that firms with superior environmental performance have significantly lower debt ratios and use mostly short‐term debt for temporary financing needs. In doing so, environmentally responsible firms are able to achieve more tax savings and experience lower costs of financial distress. Our results provide new empirical facts about environmental performance and financing decisions, and they help explain the observed relationship between environmental performance and economic performance.     

Service industries,growth dynamics and financial constraints

This work represents a first attempt to study the effects of financial constraints on firm growth within the business services as it can be argued that firms are different not only in terms of size but also in the way they operate in a specific industry. Thus, firms can be either characterized by the use of intensive professional knowledge or, alternatively, by the use of a workforce with no specific professional skills. For the business services included, the results reveal the relative importance of internal sources of financing with respect to the external ones. The liquidity constraints mainly affect the growth of industries requiring qualified labor pool, such as computer programming and information service activities, as well as the professional and scientific ones. In these sectors, foremost operate small firms with a superior innovation capacity; therefore, they are considered risky and face difficulties in raising debt capital on favorable terms.     

Industry Merger Intensity and Cost of Capital

Using a panel of industry‐average implied cost of equity capital and the value of prior year aggregate industry mergers, we find strong evidence that the industry cost of equity capital is negatively associated with industry merger activity. Our evidence is consistent with greater media coverage, analyst following, or increase in investor attention associated with industry merger activity lowering the required return on equity for firms in an industry that is not involved in merger activity via the ‘information risk’ or ‘incomplete information’ channels.     

New Service Development Process

Abstract

To continue to grow, more and more U.S. service firms have looked overseas in recent years to find markets for their offerings. Thus, innovation in the global context has become a strategic imperative for many service firms. While the issue of how to foster service innovation has been an area of extensive research, the cross-national comparison of innovation practices particularly between developed and emerging countries has been only a nascent field of research. To address this gap in the literature we conducted a comparative study of new service development process and stages of the financial service firms in an emerging country, India, and a developed country, the United States. The results support the central argument of the article that significant cross-national differences do exist with regard to a firm's new service development process. The findings should be of value to managers faced with the tasks of selecting and managing service innovation in emerging markets, as well as those firms experiencing international competition.     

R&D,Human Capital and Export Behavior of Manufacturing and Service Firms in Ghana

ABSTRACT

The paper carries out a detailed analysis of the effects of R&D and human capital as well as their interactions with innovation on export behavior of manufacturing and service firms in Ghana using a dataset of 720 firms that merges the Enterprise, Innovative Capability and the Innovation Follow-up Surveys respectively for Ghana. Using a bivariate probit regression, the results show that R&D and human capital (employees’ education, slack time and formal training) are positive and significantly related to the propensity for firms to export in Ghana. The cross derivatives (differences) for the interaction terms (R&D and innovation, and education and innovation) also showed that these interaction terms have positive effects on the likelihood for firms to export but are significant only for a negligibly small fraction of the sample. Thus, there is no much statistically significant evidence in support of the mediation role of innovation in the relationship between R&D/education and the export behavior.     

Political risk and the cost of capital in the MENA region

We examine the impact of political risk in the MENA region on the cost at which firms can raise capital. Using the implied cost of equity as a measure of the cost of capital and ICRG's political risk rating as a proxy for political risk, we find that political risk results in a higher cost of capital. Economically, our results suggest that a one standard deviation increase in the political risk index is associated with a 450 basis points increase in the cost of equity capital of MENA firms. Our results are consistent across a battery of robustness checks. Our findings have important policy implications that are relevant to the MENA region and beyond.     

The Internationalization of Service Firms in China: A Comparative Analysis with Manufacturing Firms

In this article, we expand upon the springboard perspective of emerging markets in the service sector. We investigate the phenomenon of service firm internationalization in China and the distinct differences between service and manufacturing firms during international expansion. Using dynamic analysis of historical data for 363 service firms and 569 manufacturing firms from 2001 to 2007, we find that the internationalization of service firms in China is different from that of manufacturing firms in terms of resource requirement and experience exploitation. The internationalization of service firms relies more on international experience than corporate resources. Furthermore, we also identify the structural differences between hard and soft service industries. In China, identifiable intangible assets are found to be more important for the international expansion of hard service firms than they are for soft service firms. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The war for talent: human capital challenges for professional service firms

Abstract

Professional service firms face particular human capital challenges. This study reflects on the distinctive characteristics of professional service firms through the concepts of knowledge intensity, low capital intensity and professionalized workforce. Based on in-depth interviews with 21 partners of Australian law firms, we provide empirical evidence on the war for talent challenges faced by professional service firms and in particular, law firms. The findings point to talent management challenges including reputation building and maintenance, employee autonomy, knowledge acquisition, revenue and profitability through internationalization, managing knowledge across borders, managing employee mobility, talent acquisition and retention, talent engagement, performance management and developing leadership capability. These challenges are important issues to be considered by professional service firms as they attempt to compete more effectively in global business contexts.