Impact of IFRS adoption on accounting quality in European firms

In this paper it is examined whether firms following International Financial Reporting Standards （IFRS） exhibit higher accounting quality. While IFRS are supposed to improve international comparisons by harmonisation and definition of strong principles, Ball （2006） and Nobes （2006） were concerned about differences in the application of IFRS cross-countries and firms. Barth, Landsman ＆ Lang （2008） stated that the flexibility of principles- based International Accounting Standards （IAS） could create incentives for firms to manage earnings. This paper contributes to analyse the impact of IFRS on accounting quality for European firms. The findings show that for firms in the European Union （EU） IFRS produce a negative effect on accounting quality that continues after 2005, when IFRS becomes mandatory. By contrast, for European firms which are not EU members the IFRS adoption increases accounting quality. These results support the concerns about IFRS application and flexibility and indicate that accounting quality does not improve just because the adoption of IFRS is mandatory.     

Managerial and program inefficiency for European meat manufacturing firms: A dynamic multidirectional inefficiency analysis approach

This paper proposes a dynamic multidirectional inefficiency analysis approach within the context of Data Envelopment Analysis to measuring input- and investment-specific managerial and program inefficiency for groups of firms characterized by different technologies. Dynamic managerial inefficiency refers to the distance to the firms’ group-specific dynamic frontier of best practices, and dynamic program inefficiency measures the difference between the group-specific dynamic frontier and the pooled dynamic frontier. The empirical application focuses on panel data of large meat processing firms in Eastern, Western and Southern Europe over the period 2005–2012. The results show that Eastern European firms have the highest dynamic managerial inefficiency for all inputs, but have the smallest values for dynamic program inefficiency. Western European firms perform worst in terms of program inefficiency for all inputs, while Southern European firms are the best with regard to dynamic managerial inefficiency. The results also reveal that regardless the dynamic inefficiency dimension considered, investments is the most inefficient input, followed by labor, and materials.     

The relationship between information technology capability,inventory efficiency,and shareholder wealth: A firm-level empirical analysis

Inventories represent an important strategic resource for firms, with implications for shareholder wealth. As such, firms expend considerable effort in managing their inventories efficiently. Among other factors, information technology (IT) capability can play an important role in enabling inventory efficiency and financial performance. However, insight into the chain-of-effects linking IT capability, inventory efficiency, and stock market returns and risk remains limited. In this paper, we provide a conceptual model outlining the relationships between these constructs. Next, we evaluate the model using secondary information on firms from multiple industries across the 10-year time period of 2000–2009. Our analysis confirms that firms’ IT capability plays a significant role in enhancing their inventory efficiency, which, in turn, is observed to increase stock market returns. Our results also reveal that firms’ IT capability directly reduces their stock market risk and enhances their stock market returns. Taken together, these findings, along with the conceptual model that we advance, have important research and managerial implications.     

A taxonomy of ecopreneurship in small manufacturing firms: A multidimensional cluster analysis

This study presents a multidimensional taxonomy of “ecopreneurship” for small manufacturing firms. Based on a cluster analysis of 312 Swedish firms, four distinct clusters are identified: pioneers, green dumpers, overlookers, and recyclers. These clusters are compared regarding their level of entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance. Based on the results, and because of the resource constraints associated with small firms, managers of such companies are advised to examine the economic consequences of specific environmental business practices and to adopt a less aggregated approach to ecopreneurship. This study illustrates the usefulness of a multidimensional scale when researching environmental behaviors and is a response to the lack of an empirically based classification of ecopreneurship configurations.     

Literary analysis as a metaphor in processual research: A story of technological change

This paper suggests that elements of literary analysis such as a plot, characterization, theme and style can be used metaphorically to guide data analysis and write-up in processual research that entails telling a story of a particular sequence of events or actions. How literary analysis as a metaphor can be used not only to guide research but assess the completeness of a research report, is illustrated with a field study of technology adoption in a Finnish pre-press firm.     

Risk shocks and housing supply: A quantitative analysis

This paper analyzes the role of stochastic uncertainty in a multi-sector housing model with financial frictions. We include time varying uncertainty (i.e. risk shocks) in the technology shocks that affect housing production and provide estimates of the time-series properties of risk shocks by using firm level productivity data. The analysis demonstrates that risk shocks to the housing production sector are a quantitatively important impulse mechanism for understanding housing price movements. Specifically, the model can match the volatility of housing prices observed in the data. It is also demonstrated that adjustment costs are important in replicating the contemporaneous correlation of housing prices with GDP and residential investment. Critically, bankruptcy costs act as an endogenous markup factor in housing prices and are an important determinant of house price volatility. However, in comparison to housing demand shocks, risk shocks have low explanatory power for real quantities.     

Testing the Information Structure of Eastern European Markets: The Warsaw Stock Exchange

This paper investigates the content of the information set used by the agents in the Warsaw Stock Exchange - WSE. Three “candidate variables” are examined — consumers’ prices, the zloty/US$ exchange rate and the refinancing rate of the National Bank of Poland — with respect to three WSE stocks, from different sectors of the economy. The methodology employed supposes that the innovations in the price series are orthogonal to all variables within or outside the information set. Beyond the question of how to specify the agents expectations, the WSE trading rules and the high volatility period present in all monthly price series were additional problems to render it operational. Given the solutions adopted, in only three out of the nine cases tested, it was possible to reject the null that the candidate did not belong to the information set. This is a signal that macroeconomic fundamentals are still absent from the WSE. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

城市化进程中地名文化价值的量化分析——以上海市乡镇级地名为例

在城市化进程中,一些文化内涵深刻的老地名被弃用,原因在于对地名文化价值的判断以及地名的取舍缺少客观、稳定和统一的标准。通过对城市化进程中开展地名文化价值量化分析的意义、基本指导思想和主要研究过程等进行阐述,以上海市乡镇级地名文化保护过程中的实际应用为例,进行了量化分析的探索。     

The Turnover Intention–Behaviour Link: A Culture-Moderated Meta-Analysis

Turnover intention is widely regarded as a direct antecedent to and proxy for actual voluntary turnover behaviour. However, previous studies have found the turnover intention-behaviour link to be highly heterogeneous and not necessarily strong. This study adopts a cross-cultural perspective, examining how the link varies as a function of Hofstede’s four work-related cultural dimensions. Data from 152 independent samples were meta-analysed, representing the testing of 216,093 employees from 18 nations across 9 geographical regions. The multilevel meta-analytic results reveal significantly stronger turnover intention-behaviour links for countries higher in power distance, higher in individualism, and lower in masculinity.     

Leadership ideologies among European managers: A comparative survey in a multinational company

Adopting a subjective culture approach, the present study focuses on managers' beliefs about ideal leadership behaviour in organizations (i.e. leadership ideologies). On the basis of reported cultural dimensions which distinguish countries from one another, it is expected that the national origin of European managers will significantly influence their ideologies. The findings provide support for this assumption, since significant differences appeared between countries in eight aspects of leadership. Finally, the findings are compared with existing knowledge of cultural variation between these countries.     

How do institutional shareholders manipulate corporate environmental strategy to protect their equity value? A study of the adoption of ISO 14001 by Egyptian firms

Theoretical as well as empirical evidence regarding the influence of institutional ownership on corporate environmental strategy not only is inconclusive but also reflects experience from either the Anglo‐American context or other developed countries. The underlying assumption of most of this literature is that institutional shareholders are always ‘active’ or ‘passive’ in their actions towards corporate environmental strategy. However, this study argues that this relationship might be moderated by various motivations such as legitimizing existence and operations, conforming with industry norms or lessening managerial entrenchment. Econometric analysis, using a sample of Egyptian firms, as hypothesized, demonstrated that institutional ownership exerted positive and significant effects on a corporation's tendency to adopt environmental management standards only when financial resources are available and investment opportunities are limited. A possible explanation of this finding is that Egyptian institutional investors are more likely to use corporate environmental responsibility to offset their inability to confront managerial discretionary power. An implication of this finding is that not only will different types of stakeholder ask for different levels of social and environmental responsibility, but also the same type of stakeholder may ask for different levels of social and environmental responsibility in different contexts. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Money,random matching and endogenous growth: A quantitative analysis

In this study, we develop a search-and-matching monetary growth model to analyze the effects of inflation on economic growth and social welfare by introducing endogenous economic growth via capital externality into a two-sector search-and-matching model. We find that the channel through which inflation affects economic growth in the search-and-matching model is different from the traditional cash-in-advance model. To facilitate the calibration, we obtain an empirical estimate of the effects of inflation on economic growth using panel regressions. In the simulation analysis, we quantitatively evaluate the welfare effect of inflation in the search-and-matching endogenous growth model and compare it to a search-and-matching exogenous growth model. We find that the welfare effect of inflation is nonlinear in the endogenous growth model whereas it is linear in the exogenous growth model. Furthermore, we find that the welfare cost of inflation under endogenous growth is up to four times as large as the welfare cost of inflation under exogenous growth.     

New public stock issues by seasoned and unseasoned firms: A comparative analysis in a turbulent environment—the case of israel

This study presents and examines new evidence on the relationship between financial structure and ownership in New and Veteran Public firms (sometimes known as unseasoned or seasoned firms, respectively). The major findings are: (1) the cost of capital and the cost of equity increased with financial leverage, but at a different magnitude in new and veteran public firms reflecting different risk conceptions; and (2) management and administration costs for new public firms are indicated to be higher than for veteran public firms. Reasons for and implications of these findings are subsequently discussed.     

The globalization of operations in Eastern and Western countries: Unpacking the relationship between national and organizational culture and its impact on manufacturing performance

Understanding national and organizational culture becomes increasingly important in the era of transnational manufacturing. As the world becomes flat and boundaries break down, manufacturers need to understand the proper role of culture in order to obtain competitive advantage. Thus, the current study conducts a multilevel investigation of the impact of eight national and organizational culture dimensions (according to GLOBE framework) on manufacturing performance. An ANOVA comparison of 189 manufacturing plants between Eastern (Japan and South Korea) and Western (Germany, United States, Finland, and Sweden) countries indicates that organizational culture inside plants differs in three dimensions (power distance, future orientation, and performance orientation). Hierarchical Linear Modeling analysis further suggests that organizational culture has more of an effect on manufacturing performance than national culture or the fit between them. In addition, Country Developmental Indexes, both Economic and Infrastructural, do not impact manufacturing performance, reinforcing our conclusion about the weak influence of the national level factors on manufacturing performance. In an era of globalization, these results have practical implications for organizations expanding across national boundaries by developing an internal organizational culture consistent with high performance manufacturing.     

A triangulation analysis of value congruency in corporate Spain: American dream or Spanish reality?

The construct of value congruency has become the centre of scholarly as well as practitioner attention in the past two decades. Theoretical reasoning, however, has mainly originated in an Anglo Saxon context accompanied by scarce and contradictory empirical results. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to explore further the construct and determine its presence in the relatively unexplored cultural context of Spanish organizations. A novel triangulation measure is proposed and values are assessed by three independent data sources, representing three different constituencies in the company: non-management employees, HR directors, and a blend of senior management and communication directors inferred by the corporate websites of the firms studied. The latter is a relatively new medium for companies to shape and instil values, and is assessed by means of content analysis. Results show that value congruency is rather rare for the organizations of the sample studied and discussion revolves around issues of culture, possible clashes between values and the respective impact on the hypothesized sequence: values–satisfaction–performance. It is proposed that it may be more relevant in subsequent research to focus on incongruencies or ambiguities.     

A quantitative study of financing efficiency of low‐carbon companies: A three‐stage data envelopment analysis

This study set out to evaluate the financing efficiency of low‐carbon companies. Applying a three‐stage data envelopment analysis with the data from 85 listed companies in China's low‐carbon industries over the period 2011 to 2017, this study has found that the overall financing efficiency of low‐carbon companies was relatively high, and the pure technical efficiency was quite steady over the period. The overall financing efficiency of these low‐carbon companies on average tended to change with the scale efficiency. This study has also shown that the scale efficiency was the main constraint influencing the financing efficiency of low‐carbon companies in China over the period. Our results are robust and have significant implications for policy makers and corporate managers.     

The social context of performance appraisal and appraisal reactions: A meta‐analysis

This study reviews and meta‐analyzes the literature on the social context of performance appraisal. Results indicate that aspects of rater‐ratee relationship quality (i.e., supervisor satisfaction, supervisor support, supervisor trust) are strongly related to ratee reactions to performance appraisals. Rater‐ratee relationship quality is more strongly related to appraisal reactions than appraisal participation or performance ratings. Integrating social exchange theory with procedural justice theory, this article tested whether or not the relationship quality–appraisal reactions relationship was due to relationships between relationship quality and instrumental resources for the ratee (i.e., appraisal participation and rating favorability). When controlling for relationships between these resources and appraisal reactions, a direct path between relationship quality and reactions was significant, supporting a relational model of the exchange between appraisal partners. The relationship quality–appraisal reaction relationship was not moderated by performance rating favorability or appraisal participation. In total, these results highlight the importance of relationship quality to employee reactions to performance appraisal—and the importance of ratee reactions as an important resource in the social exchange between appraisal partners. Implications for theory, practice, and future research are discussed. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Government involvement in entrepreneurship and new business creation in Australia: A quantitative analysis of public perceptions and opinions

In order to determine the range of Australian perceptions on new venture creation at the end of the decade of the 1980s, and in particular attitudes towards government involvement in fostering entrepreneurship, a major quantitative study was conducted. The survey involved more than 1500 Australians in face-to-face interviews (300 in each mainland capital city) chosen on a random basis.

An analysis of the data provides an assessment of the Australian general public&s perceptions in three key areas: their understanding of the word ‘entrepreneur’ their rating of importance of new venture creation; their belief in government involvement in fostering new venture creation.

It is believed to be the first study attempting to quantify an entire nation&s perceptions in three areas vital to creators of national economic and industry policies.