The effect of environmental information on investment allocation decisions – an experimental study

This paper focuses on the use of environmental information in investment decision making. The research approach employed is based on an experiment where three groups of final year finance students were asked to allocate investment funds between two companies based on financial accounts and information material from these companies in which environmental information was included in varying degrees. The overall conclusion is that the qualitative environmental information affects short term allocation decisions, hence indicating a risk reduction potential of environmental information comparable to the classic interpretation of financial information. The quantitative environmental information included in the experiment seems to mitigate rather than extend the directional effect of more environmental information. The evidence also seems to indicate that decision makers are not always aware which information categories affect their decision making. Hence, this has implications for how the potential value of environmental information is to be assessed. Finally, experimental studies as a methodology seem to be better suited to indicate actual effects of different types of information on decision making than attitude surveys. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Tracing business and environmental effects of environmental management systems—a study of networking small and medium‐sized enterprises using a joint environmental management system

In Hackefors Industrial District in Sweden, 26 small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) have formed an environmental network and implemented a joint environmental management system (EMS) according to ISO 14001. Based on interviews with the environmental co‐ordinators at these enterprises, the effects on business and environmental efforts and impacts are analysed. It can be concluded that the joint EMS has resulted in better relations with important stakeholders, such as existing and potential customers. For example, three‐fifths said that their EMS had made it easier to receive a contract for the sale of products and services. Several environmental improvements have been observed and are presented in the paper, many of which are considered as consequences of the EMSs. Moreover, based on observations during the study, this paper discusses how boundaries and screening affect the connection between EMSs and environmental performance. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment     

The Disability Discrimination Act—an early response of employers

This article seeks to provide an insight into how employers have initially responded to the DDA. From a study of twenty four organisations it was found that many were revising their policies and procedures on disability as a result of the Act. However, it is suggested that there were problems of implementation due to attitudes among the workforce, operational and budgetary restrictions within decentralised management structures and lack of information and ambiguity regarding key provisions of the DDA.     

中国互联网公司员工激励研究

经过十几年的发展,我国互联网产业有了一定规模,但我国互联网公司在员工激励方面还存在着一些问题.本文详述了我国互联网公司激励的现状,从物质激励、精神激励、人力资本提升、长期激励等几个方面找出了其中存在的问题,通过具体分析得出了相应的解决方法.     

External communication behaviour of purchasers—effects on supplier management performance

This article presents findings of a research effort that focuses on the relationships among the external communication behaviour of purchasers, individual and contextual factors and the performance in supplier management. Communication quantity, openness and friendliness were identified as dimensions of individual communication behaviour. Information and relationship quality were used as the two dimensions of communication quality. The results, based on structural equation analysis, provide support for the positive influence of individual communication behaviour on communication quality and supplier management performance. Results suggest that relationship quality appears to be of great significance in the model. Oral communication capability and purchasers’ attitudes towards individual communication with suppliers also play important roles in explaining external communication behaviour of purchasers.     

The position of agriculture in kibbutz economy—an attempt at quantitative projection

The Israeli Kibbutz Movement adopted the ideology of the “Return to Nature” and aspired to especially develop agricultural labour. But in the past decade there has been a process of “internal migration” of workers from agriculture to industrial occupations, which was compared to the “Industrial Revolution”. The ratio of agricultural workdays to other productive branches workdays decline from 62% in 1967 to 46.5% in 1974. Kibbutz' management has many reasons to evaluate its future direction, (investment in land, in education, etc.). We shall try to describe the expected developments, using the Markov chain. We shall also try to analyse the yearly interchanges and transfer from agriculture to industry and vice versa. We shall attempt to show that the process of decreasing agricultural manpower has almost ceased, and it will become stable on a fixed level of about 43%.     

Learning curves—an axiomatic approach

A systematic mathematical analysis of learning curves is presented. It is shown that while a learning curve with learning factor k does necessarily satisfy the functional equation f(2x) = kf(x), this equation admits numerous other analytic, convex solutions as well so that it cannot be used to uniquely characterize learning curves. Rather, it is shown that a pair of functional equations f(rx) = kf(x) and f(sx) = jf(x) where rⁿ ≠ s^m for any positive integers n and m suffice to uniquely determine the learning curve; compatibility of the two equations requires that log_rk = log_sj or there will be no learning curve satisfying the pair of equations. Two classes of almost learning curves are generated and studied by means of suitable perturbation terms in the differential equation y = by/x of the true or standard learning curve and these curves are applied to describe data not exhibiting exact learning-curve behavior. Finally the concept of average marginal hours or cost is introduced and its behavior is found to also exhibit the learning-curve phenomenon except for an initial deviation.     

Budgeting — an unnecessary evil

Almost 30 years ago — in 1970 — the largest commercial bank in Sweden, Handelsbanken, was in a major crisis. Profitability was low and the bank was in conflict with the authorities. As a result of the crisis the executive director left the bank, as did several of the top officials.At this point the board of the bank asked me to become executive director. At that time I was head of a provincial bank in the northern part of Sweden – Sundsvallsbanken. I had been at that bank for ten years. Before that I was a professional economist, head of a major research institute and an associate professor at the University of Stockholm. I did not have any practical business experience and knew nothing about banking, but after 10 years in Sundsvallsbanken, I had learned a lot and developed some firm ideas about how to run a bank with a large network of branch offices.     

Tripartite adjudication—an endangered species

This article focuses on the role of lay members in tripartite employment tribunals, arguing that tribunals' legitimacy has been undermined by restrictions on the use of members' workplace experience, by the growth of the law, by changes to the method of lay member appointment and because judges now decide certain cases alone.     

短生命周期产品供应链协调动态激励研究

为了解决短生命周期产品供应链协调的特殊性问题,文中采用博弈理论分析了供应链系统的多周期激励协调问题,从理论上给出了系统协调的最终结果:供应链系统最终处于平衡状态。应用马尔可夫决策过程建立了短生命周期产品供应链协调动态激励模型,实现了有限时段供应链系统多周期总体收益最大。通过数值分析,得到了供应链系统动态激励的帕累托最优策略。动态激励深入挖掘了供应链系统的潜能,在现有文献关注的激励内容的基础上,着重解决了激励过程,从而实现了供应链系统协调静态和动态激励的有机结合。     

考虑声誉效应的外包中服务商激励机制

在考虑声誉的情形下,建立一个博弈模型,探讨了外包中服务商激励约束机制的内在机理。分析表明：声誉对服务商激励有重要影响,可以提高服务商在前期的努力程度,在某种程度上,声誉效应能很好地解决来自服务商的道德风险问题。同时,文章还提出了基于服务商声誉的约束机制建设的建议。     

The Europeanisation—or the Erosion—of Industrial Relations?

This article considers the impact of European integration on industrial relations. An industrial relations regime can be understood as a tension between employment structured by market dynamics and broader social regulation, between the principles of contract and status. Economic Europeanisation threatens this relationship. Its survival may depend on new forms of supranational regulation, but not necessarily as the ‘social dimension’ of Europeanisation is customarily conceived.     

企业工作中的激励管理

通过研究发现,一个人如果没有受到激励,仅能发挥其能力的20-30％,如果受到正确而充分的激励,就能发挥其能力的80-90％,甚至更高。     

The decline of incentive pay in British manufacturing

Motivation theories and the strategic pay literature envisage that the management of employees can be well‐served by financial incentives and other forms of pay flexibility. Traditionally, UK manufacturing has made extensive use of variable payments systems (VPS), notably piece‐work and bonuses, but these have declined at the same time as managerial control over pay‐setting has increased. Evidence from six case studies suggests that a focus on pay is only part of the picture. Increased competition and change makes the design of VPS more complex, and new forms of work organisation become the focus of performance. In this context, firms have (i) abandoned individual incentive pay and (ii) aggregated VPS in support of broader objectives.     

The Dortmund Case — On the Enactment of an Urban Economic Imaginary

Launched in the year 2000, the so‐called Dortmund Project was a 10‐year local development initiative aimed at creating 70,000 new jobs and redeveloping the old industrial sites in Dortmund, a city in the Ruhr area of Germany. The project's proclaimed vision of a ‘new Dortmund’ is seen as a part of a new imaginary. This article uses a praxeological perspective to work out the enactment practices in this imaginary, viewing them as various nexuses of doings and sayings. In doing so, it stresses the relevance of the production and influence of different reports in this process and seeks to offer an insight into the complexity of the setting in which this imaginary was enacted.     

Vendor managed category management—an outsourcing solution in retailing

Outsourcing is expanding from parts and components to include services and process management. The question is no more just who designs and manufactures the goods, but also who manages the logistical processes along the supply chain. In this paper, we argue that this approach to outsourcing provides new opportunities for those retailing and grocery sectors that traditionally have not considered outsourcing as a strategic option to develop their operations. Retailers, especially supermarkets, are managing an increasing number of product categories and stock keeping units that have forced them to develop their replenishment practices in order to minimise out-of-stock problems. This paper examines the options open to the grocery retailing industry that will enable it to attack the problem through outsourcing. A new process innovation, vendor managed category management, is proposed. A potential application is presented by means of one real-life case, in which a distributor offers the retailers full management of one category that includes assortment forming and logistical functions.     

Portfolio selection in thinly traded environments—a case study

This paper proposes a flexible technique for selecting portfolios in an environment which includes thinly traded shares. The proposal uses the Capital Asset Pricing Model with a thinly traded beta estimator to generate the expected return input. This technique has the advantage of being applicable when the opportunity set includes well-traded securities, as the beta estimator converges to the ordinary least squares beta for well traded shares. In addition, it allows portfolio estimation to be carried out under a range of expected market performance scenarios. An empirical study on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange over the period 1974–85 indicates that the proposed method is superior to traditional techniques.