Lessons from Japan: American and Japanese strategies and goals in the 1990s

This article recounts various Japanese business approaches touted in the 1980s as “Lessons from Japan” for U.S. managers. The logical expectation, given the sheer bulk of the literature, was that U.S. managers would become more “Japanese” in their business strategies and goals while the Japanese would have become more entrenched in their approaches. Questionnaire responses from 95 Japanese and 70 American firms suggest, however, that U.S. managers tend to make few shifts from the strategies and goals they emphasized in the 1980s. Meanwhile Japanese managers report that they expect to move toward more “American” business practices. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The changing role of U.S.-based MNCs: A financial perspective

An increasing number of US.-based multinational companies have adopted a strategy of “inward-oriented” diversification in the 1980s. This article focuses on the ensuing financial performance of these firms, especially as compared to that of a group of U.S.-based domestic corporations. Specifically, well-known performance and risk measures are applied to a sample of multinational and domestic firms based in the U.S. The data are analyzed over three five-year periods (1979-1983, 1980-1984, and 1981-1985). The overall results, while providing total support for a few of the major issues and lending partial support to the others, seem to indicate that U.S. multinationals may have adopted a successful strategy in response to a changing global economic environment.     

Is it U.S. GAAP or IFRS? Understanding how R&D costs affect ratio analysis

While financial reporting standards under U.S. GAAP and IFRS are fundamentally similar, differences do exist that may affect our analysis of company financial statements. This is particularly true when comparing a U.S. company following U.S. GAAP to a firm that uses IFRS. To illustrate, we compare research and development (R&D) accounting methods under both sets of standards and illustrate how they affect the analysis of financial results of firms in a specific industry—automotive manufacturers. Our results provide insight into settings in which differences in R&D accounting may have the greatest impact on financial analysis.     

20-F reconciliations and investment recommendations by financial professionals

As part of the U.S. regulatory requirements, non-U.S. companies registered on U.S. stock exchanges (‘foreign registrants’) are required to compile financial reports that comply with U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (‘GAAP’) or provide a reconciliation of non-U.S. GAAP financial statements to U.S GAAP (20-F reconciliation). The objective of this study is to determine if identical information with respect to U.S. GAAP may be evaluated differently depending on whether the 20-F reconciliation information is presented in a positive (20-F reconciliation gain) or negative (20-F reconciliation loss) way. The research results indicate that the financial professionals' investment recommendations were significantly lower for a firm when it reports a reconciliation loss relative to when it reports a reconciliation gain or when it reports under U.S. GAAP, although the financial results were identical in all cases. Further, consistent with Bradshaw [Bradshaw MT. How do analysts use their earnings forecasts in generating stock recommendations? Account Rev 2004;79(1):25-50.], the financial professionals' expectations of earnings growth were significantly and positively associated with their investment recommendation.     

管理者金融危机经历影响企业金融化水平吗？——基于中国上市公司的实证研究

文章以我国2008—2017年非金融上市公司为样本，结合“烙印理论”，考察了管理者金融危机经历对非金融企业金融化水平的影响，研究发现：管理者的金融危机经历对其所在企业的金融化水平具有显著的正向影响，在一系列的稳健性检验后，该结论依然成立。且该效应在融资约束严重的企业和制度环境较好地区的企业中更加显著，而在金融危机期间遭受财务困境的企业中受到明显抑制。拓展的研究表明，经历过金融危机的管理者持有金融资产的动机并不单一，但获利动机更强烈。最后文章还发现，管理者的获利动机和管理者自信可能是金融危机经历影响企业金融化水平的关键作用机制。文章从企业微观层面拓展了非金融企业金融化水平的影响因素研究，并对企业管理者经历对非金融企业金融化的影响及作用机制研究进行了一定的探索。     

The Effects of Moral Reasoning and Self-Monitoring on CFO Intentions to Report Fraudulently on Financial Statements

This study adapts the theory of reasoned action (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980) to the behavior of fraudulent reporting on financial statements so as to examine the effects of moral reasoning and self-monitoring on intention to report fraudulently, using structural equation modeling. The paper seeks to investigate two of the red flags for financial statement fraud identified in Loebbecke et al.'s (1989) paper: client management displays a significant lack of moral fiber and client personnel exhibit strong personality anomalies. As expected, high moral reasoners are more influenced than low moral reasoners by their own attitude towards the behavior. Contrary to prior research, low self-monitors are found to be more influenced than high self-monitors by subjective norms. Future research is recommended to investigate the counter-intuitive results for self-monitors, to consider the implications of group decision making as regards the promulgation of fraudulent financial statements, and to examine additional red flags for financial statement fraud.     

The influence of management and auditors on consolidation decisions

Historically, the decision over whether or not to consolidate was guided by bright-line rules, which outlined the minimum percentage of ownership required in a subsidiary for it to be considered controlled by a reporting entity and thus included in the consolidated financial statements (CFSs). Today, U.S. GAAP and IFRS use a principles-based approach, which is guided by the concept of control to determine whether a subsidiary is to be consolidated in the CFSs. In this context, a debate exists between managers and auditors about which subsidiaries should be consolidated. To deepen our understanding of how managers and auditors grapple with consolidation decisions, we interviewed several CFOs and audit partners to determine if they are anchored to legalistic mechanisms or if, instead, they are strategically developing ways to support the consolidation decision. Based on our interviews, we find that opportunistic transactions—criticized at the time of the rules-based approach—still exist due to the search for legalistic mechanisms that protect underlying choices influenced by economic incentives. Such results are crucial for analysts and investors to properly interpret consolidated financial performance.     

Performance effects of alternative joint venture resource responsibility structures

This study examines the relationship between the acquirers of a joint venture's (JV's) resources and the JV's performance in achieving its partners' goals. Research data were collected through surveys of 83 U.S. firms involved in manufacturing JVs to examine the differential impact of alternative resource responsibility structures on JV performance. The analysis shows that JVs receiving a variety of resources from both partners outperform JVs where JV management is responsible for securing its own resources, and outperform JVs receiving resources primarily from a dominant partner. The implications of the study's results for theory development, future research, and practicing managers are discussed.     

Corporate ethics statements: Current status and future prospects

This paper reports on a study of large U.S. based corporations concerning the status of formal ethics statements. Almost all responding firms (91%) have promulgated a formal code of ethics while one-half have published values statements and about one-third have a corporate credo. Analysis of these statements concentrated on to whom they are communicated; whether codes of ethics contain information pertinent to the industry, include sanctions for violations and provide specific guidance regarding gifts. Conclusions and implications for managers and researchers are drawn.Patrick E. Murphy is Professor and Chairman of the Department of Marketing at the University of Notre Dame. He is coauthor (with G. R. Laczniak) ofEthical Marketing Decisions: The Higher Road, Allyn & Bacon, 1993. His research interests focus on ethical and public policy issues facing marketing and business. He serves on the editorial review boards of several marketing and ethics journals.     

Women as Managers in the United States and China: A Cross-Cultural Study

This article investigated Chinese and U.S. attitudes toward women as managers with the goal of establishing an empirical basis for comparison and understanding of the glass ceiling potential in each culture. The authors used the Women as Managers Scale (WAMS) to measure perceptions of 919 U.S. and Chinese participants. Results indicated differences in perceptions by gender and nationality. Overall, women were perceived less favorably as managers by Chinese and U.S. males as compared to perceptions of Chinese and U.S. female participants. Findings are discussed in terms of existing research and areas for future research are suggested.     

Ethical Decision-Making Differences Between American and Moroccan Managers

Our research’s aim is to assess the effect of cultural factors on business ethical decision-making process in a Western cultural context and in a non-Western cultural context. Specifically, this study investigates ethical perceptions, religiosity, personal moral philosophies, corporate ethical values, gender, and ethical intentions of U.S. and Moroccan business managers. The findings demonstrate that significant differences do exist between the two countries in idealism and relativism. Moroccan managers tend to be more idealistic than the U.S. managers. There is a strong positive relationship between religiosity and idealism. There were mixed findings in examining the correlates of religiosity and various components of ethical intentions. Moroccan managers were more homogenous in their corporate ethical values than were the U.S. managers. The results demonstrate that (in general) idealism is a good predictor of ethical intentions and behaviors. Additionally, managers from the two countries differed in the degree of relationship between perceptions and intentions in three of the four scenarios. This study’s results confirm other research findings that, in general, female business managers have higher ethical sensitivity in terms of their ethical judgment than their male counterparts. Managerial implications are also discussed.     

Cultural Change and Marketing

ABSTRACT

The results of this study suggest that marketing strategies need to be adjusted to changing cultures. Culture affects marketing decisions regarding product, price, promotion and place (the 4 Ps). Many marketing studies have been reported based on Hofstede's seminal work on national culture (1980). Marketing managers need to be cautious about assuming the validity of the Anglo cluster equating the cultures of the United States (U.S.) and Canada. We should recognize that national cultures are changing in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, as well as most other countries in the world. Our findings for a very recent sample of people attending executive and MBA programs would seem to apply to the upwardly-mobile business class. Contrary to the ubiquitous Hofstede data found in textbooks, we found no significant differences in Power Distance between the U.S., Mexico and Canada. Our findings regarding differences in Uncertainty Avoidance show that Mexico did not have a significantly higher mean than the U.S., but that the U.S. had a higher mean than Canada. The U.S. and Canada did not differ significantly on Individualism/Collectivism. Our results suggest that caution should be taken in automatically assuming cultural parity between the U.S. and Canada and that established cultural positions between the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) member nations may be changing.     

Store Manager–Store Performance Relationship: A Research Note

Despite the critical role that store managers play in linking top management teams and service/retail employees, as well as in fulfilling corporate strategy within chain store environments, service management research infrequently addresses the factors that may promote store managers’ effective exchange relationships within the firm and subsequent effects on store operations and profitability. This study focuses on how store managers’ performance orientation, trust of a regional manager’s capabilities, and organizational commitment affect a manager’s relationships relative to regional managers and frontline employees. The direct effect of store managers’ relationship capacity on store performance is also examined. The results, based on survey data from managers of stores of a retail and service chain and company financial reports, generally support the suggested hypotheses. Specifically, a store manager’s relationship with his/her supervisor has a strong influence on how the manager views the supervisor’s leadership support and leadership style, which ultimately influence store performance (primary goods/service sales and store profits).     

Social media resources and capabilities as strategic determinants of social media performance

Recent research reveals meaningful uses of digital marketing instruments, though without addressing internal, organizational antecedents of a firm’s social media performance. Drawing on resource-based theory and the concept of dynamic capabilities, this article identifies social media–specific resources and dynamic capabilities that can enhance social media performance. It also offers theoretically supported and validated scales to measure them. The authors empirically investigate their performance effects using different kinds of data pertaining to consumer brands, gathered from manager surveys, brands’ financial statements, Facebook fans, Instagram followers, YouTube subscribers, and brand image measures. The proposed social media resources and capabilities improve social media performance directly and brand perception indirectly. In particular, the impact of the social media strategy and measurement is moderated by firm size. A profile deviation analysis further reveals that the social media capabilities gap between top-performing versus other brands explains significant variance in social media performance. The advantages of developing social media capabilities early on also persist in the long-term, with substantial relevance for managers.     

中国上市公司现金流管理研究——兼对中美市场现金流管理行为比较研究

This paper examines cash flow management in the Chinese market and compares it to that in the U.S. market. It adopts Burgstahler and Dichev (1997) and Degeorge et al.’s (1999) method and the best-fitted distribution model to analyze the financial data of Chinese listed firms during 1998–2005 and the forecasted cash flow per share (CPS) data for Chinese firms in the I/B/E/S database during 1993–2005. Results reveal that cash flows reports are not as reliable as people think, and managers manipulate cash flows just as they manipulate earnings. Further analyses show that zero point, last year’s cash flow and analyst cash flow forecast are the three thresholds that influence managers’ decision when they report cash flow performance. Over 16% of the firms with small positive cash flows manipulate their cash flow. Moreover, 16.64% of the firms with small changes in cash flow and 9.81% of the firms with small surprises manipulate cash flows to reach the targets. A comparative analysis shows that cash flow management behaviors around zero and zero changes are more prevalent in the Chinese market than in the U.S. market. Cash flow management around analyst cash flow forecasts, however, is no more prevalent than that in the U.S. market. Translated and revised from Zhongguo Kuaiji Pinglun 中国会计评论 (China Accounting Review), 2007, 5(3): 381–400     

Challenges in the education of the contemporary U.S. international manager

Failure rates of 30% for U.S. expatriate international managers relative to less than 10% for comparable Japanese and European international managers represent substantial costs to individuals, corporations, and U.S. global economic interests. The authors provide a profile of successful expatriate international managers and recommend four changes: (1) inclusion of international management development as a strategic U.S. corporate issue for global success; (2) alteration of current U.S. corporate selection procedures; (3) expanded implementation of rigorous leading edge international training programs; and (4) a renewed U.S. corporate-academic-government collaborative partnership to enhance international competitiveness.     

Do Leveraged Firms Underinvest in Corporate Social Responsibility? Evidence from Health and Safety Programs in U.S. Firms

The explosion of health-related costs in U.S. firms over more than a decade is a huge concern for managers. The initiation of Health and Safety (H&;S) programs at the firm level is an adequate Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative to contain this evolution. However, in spite of their documented efficiency, firms underinvest in those programs. This appears as a puzzle for health economists. In this paper, we uncover a strong negative relation of financial leverage to the implementation of H&;S programs. The negative impact of debt on investment and CSR activities is generally interpreted as an efficient disciplinary effect of debt on managers. H&;S are particularly well suited to revisit this evidence, given their strong profitability and homogeneity across firms. Very interestingly, the negative effect is stronger for firms with high free cash flows, for which debt is used to prevent overinvestment. This strongly suggests that debt, while disciplining managers, also discourages investments which are valuable both for firms and society.     

Value co-creation and social media: Investigating antecedents and influencing factors in the U.S. retail banking industry

This study seeks to examine and unearth antecedents to co-creation behaviours within a U.S. retail banking context. A critical aspect for marketing managers and academics alike, co-creation has a strong influence on tangible factors such as profit and intangible factors such as referrals, satisfaction and feedback. Antecedents were identified as trust, customer engagement and participation attitude whilst social media usage was a consumer characteristic identified as influencing co-creation. Data was collected from 489 U.S. retail banking customers via an online survey. The data was analysed via structural equation modelling. The findings indicate that customer engagement influences trust, co-creation and participation attitude. Participation attitude was found to influence trust and co-creation but trust had no direct effect on co-creation. The study further found that social media usage intensity influenced co-creation behaviours. The findings contribute in three ways. First, this is one of the first studies to scrutinise participation attitude in an attempt to explain co-creation behaviours for U.S. banks over social media. Second, identification of precursors to value co-creation has been ascertained in a U.S. retail banking social media context. Third, the study additionally contributes to the findings that social media usage has a moderating effect in value co-creation and offers a potential segmentation strategy.     

Why Have U.S. Prices Become Independent of Business Cycles?

This article analyzes the issue of price cyclicality from a Post Keynesian perspective. It shows that there are two key factors at the center of the mechanism for the sudden U.S. transition from counter‐cyclical to a‐cyclical price movement in the early 1980s. First, the cost pass‐through policy has been changed to ensure that the cyclical changes of input prices and/or labor productivity are absorbed more thoroughly and are thus reflected more frequently in profit markups than occurred prior to 1984. This relatively increased adaptability of the profit markups in the aggregate sense between the pricing periods cushions the direct effect of cyclical changes in the cost base on price cyclicality. Second, a structural change in the U.S. labor productivity's cyclical property has generated cost‐base stability during the post‐1984 period. Declines in hiring and firing costs and cutbacks in social security benefits have led the labor discipline effect to dominate the labor hoarding effect. This has allowed labor productivity to increase as the unemployment rate rises; thus, the cost base cyclicality has weakened, and prices have become less cyclical since 1984.     

Has financial attitude impacted the trading activity of retail investors during the COVID-19 pandemic?

Financial attitude influences the financial behavior of retail investors. Although the extant research has acknowledged and examined this relationship, the measures of financial attitude and behavior still vary widely and are generally posed as a series of questions rather than statements. In addition to this, there is insufficient knowledge regarding retail investors' behavior in the face of a health crisis, such as the current COVID-19 pandemic. This study addresses these gaps in the prior literature by examining the relative influence of six dimensions of financial attitude, namely, financial anxiety, optimism, financial security, deliberative thinking, interest in financial issues, and needs for precautionary savings, on the trading activity of retail investors during the pandemic. Data were collected from 404 respondents and analyzed using the artificial neural network (ANN) method. The results revealed that all six dimensions had a positive influence on trading activity, with interest in financial issues exerting the strongest influence, followed by deliberative thinking. The study thus contributes important inferences for researchers and managers.