Managing risk in the formative years: Evidence from young enterprises in Europe

This paper empirically investigates aspects of risk management in young small enterprises? effort to survive and grow. We use a new dataset on several thousands small businesses in their “formative age” (2–8 years old) in 10 European countries and 18 sectors. Firms across all types of sectors use internal risk mitigation strategies to manage technology risk and operational risk. Financial risk is managed by tapping formal and informal networks. Market risk appears less amenable to internal management action. Formal network participation (strategic alliances) is a strategy cutting across all kinds of risk with the exception of operational risk. Firms in knowledge-intensive sectors (high-tech manufacturing and KIBS) engage in risk management activities more extensively. Firms led by more educated entrepreneurs and/or operating in demanding volatile markets tend to network more and to use internal risk mitigation strategies more extensively.     

高校学生政治参与行为调查研究

本文通过对重庆市10余所高校学生的调查研究得出当代大学生政治参与行为的特征,其主要表现在政治投票和结社、政治接触以及政治表达这三个方面。在此基础上分析了大学生政治参与行为的现状,从而对加强大学生政治参与的相关行为提出相应的建议。     

Public–Private Sector Comparisons of Nurses’ Work Harassment Using Set: Italy and Australia

Using Social Exchange Theory, this study compared the impact of nurses’ workplace relationships with management and colleagues upon nurses’ work harassment, psychological well-being, and engagement within the public and private sectors in both Australia and Italy. Using survey data from 1,587 nurses, SEM findings indicated that public sector nurses in Australia had the lowest satisfaction with supervision, higher work harassment, and lower engagement and psychological well-being, than the other groups. The implications include that poor workplace relationships enable work harassment and therefore management upskilling is required along with changes in performance measures to ensure greater nurse well-being and engagement.     

The Buffering Effect of Perceived Organizational Support on the Relationship Between Work Engagement and Behavioral Outcomes

The present study examined the commonly held assumption that a low level of work engagement leads to higher turnover intentions and employee deviant behavior. Employee survey results (n = 175) from a manufacturing organization in the United Kingdom showed that employee work engagement correlates negatively with lagged measures of turnover intentions and deviant work behavior directed toward the organization. The results suggest that perceived organizational support moderates the relationship between work engagement and turnover intentions and deviant behaviors directed toward the organization, such that perceived organizational support compensates for relatively low levels of work engagement. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

High Job Performance Through Co‐Developing Performance Measures With Employees

According to various studies, employee participation in the development of performance measures can increase job performance. This study focuses on how this job performance elevation occurs. We hypothesize that when employees have participated in the development of performance measures, they perceive these measures to be of higher quality, which in turn elevates their attitudes toward, perceived social norms for, and perceived control over performing well in their jobs. Based on the theory of planned behavior, the latter three factors are hypothesized to increase job performance. Survey data from 95 employees as well as 88 of their managers were analyzed using structural equation modeling. Employee participation in developing performance measures is found to be related to job performance, via perceived measurement quality and employees’ perceived control over performing well. We discuss the practical and theoretical implications of these findings, including the limitations of this study's design, and sketch a number of future research paths in this area. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Financial participation and performance in Europe

This article assesses whether financial participation (profit‐sharing and employee share ownership plans) is associated with positive performance outcomes, and whether direct and indirect employee participation complement financial participation in this respect. It also examines whether employee involvement in the design of financial participation afects performance outcomes. The article uses data from a survey of listed firms in Finland, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. Several outcome measures are used, based on respondents' assessments of the effects of financial participation. Higher participation in equity‐based plans, but not in profit‐sharing, is found to be associated with more successfil outcomes. None of fhe other forms of employe? pnrticipafion uins found to contribute to the success of financial participation. The results therefore cast some doubt on complementarity between financial and other forms of participation.     

Integrated financial supervision: Which model?

Integrated agencies supervising banks, nonbank financial institutions, and securities markets have been gaining popularity around the globe. Using a unique data set on compliance with international standards in 84 countries, we find that greater supervisory integration is associated with higher quality of insurance and securities supervision and greater consistency of supervision across sectors. Within the different forms of integration, we find some support for the “twin peaks” model that integrates supervision across sectors but separates business conduct and prudential supervision. We also find that whether supervision is located inside or outside the central bank has no significant relation to supervisory quality.     

Sustainable procurement in Malaysian organizations: Practices,barriers and opportunities

The purpose of this study is to uncover the extent of sustainable procurement practices amongst procurement directors/managers employed in public and private sector organizations in Malaysia, a developing country where socialization is underpinned by religious beliefs. The results showed there is a significant variation in the adoption of sustainable procurement across the sectors with the private sector registering significantly higher levels of SP practices than their public counterparts. Lack of awareness posed the most significant barrier to sustainable procurement implementation regardless of organizations or sectors whilst improved working conditions, an organization׳s/council׳s/public image, and organizational efficiency and transparency provided optimal opportunities for implementing sustainable procurement practices. Finally this study identified the two new factors of religion and sense of humanity as influencing an employee׳s engagement in sustainable procurement practices.     

Helping top management avoid failure during planned change

Managers use a variety of tactics to set directions, to identify ideas, and to implement plans during planned change. Some of these tactics were found to be quite successful, and others have high rates of failure. Failure stemmed from imposing ideas, adopting ideas after a limited search, and using power to implement plans. Managers were far more successful when objectives were set and the need for action made clear at the outset, when an unrestricted search for ideas was carried out, and when participation was used to entice people to go along with the planned change. Suggestions to improve practice are offered as steps to take and steps to avoid during planned change. © 1993 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

How warm is the corporate response to climate change? Evidence from Pakistan and the UK

In response to growing consensus among scientists and governments to act fast to avoid dangerous impacts of climate change, many industries have started to prepare for a carbon‐constrained world. However, this response is far from being uniform. Often action is predicated on economic, technological, organizational and institutional drivers and barriers, which vary between countries and across industrial sectors. In order to understand the effectiveness of industry response, it is therefore important to analyse corporate response across different sectors in different countries. Focusing on the nine most energy‐intensive and greenhouse gas (GHG) emitting industrial sectors, this paper compares corporate responses to climate change in Pakistan and the UK. By analysing the divergence of strategies adopted by industries across different sectors in two countries, the paper examines the key factors influencing corporate adoption and implementation of GHG reduction and energy‐efficiency strategies in Pakistan and the UK. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

中国能源碳排放的区域差异及其影响因素分析

本文采用1998-2007年30个省份的能源消耗、工业产业、交通和生活数据,从省域层面上分析了碳排放总量和单位GDP碳排放量的空间差异和变动情况,并分阶段分类型对单位GDP碳排放量的影响因素作了逐步线性回归分析.结果表明:无论从碳排放总量还是单位GDP碳排放量来看,其都存在明显的空间差异;从变动情况来看,高于全国平均单位GDP碳排放量的省份有向南部内陆省份扩大趋势.不同水平的单位GDP碳排放量影响因素差异大,高于全国平均单位GDP碳排放量的省份影响因素以工业行业结构为主,低于全国平均单位GDP碳排放量的省份影响因素以交通和生活为主,且制造业产业结构对单位GDP碳排放量开始起抑制作用.     

Conceptualising the dynamics of employee information and consultation: evidence from the Republic of Ireland

The debate concerning the emerging regulatory environment for employee voice continues apace, in particular the requirements to inform and consult employees as a result of the European Employee Information and Consultation Directive. This article examines the processes used to inform and consult employees across 15 case studies in the Republic of Ireland. It evaluates different voice arrangements using a conceptual framework that seeks to capture the dynamics of different employee voice schemes across union and non‐union companies. The findings suggest that participation is more robust when the channels for information and consultation accommodate both conflictual and cooperative processes. It is shown that robust forms of participation are more likely through processes that facilitate independent representation. The evidence also shows that some employers may devise their own counterbalancing forms of (pseudo) consultation, in an attempt to minimise the impact of regulatory rights for employee voice.     

Child-custody reform, marital investment in children, and the labor supply of married mothers

Research on child custody primarily focuses on the well-being of children following divorce. We extend this literature by examining how the prospect of joint child custody affects within-marriage investment in children through changes in household bargaining power. Variation in the timing of joint-custody reforms across states provides a natural-experiment framework with which to examine within-marriage investment in children. The probability of children's private school attendance declines by 12% in states that adopt joint-custody laws. We also find evidence linking joint-custody reform to higher rates of labor force participation for married mothers, which may indicate less time devoted household production.     

Enhancing the green efficiency of fundamental sectors in China’s industrial system: A spatial-temporal analysis

Due to sectoral interactions in the economy, the overall green efficiency (GE) of China’s industrial system relies heavily on fundamental sectors that contribute substantial energy to the supply chain production of other sectors but shows low sectoral GE. For the three fundamental sectors in China’s industrial systems, namely the smelting and pressing of nonferrous metals (SPNFM), the processing of petroleum, coking, and nuclear fuel (PPCNF); and the manufacturing of nonmetallic mineral products (MNMMP), we employed a three-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) model to measure GE in the fundamental sectors in 30 provinces from 2010 to 2015. We then adopted a stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) model to evaluate the influence of technological innovation (TI), industrial agglomeration (IA), environmental regulation (ER), and intraindustry competition (IC). The results showed that GE in the three fundamental sectors varied spatially. Specifically, TI promoted GE in MNMMP, but the effect was not obvious in the SPNFM and PPCNF sectors. Moreover, ER had positive impacts on GE in the fundamental sectors. The effects of IA and IC on GE in the fundamental sectors varied in direction and strength. After eliminating the impacts of environmental effects and statistical noise, the real GE in the three fundamental sectors varied significantly compared to the comprehensive GE. Policy opportunities for enhancing GE in the fundamental sectors mainly lie in region-specific policy and regulations that avoid a “one-size-fits-all” governance approach.     

顾客参与对行为意向的影响研究

本文基于顾客参与理论及相关研究文献,以美发业为分析单位,建立顾客参与对行为意向影响的关系模型,在问卷调查的基础上得出数据,并运用SPSS15．0和LISREL软件进行结构方程模型等分析以验证假设检验。实证分析结果表明：顾客参与的信息分享维度对服务质量和行为意向的影响不显著;顾客参与的责任行为维度对服务质量和行为意向分别产生正向显著影响;顾客参与的人际互动维度对服务质量产生直接影响,并以服务质量为中介变量影响行为意向。因此,建议服务企业鼓励顾客参与服务传递过程、加强关系营销并不断提高服务质量。     

Work environment and participation: the case of teachers in Denmark and New Zealand

Employees' participation in decision making at work is often identified as a key element in work environment quality. In this comparative case study, the focus is on teachers' work in Denmark and Zealand. The substantial variations in work environment quality found across four schools are shown to be associated with corresponding differences in participation. In particular, perceived work environment quality is associated with collective and representative forms of participation.     

In the LEED: Racing to the Top in Environmental Self‐Regulation

Does voluntary participation in eco‐certification become more substantive over time, or less? Although past research on voluntary programs suggests that later participants are more likely to greenwash by only symbolically adopting voluntary standards, theories of regulatory competition suggest a possible “race to the top.” We argue that participation in voluntary programs can facilitate competition that enables a race, and we advance a theory of self‐regulatory competition to explain dynamics of participation in voluntary environmental programs. Under this perspective, environmental self‐regulation may facilitate a race to the top, despite possibilities for purely symbolic adoption. Analyzing data from a voluntary green building certification program in the United States, we introduce a methodology to distinguish propensities for symbolic certification from more substantive environmental performance. Data demonstrate that later adopters invest additional resources to attain higher certification, becoming greener and suggesting a race to the top in a voluntary greenbuilding certification program.     

The influence of insurance company earnings and dividends in establishing stock price floors and ceilings: Further evidence based upon industry sector classifications

Prior research regarding the influence of dividends and earnings on stock prices in the insurance industry is extended through comparison across insurance industry sectors. Dividends and earnings appear to have different impacts across sectors and at the high versus low levels of the annual stock price trading range.     

The Effect of Income Distribution on the Ability of Growth to Reduce Poverty: Evidence from Rural and Urban African Economies

The present study examines the extent to which income distribution affects the ability of economic growth to reduce poverty, based on 1990s data for a sample of rural and urban sectors of African economies. Using the basic‐needs approach, an analysis‐of‐covariance model is derived and estimated, with the headcount, gap, and squared gap poverty ratios serving as the respective dependent variables, and the Gini coefficient and PPP‐adjusted incomes as explanatory variables. The study finds that the responsiveness of poverty to income growth is a decreasing function of inequality, albeit at varying rates for the three poverty measures: lowest for the headcount, followed by the gap and fastest for the squared gap. The ranges for the income elasticity in the sample are estimated at: 0.02–0.68, 0.11–1.05, and 0.10–1.35, respectively, for these poverty measures. Furthermore while, on average, the responsiveness of poverty to income growth appears to be the same between the rural and urban sectors, there are substantial sectoral differences across countries. The results suggest the need for country‐specific emphases on growth relative to inequality.     

Weekly pattern in higher moments: An empirical test in Hong Kong stock market

This paper provides a direct test on the day-of-the-week effect on higher moments of stock returns and compares across different industrial sectors of the Hong Kong market. Empirical results show that daily returns of six different industrial sectors on all weekdays are non-normally distributed. The hypothesis of equal higher moments is rejected by most pairs of weekdays, particularly the Monday-Tuesday pair, for all indices, supporting the existence of the day-of-the-week effect on higher moments. The results also show that the weekly pattern on volatility and higher moments cannot help explain the weekly pattern on mean returns through the concept of risk premium. Further analysis shows that Rogalski’s effect exists on the higher moments because the day-of-the-week effect exists only in non-January months.