Less is More,or Not? On the Interplay between Bundles of Slack Resources,Firm Performance and Firm Survival

Although a significant body of research has investigated the independent effects of distinct types of slack resources, current theoretical and empirical work does not sufficiently clarify how bundles of slack resources affect firm outcomes. Drawing on the resource constraints literature and the slack literature, we investigate how distinct bundles of financial and human resource slack influence firm performance and survival. Using a sample of 4715 European information and communication technology firms, we show that neither parallel resource abundance (having slack in financial and human resources) nor parallel resource constraints (lacking slack in financial and human resources) are optimal for firm performance and survival. However, firms with selective constraints that combine slack in financial resources with constraints in human resources exhibit superior performance without decreased survival prospects. Taken together, this study extends current research by providing a more nuanced view of the relationships between slack resources, firm performance, and firm survival.     

Compete at the expense of responsibility? Firm’s alliance responsibility in innovation process for SMEs

This paper attempts to investigate the impact of a firm’s social responsibility on its level of competition, cooperation and co-opetition using the game theory approach. We consider a duopoly market that comprises the focal firm which undertakes the responsibility of alliance and peripheral firm that represents all other firms within the technological innovational alliance of Small and Medium Enterprise (SME). Both the focal firm and the peripheral firm conduct technological innovation to overcome the constraints of technology, talent and fund. The study concludes that competitive efforts could substitute alliance responsibility, and cooperation efforts are contingent upon the market demand and/or alliance responsibility.     

The Formation and Development of Modern Firm Financial Governance Theory

This paper points out the drawbacks of traditional financial governance. After introducing Chinese and western economists＇ researches on firm financial governance theory, we put forward modern finn financial governance system, which is based on the core of finance-rights allocation. In our opinion, the theory of finance-rights is the important cornerstone of the theory of financial finance-rights theory. Financial governance structure system is the basic framework of the research of financial governance.     

Research on Firm Size, Firm Performance and Internal Auditing Modes——Based on Listed Manufacturing Companies of China

This paper is based on the samples of listed manufacturing companies of China, taking the financial performance as criterion, and then does research on the firm performance with different internal auditing modes, using Cross-sectional data to analyze the distribution of internal auditing modes and the characteristics of the firm performance. The conclusion is that setting up internal auditing is good for the development of companies, but the function of internal auditing has not been widelv fulfilled.     

Experience Matters? The Impact of Prior CEO Experience on Firm Performance

We sample CEOs of the 2005 S&P 500 corporations to look at the relationship between experience in the CEO position of a different firm and the post‐succession financial performance of the firm that they currently lead. We find that experience in the CEO position is negatively related to firm performance. CEOs who directly move to their current CEO position from the previous one and those with job‐specific experience in the same or related industry or at the helm of a previous company similar in size to the current one are associated with significantly lower post‐succession performance than those without prior CEO experience. The results contribute to the literatures on CEO succession, the performance effect of job‐specific experience, and the transferability of human capital. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Understanding the Inputs into Innovation: Do Cities Substitute for Internal Firm Resources?

We examine whether there is a trade-off between employing internal (firm) resources and purchased external (local) resources in process innovation. We draw on a rich dataset of Internet investments by 86,879 US establishments to examine decisions to invest in advanced Internet technology. We show that the marginal contribution of internal resources is greater outside of a major urban area than inside one. Agglomeration is less important for firms with highly capable IT workers. When firms invest in innovative processes they act as if resources available in cities are partial substitutes for both establishment-level and firm-level internal resources.     

Analysis on the Background of Applicability of the Conservatism Convention

＂Conservatism＂ is a widely accepted accounting convention in the industrialized world, but it has long been slated and prohibited under the orthodox ideological influences. To date, the conservatism convention has not been fully adopted or implemented although the governments have made substantial efforts to reform its accounting system to bridge the gaps between the accounting practices in recent years. The study findings will facilitate a proper assessment of the future development of accounting standards and practices.     

The wisdom of the few or the wisdom of the many? An indirect test of the marginal trader hypothesis

The Marginal Trader Hypothesis (Forsythe et al. 1992, in American Economic Review 82(5): 1142–1161) posits that a small group of well-informed traders keep an asset’s market price equal to its fundamental value. Forsythe et al. base this claim on evidence from U.S. presidential prediction markets. We test the Marginal Trader Hypothesis by examining a decision task that precludes marginal traders. Specifically, students are asked to predict the class average for a given exam. We show that performance on our task is similar to that reported for the Iowa Electronic Markets, and that accuracy is unrelated to academic performance and does not correlate across tasks.     

In Search of the Impactful and the Interesting: Swings of the Pendulum?

In this article we reflect on our time as editors of JMS during the period 2003–09. First we describe the context as we saw it on assuming editorship of the Journal and the actions that we took to improve the quality of scholarship published in the journal in order to set JMS on the trajectory to become a world‐leading Journal. We articulate our view of what quality means in this context and observe that we eschewed the USA–Europe divide. Rather, to be publishable, all papers had to meet the highest standards relative to their epistemological assumptions. Finally, we address two important challenges facing the Journal, and indeed management research in general, and consider what they mean for the future of JMS, notably in relation to open access publishing and to provide greater practical relevance. We conclude that the latter represents a swing of the pendulum towards the kinds of papers published in the early years of JMS but that recent developments in JMS provide new conceptual frameworks and empirical methods that contribute to enhanced insights for practice.     

Can University Leaders Manage the Tensions Between the Practice of Innovation and the Traditions of the University?

The practice of innovating within a university causes tension because it is not well understood, is perceived as risky, and is seen as a threat to established power, which makes it difficult to know where to house it for maximum effect. The tension can be reduced by focusing on the similarities of innovating and teaching, inviting faculty and staff to serve as early adopters, and having senior administrators be the budgetary and political champions for innovation initiatives.     

Does the Diversification–Firm Performance Relationship Change Over Time? A Meta‐Analytical Review

We study the relationship between diversification and firm performance in the context of the decline in levels of diversification over time. We argue that the pressure to reduce diversification may have more strongly affected those firms whose diversification strategies were most detrimental to firm performance. We employ meta‐analytical regression (MARA) in order to test our hypotheses, using a total of 267 primary studies containing 387 effect sizes based on 150,000 firm‐level observations from over 60 years of research on the diversification–firm performance relationship. The findings suggest that levels of unrelated diversification have decreased, whereas levels of related diversification have increased since the mid‐1990s, following an initial decrease in the 1970s and 1980s. Furthermore, we find that the relationship between unrelated diversification and firm performance has improved significantly over time, whereas the relationship between related diversification and performance has remained relatively stable.     

Effect of the Government’s Use of Social Media on the Reliability of the Government: Focus on Twitter

Abstract

The social media have been well recognized as important spaces for providing the people with government service and PR policy and they have been utilized by most of the government entities. Therefore, we try to identify whether the social media can be used as tools to enhance the reliability of the government. This study indicates Twitter is different from other conventional channels not only in the form but also in substance. Therefore, the service prioritizing more on transparency, participation, and communication or relationship appears more desirable and is utilized to the maximum.     

Internal Commitment or External Collaboration? The Impact of Human Resource Management Systems on Firm Innovation and Performance

Complementing previous research that showed a positive effect of general human resource management (HRM) systems on general firm performance, this article undertakes an integrative approach to compare the main effects and examine the interaction effects of two particular HRM systems on influencing firm innovation and performance. Using data from 179 organizations in China, we found that both the commitment‐oriented system, which emphasized internal cohesiveness, and the collaboration‐oriented system, which was intended to build external connections, contributed to firm innovation and, subsequently, bottom‐line performance. We also found an attenuated interaction between the two HRM systems in predicting firm innovation. We employed a mediated‐moderation path model to extricate the relationships. Results suggested that organizations that implemented both HRM systems to promote innovation might face ambidexterity challenges. Ideas for future research and practical implications are discussed.     

The Terminal Value （TV） Performing in Firm Valuation： The Gap of Literature and Research Agenda

The uncertainty about the future of firms must be modeled and incorporated in the valuation of enterprises outside the explicit period of analysis, i.e., in the continuing or terminal value （TV）. There is a multiplicity of factors that influence the TV of firms which are not being considered within current evaluation models. This aspect leads to the incurring of unrecoverable errors, thus leading to values of goodwill or bad will far away from the substantial value of intrinsic assets. As a consequence, the evaluation results will be presented markedly different from market values. There is no consensus in the scientific community about the method of computation of the TV as a forecast in an infinite horizon. The size of the terminal, or non-explicit period, assumed as infinite, is never called into question by scientific literature, or the probability of business bankruptcy. This paper aims to promote a study of the existing literature on the TV, to highlight the fragility of the evaluation models of companies that have been used by the academic community and by financial analysts, and to point out lines for future research to minimize these errors.     

On the phenomenology of technology: the “Janus-faces” of mobile phones

This paper argues that technologies perform in Janus faced ways; that is, in ways that are ironic, perverse and paradoxical, and it is argued that these qualities are important to apprehend if we are to more fully understand the role of technology in organizations and in our daily lives.The argument opens with an account of Janus as a metaphorical evocation of irony and paradox, and general examples of Janus faced technologies are given. Prominent philosophies of technology and theoretical approaches to technology are discussed in terms of their capacity to account for generalized examples of irony and paradox. Of these, it is argued that the most satisfactory account is provided by (a) Heidegger’s suggestion that our world is enframed by technology, taken together with (b) a logic of sociotechnical systems based in relational and hybrid ontologies. This sketch of the philosophical landscape occupied by Janus is followed by a interpretation of the specific case of mobile phones, which provides concrete and hopefully vivid examples of the Janus faced performance of technology.The conclusion reached is that the Janus faced metaphor and its philosophical context provides the researcher with the analytic advantages of foregrounding uncertainty, avoiding an essentialist or determinist role for technology, and allowing for the possibility of the presence of tension and contradiction in accounts of sociotechnical outcomes.     

The Study of the Application of the Gray Relevancy Analysis to the Value Chain Based Cost Control

Cost problem is always a bottleneck which ties to the development and the competition ability in the enterprise of our country, especially in state-owned enterprise. Practice proves that traditional cost control can not satisfy the needs of enterprises. Enterprises are seeking better cost control approach with great efforts in order to calculate and control cost more accurately, and require cost control system has more strong functions. This paper analyzes value chain based cost control approach, and applies the gray relevancy analysis to the approach rightly.