Competition and managerial autonomy

I formalize and challenge the idea that competition forces managers to make better choices, thus favoring managerial autonomy in decision making. If managers care about keeping their position or avoiding interference, and they can make strategic choices that affect both expected firm profits and their riskiness, even if competition at first pushes the manager towards profit maximization, further increases in competition might lead him to take excessive risks. To curb this possibility, the principal owner optimally reduces the degree of autonomy granted to the manager. Hence, higher levels of managerial autonomy are more likely for intermediate levels of competition.     

Modelling spatial regimes in farms technologies

We exploit the information derived from geographical coordinates to endogenously identify spatial regimes in technologies that are the result of a variety of complex, dynamic interactions among site-specific environmental variables and farmer decision making about technology, which are often not observed at the farm level. Controlling for unobserved heterogeneity is a fundamental challenge in empirical research, as failing to do so can produce model misspecification and preclude causal inference. In this article, we adopt a two-step procedure to deal with unobserved spatial heterogeneity, while accounting for spatial dependence in a cross-sectional setting. The first step of the procedure takes explicitly unobserved spatial heterogeneity into account to endogenously identify subsets of farms that follow a similar local production econometric model, i.e. spatial production regimes. The second step consists in the specification of a spatial autoregressive model with autoregressive disturbances and spatial regimes. The method is applied to two regional samples of olive growing farms in Italy. The main finding is that the identification of spatial regimes can help drawing a more detailed picture of the production environment and provide more accurate information to guide extension services and policy makers.     

The role of performance appraisals in motivating employees

Workers' rewards and career perspectives often depend on how their supervisors perceive their performance. However, evaluating a worker's performance is often difficult. We develop a model in which a worker is uncertain about his own performance and about his supervisor's ability to assess him. The supervisor gives the worker a performance appraisal aiming to affect both the worker's self‐perception and his own credibility in assessing the performance. We examine how performance appraisals affect the worker's future performance. Our model's predictions are consistent with empirical findings. Supervisors give, on average, “too” positive appraisals, and both positive and negative feedback can (de)motivate workers.     

Success Factors in Product Innovation: A Selective Review of the Literature

In today's increasingly competitive climate, more and more managers are having to update themselves on the range of factors that determine product innovation success. Such successes can be measured at the project (product) level or at the program level. Axel Johne and Patricia Snelson have prepared a review of factors associated with achieving success in a high proportion of recently developed new products. The authors address practical questions, such as the following: To what extent can product innovation be planned? Should development tasks be scheduled sequentially or in parallel? What is the proper degree of formality in effective new product decision making? What are the optimal organizational arrangements? The article concentrates on recent writings, drawing chiefly from journal articles published after 1980, including a large number from the Journal of Product Innovation Management. Factors contributing to success are ordered according to the now well-known McKinsey 7 Ss framework popularized by Peters and Waterman in their book In Search of Excellence. Detailed development tasks are considered according to the schema advanced by Crawford in his book New Products Management.     

河北省外向型经济发展的战略构想

目前河北省的外向型经济，无论对外开放方面，还是对内开放方面，都还比较落后，对全省经济发展的拉动力较弱，促进河北省外向型经济发展，应根据本省的实际情况大力发展劳动密集型产业，发挥外销产品的比较优势，加快高新技术产业的发展步伐，努力实现贸易方式、引资方式和引资结构的多元化；应根据我国和国际的经济战略调整，精心研究制定我省的外向型经济发展战略，并积极改善投资环境。     

Trading frequency and event study test specification

We examine the effects of thin trading on the specification of event study tests. Simulations of upper and lower tail tests are reported with and without variance increases on the event date across levels of trading volume. The traditional standardized test is misspecified for thinly traded samples. If return variance is unlikely to increase, then Corrado's rank test provides the best specification and power. With variance increases, the rank test is misspecified. The Boehmer et al. standardized cross-sectional test (Event-study methodology under conditions of event-induced variance, Journal of Financial Economics 30, pp. 253–272) is properly specified, but not powerful, for upper-tailed tests. Lower-tailed alternative hypotheses can best be evaluated using the generalized sign test.     

Öffentliches und Geheimes

In the second half of 2009, the entire media agenda in Germany was dominated by the swine flu, next to the German Federal Parliament elections. Criticism was voiced in the media against the pharmaceutical industry for lobbying the nationwide swine flu vaccination, which was widely considered nothing but a product of the industry’s lobbying power. In order to avoid the usual interviews with lobbyists, we attempted to apply a new methodological framework approach in analysing lobbying processes and key stakeholders in the public sphere—and outside. Crucial to the diversified approach, which involves quantitative content analysis of media coverage and press releases, are interviews with journalists, lobbyists’ network analysis and internet research on biographies. Although a conspiracy could not be conclusively proven, the results do indicate associations that validate the criticism of the industry’s lobbying activities.     

Personalisation–privacy paradox: The effects of personalisation and privacy assurance on customer responses to travel Web sites

Personalisation refers to individualizing products, services, and contents according to customer interests and preferences. In order to deliver appropriate personalised offerings, firms inevitably need to collect rich customer data profiles. Prior research suggests that personalised services lead to positive customer responses such as increased willingness to disclose personal information and make purchases. However, another stream of research emphasizes negative outcomes of personalisation – namely, privacy concerns surrounding the use of personal information and associated negative effects on behaviour. The objectives of this study are twofold: (1) to examine how privacy assurance affects proximal outcomes of personalisation, such as perceived usefulness and privacy concerns; and (2) to identify the role such outcomes play in predicting customer behavioural responses, such as willingness to disclose personal information and make purchases. Our findings show that enhancing privacy assurance increases the perceived usefulness of services and decreases customer privacy concerns. Moreover, customer behavioural responses are positively related to the perceived usefulness of services and negatively associated with privacy concerns. However, despite the positive effects on perceived usefulness and purchase intentions, personalisation has no effect on privacy concerns and intentions to disclose personal information.     

Performance analysis of the Gulf hotel industry: A Malmquist index with bias correction

This study uses the Malmquist index with bias correction to analyze the performance of hotel chains from the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Oman. We show that Saudi Arabia hotel chains have the highest productivity growth, followed by the UAE and Omani hotel chains. A further decomposition of productivity indicates that a small number of hotel chains experienced an increase in revenues for lower occupancy rate, while most other hotel chains experienced an increase in occupancy rate for lower revenues. Related market discussions of the results are provided.