You Don't Have to be German to be a "Hidden Champion"

The "hidden champions" among Germany's medium-sized companies are becoming a by-word for students of management. But do hidden champions exist outside Germany? What management processes distinguish them from other companies? And are there lessons from their success for other companies? This article, extracted from the author's forthcoming book, summarises his answers to these questions.     

Dynamische Berechnung der Stromgestehungskosten von Energiespeichern für die Energiesystemmodellierung und -einsatzplanung

Due to the transition in energy supply from fossil to renewable energy sources, energy storage systems are getting more and more important for the security of power supply. Therefore also the modeling of those storage systems in energy system modeling needs to be further discussed. This paper focuses on the levelized costs of energy storage. In the beginning, the existing approaches of calculating those costs are analyzed in a literature review. It will be shown that all of the approaches calculate the levelized costs on the basis of the energy storages’ lifetime. For the usage in energy system modeling it is mandatory that the calculation can be done for variable and shorter time periods. Therefore this work’s approach calculates the costs based on the time of operation in any period chosen. Additionally, the model can be used for any type of storage system. After introducing the mathematical model, the levelized costs of energy storage will be calculated to illustrate the models properties and then verified with reference load profiles for five different energy storage types. Following this, particular input parameters are varied and sensitivities are pointed out. Most of the programs for power plant dispatch calculations use linear or mixed integer linear programing algorithms. As the calculation of levelized costs of electricity is non-linear, most programs use fixed values during the whole time of simulation. In this article the integration of the presented approach into a linear optimization program via recursive and shifted calculation is elaborated. Results are presented and discussed.     

Accounting for Investments in Human Capital: A Review

This paper provides an overview of the human capital literature, focusing on the firm's incentives and disincentives to invest in human capital and subsequently to account for the investments. The evidence suggests human capital investment decisions are intrinsically linked to the success of a business and ultimately to the probability of survival. However, disclosure is largely a voluntary choice by managers as there are few formal disclosure requirements. The conclusion from the evidence shows that the benefits to stakeholders of disclosing information relating to human capital investment are likely to outweigh the costs and suggests a wide range of topics for future research.     

企业全面预算管理中的税收政策考量

本文根据《企业内部控制应用指引第15号——全面预算》,联系税收对企业的生产经营活动具有指引、评价和预测等作用,从重大事项税务前置审核、预算管理机构人员配备、预算编制及预算调整等方面,就企业在实行全面预算管理中如何遵从、利用税收政策,提升管理水平进行了分析、论述。     

Destabilisierende Spekulation als Rechtfertigung eines Europäischen Stabilisierungsmechanismus?

Im Zusammenhang mit der Zuspitzung der Staatsschuldenkrise für einzelne Euromitglieder wird immer wieder der Vorwurf einer destabilisierenden Spekulation laut. Der Beitrag gibt eine begriffliche Abgrenzung, stellt die verschiedenen Funktionen der Spekulation dar und zeigt die mikro?konomischen Zusammenh?nge stabilisierender und destabilisierender Aktivit?ten auf. Dabei wird die besondere Bedeutung von Kreditsicherungsderivaten (CDS) für die Anleihem?rkte gekl?rt und empirischen Hinweisen auf eine destabilisierende Spekulation nachgegangen.     

Does Social Software Support Service Innovation?

Recent Internet technologies and web‐based applications, such as social software, are being increasingly applied in firms. Social software can be employed for knowledge management and for external communication enabling access to internal and external knowledge. Knowledge, in turn, constitutes one of the main inputs to service innovation. Hence, social software has the potential to support service innovation. Using data from German IT and knowledge‐intensive service firms, this is the first paper that empirically analyses whether the use of social software applications triggers innovation. It refers to a knowledge production function in which social software use constitutes the knowledge sourcing activity. The results reveal a positive relationship between social software and service innovation. Since this result is robust when controlling for former innovative activities and the previous propensity to adopt new technologies and to change processes, the analysis suggests that the causality runs from social software to innovation.