Solutions for customer complaints about offshoring and outsourcing services

In order to provide the highest quality services at lower costs, global firms have shifted their customer service functions offshore. Despite the apparent advantages of offshoring services, customers tend to object to the practice based on concerns about private/personal information being sent overseas. Additionally, executing service exchanges with overseas providers can be challenging because of perceived communication difficulties and cultural differences. The purpose of this article is to offer managers of firms that offshore services a clearer understanding of consumer concerns and provide guidance for alleviating these concerns. Specifically, suggestions are proffered regarding how to (1) minimize communication and cultural misunderstandings between customers and service providers, (2) assure customers that personal/private information is secure, and (3) restructure service activities to alleviate customer dissatisfaction. Unless such customer concerns are successfully identified and addressed, companies may not benefit from pursuing a services offshoring strategy.     

中国城市养老机构的兴起:发展与公平问题

利用2009-2010年在南京市和天津市对养老机构的调查数据,描述了养老机构在两市的发展态势,比较了公办和民办机构在入住老人的健康状况及机构特征方面的差异.近10年来养老机构在两市迅猛增长,且以民办机构为主导.政府财政投入在两市公办机构的日常收入来源中占了相当的比重,而对民办机构的财政补贴则微乎其微.公办机构平均规模较大,在入住率上也远超民办机构.两市公办机构入住老人比民办机构入住老人在总体上更健康.公办机构在决定收住对象时比民办机构有更强的选择性.公众在享有现存养老机构资源时面临着机会不平等的问题.政府应确保在公办机构中公平、合理地分配公共服务资源,以最大程度地彰显其公益性,同时也应着力扶持民办机构,促进二者在社会化养老服务中公平竞争、协调发展.     

Risk management,corporate governance,and bank performance in the financial crisis

The recent financial crisis has raised several questions with respect to the corporate governance of financial institutions. This paper investigates whether risk management-related corporate governance mechanisms, such as for example the presence of a chief risk officer (CRO) in a bank’s executive board and whether the CRO reports to the CEO or directly to the board of directors, are associated with a better bank performance during the financial crisis of 2007/2008. We measure bank performance by buy-and-hold returns and ROE and we control for standard corporate governance variables such as CEO ownership, board size, and board independence. Most importantly, our results indicate that banks, in which the CRO directly reports to the board of directors and not to the CEO (or other corporate entities), exhibit significantly higher (i.e., less negative) stock returns and ROE during the crisis. In contrast, standard corporate governance variables are mostly insignificantly or even negatively related to the banks’ performance during the crisis.     

Cost and learning efficiency drivers in Australian schools: a two-stage network DEA approach

This article explore performance issues in Australian public schools, using a two-stage DEA network model, which accounts simultaneously for both cost and learning efficiency levels. In the cost efficiency stage, different types of expenses and investments are employed to support a given number of students, teachers and administrative staff. In the learning efficiency stage, these groups of individuals help to produce important outputs related to performance in student tests and school rankings. Results indicate that Australian public schools are heterogeneous. Policy implications are also discussed.     

Continuity Under a Different Name: The Outcome of Privatisation in Serbia

Normally, privatisation is seen as beneficial. This paper considers the case of Serbia – a latecomer in the matter – where privatisation was partly a result of exogenous pressures and where the process has been deemed a failure. In Serbia, a sizeable number of privatised firms were bought by bureaucrats and politicians and all firms were subjected to a period of supervision. We argue that the design of this process allowed rent-seekers to conserve their privileges through asset-stripping, which explains the failure. In order to do so, we perform an empirical analysis of the determinants of liquidation, merger and bankruptcy of privatised firms from 2002 to 2015. We construct a novel data set from primary sources, free of the ‘survivorship bias’ and containing proxies for various types of owners, indirect signs of asset-stripping strategy and a broad range of controls. Our results indicate that firms owned by politicians faced significantly higher risks of bankruptcy, especially after the end of supervision.     

An Approach to a Visual Language for Convective Fluid Flows: Visualization of Geophysical Simulations

It was known that deep within numbers and binary data from simulations of geophysical convective flows resided various patterns. Two models of convective fluid flows were being considered. One was a model of two-dimensional (768 × 256) air convection with finite Prandtl number of one and Rayleigh number of 10⁸?10¹⁰, and another was a model of three-dimensional (up to 120 × 120 × 90) mantle convection with infinite Prandtl number and Rayleigh number of 10⁶?10⁸. Clearly, phenomena existed which superceded each individual dimensionless computer model to provide a piece of information regarding actual fluid flows. The problem was how to find, prove, and communicate these patterns and phenomena for convection simulations with gigabytes of data. In a search for such an analytical and communicative tool, the alternative of visualization was considered. The need for visualization was recognized and discussed. Then, utilizing both two- and three-dimensional models of high Rayleigh number convection, basic techniques of style and content were developed. Applications of the visualization techniques were designed utilizing IBM’s Data Explorer in order to create communicative images and movies, and after the applications, the problems of data storage and transfer became apparent. Throughout the process though, it became clear how important the language of vision actually could be in the geophysics community. In a field in which words such as plumes and internal waves have in ways replaced mathematics as the basic language for science, there is a need for another resource, another language-the visualization of convective fluid flows.     

Profit sharing and strike activity in Cournot oligopoly

Within an incomplete-information framework, we develop a model of wage determination in a unionized Cournot oligopoly. The assumption of incomplete information allows the possibility of strikes or lockouts, which waste industry potential resources, at equilibrium. Facing such deadweight loss, the government or the social planner may decide to adopt a policy, such as a profit-sharing scheme. Under two different bargaining structures (firm level vs. industry level), we investigate the effects of adopting profit sharing on the wage outcome and the strike activity. If the base-wage bargaining takes place at the industry level, then the introduction of a profit-sharing scheme increases the strike activity. But if the base-wage bargaining takes place at the firm level and the number of firms in the industry is greater than two, then the introduction of a profit-sharing scheme reduces the strike activity.     

What's in a broken promissory obligation? Developing and testing a multiple component form measure of psychological contract breach

While the literature has suggested the possibility of breach being composed of multiple facets, no previous study has investigated this possibility empirically. This study examined the factor structure of typical component forms in order to develop a multiple component form measure of breach. Two studies were conducted. In study 1 (N = 420) multi-item measures based on causal indicators representing promissory obligations were developed for the five potential component forms (delay, magnitude, type/form, inequity and reciprocal imbalance). Exploratory factor analysis showed that the five components loaded onto one higher order factor, namely psychological contract breach suggesting that breach is composed of different aspects rather than types of breach. Confirmatory factor analysis provided further evidence for the proposed model. In addition, the model achieved high construct reliability and showed good construct, convergent, discriminant and predictive validity. Study 2 data (N = 189), used to validate study 1 results, compared the multiple-component measure with an established multiple item measure of breach (rather than a single item as in study 1) and also tested for discriminant validity with an established multiple item measure of violation. Findings replicated those in study 1. The findings have important implications for considering alternative, more comprehensive and elaborate ways of assessing breach.     

Measuring and Accounting for the Deprivation Gap of Portuguese Immigrants in Luxembourg

This paper examines the relative well‐being of Portuguese immigrants in Luxembourg by looking at indicators of material deprivation. We document material deprivation differences between immigrants and nationals—the “deprivation gap”—and measure the extent to which income differentials (and other sociodemographic differences) explain this gap using a combination of non‐parametric methods and a versatile graphical device. We find a large and significant deprivation gap against Portuguese immigrants, whatever the indicator considered. The extent to which the gap is merely a reflection of differences in income, however, depends on what deprivation items are taken into consideration. Income differences almost fully account for material deprivation differences when the latter is measured using the items included in the official EU social indicator of material deprivation. Inclusion of housing condition indicators mitigates this relationship and we then find compelling evidence that the deprivation gap is not entirely accounted for by income differentials.