Misunderstood and Undervalued? Personnel Management In Construction

Janet Druker and Geoffrey White, principal lecturer and senior lecturer respectively in the Business School at the University of Greenwich, draw on interviews and on a postal survey of personnel managers in the construction industry, to consider the role and responsibilities of personnel practitioners in construction. They point to the changing balance of employment within the construction firm and the greater involvement of personnel with non-manual employees. They highlight the importance of various forms of sub-contracting as a means of strengthening management control at site level. They suggest that the centrally located personnel function may well be close to strategy makers but ultimately the role was found to be advisory with a limited capacity for direct intervention.     

Hidden action,risk aversion and variable fines in agri‐environmental schemes*

This note analyses the design of agri‐environmental schemes for risk‐averse producers whose input usage is only observable by costly monitoring. The scheme penalises producers in proportion to input use in excess of a quota. A striking result is that if the scheme is designed in such a way that producers always comply with the quota, risk aversion is not relevant in determining the level of input use.     

The Impact of Pennies on the Market Quality of the Toronto Stock Exchange

Using detailed order flow data from the Toronto Stock Exchange, this paper finds no evidence that a smaller tick size lessens market liquidity for either small or large traders. Rather, there is evidence of lower trading costs, faster time to order execution, and greater price continuity. Consistent with a penny tick allowing a finer pricing grid search, there is an increase in the number of Change Former Orders and cancellations.     

Does implied volatility provide any information beyond that captured in model-based volatility forecasts?

This paper contributes to our understanding of the informational content of implied volatility. Here we examine whether the S&P 500 implied volatility index (VIX) contains any information relevant to future volatility beyond that available from model based volatility forecasts. It is argued that this approach differs from the traditional forecast encompassing approach used in earlier studies. The findings indicate that the VIX index does not contain any such additional information relevant for forecasting volatility.     

A DOMSAT for Australia: Communications planning under strain

The events leading up to the announcements of a domestic communication satellite for Australia are outlined. The implications of the satellite decision are discussed in relation to planning for the communications infrastructure as a whole. It is suggested that the communication satellite debate has revealed weaknesses in the existing policy planning process and that these will be exacerbated by the satellite decision unless appropriate strategies are developed.     

Work absence in industrialised societies: the Australian case

In this paper, Bob Crawford and Sam Volard present an analysis of the causes for temporary non-approved work absence in which they isolate the extent of the ‘sickie’ in Australian industry. They suggest areas in which management can properly institute programmes which are likely to reduce the incidence of this largely avoidable and costly organisational problem.