An Eastern and SME version of expatriate management: an empirical study of small and medium enterprises in Taiwan

This study, different from previous ‘individual level’ research, explored ‘company-level’ expatriate training, expatriation policies and the perceived willingness on the part of expatriates to take on an enhanced role in organizational performance. Based on data from 254 Taiwanese SMEs with foreign investments, an Eastern and SME version of expatriate management is presented. The most significant predictors of expatriate premature return and company sales are the ‘number of expatriates’ and ‘ratio of expatriates with managerial positions’. Companies that have a greater percentage of expatriates with spousal accompaniment experience more premature return while insufficient training explains lower company sales. Insights regarding regional expatriate differences and methodological implications are also elaborated.     

Equal access to hospitality services for guests with mobility impairments under the Americans with Disabilities Act: Implications for the hospitality industry

The hospitality operator's obligation to comply with the ADA has provided the necessary impetus to ensure that hospitality services are provided in a non-discriminatory manner. The ADA requires modification of hospitality policies and procedures to ensure that guests with disabilities are provided services in a manner equivalent to those provided to able-bodied guests. This article provides the hospitality operator with a framework for training front-line employees and offers recommendations for analyzing how current policies and procedures could be modified in a way that limits potential liability as well as more effectively meets the needs of guests with mobility impairments.     

没有国界的国家馆

在去参加第53届威尼斯艺术双年展开幕式之前的几天,我受邀出席了在意大利北部城市Bergamo的当代美术馆GAMeC举行的国际年轻策展人论坛,今年论坛的主题是"国际策展人的终结?"围绕着像威尼斯双年展、卡塞尔文献展等全球达几十个之多的国际性展览的策展策略和模式进行反思和讨论。讨论之中也不免提到了威尼斯双年展这个一直以一个策展人为主导选择艺术家的大     

National culture and labour-market flexibility

This paper develops a cultural explanation for labour-market flexibility, building on the work of Lipset. Using Hofstede's conceptual framework for categorizing national cultures, certain hypotheses are derived concerning the association of various labour-market institutions and rigidities connected with employment, pay bargaining the treatment of the unemployed, and Hofstede's dimensions of national culture. These hypotheses are tested on data for OECD countries, using ordinary least squares regression. The results demonstrate a strong statistical association between Hofstede's cultural indices and the various labour-market rigidities. In particular, there is a strong inverse relationship between Hofstede's MAS variable and all our labour flexibility variables. Cultural values reflecting feminine gender structuring appear to be strongly associated with labour-market inflexibility. There is also a strong statistical association between scores on the UAI dimension, and employment rigidities and pay-bargaining practices. Cultural attitudes to power inequalities as reflected in the PDI index inversely related to rigidities in pay-bargaining practices. While the results demonstrate only statistical associations, they are suggestive of the possibility that culture plays more determining role. This has important implications for deregulation/regulation strategies.     

Inclusion climate: A multilevel investigation of its antecedents and consequences

This study investigates the antecedents and consequences of organization‐level inclusion climate. A national sample of human resource decision‐makers from 100 organizations described their firms' formal diversity management programs; 3,229 employees reported their perceptions of, and reactions to, their employers' diversity management. Multilevel analyses demonstrate that identity‐conscious programs (programs that target specific identity groups) generate an inclusion climate. Moreover, the analyses provide evidence of multilevel mediation: In organizations with an inclusion climate, individual employees perceive the organization as fulfilling its diversity management obligations and respond with higher levels of affective commitment. This study represents an important step toward understanding how a shared perception of organizational inclusiveness develops and how inclusion climate facilitates the achievement of diversity management objectives. The findings also shed light on the important role of identity‐conscious programs in promoting organizational commitment within a diverse workforce.     

Union impact on the effective adoption of High Performance Work Practices

This paper examines the literature and research on unions relevant to the effective adoption of High Performance Work Practices. It demonstrates that unions that have a cooperative relationship with management can play an important role in overcoming barriers to the effective adoption of practices that have been linked to organizational competitiveness through the development and application of human capital. In particular, unions have the unique advantage of delivering independent voice that cannot be substituted by management. Not only can unions make a contribution to organization competitiveness but they can also ensure that employees benefit from High Performance Work Practice adoption and in doing so secure their own relevance. The contribution that unions can make is inhibited by management and union's reluctance to engage in an integrative relationship and an institutional context that does not value unions. Organizations that want to capture the value that unions can add must move away from a pluralist model of autocratic management, hostile unions and adversarial industrial relations, beyond a unitarist model that sees no role for unions, to a cooperative partnership with unions that shares the gains of implementing High Performance Work Practices.     

Retroactive Liability or the Public Purse?

The article addresses the question of whether responsibility for pollution created in the past should be retroactively applied to firms, or if the costs of cleaning up existing pollution should be financed by the public. We show that making firms liable for retrospective environmental costs can weaken the incentive to take precautions against future environmental costs. This follows since public financing of these costs can lead to greater prospective risk deterrence by allowing firms to more fully internalize the costs of future environmental risks. However, an analysis of existing public financing approaches highlights a set of dangers associated with their practical use.