Empirical Analysis of Brands: A Survey

In this paper, we survey the empirical analysis of brands. The difficulty in this area of research is that even though a brand is easily identifiable, its economic roles are not directly observable. We first discuss methods where the effect of a brand is measured as the unobservable component of sales or price of a product, which researchers recover as a residual of the sales or price regression. We then describe the approaches to estimate the various roles of brands, such as providing information and increasing the utility of consumption. Finally, we provide examples of research that highlight the role of brands in exploiting the irrationality of consumers for profit.     

Is there a “Dark Side” to Monitoring? Board and Shareholder Monitoring Effects on M&A Performance Extremeness

Research summary: W e investigate the effects of monitoring by boards of directors and institutional shareholders on merger and acquisition (M&A ) performance extremeness using a sample of M&A deals from 1997 to 2006. Both governance research and legal reforms generally have espoused a “raise all boats” view of monitoring. We instead investigate whether monitoring may serve as a double‐edged sword that limits CEO discretion to undertake both value‐destroying M&A deals and value‐creating ones. Our findings indicate that the relationship between monitoring and M&A performance is more complex than previously believed. Rather than “raising all boats” in a shift towards better M&A outcomes, monitoring instead is associated with lower M&A losses, but also with lower M&A gains . Managerial summary: M ergers and acquisitions (M&A s) are a quintessential corporate activity. There were $3.8 trillion worth of M&A deals in 2015, despite scholars and practitioners reporting that M&A s often perform poorly. We question the widespread belief that more vigilant monitoring by boards of directors and large shareholders will raise M&A performance, overall. Put differently, does monitoring constrain CEO s' discretion to pursue bad deals, while simultaneously encouraging them to pursue good ones? We find that monitoring limits both large M&A losses and large M&A gains. Contrary to widely held beliefs, our results indicate that constraining executives' ability to pursue value‐destroying M&A deals does not simultaneously encourage or enable CEO s to pursue value‐creating deals . Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Business travellers' connections to home: ICTs supporting work‐life balance

This paper examines the role of information communication technology in enabling connections to home for work‐related travellers. Although digital connectivity for work‐related tasks are well researched, the use of digital technology for home communication is under‐researched. The study draws on a qualitative study of UK‐based organisations and business travellers to explore how these travellers use ICTs for personal use while ‘on the move’. The findings reveal that organisations are supportive of work‐life balance for employees, but fail to consider specific needs of those whose work takes them away from home. For business travellers, insights are gained into practices around connecting to home and the value of this virtual presence for relationships with family while absent and work‐life balance. The study identifies and discusses practice occurring around three activities; checking in, maintaining relationships with home and sharing experiences.     

A High Road to Sustainability? Wildflower Harvesting,Ethical Trade and Social Upgrading in South Africa's Western Cape

This paper evaluates the outcomes from an ambitious wildflower harvesting programme in South Africa's Western Cape, which has sought to achieve positive outcomes in terms of socio‐economic development and biodiversity conservation. Indigenous wildflowers, harvested according to conservation principles, are processed into ‘Cape Flora’ bouquets and sold into international and domestic markets. The principal supply chain provides an example of ethical trade due to the explicit environmental and social standards that are required at local sites of production. The incorporation of such standards represents an attempt to engender economic and social upgrading within the value chain. In this sense, the programme is consistent with dominant policy discourses, which suggest that exploiting potentially profitable niches within international trade flows represents a ‘high road’ to economic growth and transformation. The paper focuses upon the job creation and social impacts of the programme in the context of efforts to overcome South Africa's deeply entrenched socio‐economic disparities and high poverty levels. Despite impressive growth in production and exports during the global financial crisis, there have been mixed outcomes in terms of benefits to stakeholders at the upstream end of the supply chain. The paper concludes by considering the extent to which local initiatives operating under the framework of ethical trade possess the potential to facilitate effective social and economic upgrading.     

Prospects for Japanese-Russian trade expansion in the second half of the 1990s

During the Soviet period, trade between the USSR and Japan was relatively unimportant, constituting approximately 2 percent of the Soviet Union's total foreign trade turnover. The composition of trade goods, moreover, was primitive. The USSR exported unprocessed raw materials in exchange for high value added industrial products. This paper examines the impact of Russia's fledgling transition on its trade with Japan and finds some hopeful developments. Although the volume of trade has contracted, Russian exports are reviving, the commodity structure is adjusting appropriately to changes in relative prices, and embodied factor content is import-capital-intensive as required by the Leontief variant of the Heckscher-Ohlin theory. The primary cloud blighting this performance is Russia's continuing inability to export its industrial goods.     

From ‘start-up’ to ‘re-boot’: Product lifecycle strategies and competitive advantage in the computer industry

The PC sector, following the packaging and car manufacturing industries, will increasingly be forced to acknowledge and account for its product base throughout the commodity's life, and beyond. The environmental problems being posed by electronic waste have been recognized and both the EU and the individual Member States are discussing solutions which may or may not include legislative action. In anticipation, product take-back programmes are beginning to emerge within the industry and the economics and logistics of re-use and recycling are at the forefront of this debate. The issues in store for this sector are examined and specific initiatives by organizations considered. It is asked whether a ‘closing of the product loop’ will generate a competitive advantage for these companies and what impact an industry-led ‘consortia’ initiative may have.     

Women, Ethics, and MBAs

We argue that the declining female enrollment in graduate business schools is a manifestation of gender bias in business education. The extant conceptual foundation of business education is one which views business activity in terms of a game with fixed and wholly material objectives. This concept betrays an underlying value system that reflects a male orientation. Business education is not merely amoral, therefore, but is gender biased. We suggest that business educators adopt a broadened behavioral rubric. Virtue-ethics theory provides such a rubric.     

Efficient inequality: differential allocation in the local public sector

This paper examines the consequences for social efficiency if the locally provided public input can be differentially allocated among residents. We derive the distributional efficiency condition, which is the distribution of public inputs that maximizes within-city gains from trade. Differential allocation also causes modifications to the standard (Samuelsonian) allocative efficiency condition. Additionally, we explore the consequences of differential allocation for the median voter model. Standard empirical voter models are seriously flawed because they fail to distinguish final public output production from either individual demand or the distribution of publicly provided inputs. Finally, we derive the club sharing efficiency condition.     

Cross‐Cultural Creativity: Conceptualization and Propositions for Global New Product Development

In today's global business environment, where multinational companies are pressed to increase revenues in order to survive, creativity may hold the key to ensuring their new product development (NPD) efforts lead to innovations with worldwide appeal, such as Apple's iPad and Gillette's Fusion Razor. To leverage creativity for effective global NPD, businesses want to know how cultures differ in their concepts of creativity and the impact of those differences on approaches to developing new products. Because global new products are increasingly developed in, by, and for multiple cultures, a particular need is for a culturally reflective understanding, or conceptualization, of creativity. While creativity is believed to be culturally tied, the dominant framework of creativity used in business and management assumes that creativity is culturally indifferent or insensitive. This knowledge gap is addressed by studying the role of creativity in NPD practices in a cross‐cultural or global context. The study begins by first developing a culturally anchored conceptualization of creativity. Called cross‐cultural creativity, the concept draws on creativity insights from the field of art and aesthetics. The concept specifies two modes of creativity, neither of which is superior to the other, called the spontaneous or S route and the divergent or D route. The S route emphasizes adaptiveness, processes, intuitiveness, and metamorphism, while the D route focuses on disruptiveness, results, rationality, and literalism. Next, this new concept is applied to NPD by positing how creativity in distinct cultures may shape NPD practices, as illustrated by Japanese and U.S. firms. Research propositions are formulated to capture these patterns, and thereafter, theoretical and practical implications of the framework and propositions are discussed. The implications center on global NPD, which is a complex enterprise involving typically more than one culture to design and develop new products for several geographic markets. The study is of interest to researchers needing a globally situated, culturally attached framework of creativity for international NPD studies, and managers seeking to exploit creativity in multinational and multicultural innovation projects.