Business Under Threat, Technology Under Attack, Ethics Under Fire: The Experience of Google in China

Although not frequently regarded as controversial, digital communications industries continue to be sites of CSR conflicts, particularly internationally. Investigating CSR issues in the digital communications industry is pertinent because in addition to being one of the fastest growing industries, it has created a host of new CSR issues that require further attention. This case study examines an incident in early 2010, when Google Inc. China and the Chinese government reached an impasse that produced a large-scale, transnational conflict that reached a head ostensibly over state-mandated censorship, ultimately prompting Google to withdraw from the mainland Chinese market and redirect its activities to Hong Kong. We track Google’s experience in China, both to explore its strategies and to consider the implications for corporate social responsibility. We situate Google’s drastic decision to withdraw entirely from mainland China in the complex multiplicity of ethical, cultural, and political conflicts that affect this particular case. On a broader level, the incident raises the question of how multinational corporations (MNCs) can achieve corporate growth while negotiating the highly sensitive sociopolitical and institutional environments of foreign nations.     

Cost-effectiveness of Access to Critical Cerebral Emergency Support Services (ACCESS): a neuro-emergent telemedicine consultation program

Aims: Access to Critical Cerebral Emergency Support Services (ACCESS) was developed as a low-cost solution to providing neuro-emergent consultations to rural hospitals in New Mexico that do not offer comprehensive stroke care. ACCESS is a two-way audio-visual program linking remote emergency department physicians and their patients to stroke specialists. ACCESS also has an education component in which hospitals receive training from stroke specialists on the triage and treatment of patients. This study assessed the clinical and economic outcomes of the ACCESS program in providing services to rural New Mexico from a healthcare payer perspective.

Methods: A decision tree model was constructed using findings from the ACCESS program and existing literature, the likelihood that a patient will receive a tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), cost of care, and resulting quality adjusted life years (QALYs). Data from the ACCESS program includes emergency room patients in rural New Mexico from May 2015 to August 2016. Outcomes and costs have been estimated for patients who were taken to a hospital providing neurological telecare and patients who were not.

Results: The use of ACCESS decreased neuro-emergent stroke patient transfers from rural hospitals to urban settings from 85% to 5% (no tPA) and 90% to 23% (tPA), while stroke specialist reading of patient CT/MRI imaging within 3?h of onset of stroke symptoms increased from 2% to 22%. Results indicate that use of ACCESS has the potential to save $4,241 ($3,952–$4,438) per patient and increase QALYs by 0.20 (0.14–0.22). This increase in QALYs equates to ～73 more days of life at full health. The cost savings and QALYs are expected to increase when moving from a 90-day model to a lifetime model.

Conclusion: The analysis demonstrates potential savings and improved quality-of-life associated with the use of ACCESS for patients presenting to rural hospitals with acute ischemic stroke (AIS).     

Flexibility-efficiency tradeoff and performance implications among Chinese SOEs

This paper examines performance implications of the flexibility-efficiency tradeoff in the turbulent environment. We test the relationship between resource utilization and firm performance among the Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) during China's economic transformation. The study finds that (1) overall efficiency enhances performance; (2) different measures of efficiency all exhibit curvilinear relationship with performance; and (3) differences exist between high efficiency and low efficiency subgroups of firms. The results reveal that efficiency as well as flexibility has a positive impact on firm performance only within a certain range. Beyond a certain point, the cost of maintaining flexibility overwhelms the benefit, causing performance to decline.     

EVA与公司业务组合战略

许多企业迫切希望弄清,在它们的业务组合中,哪些在创造价值,又有哪些在损毁价值。然而80％的企业没能够在业务单位层面以下衡量资产回报率。实践中,要想找到能够行之有效的评估顾客、产品及最小库存单位（SKU）赢利性的衡量标准,仍然是个遥远的梦。     

Performance differences in property-type diversified versus specialized real estate investment trusts (REITs)

Evidence from the corporate finance literature indicates that diversified firms trade at a discount to otherwise comparable specialized firms. However, very little research has addressed whether a similar diversification discount might exist in equity REITs that diversify across property types relative to those specializing in one property type. Using a sample of 75 equity REITs, the existence of a property-type diversification discount is tested using standard Jensen's Alpha, Treynor Index, and Sharpe Ratio performance ranking methodologies over four commonly employed market proxies. Several variations of these standard tests are also utilized as robustness checks.     

A modeling framework for enhancing aid effectiveness

ABSTRACT

The development literature lacks consensus about the link between aid effectiveness and governance improvement. A basic rational actor model is introduced to clarify how donors can influence recipient behaviors and more broadly how foreign aid can support or impede governance quality improvement. Adopting the underutilized perspective of donor behavior, this study identifies mechanisms through which aid hinders governance improvement and offers substantive recommendations about how donors can enhance aid effectiveness, including strategies for donors to raise the level of effort recipients devote to project success.     

Asset Recognition And Probabilistic Judgments

With the issuing of Statement of Accounting Concepts 4 on the definition and recognition of elements of financial statements, research into the possible ramifications of the application of recognition criteria in that statement is timely. Using 60 experienced Australian auditors as subjects, this study provides information on the numerical equivalents of uncertainty expressions such as "beyond any reasonable doubt" and "virtually certain" (as per the asset-recognition criteria of AASB 1020), and "probable" (as per Statement of Accounting Concepts 4). In addition, it compares the decisions made by auditors under the criteria included in AASB 1020 and SAC 4. The results indicate that the regognition criteria in AASB 1020 are a higher test of stringency for the recognition of assets than those adopted in the new SAC 4.     

潮涌现象与发展中国家宏观经济理论的重新构建

现有宏观经济学理论以产业升级时国民经济中每个企业对于下一个有前景的产业存在何处没有共识为暗含前提,但是,由于后发优势的存在,发展中国家的企业很容易对下一个有前景的产业产生共识,投资上出现“潮涌现象”,并伴随此现象出现产能过剩和相关的一系列问题。所以,有必要放松现有的暗含前提,重新构建一套新的宏观经济理论体系,探讨投资的“潮涌现象”对发展中国家的物价、就业、经济增长和周期波动的影响,作为政府制定财政、货币、金融、外贸、产业发展等宏观经济管理政策的参考。     

Fit by adaptation or fit by founding? A comparative study of existing and new entrepreneurial cohorts in China

Extant research provides ambiguous views on the network adaptability of existing ventures and new ventures during environmental change. Applying an institutional perspective, this research aims to provide a clearer picture by comparing the adaptation and network configurations of existing vs. new entrepreneurial cohorts during China's institutional change after 1992. The qualitative and quantitative analyses show that the existing cohort of entrepreneurs displays network inertia, in that they largely maintain strong tie‐based political and market networks; the new cohort instead demonstrates better adaptation by establishing fewer political networks but more weak and diverse market networks. This comparative research unpacks the institutional mechanisms underlying such differences, and serves as a ground for future investigations dealing with the strategic actions of different entrepreneurial cohorts that are largely neglected in previous studies. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Senior Team Attributes and Organizational Ambidexterity: The Moderating Role of Transformational Leadership

abstract    Organizations capable of pursuing exploration and exploitation simultaneously have been suggested to obtain superior performance. Combining both types of activities and achieving organizational ambidexterity, however, leads to the presence of multiple and often conflicting goals, and poses considerable challenges to senior teams in ambidextrous organizations. This study explores the role of senior team attributes and leadership behaviour in reconciling conflicting interests among senior team members and achieving organizational ambidexterity. Findings indicate that a senior team shared vision and contingency rewards are associated with a firm's ability to combine high levels of exploratory and exploitative innovations. In addition, our study shows that an executive director's transformational leadership increases the effectiveness of senior team attributes in ambidextrous organizations and moderates the effectiveness of senior team social integration and contingency rewards. Hence, our study clarifies how senior executives reconcile conflicting demands and facilitate the balancing of seemingly contradictory forces in ambidextrous organizations. Implications for literatures on senior team attributes, transformational leadership and organizational ambidexterity are discussed.