Workplace organization and innovation

Abstract This study uses panel data on Canadian establishments to explore the relationship between the organization of work – in particular decentralization, information‐sharing, and incentive pay schemes – and innovation. Like other studies, ours finds a clear positive link between these factors. However, the data give strong indications that this relationship is not causal. We show that: (1) the correlation between workplace organization and innovation holds for information‐sharing but is much weaker for decentralized decision‐making or incentive pay programs, (2) controls for unobserved heterogeneity significantly weaken results, and (3) lagged variables give no clear evidence that organizational changes predate innovation.     

Environmental practices in the wine industry: An empirical application of the theory of reasoned action and stakeholder theory in the United States and New Zealand

Industry transformation related to environmental stewardship has received significant scholarly attention over the past decade. However, limited theoretical and empirical work examines the motivations for improving environmental performance in an industry in different countries. In this paper, we develop a set of hypotheses, based in the theory of reasoned action and stakeholder theory, regarding drivers of the adoption of environmental practices in the wine industries of New Zealand and the United States. We test our hypotheses using data from survey questionnaires collected in each country. Our findings suggest that subjective norms and internal stakeholder pressures are common drivers of the adoption of environmental practices in these two countries. However, managerial attitudes and external stakeholder pressures are not significant drivers. We also find that managerial attitudes and export dependence are stronger determinants of environmental practice adoption in New Zealand compared to the U.S.     

Comments on the Institutionalist View of Reaganomics

Gender inequality is caused by numerous factors, among which one may find traditional division of labor, family, religion and many other institutions. The state also influences a position of women in society and economy. Nowadays most western states seem to engage in the promotion of equal status of men and women. The European Union (EU) is known for its policy of gender mainstreaming that has been implemented in member states. The EU, however, promotes a neoliberal approach in the economy that seems to be in contradiction to the promotion of gender equality.

In Poland, tendencies to liberate, privatize and deregulate are warmly welcomed as cures for economic underdevelopment. Gender equality, on the other hand, has been challenged as a relic of the former political system. In this paper, the author attempts to answer the question whether macroeconomic policy promoted by the EU influences the status of women in Poland.     

The Structure of the American Economy

We explore the relationship between input–output accounts and the national revenue function. The generalized inverse of an economy's technology matrix carries information relating changes in endowments with changes in outputs; its transpose relates output prices and factor prices. Our primary theoretical contribution is to derive an economy's revenue function for an arbitrary Leontief technology. Our main empirical contribution is to compute the national revenue function for the American economy in 2003 and to describe its properties. We implement our ideas using two different models: one where all factors are mobile and another with sector‐specific capital.     

The 'Parent Shift' program: incentives for nurses, rewards for nursing teams

To create new opportunities for nurses to reenter the workforce, a RN p.r.n. program must meet the needs of nurses who wish to make dual commitments to home and work. The Parent Shift program provides an innovative model of attracting and retaining nurses in a hospital workforce. Many nurses who joined the program were away from the field of nursing for many years and were drawn to the program because of the promise of flexible shifts and minimal requirements for participation. In this study, flexible shifts not only encouraged program entry, they were also a powerful motivator for continued program participation over time. Parent Shift nurse presence was perceived by nurse managers to decrease stressors and improve time efficiency of full-shift staff.     

Kunden und Markt im Fokus –mit Marketingcontrolling zum Erfolg

PRAXIS | Magazin

Kunden und Markt im Fokus –mit Marketingcontrolling zum Erfolg Konferenz-Review     

Emic and etic interpretations of engagement with a consumer-to-consumer online auction site

This paper provides emic and etic interpretations of engagement with a consumer-to-consumer (C2C) online auction site, based on in-depth interviews with buyers. The study exposes three misconceptions about online C2C auctions; that the interaction between parties occurs exclusively online, that the relation between buyers and sellers is purely transactional in nature, and that the interaction between buyers and sellers does not lead to ongoing business relationships. The paper reveals the utilitarian, hedonic and social benefits that are the bases of engagement with the auction site. Social benefits materialize for auction buyers during offline exchanges. The paper also reveals marketer incentives and structural disincentives for consumers' ongoing use of the auction site.     

Stochastic efficiency analysis with risk aversion bounds: a correction

A recent paper by Hardaker et al. (The Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 48, 2004a, 253) and book by Hardaker et al. (Coping with Risk in Agriculture, 2004b) describe a procedure for determining an efficient set from among a set of random alternatives. This procedure, called stochastic efficiency with respect to a function (SERF), is claimed to make the same assumption concerning the risk aversion measures as does stochastic dominance with respect to a function (SDRF). This is claim is incorrect. SERF imposes an additional requirement on the risk aversion measures of the decision makers. Both procedures assume a lower and an upper bound on risk aversion, but SERF also assumes that all risk aversion measures are of the same functional form as these lower and upper bound functions. This additional strong requirement on risk preferences implies that the efficient set identified under SERF is usually smaller than that identified using SDRF.