The innovation blueprint

In boardrooms across North America, executives extoll the advantages of being innovative. Some believe that it is the next level of competitive advantage, the Holy Grail of business. Yet, according to consulting firms Arthur D. Little Inc. [Jonash, R.S. & Sommerlate, T. (1999). The innovation premium. Reading, MA: Perseus Books, pp. 115-135.] and Gary Hamel's Strategos (www.strategos.com/survey/index.cfm), many organizations that try to become innovative rate themselves poorly at it. Why is this the case, and how can these barriers be overcome? This article sets out to answer these questions. It introduces a blueprint that, if followed, will direct organizations to the “innovation zone.” Once organizations reach this nexus, a level of synergy between strategy and innovation is achieved, effectively enhancing the organization's ability to develop new wealth-creating opportunities, identify positive twists in strategic direction, and develop an ongoing capability to innovate.     

Earnings Management Constraints and Classification Shifting

Prior literature has investigated three forms of earnings management: real earnings management (REM), accruals earnings management (AEM) and classification shifting. Managers make trade‐off decisions among these methods based on the costs, constraints and timing of each strategy. This study investigates whether managers use classification shifting when their ability to use other forms of earnings management is constrained. We find that when REM is constrained by poor financial condition, high levels of institutional ownership and low industry market share, managers are more likely to use classification shifting. Further, we find that when AEM is constrained by low accounting system flexibility and the provision of a cash flow forecast, managers are more likely to use classification shifting. In addition, when we limit our sample to firms that are most likely to have manipulated earnings, we continue to find support for constraints of both REM and AEM leading to higher levels of classification shifting. We also find support for the hypothesis that the timing of each earnings management strategy influences managers’ trade‐off decision. Our results indicate that managers use classification shifting as substitute form of earnings management for both AEM and REM.     

Gender and entrepreneurial orientation: a multi-country study

The purpose of this comparative study is to investigate the role of gender and culture in entrepreneurial orientation (EO) among students in the selected nations. EO dimensions are important variables in the study of organizational performance. We adopted Lumpkin and Dess’ EO dimensions. We statistically analyzed the collected data from 389 university students in the US (96), Korea (114), Fiji (80), and Malaysia (99). The results showed significant differences in most EO dimensions between genders and among the nations. Thus, it is important that customized approaches based on gender and unique cultural context are needed for developing EO among college students.     

An Essay on When to Fully Disclose in Sales Relationships: Applying Two Practical Guidelines for Addressing Truth-Telling Problems

Salespeople have a moral obligation to prospect/customer, company and self. As such, they continually encounter truth-telling dilemmas. "lgnorance" and "conflict" often block the path to morally correct sales behaviors. Academics and practitioners agree that adoption of ethical codes is the most effective measure for encouraging ethical sales behaviors. Yet no ethical code has been offered which can be conveniently used to overcome the unique circumstances that contribute to the moral dilemmas often encountered in personal selling. An ethical code is developed that charts ethical paths across a variety of sales settings (addressing "ignorance") while illustrating why the cost associated with acting morally is generally reasonable (addressing "conflict"). The code applies the universal transactional notions of customer expectations and salesperson reputation to illustrate why and when salespeople are morally required to tell the truth. In doing so, the code tackles head-on the vexing question of how best to juggle mixed motives - involving self-interests, corporate-concerns, cus-tomer-needs and other influences such as the nature of the transaction. The issue of how mixed motives can be dealt with through moral means is one that ethicists have previously sidestepped (Stark, 1993).     

聊聊海外货运代理

在货运企业的发展当中,从本地服务跨越到国际物流服务的起点往往是海外代理开发。可以说,没有海外代理的存在,国际物流是空谈。笔者查阅21家货运企业的网站,发现每一家都把“广泛的海外代理网络”、“覆盖全球基本港代理”作为一项卖点。但在培训当中,我们发现大部分的货运企业对“为什么要有海外代理”、“海外代理的作用”并没有清晰的概念。本文拟就此问题进行讨论。     

Integrating econometrics: A modern undergraduate economics capstone experience

Angrist and Pischke (2017) call for a pedagogical paradigm shift by pointing out that econometrics courses often do not align with modern empirical approaches employed by economists. This article's authors propose a modern capstone experience, designed to address these concerns by integrating econometrics into the traditional capstone approach. They couple a full econometrics course with a traditional capstone course by weaving a cohesive econometrics-heavy research paper through the two courses. They feel this approach addresses the lack of econometrics skills among economics majors while simultaneously making some necessary improvements to undergraduate econometrics content. They hope this article will be a valuable resource for programs changing course requirements or revamping their curriculum to better fit the increasing demand for data analysis skills in the job market.     

From compensation to development： the application and progress of RwD in China

Involuntary resettlenment caused by project construction is a difficult problem over world. In the past, therestoration of livelihoods in the event of involuntary resettlementhas been based purely on providing compensation to those who are displaced. Evidence has shown that compensation-based involuntary resettlement can not realize the objective of restoring and improving resettlers＇ living standard. With a view to improve this outcome, the concept of Resettlement with Development （RwD） was envisaged and is now generally heralded as the means to mitigate catastrophic failures of the past. However, few developing countries have included the concept of RwD into th, ational policies and China is one of them. The Chinese government has taken resettlement as an opportunity to help resettlers restore and improve their living standards and develop economy in reservoir areas by implementing RwD olicy including giving compensation and subsidies at early stage and offering production assistance at late stage, citing up reservoir construction fund, initiating partnership programs and preferential policy as well as enhanc infrastruture construction. The preliminary experience from the TGP resettlement has verified that the transformation from compensation-based resettlement to RwD is a right policy, choice. Meanwhile. because ofthe changing political environment and the complexity of involuntary resettlement there is still room for china to improve its RwD policy.     

Google in China: A Manager-Friendly Heuristic Model for Resolving Cross-Cultural Ethical Conflicts

Management practitioners and scholars have worked diligently to identify methods for ethical decision making in international contexts. Theoretical frameworks such as Integrative Social Contracts Theory (Donaldson and Dunfee, 1994, Academy of Management Review 19, 252–284) and more recently the Global Business Citizenship Approach [Wood et al., 2006, Global Business Citizenship: A Transformative Framework for Ethics and Sustainable Capitalism. (M. E. Sharpe, Armonk, NY)] have produced innovations in practice. Despite these advances, many managers have difficulty implementing these theoretical concepts in daily practice. Using the example of recent decisions by internet service providers Google, Yahoo, and MSN regarding censorship requirements in China, we offer six heuristic questions to help managers to resolve cross-cultural ethical conflicts in which the firm’s way of doing business differs from the practice in the host country. Recognizing that companies can take different approaches to law and ethics (Paine, 1994, Harvard Business Review 72(2), 107–117), our aim is to provide a management decision process to deal with demands or opportunities for engaging in questionable business practices in a host country.     

The use of slip charts to review research projects

Three years’ experience with this method of review has produced improvements in communications and established a framework within which scarce resources can be optimized and a five-year rolling programme pursued. The use of slip charts to monitor and progress research projects at the Electricity Council Research Centre is described.