Bayesian smooth-and-match inference for ordinary differential equations models linear in the parameters

Dynamic processes are crucial in many empirical fields, such as in oceanography, climate science, and engineering. Processes that evolve through time are often well described by systems of ordinary differential equations (ODEs). Fitting ODEs to data has long been a bottleneck because the analytical solution of general systems of ODEs is often not explicitly available. We focus on a class of inference techniques that uses smoothing to avoid direct integration. In particular, we develop a Bayesian smooth-and-match strategy that approximates the ODE solution while performing Bayesian inference on the model parameters. We incorporate in the strategy two main sources of uncertainty: the noise level of the measured observations and the model approximation error. We assess the performance of the proposed approach in an extensive simulation study and on a canonical data set of neuronal electrical activity.     

Environmental transparency and investors' risk perception: Cross-country evidence on multinational corporations' sustainability practices and cost of equity

We explore whether a greater amount of environmental disclosure can reduce a firm's ex ante cost of equity. This could occur because the quantity of environmental information changes investors' risk perception of the company, thereby influencing its ex ante cost of equity. Our study is a cross-country analysis of 1481 multinational corporations (MNCs) across 43 countries and territories from 2013 to 2019. Firstly, we measure investors' risk perception as a firm's ex ante cost of equity by employing five different valuation models, all based on equity analysts' forecasted data. We then investigate whether large quantities of environmental information disclosed by an MNC affect its ex ante cost of equity. We find evidence that investors price the amount of environmental disclosure. More environmental disclosure decreases a firm's ex ante cost of equity because it lessens investors' information asymmetry. However, this relationship is non-linear. Once the amount of environmental disclosure data exceeds a certain threshold level, a firm's ex ante cost of equity will rise again. Our empirical results also suggest that non-financial factors at the country level play a role in shaping how investors perceive a firm's riskiness. Locating the firm in a country with better environmental performance and a higher score of the human development index can reduce investors' risk perception and result in a lower ex ante cost of equity. A policy implication of our findings is that a global standardised and effective corporate sustainability reporting is needed to provide investors a more holistic view for evaluating the riskiness of their investments.     

Corporate venture capital as a strategy for external innovation: an exploratory empirical study

By creating corporate venture capital (CVC) units, large corporations predominantly pursue strategic objectives, especially the realisation of external innovations. Theoretical and preliminary empirical results on corporate venturing suggest how to manage CVC in order to achieve strategic objectives. We analyse for a sample of 21 corporate venture units in Germany, if the respective CVC programmes pursue the strategic objective to leverage external innovation and if these programmes are managed accordingly. We find that the majority of German corporate venture programmes follow mixed objectives and are not organised and managed as suggested in the literature. We come to the conclusion that a short-term focus on financial objectives of these CVC programmes prohibits the achievement of long-term strategic benefits from external innovation.     

Sustainable Development and International Distribution: Theory and Application to Rainforests

A situation is analyzed in which two countries negotiate the financing of costs that accrue if one of them switches onto a sustainable development path. The other country's incentive to pay arises as it benefits from the developing country's environmental resources, but at an ever declining rate as long as development remains nonsustainable. In an application to the protection of tropical rainforests it is shown that North to South redistribution of welfare would be substantial, yet the North would still gain enormously in efficiency terms. An explanation is given of why the Rio Conference failed in terms of rainforest protection.     

MAKING ARCHIVAL CHOICES FOR BUSINESS HISTORY

To become more proactive in their acquisition of the archives of Victorian business, the University of Melbourne Archives adapted a methodology pioneered by the Minnesota Historical Society. This enabled them to establish criteria to identify industrial sectors, and target specific companies within them, which match the strengths of the Victorian economy; and to determine the type of records required to adequately document both company and sector.     

Identifying peer mentors in the sales force: An exploratory investigation of willingness and ability

There has been a high level of interest in the sales management practitioner literature in mentoring, but very little is known about peer mentoring relationships between more experienced and less experienced salespeople. Sales organizations that wish to initiate or encourage peer mentoring relationships must identify those salespeople who are both able and willing to mentor less experienced salespeople. The results of an exploratory study to identify mentors in an industrial sales force are reported. The authors find that job experience, job satisfaction, a measure of interpersonal competence, and role conflict are associated with willingness to mentor; interpersonal competence and role conflict are associated with ability to mentor. Results are discussed and opportunities for future research are offered. She received her M.S. from Ohio State University and her M.B.A. from Wright State University. She has experience in personnel training with an industrial sales organization. Her research interests are in the areas of salesperson communication competence, buyer-seller interactions, and buyer-seller negotiation. Her research has been published in various conference proceedings. She received her Ph.D. from University of Tennessee. She has experience in industrial sales and sales management. Her research interests are in the area of buyer-seller interactions and managing sales relationships. Her research has been published inJournal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and various conference proceedings. Wendy L. Warren is in management at Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., and has experience in new product development. She received her M.S. from Ohio State University. Her research has been published inJournal of Consumer Research.     

When is a “KO” OK? Capitalizing on existing knowledge structures to facilitate pre-training transfer

Emerging research on training suggests that cognitive and adaptive approaches to training design can facilitate the “pre-training transfer” of trainees' relevant knowledge and skills to the training context. Little empirical work has tested this notion, in part, because of a weak theoretical base and inadequately developed testable hypotheses. This article reviews instructional and cognitive research and proposes that training effectiveness is a function of the correspondence between training treatments (e.g., discovery, remedial, didactic) and the nature of the overlap between trainees' pre-training knowledge structures and training's target knowledge structures. We identify 5 different types of overlap that influence the selection, and subsequent effectiveness, of training treatments: congruence, unrelatedness, conflict, over-generality or over-specificity.