Objective estimation versus subjective perceptions of earnings patterns and post‐earnings‐announcement drift

We investigate how the market's subjective estimates of autocorrelation in quarterly earnings vary with objective time‐series estimates. Our results suggest that investors increasingly underestimate the correlation as the autocorrelation level increases, and as a result, the post‐earnings‐announcement drift (PEAD) increases with the level of autocorrelation. We further show that the ability of autocorrelation to explain variation in the PEAD is robust to alternative explanations based on risk and institutional factors. Additional analysis indicates that the market's inefficiency in assessing the existence and magnitude of autocorrelation (and the related impact on PEAD) is inversely related to the richness of the information environment.     

The Surprising Use of Credit Scoring in Small Business Lending by Community Banks and the Attendant Effects on Credit Availability, Risk, and Profitability

The literature has documented a positive relationship between the use of credit scoring for small business loans and small business credit availability, broadly defined. However, this literature is hampered by the fact that all of the studies are based on a single 1998 survey of the very largest U.S. banking organizations. This paper addresses a number of deficiencies in the extant literature by employing data from a new survey of the use of credit scoring in small business lending, primarily by community banks. The survey evidence suggests that the use of credit scores in small business lending by community banks is surprisingly widespread. Moreover, the scores employed tend to be the consumer credit scores of the small business owners, rather than the more encompassing small business credit scores that include data on the firms as well as on the owners. Our empirical analysis suggests that credit scoring is associated with an initial increase in small business lending activity that moderates over time and no change in the quality of the loan portfolio. Supplementary analysis suggests that the use of credit scores for small business lending has a negative initial effect on community bank profitability that moderates over time.     

What Coaches Believe are Best Practices for Coaching: A Qualitative Study of Interviews from Coaches Residing in Asia and Europe

The industry of executive and leadership coaching has grown over the past decade, becoming an integral part of many leadership and executive training and development initiatives globally. As a result, research focusing on coaches in Asia and Europe may uncover useful best practices that could inform the field. Such knowledge would enable coaches to better understand how to work better with their client–leaders and can also inform and develop coaching practice and research. The purpose of our qualitative study was to understand, through the interviews of 12 practicing coaches residing in Asia and 19 practicing coaches residing in Europe, what their best practices are in one‐to‐one coaching engagements. Ten best practices from the coaches in Asia and six best practices from the coaches in Europe emerged. Each best practice is discussed as well as limitations, future research, and implications from the findings of our study.     

The transnational family: A typology and implications for work-family balance

In a growing number of families, members are dispersed across country borders, but maintain close ties. Despite their growing prevalence, an overarching theoretical framework to explain this phenomenon is absent and little is known about work-family experiences in this type of family. With this in mind, we provide a typology that can be applied to the transnational family as a theoretical lens through which diverse forms of transnational families can be understood. Next, we provide a definition of work-family balance (WFB) that considers unique aspects of transnational families while also drawing upon previous definitions of WFB developed in the domestic work-family literature. Finally, we discuss how WFB may differ depending on the characteristics of transnational families. We conclude by discussing implications and suggestions for future research.     

Working for a higher purpose: A theoretical framework for commitment to organization-sponsored causes

We explicate the theoretical foundations of employee commitment to organization-sponsored causes—voluntary, socially responsible practices or programs espoused by an organization—as targets of employee commitment. Although scholarly interest in organization-sponsored causes is increasing, little is understood about the mechanisms for employee involvement in organization-sponsored causes, since the motives and context for participation may differ significantly from participation in such causes outside of work. We propose that commitment to organization-sponsored causes can be conceptualized in terms of affective and normative mindsets and suggest that these mindsets, both separately and in combination, influence employees' behavioral support for the cause. We also draw upon the theory of planned behavior to suggest that employee perceptions regarding how an organization supports employee participation in the cause may influence their behavioral support for the cause. Finally, we describe the interrelationships among commitment to the organization-sponsored cause, employees' behavioral support for the organization-sponsored cause, and organizational commitment.     

The Nature of Cities: The Scope and Limits of Urban Theory

There has been a growing debate in recent decades about the range and substance of urban theory. The debate has been marked by many different claims about the nature of cities, including declarations that the urban is an incoherent concept, that urban society is nothing less than modern society as a whole, that the urban scale can no longer be separated from the global scale, and that urban theory hitherto has been deeply vitiated by its almost exclusive concentration on the cities of the global North. This article offers some points of clarification of claims like these. All cities can be understood in terms of a theoretical framework that combines two main processes, namely, the dynamics of agglomeration/polarization, and the unfolding of an associated nexus of locations, land uses and human interactions. This same framework can be used to identify many different varieties of cities, and to distinguish intrinsically urban phenomena from the rest of social reality. The discussion thus identifies the common dimensions of all cities without, on the one hand, exaggerating the scope of urban theory, or on the other hand, asserting that every individual city is an irreducible special case.     

Autonomy,accountability, and ambiguity in arm’s-length meta-governance: the case of NHS England

ABSTRACT

Meta-governance involves orchestrating the ‘rules of the game’ in public management. Arm’s-length bodies are particularly important vehicles for this. We consider the case of an arm’s-length body (NHS England) created to oversee the English NHS’ day-to-day operation, and remove ‘political interference’. Although mandated by the Department of Health it has increasingly operated as policy-maker, developing policies in tension with existing legislation, while Ministers have faded from public-facing accounts of service operation. This suggests NHS England operates as a meta-governor, insulating government whilst pursuing its own agenda, and raises crucial questions about governmental accountability whilst simultaneously making answers harder to obtain.