Joint Venture Formation and Internationalization: A Japanese MNEs' Perspective

This article examines relationships among top-management-team composition, group processes, and the effects of those processes on cohesion for international joint venture teams in Thailand. For culturally diverse teams, demographic elements (member age, length of team tenure, level of education, functional expertise) and cultural characteristics (country of education, nationality, affiliation with a parent organization, primary language spoken) define heterogeneity. Overall, demographic heterogeneity had a significant influence on openness among team members and on cohesion when mediated by openness. Cultural heterogeneity had a significant influence on openness and cohesion among team members, with loyalty and openness having a significant influence on cohesion.     

Distribution Channel Relational Cohesion Exchange Model: A Small‐to‐Medium Enterprise Manufacturer's Perspective

This study investigated the influence of dealers' expert, referent, and legitimate sources of power on small‐to‐medium enterprise manufacturers' relationship commitment in distribution channel systems. A theoretical model drawing on the relational cohesion theory and the extant marketing literature is developed and tested empirically using a sample data set of 452 from Zimbabwe. In this model, expert, referent, and legitimate powers are the predictors, whereas trust, cooperation, and relationship satisfaction are the mediators, and relationship commitment is the outcome variable. Analysis reveals that these three powers positively influence the mediators and outcome variable in a significant way, except for legitimate power to cooperation relationship. Managerial implications and future studies are suggested.     

Analysis of rural activity spaces and transport disadvantage using a multi-method approach

Current knowledge about the relationship between transport disadvantage and activity space size is limited to urban areas, and as a result, very little is known about this link in a rural context. In addition, although research has identified transport disadvantaged groups based on their size of activity space, these studies have, however, not empirically explained such differences and the result is often a poor identification of the problems facing disadvantaged groups. Research has shown that transport disadvantage varies over time. The static nature of analysis using the activity space concept in previous research studies has lacked the ability to identify transport disadvantage in time. Activity space is a dynamic concept; and therefore possesses a great potential in capturing temporal variations in behaviour and access opportunities. This research derives measures of the size and fullness of activity spaces for 157 individuals for weekdays, weekends, and for a week using weekly activity-travel diary data from three case study areas located in rural Northern Ireland. Four focus groups were also conducted in order to triangulate quantitative findings and to explain the differences between different socio-spatial groups. The findings of this research show that despite having a smaller sized activity space, individuals were not disadvantaged because they were able to access their required activities locally. Car-ownership was found to be an important life line in rural areas. Temporal disaggregation of the data reveals that this is true only on weekends due to a lack of public transport services. In addition, despite activity spaces being at a similar size, the fullness of activity spaces of low-income individuals was found to be significantly lower compared to their high-income counterparts. Focus group data shows that financial constraint, poor connections both between public transport services and between transport routes and opportunities forced individuals to participate in activities located along the main transport corridors.     

The Effect of Conference Calls on Analysts' Forecasts – German Evidence

This study examines whether conference calls provide additional information to analysts. For a large sample of conference calls, hosted by German firms between 2004 and 2007, our results show that conference calls improve analysts' ability to forecast future earnings accurately. This suggests that additional information is released during conference calls. The reduction in forecast error is economically significant and larger in magnitude when compared to results for the US (Bowen et al., 2002). These findings are consistent with the notion that committing to additional disclosures is likely to yield greater effects in a less stringent disclosure system (Verrecchia, 2001). Since the majority of our sample firms conduct conference calls as closed calls, the evidence of this paper suggests that conference calls may contribute to an information gap between call participants and non-invited parties. Our findings should be of substantial interest to European regulators seeking to level the informational playing field for all investors.     

KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Study (KIDS) 1993–98: A longitudinal household database for South African policy analysis

An important adjunct of apartheid has been the absence of credible and comprehensive data on which policies, such as poverty reduction strategies, can be grounded. The 1993 Project for Statistics on Living Standards and Development (PSLSD) provided the first comprehensive household database for South Africa. Despite its usefulness, however, the one round PSLSD cannot provide answers to many questions important to policy researchers and practitioners, particularly questions about dynamic processes. The primary objective in this article is to introduce a new longitudinal household database, based on the PSLSD, which begins to fill this gap. Households surveyed by the PSLSD in KwaZulu-Natal province were re-surveyed in 1998 by the KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Survey (KIDS). As a research endeavour, the KIDS project addresses one of the most vexing and important problems confronting contemporary South Africa: understanding the forces and mechanisms which contribute to the perpetuation of apartheid's legacy of poverty and inequality.     

Retail bank selection in developed and developing countries: A cross‐national study of students' bank‐selection criteria

This exploratory research article is concerned with students' selection of retail banks in the United States and Ghana. It is a comparative cross‐national study aimed at revealing the factors determining retail bank selection among students in different environmental settings. The key objective is to establish if there are any significant differences and/or similarities in students' selection of retail banks in developed and developing economies. A similar data‐collection method was employed in the United States and Ghana to facilitate constructive comparison. The results identified four key factors—convenience, competence, recommendation by parents, and free banking and/or no bank charges—to be consistent across the two economies. The recommendation of the study is that in the context of an open and liberalized market environment, retail bank marketing strategies should be standardized irrespective of the national development stage. It concludes that retail bank managers particularly in developing countries should learn to provide consistent and good customer care. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.