The role of corporate culture in the process of strategic human resource management: Evidence from Chinese enterprises

Extant research on strategic human resource management (SHRM) has primarily focused on the content of SHRM (best practices, bundles of practices, etc.) and its effect on firm performance. Little research has examined the SHRM process so as to better understand how SHRM is adopted and implemented and what impact it has on organizational processes and outcomes. This article examines the role of corporate culture in the SHRM adoption and implementation process. Empirical results from a sample of 223 Chinese enterprises indicate that corporate culture has an impact on the adoption of SHRM, and that different types of culture affect the SHRM process differently. Specifically, group and developmental cultures have positive effects on the adoption of SHRM, but the effect of hierarchical culture is not significant. Developmental culture is also found to have a direct effect on firm performance. This study offers significant implications for HRM in China and other dynamic and emerging economies. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Decision-Making Process of Internal Whistleblowing Behavior in China: Empirical Evidence and Implications

In response to the lack of empirical studies examining the internal disclosure behavior in the Chinese context, this study tested a whistleblowing-decision-making process among employees in the Chinese banking industry. For would-be whistleblowers, positive affect and organizational ethical culture were hypothesized to enhance the expected efficacy of their whistleblowing intention, by providing collective norms concerning legitimate, management-sanctioned behavior. Questionnaire surveys were collected from 364 employees in 10 banks in the Hangzhou City, China. By and large, the findings supported the hypotheses. Issues of whistleblowing in the Chinese context and implications were discussed.     

Real-time mobilization decisions for multi-priority emergency response resources and evacuation groups: Model formulation and solution

This paper presents a model formulation and solution for simultaneous mobilization destination, traffic assignment, and departure schedule for multi-priority groups (SMDTS-MPG) for real-time emergency response in no-notice disasters. The presented approach addresses the decision context in which multiple emergency responses and evacuation flow groups with different destinations and varying priorities coexist in the same traffic network, within which simultaneous mobilization strategies must consider this requirement. The proposed modeling technique and the cell transmission model (CTM)-based linear-programming model provides a mechanism to accomplish this goal in an intuitive and coherent manner. The proposed matrix formulation of the SMDTS-MPG model permits the rapid deployment of the model to large networks. Model formulation and numerical examples are presented in detail in this paper.     

Relationship governance mechanisms and collaborative performance: A relational life-cycle perspective

Governance mechanisms protect the investments involved in transactions and thereby facilitate and promote sustainable and cooperative relationships; however, the empirical results of prior research concerning the relationship between governance mechanisms and collaborative performance are inconsistent. Based on transaction cost economy (TCE) and social exchange theory (SET), a relational life-cycle framework that considers the dynamic evolution of collaborative relationships and re-examines the relationship between governance mechanisms and collaborative performance was developed in this study. Evidence from 124 manufacturers in Taiwan indicates that the effects of governance mechanisms on collaborative performance differ according to the current life-cycle phase. In the exploration phase, contractual control exerts a positive impact on cooperative performance. In the buildup and maturity phases, relational control remains positively associated with collaborative performance, whereas the impact of contractual control is insignificant. In the decline phase, both contractual control and relational control have an insignificant impact on collaborative performance. Herein, we discuss the implications of our empirical findings and their relevance to managers.     

Technology transfer and innovation performance: Evidence from Chinese firms

This paper explores the relationship between technology transfer activities and innovation performance with special reference to Chinese industrial firms. It is based on a recent nationwide survey covering 2334 Chinese industrial firms. The impact of technology transfer on their innovative performance was analyzed for all the responded firms and similar analyses also addressed the issue from perspectives of general industrial firms versus high-tech firms, and large firms versus small and medium firms. Several critical types of technology transfer activities were identified and both positive and negative impacts were discussed along with the Pearson correlation analysis and stepwise regression analysis. The study revealed that the innovation activities in Chinese manufacturing firms could not be boosted substantially merely through the acquisition of key equipment and apparatus from abroad. The findings also suggested that Chinese firms should develop their technological absorptive capacity and transformative capacity, and foster technology transfer and communications among trading partners. Moreover, it would be crucial for Chinese firms to stress the nurturing of indigenous innovation capabilities so as to sustain their performance improvement.     

异地审计与审计定价——基于静态与动态视角的检验

地域特征是影响中国上市公司审计定价的重要因素。利用2004~2009年339家非金融行业上市公司组成的平衡面板样本,从静态和动态两个视角考察上市公司所在地与会计师事务所所在地的异同对审计定价的影响。研究发现,异地审计与审计定价显著负相关,中国证券市场确实存在"低价揽客"的现状。同时还发现,调整成本也是影响审计定价的重要因素。     

Does Trading Improve Individual Investor Performance?

From 52,649 accounts and 10,615,117 transaction records obtained from a renowned brokerage house in Taiwan we find that individual investors purchase 73.4% and sell 64.5% of their stock portfolios each month. This is more than ten times the statistics for their U.S. counterparts. In general, individual investors have positive abnormal returns from factor-based models. However, they would have earned higher returns from following a buy-and-hold strategy. We find a U-shaped rather than a monotonic turnover and performance relation. The results do not support the overconfidence argument proposed by Barber and Odean (2000, 2001) nor does the rational model of Grossman and Stiglitz (1980). We find that investors with large portfolio values tend to be informed traders whose excess trading does create performance value. We also investigate whether men are more overconfident than women and find that even though men trade more excessively than women, men's performance measures are not dramatically lower than women's. Specifically, the own-benchmark adjusted gross return for men is higher than that for women. The regression results indicate that electronic traders rather than men are overconfident.     

Risk aversion with state-dependent preferences in the rank-dependent expected utility theory

We extend the analysis of risk aversion with state-dependent preferences to the rank-dependent expected utility theory. We find that in this extended theory, for two preference relations to be comparable in risk aversion not only do their reference sets need to coincide (a condition first introduced by Karni [1983, 1985] in the original expected utility framework), but they must also rank the prospective state-dependent outcomes in the same manner. We formalize this additional condition by introducing the concept of certainty sets. Under our condition of comparability, various results and characterizations of interpersonal comparison of risk aversion are obtained. The implications for a specific insurance problem are also discussed.     

Ethical Judgment and Whistleblowing Intention: Examining the Moderating Role of Locus of Control

The growing body of whistleblowing literature includes many studies that have attempted to identify the individual level antecedents of whistleblowing behavior. However, cross-cultural differences in perceptions of the ethicality of whistleblowing affect the judgment of whistleblowing intention. This study ascertains how Chinese managers/professionals decide to blow the whistle in terms of their locus of control and subjective judgment regarding the intention of whistleblowing. Hypotheses that are derived from these speculations are tested with data on Chinese managers and professionals (n = 306). Statistical analysis largely supports the hypotheses, which suggests that an individual's locus of control does moderate the relationship between ethical judgment and whistleblowing.