One hundred years of excellence in business education: What have we learned?

The quality of the next generation of business leaders will be determined by the ways in which business schools respond to a host of dramatic changes emerging in the environment of higher education. While specific initiatives will vary widely, one thing seems certain: business schools will need to be more nimble, more innovative, and more efficient than ever before. The Kelley School of Business, Indiana University has consistently been at the forefront of business education. Over the past century, the School has developed a set of capabilities that has enabled it to capitalize on the forces that have shaped the evolution of business education. In this article, we review several significant trends affecting the future of business education and share the success principles that we believe are most applicable to thriving in the new world that is on our doorstep.     

Supply Chain Collaboration,Integration, and Relational Technology: How Complex Operant Resources Increase Performance Outcomes

How firms coordinate efforts to collectively compete as supply chains is a key concern of supply chain management scholars and practitioners. One avenue, the development of collaborative relational capabilities that support supply chain integration, offers promise. However, the effectiveness of collaboration as a supply chain resource has been questioned due to concerns associated with collaborative technologies, and thus prior research has called for a deeper examination of the role that technologies play in facilitating integration. Employing a Service‐Dominant Logic view of hierarchical resources, grounded in Resource Advantage Theory, this research tests a model subsuming relationships between collaboration, integration, and interfirm coordination technologies, and their associated performance outcomes. A sample of 282 supply chain managers from a variety of industries were surveyed, with proposed relationships examined employing structural equation modeling. Test results indicate that collaboration and integration interact to form higher order resources that collectively influence firm performance outcomes through interfirm coordination technologies.     

The impact of increases in subsidiary autonomy and network relationships on performance

This paper uses network approaches to subsidiary theory to investigate the performance impacts of interactions among the factors of autonomy, intra-organizational network relationships, and inter-organizational network relationships. The paper offers an analysis of both direct and indirect interactions among these factors. This study develops and extends existing research that uses network-based approaches in studies of subsidiary performance by considering the roles of autonomy and network relationships. In addition, the study examines changes in terms of increases in the interactions between the main factors rather than the levels of these factors. The examination of the interactions between increases in autonomy and networks and the subsequent impact of this change on performance contributes to a better understanding of subsidiary evolution. The results, which are based on data gathered from a survey of 350 foreign-owned subsidiaries in the UK, Germany, and Denmark, reveal complex interactions between increases in autonomy and network relationships, and the subsequent impact of these changes on performance. The results also highlight the central role of inter-organizational network relationships in the interaction between the factors, which produce significant and positive effects.     

The role of information asymmetry in the choice of entrepreneurial exit routes

Our quantitative study investigates the determinants of internal versus external exit routes in family firms. Building on information asymmetry theory, we examine how an owner's inferior knowledge about the abilities of potential external entrants (in contrast to family internal successors) renders a family internal transfer more likely. This information asymmetry, however, can be mitigated by activities such as owners' screening and transfer candidates' signaling efforts to reveal the candidates' abilities. Our data exhibits a positive effect of signaling and an inverted U-shaped effect of screening on the probability of external exit routes. Firm age, as a driver of emotional attachment, weakens these effects.     

Ecology and competitiveness in Swiss industries

This article investigates ecological problems and their influence on competitiveness in two selected Swiss industries: food and transportation. Ecological problems defined at a bio-physical level and the ecological stakes defined at a socio-economic level will be analysed. The ‘matrix of ecological problems’ and the ‘matrix of ecological stakes’ are useful and powerful instruments for analysing these two levels. It will be shown that ecological problems and ecological stakes vary from industry to industry. Ecological problems lead to ecological stakes. The ecological stakes lead to ecological changes within the two industries. The central forces of competition are influenced due to ecological issues. In order to be prepared for these changes, companies have to develop strategies which meet both economic and ecological requirements. Examples for such strategies are given in the text.     

THE USE OF TENDENCY SURVEYS IN EXTRAPOLATING NATIONAL ACCOUNTS

A well-known way of using tendency survey data is the construction of Composite Leading Indicators (CLIs). It is rather peculiar that CLIs pretend to predict macroeconomic aggregates, while their construction is not consistent with the way actual macroeconomic statistics are compiled. This paper contains preliminary results of an attempt to integrate tendency survey indicators into the framework of the Dutch Quarterly Accounts. We conclude that tendency survey indicators can contribute to an explanation of trends in "real" economic variables. Many of these indicators lead the Quarterly Accounts indicators. They can, therefore, contribute to a timely estimation of National Accounts aggregates.     

Consumer demand theory,goods and characteristics: Breathing empirical content into the Lancastrian approach

To begin with, it is argued that consumer demand theory has resulted in narrowly econometric more than broadly managerial applications. Further, Lancaster's recognition of the intrinsic attributes of goods has not been adequately exploited. Lancaster is summarized and appraised and empirical work to date reviewed. Finally a test of the characteristics hypothesis is given, using survey data on beer consumption. Subjectivity of choice is explicitly recognized and factor analysis is used to evaluate the components of demand of which quality and price variables appear to dominate. With the matching of the people-characteristics features (demand) and the technical goods-characteristics attributes (supply) a method of predicting demand is derived. This methodology may be used for a wide range of consumer goods.