Bracing for MNC competition through innovative HRM practices: The way ahead for Indian firms

With increasing globalization, firms are entering a dynamic world of international business that is marked by liberalization of economic policies in a large number of emerging economies like India. To face the challenge of increasing competition that has resulted from liberalization, Indian organizations have initiated adoption of innovative human resource management practices both critically and constructively to foster creativity and innovation among employees. With the help of 11 in‐depth case studies, this article tries to understand how innovative HRM practices are being adopted by Indian firms to brace for competition in the postliberalization scenario. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Legal form of the firm and overseas market choice in India’s software and IT industry

Drawing upon the economics, international business, and law literatures, we hypothesize that variations in governance characteristics, associated with firms being public limited companies, private limited companies, or unincorporated enterprises, influence the internationalization patterns of the software and information technology (IT) companies in India. The results provide some support for our hypotheses, as variations in legal form were found to significantly impact regional sales in the US and Canada, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. Organizational size and business type were also significantly related to sales in a number of regions. Implications of our findings and directions for future research are discussed.     

Market orientation and performance in the biotechnology industry: An exploratory empirical analysis

The purpose ofthis study was to conduct an exploratory investigation into the link between market orientation and business performance in the biotechnology sector. Based on the nature and character of the biotechnology industry, a multi-faceted scale of market orientation was derived from a preuiously tested and refined measure of the construct. Data were generated from 62 biotechnolog firms and a variety of market orientation-performance relationships were investigated, alongside other potential effects on the different dimensions of business performance. The findings indicate that market orientation is positively and signficanttly associated with three of the four performance measures examined. Implications of our findings for biotechnology industry managers are discussed and limitations of the study as well as future research directions are addressed.     

Impact of Risk on HYV Adoption in Bangladesh

The objectives of this paper are to develop a measure of risk aversion based on the safety-first principle. The risk coefficient for a large number of farmers was positive indicating the tendency towards gambling in Bangladesh agriculture. Farmers who were near subsistence income (disaster level of income) tended to choose riskier crops such as HYV rice. The risk-aversion variable was highly correlated with demographic and socioeconomic variables. Large holders of land tended to be relatively more risk-averse than small holders of land and area allocated to HYV proportionally declined with increases in holding size. A three-equation model on HYV adoption decisions, fertilizer and hired labour was estimated with a risk-aversion variable based on the safety-first principle, and expected and significant signs were obtained with the risk-aversion variable in HYV and hired labour equations.     

Making Trade-Offs in the New Product Development Process: A German/US Comparison

Using a conjoint analysis experiment, Ashok Gupta, Klaus Brockhoff and Ursula Weisenfeld present how R&D, marketing, and manufacturing managers in Germany make trade-offs among three critical variables in the new product (NPD) process: development schedule, development costs, and product performance. The findings are compared with a similar study of US firms. This comparison underscores the basic problem: US managers do not emphasize product development speed to the same extent as do German managers.     

HOUSEHOLD CONSUMER EXPENDITURE INEQUALITIES IN INDIA: A DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS

The objectives of this study are to decompose household consumer expenditure inequalities in India by regions (states) and sectors (urban-rural) for the years 1977–78 and 1983 based on the National Sample Survey data. A class of Generalised Entropy measures is used. Our results consistently indicate that the inequality within states contributes much more towards national inequality and within-sector inequality explains a large part of state level inequality. The inequality at state levels has shown a decline from 1977–78 to 1983 due to a better monsoon season in 1983, and anti-poverty programmes.     

Modelling the exchange rate behaviour of yen and deutsche mark against the dollar

Zusammenfassung Ein Modell des Wechselkursverhaltens des Yen und der Deutschen Mark gegenüber dem Dollar. — Ziel dieser Untersuchung ist es, die kurz- und langfristigen Beziehungen zwischen bilateralen Wechselkursen und wirtschaftlichen Variablen zu bestimmen (Unterschiede im Geldangebot, Zinsdifferenzen, Abweichungen von der Kaufkraftparit?t, Unterschiede in der Inflationsrate, Industrieproduktion und Handelsbilanz). Statistische Tests auf Kointegration werden durchgeführt; und wenn die Hypothese “Keine Kointegration” zurückgewiesen wird, ergibt sich eine langfristige Gleichgewichtsbeziehung. Eine kurzfristige Beziehung wird im Rahmen eines Irrtumskorrektur-Modells gesch?tzt. Für den Yen/Dollar-Kurs ergeben sich lang- und kurzfristige Beziehungen, die ?konometrischen Tests standhalten. Für den DM/Dollar-Kurs ist die langfristige Beziehung zweifelhaft, aber eine kurzfristige Beziehung wird ermittelt. Das ist plausibel, wenn man die Effizienz des Devisenmarktes berücksichtigt.

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Résumé Le modelage du comportement des cours du change du Yen et de la mark allemande envers le dollar. — L’intention de cette étude est de déterminer les rapports à court terme et à long terme entre les cours du change bilatéraux et des variables économiques comme les différences concernant l’offre monétaire, les taux d’intéréts, les taux d’inflation, l’activité industrielle ainsi que les déviations de la PPA et les balances commerciales. On fait des tests statistiques de cointégration. Si l’hypothèse de non-cointégration est rejeté, on obtient un rapport d’équilibre à long terme. On estime aussi un rapport à court terme en utilisant un modèle d’erreur-correction. En ce qui concerne le cours du change entre le Yen et le dollar, on obtient un rapport à long terme et à court terme qui satisfait des tests économétriques. Pour la DM/dollar relation, le rapport à long terme est douteux, mais un rapport à court terme est obtenu. Ce résultat est plausible si l’on considère l’efficience du marché des changes.

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Resumen Modelando el comportamiento de la tasa de cambio del yen y del marco alemán frente al dólar. — El objetivo de este trabajo es determinar las relaciones de corto y largo plazo entre tasas de cambio bilaterales y variables económicas como las diferencias entre la oferta monetaria, entre las tasas de interés, entre las tasas de inflación, entre la actividad industrial, las deviaciones de la paridad del poder de compra y el saldo comercial. Se llevan a cabo tests estadisticos de cointegración y, en caso de rechazarse la hipótesis de no cointegración, se obtiene una relación de equilibrio de largo plazo. Se estima una relación de corto plazo utilizando un marco de correction de errores. Para la tasa yen/dólar se obtienen relaciones de corto y largo plazo que satisfacen tests econométricos. Para la tasa DM/dólar la relación de largo plazo es sospechosa; se obtiene una de corto plazo. Esto es plausible, dada la eficiencia con la cual funciona el mercado de cambios.

     

Risk attitudes and premiums of U.S. corn and soybean producers: an empirical investigation

The 2000 Agricultural Risk Protection Act and 2002 Farm Security and Rural Investment Act reduced price and yield risks faced by many U.S. crop producers to low levels. We use a non-structural methodology extended for application to pseudo panels and national survey data to examine the risk attitudes of U.S. corn and soybean producers to test whether, and examine how, risk attitudes varied during the 1996–2001 and 2002–2008 periods by revenue category. We cannot reject the hypothesis of risk neutrality for the entire population, and for each revenue category, for the former period, but can reject risk neutrality, in favor of risk tolerance, for the entire population and for the larger revenue categories for the latter period. Estimated risk premiums for the latter period suggest that U.S. corn and soybean farmers who earn more require larger payments to remain indifferent between receiving their expected income with certainty and receiving an uncertain income from farming and government programs.