The role of the ideal organization in comparative management: A cross cultural perspective of Japan & Korea

It is popular to talk of the Confucian Work Ethic when explaining the successes of Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. This is not an accurate impression. The authors of this article found significant differences in management practices — both actual and ideal — between Japan and South Korea.Professors Lane Kelley, Reginald Worthley and Harry Lie are from the College of Business Administration, University of Hawaii while Professor Arthur Whatley is from the College of Business Administration & Economics, New Mexico State University.     

Where’s the Money? An Investigation into the Whereabouts and Uses of Australian Banknotes

The Reserve Bank of Australia is the sole issuer and redeemer of Australian banknotes, but between issuance and destruction there is little information about where banknotes go or what they are used for. We estimate the whereabouts and uses of Australian banknotes, and find that 15–35 per cent are used to facilitate legitimate transactions, 4–7 per cent are used for transactions in the shadow economy, while the remainder are non-transactional. The vast majority of non-transactional banknotes are likely to be hoarded, and we estimate that 5–10 per cent of outstanding banknotes are lost or collected.     

Assembly FG: An Educational Case on MRP II Integrated within ERP

This case teaches students how discrete (job order) manufacturing companies use Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP II) within Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems to plan purchase orders for direct materials and shop orders for work‐in‐process and finished goods. Students simulate MRP II integrated within ERP, using Microsoft Excel to learn MRP II's bill‐of‐materials (BOM) Explosion that plans order quantities and MRP II's scheduling logic that uses lead‐times to determine start dates for planned orders. Students explain why MRP II is most practical and effective when executed within ERP and how MRP II can reduce excess inventories, prevent inventory shortages, and help companies deliver quality products to customers on schedule. Also, students explain why BOM, inventory, and lead‐time inaccuracies can adversely affect the accuracy of MRP II‐planned replenishments and identify controls that reduce the risks of these inaccuracies.     

An investigation of wholly‐owned foreign subsidiary control through transaction cost economics theory

This paper investigates the management control systems used by multinational corporation headquarters to control wholly‐owned foreign subsidiaries. Our theory development is based on transaction cost economics. First, we conduct a series of exploratory interviews, providing an insight into the context, and second, we provide empirical evidence based on cross‐sectional survey data. Our results indicate that activity traits (uncertainty, asset specificity and post hoc information impactedness) have significant implications on control choices, in particular the control archetype combinations chosen by headquarters, although not all results are consistent with theory predictions. Our findings are supported by extensive alternative testing.     

How consumer shopping orientation influences perceived crowding, excitement, and stress at the mall

While a few researchers have started to chip away at the notion that retail density is always negative, extant studies do not empirically address the question of why some shoppers respond negatively to a specific level of density while others respond positively. We examine this issue by drawing upon field theory (Lewin 1939) to shed light on how shoppers vary in terms of deeper motives (McClelland 1953) to seek control or intimacy with others in retail mall settings, and whether these motives influence shopping orientations. Shopping orientation is then hypothesized to affect perceptions of crowding, and, in turn, subsequent affective responses to the mall shopping experience. Moreover, we examine whether individual differences (gender and age) can help retailers segment those with different shopping orientations and the motives that influence these orientations. We found that task and social shopping orientations were influenced by deeper motives for control and intimacy. The causal relationships between shopping motive, shopping orientation, and consumers?? affective responses of stress and excitement were also discovered. Finally, we address theoretical and managerial implications of our results.     

Depreciation Need Not Be Arbitrary

Following Thomas (1969, 1974) the depreciation adjustment charged against accounting earnings is nowadays commonly presumed to be entirely arbitrary when it is viewed from a measurement perspective. This paper develops a statistical interpretation of accounting measurement to show that the depreciation calculation need not necessarily be viewed as incorrigible in Thomas's sense. A probability modelling approach is adopted to illustrate how the depreciation adjustment can be used to smooth accounting earnings over time. Depreciation is thus shown to have potentially useful estimation properties. The results have obvious policy implications regarding the objectives that depreciation and other accounting allocations might serve. They also have a bearing on fundamental questions regarding the nature of accounting measurement.     

Do international investment income flows smooth income?

Do International Investment Income Flows Smooth Income? — One mechanism by which international capital market integration can smooth consumption is to stabilize national income. In order to provide income smoothing, net international investment income should negatively co-vary with GDP. Moreover, to maximize stabilization of GNP in the face of GDP fluctuations, the yield on foreign assets should move countercyclically and the yield on foreign liabilities procyclically. In both time series and panel settings, we reject these hypotheses, suggesting that positive gross international investment income positions are not associated with income smoothing at businesscycle frequencies.     

Complementary technologies,knowledge relatedness,and invention outcomes in high technology mergers and acquisitions

Prior research on M&As and invention outcomes has not systematically examined the influence of two types of knowledge differences. Knowledge relatedness has typically been equated with knowledge similarity and the separate influence of knowledge complementarity has been overlooked. Similarly, studies examining innovation outcomes of M&As have typically focused on the role of technological knowledge and overlooked the influence of scientific knowledge. We develop a model of relatedness and invention performance of high‐technology M&As that considers science and technology similarity and complementarity as important drivers of invention. We test the model using a sample of M&As from the drug, chemical, and electronics industries and a fine‐grained measure of knowledge relatedness that distinguishes between science and technology relatedness. We find that complementary scientific knowledge and complementary technological knowledge both contribute to post‐merger invention performance by stimulating higher quality and more novel inventions. This suggests that high‐technology firms seeking acquisitions should search for, identify, and acquire businesses that have scientific and technological knowledge that is complementary to their own. Our results also suggest that similarities in knowledge facilitate incremental renewal, while complementarities would make discontinuous strategic transformations more likely, and that absorptive capacity research should be expanded to consider complementarities as well as similarities. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Building a multi-category brand: when should distant brand extensions be introduced?

When companies plan to build multi-category brands by adding new products to their product lines, two questions loom large: (1) whether and (2) when brand extensions perceived as distant (comparatively dissimilar) from the company’s existing core line of products should be introduced. Since many real-world firms have introduced distant brand extensions, this paper focuses on the second question: when the company should introduce a distant extension within a series of other closer extensions—a decision for which there is little research-based guidance for managers. Building on theories of mental categorization, the authors argue that early (vs. late) introductions of distant brand extensions can be more beneficial for the brand. Three studies support this conclusion, demonstrating that early (vs. late) introductions of distant extensions can result in more positive final brand attitudes; that is, attitudes held after all the extensions have been introduced. This effect is driven by how easily the distant extension is integrated into consumers’ brand concepts and is moderated by overall brand positioning. Importantly, this effect on final brand attitudes is shown to influence behavioral measures of product preference and brand engagement.