An exploratory study of organizational politics in Kuwait

Because politics is a way of life in organizations, organizational politics has been studied by several scholars over the past 40 years. Few studies, though, have examined organizational politics outside of the United States and Europe. This study is a further step toward closing that gap. In particular, we (1) examined the applicability of the Perceptions of Organizational Politics Scale (POPS) instrument in Kuwait, (2) examined the perceived existence of organizational politics in a public organization in Kuwait, and (3) sought to determine if perceptions of organizational politics seemed to be influenced by the same variables in Kuwait as in Western societies. The study found that the perception of organizational politics is relatively strong and that the POPS instrument was applicable in the Kuwaiti culture and could lead to an expanded understanding of organizational politics. The gender of the respondents, their tenure, and their current positions had some influence on perceptions of organizational politics. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

What does it mean to find the face of the franchise? Physical attractiveness and the evaluation of athletic performance

We show that attractiveness, as measured by facial symmetry, leads to greater rewards in professional sports. National Football League quarterbacks who are more attractive are paid greater salaries and this premium persists after controlling for player performance.     

Industry dynamics: Foundations for models with an infinite number of firms

This paper explores the connection between three important threads of economic research offering different approaches to studying the dynamics of an industry with heterogeneous firms. Finite models of the form pioneered by Ericson and Pakes (1995) capture the dynamics of a finite number of heterogeneous firms as they compete in an industry, and are typically analyzed using the concept of Markov perfect equilibrium (MPE). Infinite models of the form pioneered by Hopenhayn (1992), on the other hand, consider an infinite number of infinitesimal firms, and are typically analyzed using the concept of stationary equilibrium (SE). A third approach uses oblivious equilibrium (OE), which maintains the simplifying benefits of an infinite model but within the more realistic setting of a finite model. The paper relates these three approaches. The main result of the paper provides conditions under which SE of infinite models approximate MPE of finite models arbitrarily well in asymptotically large markets. Our conditions require that the distribution of firm states in SE obeys a certain “light-tail” condition. In a second set of results, we show that the set of OE of a finite model approaches the set of SE of the infinite model in large markets under a similar light-tail condition.     

Prioritising land to be preserved for agriculture: A context-specific value tree

In Belgium as in many other countries, agricultural land is under pressure for development of other land uses. This paper presents a method for setting priorities for preservation of land for agriculture. The method is based on a participatory approach through which a value tree is formulated. This results in a list of criteria to define farmland value, which is explicitly linked to the objectives for farmland preservation. The value tree allows the list of criteria to be determined in a structured and consistent way. The participatory process contributes to the development of a shared vision on farmland preservation. The approach also incorporates context specificity, as shown by its application for farmland preservation in Flanders.     

Career mentoring in context: A multilevel study on differentiated career mentoring and career mentoring climate

This study explores how supervisor career mentoring contributes to contemporary organizational career development, which strives to foster employees' promotability while strengthening their intention to stay. Specifically, we focus on the implications of career mentoring in team contexts. Applying a multilevel framework, we distinguish between individual‐level differentiated mentoring (i.e., an employee's mentoring perceptions as compared to those of other team members) and group‐level career mentoring climate (i.e., the average perception across all group members). In a workplace setting, we collected data from vocational job starters (N ranged from 230 to 290) and their company supervisors (N ranged from 56 to 68). We find that career mentoring climate positively relates to promotability, more so than differentiated career mentoring. Both career mentoring climate and differentiated career mentoring are positively related to the intention to stay. At the individual level, this relationship is mediated by job satisfaction. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of differentiated and group‐level mentoring.     

Do satisfying walking and cycling trips result in more future trips with active travel modes? An exploratory study

Previous studies have indicated that travel satisfaction - the experienced emotions during, and cognitive evaluation of, a trip - can be affected by travel mode choice and other trip characteristics. However, as satisfactory trips might improve a person's attitude towards the used mode, persons may be more likely to use that same mode for future trips of the same kind. Hence, a cyclical process between travel mode choice and travel satisfaction might occur. In this paper we begin to analyse this process—using a structural equation modelling approach on cross-sectional data—for people who engage in walking and cycling for leisure trips in the Belgian city of Ghent. The focus on walking and cycling reflects recent studies indicating that active travel is often associated with the highest levels of travel satisfaction. Results of this exploratory analysis offer tentative support for the idea of a cyclical process: the evaluation of walking and cycling trips positively affects the respondents' attitude towards the respective mode, which in turn has a positive effect on choosing that mode.     

Why are REITS Currently So Expensive?

Over the last several years, the price of listed real estate stocks has been unusually high relative to dividends. I find that neither low interest rates nor low risk premia can account for the high valuation ratios. Lower interest rates have been offset by rising risk premia to keep expected returns close to average. Instead, the market has priced in future income growth on commercial properties far above the growth rates seen in the data. High implied growth rates are less extreme for nontraditional REIT sectors. Income growth expectations are also less extreme for international listed real estate.     

U.S. House Prices over the Last 30 Years: Bubbles,Regime Shifts and Market (In)Efficiency

This paper studies U.S. house prices across 45 metropolitan areas from 1980 to 2012. It applies a version of the Gordon dividend discount model for long‐run “fundamentals” and uses Mean Group and Pooled Mean Group estimation to estimate long‐run and short‐run determinants of house prices. We find great similarity across cities in that the long‐run house prices are largely explained by the same fundamentals; the long‐run rent to price ratio is approximately 5% plus 0.75 times the real interest rate (which is on the order of 2%). However, adjustments to deviations from the fundamentals are slow, in the long‐run, closing the gap at a rate of around 10% per year. We find sharp differences in short‐run adjustments (momentum) away from the fundamentals across cities, and the differences are correlated with local supply elasticities (more momentum with lower elasticity). Analysis of residuals suggests strong cyclical deviations, which are mean‐reverting.