The effects of offering flexible work practices to employees with unpaid caregiving responsibilities for elderly or disabled family members

Approximately one in 10 employees in Australia, the United States, and Europe have unpaid caregiving responsibilities for elderly or disabled family members. This combination of employment and caregiving roles is problematic when there is conflict between their simultaneous demands. Flexible work practices can be an important mechanism for assisting these employees. However, limited attention has been given to determining the benefits of flexible work practices for these employees, or the process by which these effects arise. We address these gaps via a survey of employees with unpaid caregiving responsibilities for family who are elderly or disabled. Results indicate that greater availability of flexible work practices improves perceptions of workplace support for combining caregiving and employment. This effect was partially and sequentially mediated by disclosure, practice utilization, and practice helpfulness. Additionally, practice availability had a direct positive effect on practice utilization, while disclosure had a direct positive effect on perceived support. Overall, the findings demonstrate the benefits of flexible work practices for employees with caregiving responsibilities. The study also points the way to interventions that can improve the effectiveness of flexible work practices by demonstrating how the potential benefits of these practices are translated into actual improvements in perceived support.     

实物期权在制造系统中的应用

实物期权是一种新的有很大发展前途和应用潜力的投资评价方法,人们对它在制造系统中的应用还没有给予足够的重视。本研究从设备柔性、生产柔性和企业总体柔性角度,对实物期权在制造系统中的应用进行了回顾,指出:实物期权是一种对制造系统有具大应用价值的战略管理工具;企业为了提高制造柔性,发展了多种经营形式;制造柔性不但有经营价值,也有战略价值;企业要关注战略柔性,应当把柔性的管理作为重要的战略任务;同时,企业还应对柔性的价值和成本进行权衡,以确定其经济性。     

Caught in the Middle: Organizational Impediments to Middle Managers’ Work-life Balance

As increased work demands and longer working hours become the reality for many employees, the concept of work-life balance has received increasing attention. This paper presents findings from an exploratory study of Australian middle managers, which investigated the impact of middle managers’ daily organizational experiences on their lives both in and beyond the workplace. We focus on respondents’ reports of the difficulty in achieving work-life balance, specifically, the organizational impediments to creating balance. Three particular areas where these impediments were apparent are: the impact of new technologies; limits to autonomy and control in the middle management role; and difficulties in taking advantage of flexibility initiatives in the workplace. As middle managers are caught in the middle between work and personal life, there is a need for organizations to support middle managers’ efforts to achieve work-life balance if the organization’s long-term goals are to be achieved.     

Mickey Mouse and the IDioT principle for assessing research contribution: discussion of ‘Is the relationship between investment and conditional cash flow volatility ambiguous,asymmetric or both?’

Keefe and Tate ( 2013 ) provide both interesting and worthwhile insights into whether, under what circumstances and to what extent cash flow volatility impacts corporate investment. In the current paper, I have two related goals. First, more narrowly, I provide a constructively critical commentary on salient aspects of their empirical strategy, giving particular emphasis to the key drivers of Keefe and Tate's contribution to the literature. Second, illustrated in the context of Keefe and Tate, my broader goal is to give general advice especially aimed at novice researchers on how to make any empirical study more appealing to a critical reader.     

Does it Pay to be Flexible?

This paper addresses the determinants of price-cost margins inU.S. 4-digit industries. Margins are larger in capital intensive andconcentrated industries with high growth rates and R & D andadvertising to sales ratios. They also fluctuate significantly overthe business cycle. We go beyond the existing literature byconsidering an issue which is a dominant topic in the businessliterature, the flexibility of firms to adjust to exogenous shocks.In particular, we find a significant positive relationship betweenthe flexibility of labour demand and price cost marginssuggesting that it pays to be flexible.     

What Drives the Relationship Between Financial Flexibility and Firm Performance: Investment Scale or Investment Efficiency? Evidence from China

Financial flexibility helps improve firm performance. By using data from Chinese listed companies, we examine whether investment scale or investment efficiency drives the relationship between financial flexibility and firm performance via a special mediator testing method that is widely used in the psychology literature (Baron and Kenny, 1986). We find that financial flexibility has a significant and positive effect on both investment and firm performance. However, investment scale rather than investment efficiency seems to drive firm performance. This finding helps us understand that Chinese companies tend to emphasize investment expansion more than they do investment efficiency to improve firm performance.     

Technology and Flexibility: Enablers of Collaboration and Time‐Based Logistics Quality

Collaboration has been cited as one of the most important elements in leveraging supply chains to achieve competitive advantage. Literature in the field of collaboration tends to focus on strategic level initiatives; this research examines the benefits of implementing collaborative approaches at the logistics operations level. We find that leading strategic indicators, including technological innovativeness, technological complementarity, and flexibility are positively related to higher levels of collaboration and logistics service quality at the operational level in retail firms.     

基于价格预期弹性的人民币升值分析

人民币升值是当前经济运行中的热点、重点问题,也是难点问题。由于现有的汇率决定理论对于汇率变动的解释能力十分低下,经不起实证的检验。因此,笔者试从人民币的价格预期弹性分析入手,阐明预期才是人民币升值问题的最深层次矛盾,同时为妥善解决人民币升值问题提供了有益的参考方向。     

实物期权视角下的战略投资决策

战略投资所具有的特殊特点,使得传统评估方法不能够合理评价其价值。而实物期权能够很好地的与战略投资特点相适应,故而采用实物期权思维能够计算出传统评估方法所忽略的灵活性价值,从而使得其评价具有更现实更合理的意义。