Assessment and selection of management consultants: A comparative cognitive study between small- and large-scale companies

This paper explores alternative ways of evaluating and ultimately hiring a generalist consultancy for short- and medium-term projects, and how this is shaped by the size of the clients’ company. What buying factors do managers of small and large firms have in mind when hiring consultants for their projects?Instead of employing surveys incorporating predefined buying factors based on what the researchers think would be important, a cognitive mapping methodology - the repertory grid technique - is applied to investigate the underlying phenomena. Using the repertory grid technique to draw mental models is a novel research technique within the supply management field. Recent behavioral supply chain management research found the behavior of managers to be critically influenced by mental models: the lenses through which managers perceive, simplify and interpret the world.Results show differences between the buying factors used in small- and large-scale companies: managers of large companies are more ‘reputation and outcome-oriented’ and managers of small businesses are more concerned with ‘how the services are rendered’. However, both constituents stressed the importance of expertise, quality and the relationship between the client and the management consultancy, although the character of such a relationship differed between small- and large-scale firms. Results also point out criteria that managers of small and large companies employ to discriminate between good and poor performing consultancies and to judge service delivery. The practical implications for both companies hiring consultancies and the consultancy companies are discussed. For consultancies, our findings can help tailoring their efforts to a differing clientele when marketing and selling their services. For companies hiring consultancies, fixating too much on particular buying factors may lead to biased decisions.     

Ethical Codes in Sports Organizations: Classification Framework,Content Analysis,and the Influence of Content on Code Effectiveness

Although there is a growing body of research on social media, only few studies have considered organic products. Therefore, this study mapped the diffusion path of the social media resources for organic products in Mexico and South Korea through Twitter and compared the contents of tweets about organic products in terms of their semantic and hyperlink networks using webometric methods. The results indicate that for organic products, Koreans sent tweets much more frequently than Mexicans. Mexican tweets focused on basic food products in street markets, whereas Korean tweets highlighted promotions and firms, revealing the corporatist structure of its economy. In both cases, the findings support Twitter as a useful tool for Word-of-Mouth Communication on the online environment, among product consumers, and between consumers and enterprises.     

Optimal regime switching and threshold effects

We consider a general control problem with two types of optimal regime switch. The first one concerns technological and/or institutional regimes indexed by a finite number of discrete parameter values, and the second features regimes relying on given threshold values for given state variables. We propose a general optimal control framework allowing to derive the first-order optimality conditions and in particular to characterize the geometry of the shadow prices at optimal switching times (if any). We apply this new optimal control material to address the problem of the optimal management of natural resources under ecological irreversibility, and with the possibility to switch to a backstop technology.     

Pitfalls and Challenges for Trust and Effectiveness in Collaborative Networks

Abstract

Collaborative networks in the public and non-profit sector face challenges that are typical for their institutional context. The typical characteristics that might impede the functioning of networks and, in particular, the development of trust and network effectiveness, are related to type of instigation, network flexibility, and power in the form of unbalanced influence and the vertical character of networks. In a sample of 52 networks, the effects of network flexibility, mandatory and vertical networks, and influence on trust and network effectiveness were studied. Findings indicated that particularly flexibility in networks was important and that cognition-based trust played a central role in obtaining effective networks.     

Bargaining in committees as an extension of Nash's bargaining theory

This paper addresses the following issue: if a set of agents bargain on a set of feasible alternatives ‘in the shadow’ of a voting rule, that is, any agreement can be enforced if a ‘winning coalition’ supports it, what general agreements are likely to arise? In other words: what influence can the voting rule used to settle (possibly nonunanimous) agreements have on the outcome of consensus? We model the situation as an extension of the Nash bargaining problem in which an arbitrary voting rule replaces unanimity. In this setting a natural extension of Nash's solution is characterized.     

Intertemporal transfers of emission quotas in climate policies

We are interested in situations in which governments are committed to some pollution abatement constraint which does not match the society's most preferred level of pollution, like in the current climate change policies undergone on behalf of the Kyoto protocol. We develop an overlapping generations model with capital and pollution in which the individuals care about the environmental quality. We show that slightly improving the intertemporal flexibility of the emission quotas by authorizing two-period backward and forward transfers allows to decentralize the whole optimal growth path at competitive equilibrium.     

Small-Business Owner-Managers’ Perceptions of Business Ethics and CSR-Related Concepts

Recent academic articles point to an increased vagueness and overlap in concepts related to business ethics and corporate responsibility. Further, the perception of these notions can differ in the small-business world from the original academic definitions. This article focuses on the cognition of small-business owner-managers. Given the impact of small-business owner–managers on their ventures, corporate responsibility and ethical issues can take a different route in SMEs. The small-business owner–manager is able to shape the corporate culture and to enact values other than profit. Adopting a cognitive perspective, we have identified how the small-business owner–manager makes sense of notions linked to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and business ethics. The concept of sensemaking has recently been applied to CSR (Basu and Pallazzo, 2008; Cramer et al., 2006). Applying a cognitive perspective to small-business owners may help in explaining specific phenomena found within small-business ownership. For this research, the Repertory Grid Technique (RGT) is used, a method that has not previously been widely applied in the business and society field.     

Public infrastructure,non‐cooperative investments,and endogenous growth

Two countries strategically invest in productive infrastructure within a general equilibrium model with endogenous growth. These public investments generate externalities. Dynamic analysis reveals that: (1) under constant returns, the two countries’ growth rates differ during the transition but are identical on the balanced growth path, (2) a country with decreasing returns can experience sustained growth provided that the other country grows at a positive constant rate, (3) cooperation does not necessarily lead to higher growth for each country, and it can increase or decrease the gap between countries’ growth rates depending on the countries’ consumption preferences regarding domestic and foreign goods.     

The environmental Kuznets curve in a world of irreversibility

This paper develops an overlapping generations model where consumption is the source of polluting emissions. Pollution stock accumulates with emissions but is partially assimilated by nature at each period. The assimilation capacity of nature is limited and vanishes beyond a critical level of pollution. We first show that multiple equilibria exist. More importantly, some exhibit irreversible pollution levels although an abatement activity is operative. Thus, the simple engagement of maintenance does not necessarily suffice to protect an economy against convergence toward a steady state having the properties of an ecological and economic poverty trap. In contrast with earlier related studies, the emergence of the environmental Kuznets curve is no longer the rule. Instead, we detect a sort of degenerated environmental Kuznets curve that corresponds to the equilibrium trajectory leading to the irreversible solution. I would like to thank Alain Venditti, Mabel Tidball, Alain Jean-Marie and Thierry Bréchet for their helpfull comments and suggestions. I am deeply grateful to an anonymous referee whose comments have greatly improved the paper.