Employee Investment Research Articles

Self-regulated learning strategies and software training

We investigated one aspect of the growing trend towards self-management within organizations by examining the learning processes that individuals use when learning computer software alone in a web-based training environment, and found that individuals learn in different ways. Software training in any context requires individuals to apply self-regulated learning strategies to achieve their learning objectives. Self-regulated learning strategies are the processes that they use to manage their own learning. As self-guided training gains popularity, self-regulated learning strategies become increasingly important, because the learner typically has more control of their training. We found that self-regulated learning strategies led to better outcomes in our study of managers and professionals learning to use an ERP system. We also gained insights into the most popular learning strategies. This work enhanced our understanding of user processes when learning computer software. It should assist organizations in maximizing the return from their investment in training employees and managing knowledge.

The Impact of Strategic Orientation on Intellectual Capital Investments in Customer Service Firms

This study examines the influence of intellectual capital on performance in customer service firms pursuing different strategic orientations (e.g., low-cost leader, differentiation). Grounding these arguments in the resource-based view and using 538 hotels in the lodging industry, this article employs an economic-based production model to empirically explore the performance effects of investing in three different types of intellectual capital: systems capital (operational knowledge), customer capital (brand and marketing knowledge), and human capital (knowledge from both service and professional employees). In addition, the authors account for key controls, including the physical asset, cost of living, customer demand, market segment, and company affiliation. Results reveal that for firms pursuing a differentiation strategy only, investments in both service employees and professional employees enhance performance. However, investments in systems capital and customer capital enhance performance for all the firms studied. The authors discuss the implications of this study for research in the services arena.

Do all institutions benefit from leadership training? Challenging tradition through systems inquiry

AbstractThere is a fascination in the business community with leadership. There is an endless stream of training and development programs on how to become effective leaders to the extent that leadership training is now a big business. But the fascination is not restricted to the business community. People are enthralled by the idea of leadership, search for more information on it, and truly believe that by becoming a leader, they can reach a more desirable future. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that all organizations do not benefit universally from their investment in employees' leadership training. After reviewing the leadership literature and systems concepts, it is recommended that the redesign of an organization in a social systemic framework will lead to optimization of benefit from leadership training.

The Human Capital Impact on the Shareholder Value Creation

The Human Capital Impact on the Shareholder Value Creation

Measurement of performance at institutions of higher learning: the balanced score card approach

Organisations have to confront with new developments brought about by the shift of industrial age competition to information age competition. As a result of this, certain assumptions with regard to the running and measurement of organisational performance have become obsolete. Information becomes essential to bring about new capabilities for competitive success. In the information age, it is vital for organisations to attempt to create future value through investments in customers, suppliers, employees, processes, technology and innovation (Kaplan and Norton, 1998a). Therefore, in information age, organisations need to formulate and utilise performance measurement tools that can be used to develop strategies, not only to create value for the current and future customers, but also to enhance current and future capabilities necessary to improve future performance. The tools are not only to be used to control behaviour and to evaluate past performances, but also to articulate and communicate future strategies. In brief, the objectives of this research study are: evaluate performance measurement at institutions of higher learning; assess the level of awareness and knowledge of balanced scorecard as a measure.

INVESTMENT IN PERMANENT EMPLOYEES AND EXCHANGE PERCEPTIONS AMONG TEMPORARY EMPLOYEES.

The article discusses corporate investment in permanent employees compared to temporary employees. Even though social exchange perceptions are weak among temporary employees because of short-term and discrete working arrangements, research suggests that the relationship between perceived organizational support, employer inducements, and organizational citizenship behavior is actually stronger for temporary than permanent employees. The authors examine the effects of this perception on organizations.

IMPLICATIONS OF EMPLOYEE’S PERCEPTION OF THE ROLE AND ACTIVITY OF THE HUMAN RESOURCES DEPARTMENT IN ROMANIAN TOURISM&HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

This paper is focused on the results of a study which has as main objective the assessment of the perception that employees have on the activity and the role of the Human Resources Department in Romanian Tourism and Hospitality Industry. The study was based on the administration of a questionnaire designed especially for this purpose addressed to the employees2 . The dimensions included in the questionnaire: a) The role of the HR Department from the employees’ perspective b) Typical activities of the HR Department from the employees’ perspective c) The relationship of the HR Department with the employees – trust and interaction d) The investment in employees– the development of the employees.

Biases in Allocation Under Risk and Uncertainty: Partition Dependence, Unit Dependence, and Procedure Dependence

Previous studies of employee investment in retirement plans suggest that people typically naively diversify their investment funds, tending to allocate 1/n of the total to each of n available instruments (Benartzi & Thaler, 2001). In this paper we provide experimental evidence that this bias extends to allocation among simple chance prospects and demonstrate three new violations of rational choice theory implied by use of the naive diversification strategy. Study 1 demonstrates “partition dependence” in which participants' allocations among a fixed set of investments varies with the hierarchical structure of the option set (e.g., by vendor and instrument). Study 2 demonstrates “unit dependence” in which participants' preferred allocations vary with the metric in which the investment is reported (dollars versus number of shares). Study 3 demonstrates “procedure dependence” in which the bias toward even allocation disappears if participants are asked to choose from a menu of possible portfolios. We show that these results extend to sophisticated participants, simple well-specified gambles and incentivecompatible payoffs. We close with a discussion of theoretical and prescriptive implications.

The Spread of Contingent Work in the Knowledge-Based Economy

Permanent employment, typical of industrial societies and bolstered by numerous social guaranties, has been declining in the past 2 decades. There has been a steady expansion of various forms of contingent work. The decomposition of traditional work is a logical consequence of the characteristic patterns of the knowledge-based economy. According to the logic of information technology, changeable modules are key characteristics of production processes and economic organizations. Each module leads a life of its own, with infinite combinatory possibilities. As a consequence, static and “safe” economic arrangements are replaced by dynamic and uncertain institutions. Employees (except for key personnel) become interchangeable, disposable, recallable, and transferable. Consequently, the portfolio of workers’ capabilities and knowledge should be adjusted to the requirements of changing workplaces. For companies, the return on investments in employees’ knowledge is uncertain; thus, contingent workers have to undertake, at least partly, the responsibility and costs of their own training.

Firm-Specific Human Capital and Theories of the Firm

This paper focuses on contracting problems in firms caused by asset specificity and investment incentives, particularly the problems that arise when employees make investments in specific human capital. In such cases, employee investments will also be seriously at risk in the enterprise. Under the nexus of contracts theory of corporations, corporation law is viewed as providing a standardized solution to a central contracting problem, namely the agency problem between shareholders (who are assumed to be the owners of the firm) and their hired managers. All other relationships are seen as governed by ordinary, negotiated contracts. But where employees make important specific investments, it is no longer appropriate to assume that shareholders are, and should be, the hiring party, or the owners. A broader view of what a firm is, and what corporation law accomplishes, is needed, one that permits exploration of why one set of participants in the firm might end up with certain control rights rather than some other set. For a firm in which such firm-specific employee investments are important, one would expect, for example, to find institutional arrangements that are central to the nature of the firm and that encourage continuity in the relationships between employees and the firm, as well as give employees the means to protect their stakes. Such institutions might include unions, severance pay, and social norms of lifetime employment, together with internal job ladders, career paths, seniority rules, and direct and formal control rights. The paper then reviews several new theories that view the firm alternately as a system of incentives, or as a nexus of specific investments. In other words, they conceptualize the firm as a mechanism for governing the relationships among all the participants (those who contribute labor as well as those who contribute capital), not just the relationship between shareholders and managers.

Creating value for employees: investment in employee development

Relying on a social exchange theory we examine the relationships among perceived investment in employees' development (PIED), job satisfaction, organizational commitment and intent to leave. Individual-level analyses from a sample of 405 nurses from two countries indicate that PIED is positively associated with job satisfaction and affective commitment but not with continuance commitment. As expected, job satisfaction and affective commitment fully mediate the relationship between PIED and intent to leave. Overall, this research shows support for partial measurement equivalence and equivalent structural parameters across both samples.

Applying the Ohlson and Feltham-Ohlson Models for Equity Valuation: Some Accounting Considerations

This paper is designed as a secondary research that summarizes major findings related to the equity valuation models of James Ohlson (1995) and Gerald Feltham & James Ohlson (1995) from the viewpoint of their application in real world circumstances and with only publicly available information at hand. The Ohlson model estimates the value if equity on the basis of its book value and the sum of all future abnormal earnings calculated from a clean-surplus income and a charge for the required return on the equity investment. The consequent Feltham-Ohlson model adjusts the valuation for the effects of conservative accounting practices on book values and earnings. The paper presents a case study of Microsoft Corporation, where the company is valued separately by both models and under different settings of the input data with the purpose to compare the extent to which the models deal with accounting distortions. The study focuses particularly on the impact of deviations from the clean-surplus principle and comments on other deficiencies in the publicly available accounting data. The Feltham-Ohlson model was found more suited to cope with such accounting problems, while the Ohlson valuation produced considerably understated estimates of common equity. The case study also indicated that deficiencies in the reporting of employee stock option compensation, investments and derivatives might produce major inconsistencies in the examined valuation frameworks and distort their results.

Transferable Training as a Collective Good

The potential significance of employers' collective action for economic performance is widely acknowledged, but has not been complemented with corresponding theory-guided research on the probability of collective action and the conditions for effective action. This article examines the nature of, the conditions for, and the consequences of employers' collective action on further training, a crucial component of a successful high-skill strategy for industries and nations. The collective action perspective shares the core assumptions of human-capital theory, but integrates the possibility of collective action as a solution to some of the market failures associated with investment in transferable human capital. This alternative view also predicts in what labour-market settings such action is likely to occur, building on Olson's work and theories of employers' collective action. We suggest that employers' collective action is more likely to succeed in ensuring transferability and encouraging employee investment than is the use of sanctions against employers to promote employer-financed transferable training

Some Appealing Applications of Interactive Voice Response

Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology has come a long way since it was first used for voice mail and automatic call directing. The most common input method is still a key press on a telephone keypad. Auditory interfaces are being used in a variety of applications many people might not have considered, including psychological screening and assessment, access to information about government services and matters, self-management of employee investments, and providing access to graphical user interfaces and scientific instruments to the visually impaired. With such widespread use of IVR technology, it makes sense to promote research into the development of better interfaces for auditory environments. Interactive Voice Response systems will continue to be used since not all applications of computer technology can support visual or graphical user interfaces, nor would visual interfaces be appropriate for all applications. The future will bring new applications of IVR incorporating speech input and the use of the Internet in interactive applications as an adjunct to phone-based interfaces. This paper concludes with a discussion of what makes a good IVR interface.

Roots of the Recent Recoveries: Labor Reforms or Private Sector Forces?

It is widely agreed that the natural unemployment rate recovered strongly in several OECD economies in the 1990s while not yet in the others. This paper draws on models by the authors endogenizing the path of the natural rate in order to trace the causes and apportion the credit. The results suggest that the five structural reforms of the labor market urged by the OECD Secretariat were effective and account for some of the recovery where adopted. However, the paper sees most of the recoveries as largely the emergence from structural slump to a structural boom--a boom brought by revived investment in employees, customers and fixed capital. Behind this revival is a recovery of business-asset valuations resulting from improved expectations for productivity growth and, judging by the stock market, hopes for a future lift in business earnings that exceeds extrapolations of the past--both driven by the new economy.

Social Relations and Cooperation in Organizations

The paper addresses the effects of social relations on cooperation (or collusion) in organizations and communities. and production relations are modeled as separate repeated strategic interactions. Linking them--by employing members of the same community or by encouraging social interaction between employees--is shown to facilitate cooperation in production: (a) because of available Social Capital, the slack of net expected gains from cooperation in the social relations which can be credibly transferred to discipline behavior in the workplace; (b) because payoffs from the social and production relations tend to be substitutes, in which case the linkage of more relations endogenously generates (a sort of increasing returns in cooperation); (c) because the linkage generates transfers of trust, reputation spillovers from a cooperative social background to newly started production relations; and (d) because agents who share social relations have access to additional information about each other's situations. The model provides a microfoundation for Putnam's concept of Social Capital and for Granovetter's idea of embeddedness for the employment relation. It shows that Kandel and Lazear's peer pressures are a credible effort-enforcing mechanism even when teams' members are fully self-interested, and that the threat of social sanctions can credibly enforce social norms independent of agents' moral constraints (that is, no second-order free rider problem exists). It provides an explanation for Japanese firms' investments in employees' free-time activities, for the Grameen Bank's requirement that group members belong to the same village and participate in social activities, for the ambiguous empirical results on the effectiveness of group-incentives, for markets' tendency to crowd out cooperative institutions, and for the sudden breakdown in trust and cooperation observed in communities after a war ends and peace is established.

Examining human resource options: Does investment in employees pay off?

The article presents a study on four approaches to the employment relationship in an effort to learn how different relationships affect employee attitudes and performance. The first approach offers short-term financial incentives in exchange for specific tasks accomplished by the employee. The second approach requires both the employee and employer to make open-ended and long-term investments in each other. In the third approach, known as the underinvestment approach, the employee is expected to undertake a broad number of responsibilities, while the employer reciprocates with short-term and specific monetary rewards. The fourth approach, also known as overinvestment, allows the employee to focus on a few well-specified responsibilities in exchange for lucrative rewards.

Crossing the Line: Unionized Employee Ownership and Investment Funds

Crossing the Line: Unionized Employee Ownership and Investment Funds

Employee Investment Funds in Sweden

Analyses the economic influences that led to the development of the proposal to introduce employee investment funds into Sweden in 1976. Discusses the proposed objectives of the funds and describes the controversy, both political and economic, which surrounded them. Outlines the modified form in which employee investment funds were eventually implemented in 1983 and considers the influence they exerted on the Swedish economy and the extent to which they achieved their aims. Assesses their possible evolution in the future.

Staff management in correctional institutions: Comparing DiIulio's “control model” and “employee investment model” outcomes in five jails

In this study of five podular direct-supervision jails we test whether facilities with characteristics related to an “employee investment model” for management of corrections, as opposed to a “control model,” experience the positive personnel outcomes claimed by DiIulio for prisons operated in the “control” manner. We analyze outcome measures such as job enrichment, job satisfaction, workplace stress (supplemented with data on role conflict, organizational commitment, training, and turnover) and find only limited support for the supposed benefits of the DiIulio management model in the contemporary jail. In fact, we discover some evidence that investment in personnel is beneficial to the jail organization.