Localized Spillovers and Knowledge Flows: How Does Proximity Influence the Performance of Plants?

By means of a unique longitudinal database with information on all plants and employees in the Swedish economy, this paper analyzes how geographical proximity influences the impact of spillovers and knowledge flows on the productivity growth of plants. Concerning the effects of spillovers, we show that the density of economic activities as such mainly contributes to plant performance within a very short distance and that the composition of economic activities is more influential further away. Regarding the influence of local industrial setup, proximity increases the need to be located near different, but related, industries whereas increased distance implies a greater effect of intra-industry spillovers. The analyses also demonstrate that knowledge flows via the mobility of skilled labor is primarily a sub-regional phenomenon. Only inflows of skills that are related to the existing knowledge base of plants and come from less than 50 kilometers away have a positive effect on plant performance. Concerning outflows of skills, the results indicate that it is less harmful for a dispatching plant if a former employee remains within the local economy as compared to leaving for a job in another part of the national economy.agglomeration economies, knowledge spillovers, labor mobility, plant performance, geographical proximity, related variety

Labour mobility, related variety and the performance of plants: A Swedish study

This paper analyses the impact of skill portfolios and labour mobility on plant performance by means of a unique database that connects attributes of individuals to features of plants for the whole Swedish economy. We found that a portfolio of related competences at the plant level increases significantly productivity growth of plants, in contrast to plant portfolios consisting of either similar or unrelated competences. Based on the analysis of 101,093 job moves, we found that inflows of skills that are related to the existing knowledge base of the plant had a positive effect on plant performance, while the inflow of new employees with skills that are already present in the plant had a negative impact. Our analyses show that inflows of unrelated skills only contribute positively to plant performance when these are recruited in the same region. Labour mobility across regions only has a positive effect on productivity growth of plants when this concerns new employees with related skills.labour mobility, related variety, skill portfolio, plant performance, geographical proximity

Symbolic Rationality in the Public Sector

The aim of this article is to describe work relations between leaders and counsellors in the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV). The study focus on communication, control, work ethos, worldview and Digital Production Management. This article is based on two empirical studies from the same research project at the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV) in the south of Norway called “Leadership and client orientation in NAV”. The research design led to a qualitative interview method being used to collect and analyse the opinions and experiences of the interviewees (Merriam, 2009). The study found (a) that leaders use DPM to control employees, (b) communicative and regulative aspects of working in NAV, (c) contradictory simultaneous work demands on leaders and counsellors, and (d) the symbolic rationality of work in NAV. The aspects (a) to (d) show a specific worldview in NAV. The study also found aspects of work ethos in NAV, such as a strong will to help and do well for the user, and at the same time meet NAV's financial and administrative requirements (Lundquist, 1998; Byrkjeflot, 2008). It is fruitful to describe this situation using the concept of symbolic rationality. Through symbolic rationality, the study has identified the possibility for further research on the hybrid professionalism of leadership and counsellorship, at three levels in the ambidextrous public sector. The first is the epistemological level, where the concept sets limits on how a social situation such as NAV can be spoken about and understood. A second level is the theoretical level, where categories and logics can be formed that are seen as being applicable to work in NAV. The third and final level is the practical level, where the concept of symbolic rationality and the meanings connected with it shape leaders’ and counsellors’ professional practice in the public sector.acceptedVersio

Generating Weekly Training Plans in the Style of a Professional Swimming Coach Using Genetic Algorithms and Random Trees

Optimal training planning is a combination of art and sci- ence, a time-consuming task that requires expert knowledge. As such, it is often exclusively available to top tier athletes. Many athletes outside the elite do not have access or cannot afford to hire a professional coach to help them create their training plans. In this study, we investigate if it is possible to use the historical training logs of elite swimmers to con- struct detailed weekly training plans similar to how a specific professional coach would have planned. We present a software system based on machine learning and genetic algorithms for generation of detailed weekly training plans based on desired volume, intensity, training frequency, and athlete characteristics. The system schedules training sessions from a library extracted from training plans written by a professional swimming coach. Results show that the proposed system is able to generate highly accurate training plans in terms of training load, types of sessions, and structure, compared to the human coach

Disabilities exhibited by children and adolescents that refuse to go to school

The aim of the study was to investigate what functional difficulties young people who refuse to go to school experience in their everyday lives. Research questions where what difficulties do young people who refuse to go to school experience? Are there differences between boys and girls? The study is a retrospective journal study with 28 Swedish youngsters based on Strengths & Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). Major findings where about somatic symptoms, emotional distress, loneliness, distinct gender roles, less mature and risk behavior. Although the school, social services and children- and adolescent psychiatry largely agree on the complexity of adolescents being absent from school, it seems difficult for the organizations to agree on adequate solutions.publishedVersio

Co-worker networks and agglomeration externalities

The present article provides an initial systematic analysis of how social networks influence productivity in regional agglomerations. This is accomplished by means of matched employer–employee data for the entire Swedish economy for the period 1990–2008, allowing us to construct a weighted co-worker network with aggregated tie weights on the plant level. We find evidence that increasing density of the plant-level network has a positive effect on productivity, particularly in large regional industry-clusters with high degrees of specialization. Triadic closure of ties is, however, negatively linked to productivity, suggesting the importance of nonredundant knowledge. Moreover, we find only limited support for the notion that the diversity of linkages within or across regions as such is beneficial for productivity. Instead, we show that the degree of specialization conditions the extent to which both linkages to related industries in the region and nonlocal ties are beneficial. Our results thus suggest that having dense social networks is a crucial feature of high-performing agglomerations, and that interindustry, as well as interregional, linkages are compensatory in cases when sufficient industry specialization is absent

Co-worker networks and agglomeration externalities

The present article provides an initial systematic analysis of how social networks influence productivity in regional agglomerations. This is accomplished by means of matched employer–employee data for the entire Swedish economy for the period 1990–2008, allowing us to construct a weighted co-worker network with aggregated tie weights on the plant level. We find evidence that increasing density of the plant-level network has a positive effect on productivity, particularly in large regional industry-clusters with high degrees of specialization. Triadic closure of ties is, however, negatively linked to productivity, suggesting the importance of nonredundant knowledge. Moreover, we find only limited support for the notion that the diversity of linkages within or across regions as such is beneficial for productivity. Instead, we show that the degree of specialization conditions the extent to which both linkages to related industries in the region and nonlocal ties are beneficial. Our results thus suggest that having dense social networks is a crucial feature of high-performing agglomerations, and that interindustry, as well as interregional, linkages are compensatory in cases when sufficient industry specialization is absent

Job-related mobility and plant performance in Sweden

This paper uses a Swedish micro-dataset containing 2,696,909 hires during the period 2002-2006 to assess the impact of job-related mobility on plant-level performance. The analysis classifies new recruits according to their work experience and level of formal qualification, as well as by the region of origin and of destination. New hires are divided into graduates and experienced workers and between high- and low-educated. The results point towards the importance of acknowledging both the experience and the skills of new recruits. The greatest benefits are related to hiring new workers from outside the region where the plant is located. The analysis also stresses the importance of geography, with plants in metropolitan regions gaining the most from labour mobility, while plants in smaller, more peripheral regions getting virtually no benefits from hiring new workers

Understanding European Integration with Bipartite Networks of Comparative Advantage

Core objectives of European common market integration are convergence and economic growth, but these are hampered by redundancy, and value chain asymmetries. The challenge is how to harmonize labor division to reach global competitiveness, meanwhile bridging productivity differences across the EU. We develop a bipartite network approach to trace pairwise co-specialization, by applying the Revealed Comparative Advantage method, within and between EU15 and Central and Eastern European (CEE). This approach assesses redundancies and division of labor in the EU at the level of industries and countries. We find significant co-specialization among CEE countries but a diverging specialization between EU15 and CEE. Productivity increases in those CEE industries that have co-specialized with other CEE countries after EU accession, while co-specialization across CEE and EU15 countries is less related to productivity growth. These results show that a division of sectoral specialization can lead to productivity convergence between EU15 and CEE countries.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures, 6 table