Killing two birds with one stone: Board reforms in the Japanese electronics industry

This paper combines insights from A Behavioral Theory of the Firm and Neo-Institutional Theory to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how new practices are adopted and transformed. The setting is the spread of the Executive Officer System (EOS) in the Japanese electronics industry. While this system, based on the Anglo-American system of governance, was designed to separate executive and monitoring, in reality, firms that reduced the size of the board only, leaving membership heavily weighted to executive officers. Based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative studies, we argue that this is not merely decoupling or symbolic management; rather, the legitimacy of the EOS system made it readily accessible and salient to firms searching for a solution to problems in decision-making. The legitimacy of EOS as the “global standard” of corporate governance enabled top executives to frame difficult board reforms to internal actors. Through adoption of EOS, firms were able to “kill two birds with one stone” by appealing to investors as well as solving internal problems. This research contributes to our understanding of diffusion and variation, the nature of decoupling, global spread of Anglo-American corporate governance, and NIT and BTF accounts of diffusion of new practices

Double Q2Q^2-rescaling model and the nuclear effect of the parton distribution functions

In order to overcome the shortcoming of nonconservation of nuclear momentum existing in the original $Q^2$-rescaling model(O$Q^2$RM) and avoid introducing nuclear shadowing factor, we proposed a double $Q^2$-rescaling model(D$Q^2$RM) for the parton distributions of the bound nucleon. Using the experimental data of lepton-nucleus deep inelastic scattering(DIS) and the condition of the nuclear momentum conservation, the $Q^2$-rescaling parameters of various partons for Sn, Fe, Ca and C nuclei are determined. The rescaling parameters of valence quark distributions are larger than unity and graduauly increases with atomic number A, on the contrary, the rescaling parameters of sea quark distributions and gluon distributions are smaller than unity, and slowly decreases with A. By using this model, the experimental data of the DIS process, the nuclear Drell-Yan process and $J/\psi$ photoproduction process are consistently and quite satisfactorily explained. Key words --- parton distribution functions, Nuclear effect, Double $Q^2$-rescaling model.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures (to be published in Z. Phys. C

Hospital physicians perform five types of work duties in Japan: An observational study

BACKGROUND: Physicians are expected to perform three unique roles as a clinician, educator, and researcher in university hospitals. However, the actual practices of physicians performing different duties are relatively unknown. Therefore, the authors conducted an observational study at a university hospital to examine physicians’ work activities. METHODS: Between 2011 and 2013, ten observers shadowed 20 physicians from different specialties for a day at the Tokyo Women’s Medical University Hospital. Observers recorded physicians’ activities every 30 seconds that were subsequently categorized into work types. The number of work types and activity changes performed by a physician in one observational period were counted. RESULTS: Authors categorized physicians’ work activities into five groups: patient care (direct and indirect), education, research, professional development, and administration. All physicians performed at least one type of activity in addition to patient care. Activity change occurred 1.86 times per hour, on average. The median time-distribution of 20 physicians was 173.8 minutes, 213.8 minutes, 3.3 minutes, 5.0 minutes, 0 minutes, and 0.8 minutes for direct patient care, indirect patient care, education, research, professional development, and administration, respectively. CONCLUSION: Japanese hospital physicians performed multiple work duties including professional development and administrative activities in addition to triple duties. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1472-6963-14-375) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

When do host country nationals help expatriates? The roles of identification with the multinational enterprise and career development support by the subsidiary

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