External managers, family ownership and the scope of SME internationalization

SMEs are important to world business and the majority of SMEs are family firms. Yet some family SMEs are inert, local firms while others are dynamic and international. Do certain governance structures encourage the scale and scope of their internationalization? We jointly apply social capital and corporate governance theories to explain the scope of family SMEs internationalization, and find that professional managers externally recruited from outside the family are important, but only for lower levels of family ownership, suggesting synergistic combinations of ownership and management. It is the combination of external capital with external managers that really works

The earliness of exporting and creeping sclerosis? The moderating effects of firm age, size and centralization

By using a sample of 644 manufacturing firms in four EU countries and five regions, we investigate the earliness/exporting relationship. Firstly, we examine the firm’s ability to retain LAN over time as it gets older and bigger. Secondly, we examine the role played by the firm’s decision-making structure. Our results reveal that exporting sclerosis does set in, as age and size of the firm significantly and negatively affect the earliness/exporting relationship. In addition, however, we find that centralization plays a role in the sclerotic effects of size (though only weakly for age), exacerbating their moderating effects on the earliness/exporting relationship. Our study claims to contribute to internationalization research by advancing the idea that LAN is not path-dependent but subject to liabilities. Beyond age and size, we add the more nuanced “liability of centralization” to boundary conditions for retaining LAN. Theoretical and managerial implications emerge

The ombudsman enterprise and administrative justice.

Contents: Foreword; Preface; Part I Theory and Context: The ombudsman enterprise: an introduction; The constitutional role of the ombudsman; Concepts, theories and policies of administrative justice. Part II The Ombudsman Technique: Putting it right: resolving complaints and assisting citizens; Promoting good administration and helping to get it right. Part III Setting It Right: Independence and accountability: legitimising the ombudsman; Relationships, networks and the administrative justice system; Part IV Conclusion: The 21st century ombudsman enterprise; Appendices; Bibliography; Index.The statutory duty of public service ombudsmen (PSO) is to investigate claims of injustice caused by maladministration in the provision of public services. This book examines the modern role of the ombudsman within the overall emerging system of administrative justice and makes recommendations as to how PSO should optimize their potential within the wider administrative justice context. Recent developments are discussed and long standing questions that have yet to be adequately resolved in the ombudsman community are re-evaluated given broader changes in the administrative justice sector. The work balances theory and empirical research conducted in a number of common law countries. Although there has been much debate within the ombudsman community in recent years aimed at developing and improving the practice of ombudsmanry, this work represents a significant advance on current academic understanding of the discipline

Evaluation of early neutral evaluation alternative dispute resolution in the social security and child support tribunal.

The full report (104 pp) and summary report (10 pp) are available at: http://www.justice.gov.uk/publications/early-neutral-evaluation-sscs.htmThe evaluation sought to establish the cost effectiveness of early neutral evaluation (a form of alternative dispute resolution) and whether it resulted in swifter, more proportionate resolution of cases. The research also aimed to establish appellant satisfaction with the process and the impact on and views of stakeholders.Ministry of Justic

European methods of administrative law redress: Netherlands, Norway and Germany

This report examines the profile of administrative law remedies in the Netherlands, Norway and Germany and makes some observations about the activities of regional European institutions in this field. For each jurisdiction the report provides an overview of the administrative law system and court structure, an outline of the ombudsmen schemes and the significant developments in Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR). The government’s recent White Paper, Transforming Public Services: Complaints, Redress and Tribunals, has presented some new ideas about how to proceed with the key tasks of preventing and resolving disputes in administrative justice. This report provides an opportunity to reflect on some of the European approaches that may be able to shed some light on the direction and management of such reforms.Department for Constitutional Affair

An Evaluation of the Long-term Effectiveness of Mediation in Cases of International Parental Child Abduction

The Nuffield Foundation is an endowed charitable trust that aims to improve social well-being in the widest sense. It funds research and innovation in education and social policy and also works to build capacity in education, science and social science research. The Nuffield Foundation has funded this project, but the views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Foundation. More information is available at .This research report focuses on capturing the long-term effectiveness of mediation as deployed by reunite, the UK's main NGO that provides advice on international parental child abduction cases brought under the Hague Convention of 1980. The aim was to see whether the mediation model operated by reunite has worked over time. The main research tool used was the use of in-depth telephone interviews with individuals who had participated in reunite’s mediation process from January 2003 to December 2009. 52 individuals were interviewed between September 2010 and August 2011, using a semi-structured interview guide which is reproduced as Appendix 1 of this report. Overall (see Table 7.1, at p. 27) the dataset comprised: 29 men, 23 women; 22 taking parents and 30 left-behind parents; and at the time of our interview work 21 of the total dataset could be classed as the residential parent and 31 the contact parent. Our second and supplementary research tool was a system of case reading by the research team – there were regular meetings set up after a batch of transcripts had been pre-read and where reunite’s case file was available to supplement and provide further information about the chronology and process of each case under consideration. An important element in the architecture of this report is the distinction that we draw between: i) cases where the mediation was completed – i.e. an MoU had been reached and quickly followed by a consent order in the courts: we call these ‘resolved cases’ in the report; and ii) cases where the mediation was not completed, i.e. where it was not agreed in mediation and had to be referred back to the courts for an authoritative decision: we call these ‘unresolved cases’ in the report. Of our overall set of 52 cases, we identified 29 that were ‘resolved’ and 23 that were ‘unresolved’ according to our definition. The analysis of all this material was further supported by the use of a computer-assisted qualitative data programme. A summary of the findings can be found on pp. 8-12 of the report in relation to both 'resolved' and 'unresolved' cases. Overall the key message of the report is that mediation in this specialised context should be used selectively and proportionately.Reunite International Child Abduction Centre, Leicester, UK. Nuffield Foundation, London

Employee tenure in China: comparing foreign joint ventures

The retention of qualified Chinese employees is an increasing concern for managers in China today. Various studies have highlighted the rise of turnover rates, and many have suggested how human resource practices can help promote retention. There is also some indication that employee tenure may vary with the nationality of firms in China. However, little research has compared employee tenure or the use of human resource practices for retention between firms of different nationality in China. Such enquiries would be vital for gaining a better understanding of the phenomenon, and for establishing best practice. We therefore conducted a comparison of average employee tenure and the use of HR practices between Sino-foreign joint ventures (JVs) with Western (EU/US), overseas Chinese (Hong Kong/Taiwan), and other Asian (Japanese/Korean) partners. Primary data from questionnaire surveys were obtained from a total of 316 JVs in Beijing, Tianjin, and Qingdao. We found a significant relationship between nationality and tenure. Tenure was the highest in overseas Chinese, moderate in Japanese/Korean, and lowest in Western firms. The results also suggest that the variation in tenure between nationalities was partly mediated by the firms’ use of a human resource practices. We discuss these results in terms of cultural differences and the long-term orientation of human resource systems

The Attraction of FDI to Conflicted States: The Counter-Intuitive Case of US Oil and Gas

States burdened with conflict have been considered to be undesirable destinations for foreign direct investment (FDI) due to, inter alia, political instability, regulatory unpredictability, and expropriation risk. However, we develop an alternative view based on corporate governance and real option theories. We analyze a dataset of FDI location decisions made in the Oil and Gas sector by 250 US firms across 44 countries between 2007 and 2013. After controlling for energy reserves, the results show counter-intuitively, that civil war and terrorism risks, and terrorist events are positively associated with US investment in Oil and Gas. US subsidiaries also show high levels of ownership commitment. It is tempting to conclude that US Oil and Gas is a wholly unique, resource-bound case, but we argue that this disconnect may have occurred for two reasons. First, a threat of conflict and violence can make MNEs exercise their growth options and expand resource extraction sooner rather than later. Second, political instability does not necessarily lead to higher levels of FDI expropriation risk. On the contrary, instability can reduce the incentives for the state to seize assets from technologically superior MNEs, i.e. it may reduce expropriation risk. Just as the rule of law and ‘good’ governance can constrain a state from expropriation, there are theoretical reasons why ‘bad’ governance resulting from instability and incapacity may do so, too

Executive bonus and firm performance in the UK

Annual bonus is a controversial but under-researched dimension of executive pay. Bonus packages have the chameleon-like ability to suit CEOs, shareholders or both. In other words, they may be consistent with executive power theory and the notion of “fat cats” and/or agency theory. As with many other components of executive pay, the “devil may be in the detail”, and trends in the particular architecture of schemes may prove to be at least as important as aggregate relationships. This paper presents new results on executive bonuses in the UK’s large firms. The agency perspective on the role of executive bonus is supported by the significant, aggregate, positive relation between CEO bonus pay and a firm’s financial performance. Results for the UK during a unique period of slack capital markets produces measures of bonus pay-performance responsiveness that are broadly in line with earlier studies. Transparency in bonus schemes (in the sense of simplicity in targets) is positively associated with firm performance, as agency theorists would predict. This all suggests that CEO bonuses offer a strong and consistent basis for the alignment of principals’ and agents’ interests. However, this apparent support for agency theory should be viewed with caution. While bonus simplicity is associated positively with performance, it would appear that detailed bonus scheme characteristics are generally insensitive to this relationship. Bonus schemes in the UK are becoming more complex in terms of the use of multiple targets. There appears to be a trend towards the abandonment of simple schemes with unpublished targets, in favour of schemes with more targets, and unpublished ones at that. Of course “Individual Performance Evaluation”, where Boards have some discretion over the amount of bonus paid against unpublished or undisclosed targets, may succeed in theory, especially where the nature of the business makes it advisable to keep CEO targets confidential. Nevertheless, the implication of this paper is that, on balance, transparency in the form of simplicity (and associated published targets) is positively associated with firm performance

The associations of anger and hope with project retention decisions: A case study

The role of emotions and cognition in entrepreneurship and strategic decision-making research has thus far been relatively neglected. In this research, we investigate how anger and hope may influence managers’ project retention decisions. While case studies can never test theories, our research aims to expose the Appraisal Tendency Framework (ATF) to empirical reality in a new context. A Palestinian research context characterized by extreme uncertainty is chosen as one that arguably amplifies the effects of high levels of emotion. Three businesses within a holding company were identified and twelve semi-structured interviews were conducted with managers responsible for strategic decision-making, with data analysed using Content and Thematic Analyses. The emotions of hope and anger were each independently found to be associated with project retention decisions. However, when hope and anger were experienced together, hope complemented a positive association between anger and retention. The AFT proposes that emotions with different valence (i.e., negative anger and positive hope) may be associated with corresponding thought processes (heuristic or systematic) and still result in similar behavioural outcomes. The findings also highlight implications of decision-making under uncertainty, for practitioners who may benefit from differentiating between the positive and negative influences of anger on decisions