On the Responsiveness of Supply Chains

Increasingly often we hear that ‘we are entering the era of network competition’ and that corporations increasingly recognize that they are competing as supply chains and not as firms (Hammer, 2001). What makes such statements interesting is the presumption that we already know a lot about the constitution of networks and supply chains. This paper is based on case studies of two firms at the very beginning of their SCM journey. Our research is driven by the following questions: How do supply chains come about? How does supply chain management responsiveness result? Our research suggests why it is important to recognize that Supply Chain Management does not begin at the gates of the company. Paradoxically, external supply chain responsiveness has more to do with the internal coordination of managerial and technical activities than current SCM theories anticipate

Blue Planet Biophilia

Blue Planet Biophilia is a collection of final drawings, diagrams and renders that explore how water can be integrated into the workspace to benefit workers’ wellbeing. According to biologist E. O. Wilson, ‘Biophlia’ refers to an innate and genetically determined affinity of human beings with the natural world. These designs show how water can provide natural ventilation and a more ‘biophilic’ atmosphere. With sites in both London and Barcelona, Dechow focuses on designing spaces where the user is surrounded by both the physical presence and the natural acoustics of water. The final design shows an ocean-plastic recycling hub with an adjoining design studio on the coast of Barcelona. Giant cones bring the rolling, crashing and lapping acoustics of the water beneath the building up into the workspace, where designers can sit and work surrounded by ocean views, and the comings and goings of the Mediterranean fishermen

Do males differ from females in the way they set and meet goals? An analysis of marathon runners

We examine strategies adopted by people completing a well-defined but difficult task: running a marathon. We find strong evidence that males relative to females focus on, and care more about, beating a round number time (e.g., 4:00 hours). Our evidence suggests that setting a round number goal helps males perform better in the race. We find that these males are more likely to run at constant pace (the optimal way to run a marathon) and have more energy to speed up (“kick”) towards the end of the race. In contrast, females are less likely to set round number times as goals, and run more conservatively at the start, pace themselves better throughout the race, and finish with a stronger kick, irrespective of whether their finish time is close to a round number. Our results also suggest that males benefit more from planning than do females, since we find that less experienced males are more likely to start the race too aggressively and slow down considerably (“bonk”) towards the end of the race. Our results have implications for organizations because they suggest that the sexes can subconsciously differ in the strategies they adopt to complete a task and the goals they use to evaluate their performance

Preface to Intertwingled: The Work and Influence of Ted Nelson

This is the preface to Intertwingled: The Work and Influence of Ted Nelson , which examines and honors the work and influence of the computer visionary and re-imagines its meaning for the future. Emerging from a conference held in 2014 at Chapman University, it includes contributions from world-renowned computer scientists and media figures. The full text of this book is available on an open access basis at Springer. The blog for the Intertwingled Conference can be read here.https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/scs_books/1023/thumbnail.jp

Evolutionary flexibility in routes to mat formation by Pseudomonas

Abstract Many bacteria form mats at the air-liquid interface of static microcosms. These structures typically involve the secretion of exopolysaccharides, the production of which is often controlled by the secondary messenger c-di-GMP. Mechanisms of mat formation have been particularly well characterized in Pseudomonas fluorescens SBW25; stimuli or mutations that increase c-di-GMP production by diguanylate cyclases (WspR, AwsR, and MwsR) result in the secretion of cellulose and mat formation. Here, we characterize and compare mat formation in two close relatives of SBW25: Pseudomonas simiae PICF7 and P. fluorescens A506. We find that PICF7?the strain more closely related to SBW25?can form mats through mutations affecting the activity of the same three diguanylate cyclases as SBW25. However, instead of cellulose, these mutations activate production of the exopolysaccharide Pel. We also provide evidence for at least two further?as yet uncharacterized?routes to mat formation by PICF7. P. fluorescens A506, while retaining the same mutational routes to mat formation as SBW25 and PICF7, preferentially forms mats by a semi-heritable mechanism that culminates in Psl and Pga over-production. Our results demonstrate a high level of evolutionary flexibility in the molecular and structural routes to mat formation, even among close relatives

Financial Reporting Quality, Private Information, Monitoring, and the Lease-versus-Buy Decision

A flourishing stream of research suggests that liquidity-constrained firms with low accounting quality have limited access to capital for investments. We extend this research by investigating whether these firms are more likely to lease their assets. Lessors’ superior control rights allow them to provide capital to constrained firms with low-quality accounting reports. Consistent with this conjecture, we find that low accounting quality firms have a higher propensity to lease than purchase assets. To verify that leasing does not merely reflect these firms’ desire for off-balance-sheet accounting, we investigate whether banks’ access to private information and monitoring affect the relation between accounting quality and leasing. We find the association between accounting quality and leasing decreases when banks have higher monitoring incentives and when loans contain capital expenditure provisions. These results suggest that other mechanisms can substitute for the role of accounting quality in reducing information problems

Understanding Earnings Quality: A Review of the Proxies, Their Determinants and Their Consequences

Researchers have used various measures as indications of “earnings quality” including persistence, accruals, smoothness, timeliness, loss avoidance, investor responsiveness, and external indicators such as restatements and SEC enforcement releases. For each measure, we discuss causes of variation in the measure as well as consequences. We reach no single conclusion on what earnings quality is because “quality” is contingent on the decision context. We also point out that the “quality” of earnings is a function of the firm’s fundamental performance. The contribution of a firm’s fundamental performance to its earnings quality is suggested as one area for future work

Maintaining a reputation for consistently beating earnings expectations and the slippery slope to earnings manipulation

This paper investigates whether maintaining a reputation for consistently beating analysts’ earnings expectations can motivate executives to move from “within GAAP” earnings management to “outside of GAAP” earnings manipulation. We analyze firms subject to SEC enforcement actions and find that these firms consistently beat analysts’ quarterly earnings forecasts in the three years prior to the manipulation period and continue to do so by smaller “beats” during the manipulation period. We find that manipulating firms beat expectations around 86 percent of the time in the twelve quarters prior to the manipulation period (versus 75 percent for control firms) and that manipulation often ends with a miss in expectations. We document that executives of manipulating firms face strong stock market and CEO pressure to perform. Prior to the manipulation period, these firms have high analyst optimism, growing institutional interest, and high market valuations, along with powerful CEOs. Further, we find that maintaining a reputation for beating expectations is more important than CEO overconfidence and is incremental to CEO equity incentives for explaining manipulation. Our results suggest that pressure to maintain a reputation for beating analysts’ expectations can encourage aggressive accounting and, ultimately, earnings manipulation