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The impact of board independence and foreign ownership on financial and social performance of firms: evidence from the UAE
No full textInternational audiencePurpose – This study examines the impact of two different types of foreign ownership—by Arab and non-Arab investors on firms’ financial and social performance. It then goes on to investigate how the degree of board independence affects the aforementioned relationship between these two types of foreign investors on firm performance.Design/methodology/approach – The sample for the study is a panel of all listed firms in the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) and the Abu Dhabi Securities exchange (ADX) from 2008 to 2012. Findings – Results indicate that while Arab foreign ownership affects firms’ financial and social performance negatively, non-Arab foreign ownership does so, positively. Further tests indicate that board independence weakens the negative relationship between firm financial and social performance with foreign Arab ownership and deteriorate the relationship between firm financial and social performance and non-Arab foreign ownership.Research limitations/implications – Future studies may extend the coverage of the study by including other countries in the region and other identities of the foreign investors.Practical implications – This study may help policy makers in the UAE to improve the implementation and enforcement of existing regulations concerning corporate social responsibility (CSR) and board independence. It also highlights the need to look into the monitoring role of independent board members.Originality/value – This is the first study to examine the role of board independence on the relationship between foreign ownership and firm’s financial and social performance. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper that attempts to enrich the understanding of foreign ownership by classifying it into Arab versus non-Arab
Investment opportunities, corporate governance quality, and firm performance in the UAE
No full textInternational audiencePurpose – This paper examines the influence of investment opportunities on firm performance and evaluates corporate governance practices in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to determine whether corporate governance quality moderates that influence.Design/methodology/approach – A fixed-effects regression was employed to examine the influence of investment opportunities on firm performance and the role of corporate governance quality as a moderator for all listed firms on the Abu Dhabi Stock Exchange (ADX) and the Dubai Financial Market (DFM). We examined 501 firm-year observations for the period when the corporate governance code in the UAE was coming into force, from 2008 to 2012.Findings – The regression results indicate that investment opportunities have a negative influence on firm performance. The corporate governance index used here shows that the level of corporate governance practiced in the UAEis weak.Wealso find that strong corporate governance ameliorates the negative influence of investment opportunities, which supports our hypotheses. The sub-indices of corporate governance that matter the most for moderating investment opportunities are board functioning and ethics.Practical implications – The results of this paper reflect the need to examine corporate governance in the context of the external environment represented by investment opportunities in our study. The findings could raise awareness of the importance of strong corporate governance practices, not only to directly improve firm performance but also through its influence on external variables. Legislators, regulators and other interested parties could use these results to examine practices in the UAE following the implementation of the corporate governance code.Originality/value – This study contributes to the literature by evaluating the role that corporate governance quality and its components could play in firm performance and indirectly moderating other external factors (such as investment opportunities)
A Data Envelopment Analysis Method for Finding Robust and Cost-Efficient Schedules in Multimode Projects
No full textInternational audienceThe execution of industrial projects is subject to uncertainties that cause deviations from the designated project schedules. Therefore, it is desired to generate robust schedules in the sense of being insensitive to project disruptions, such as deviations in activity durations. Beyond that, efficient schedules that offer high robustness at a low cost are preferred. This paper focuses on the discrete time-cost tradeoff problem and develops a new method for identifying and ranking efficient schedules. First, a large schedule pool with robust schedules is generated. Efficient schedules are then identified and ranked by applying data envelopment analysis (DEA) with a particular super-efficiency model. An extensive evaluation based on a project testbed and an example construction project shows that the proposed method finds and ranks efficient schedules, that can be suitably presented to a project manager for decision support
Becoming a more attractive supplier by managing references – The case of small and medium-sized enterprises in a digitally enhanced business environment
No full textInternational audienceThe importance of corporate online references in managing client perceptions and firm attractiveness is increasingly recognized. At the same time, evidence pointing to how references work in business-to-business contexts remains sporadic, with particularly limited information regarding the supplier pre-selection process in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Within the theoretical orbit of attractiveness, the purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of corporate online references, Word-of-Mouth recommendations, and firm size on customer intention to initiate the business relationship with the supplier. The study takes on a mixed methods design combining qualitative interviews and focus groups with an experimental approach; both conducted with managers from SMEs based in the United Kingdom. Results indicate important preferential differences in supplier pre-selection between managers in small versus large customer firms. While generally more elaborated corporate online references tend to be preferred across small and large SMEs, less elaborated references appear sufficient in the case of small SMEs, as long as they occur in combination with a Word-of-Mouth recommendation. Our study makes important contributions to the literature on partnering attractiveness from an SME perspective and adds meaningfully to the discussions on reference management
On the efficiency of foreign exchange markets in times of the COVID-19 pandemic
No full textInternational audienceWe employ multifractal detrended fluctuation analysis (MF-DFA) to provide a first look at the efficiency of forex markets during the initial period of the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which has disrupted the global financial markets. We use high-frequency (5-min interval) data of six major currencies traded in forex markets during the period October 1, 2019 to 31 March 31, 2020. Before applying MF-DFA, we examine the inner dynamics of multifractality through seasonal and trend decompositions using loess. Overall, the results confirm the presence of multifractality in forex markets, which demonstrates, in particular, (i) a decline in the efficiency of forex markets during the COVID-19 outbreak and (ii) heterogeneous effects on the strength of multifractality of exchange rate returns under investigation. The largest effect is observed for the Australian dollar, which shows the highest (lowest) efficiency before (during) the COVID-19 pandemic, assessed in terms of low (high) multifractality. The Canadian dollar and the Swiss Franc exhibit the highest efficiency during the COVID-19 outbreak. Our findings may help policymakers shape a comprehensive response to improve forex market efficiency during such a black swan event
Enhancing organisational commitment through task significance: the moderating role of openness to experience
No full textInternational audienceResearchers have extensively explored the factors influencing employees’ organisational commitment. However, few studies make an explicit distinction between different commitment types when exploring its determinants, and the scholarly attention to individual differences is also limited. In this paper, we confirm that developing managerial interventions to enhance task significance can be useful to promote organisational commitment, but this relationship is contingent on the commitment type and the employees’ openness to experience. We focus on two forms of organisational commitment: affective and continuance commitment. Our study shows that task significance is a better predictor of affective commitment than continuance commitment.We also find that increasing task significance is particularly good to promote more continuance commitment among employees with low levels of openness to experience. Based on data gathered from a sample of 403 employees working in Spanish firms, we find support for these ideas and develop practical implications
A fast and effective heuristic for smoothing workloads on assembly lines: algorithm design and experimental analysis
No full textInternational audienceWorkload smoothing on assembly lines, which aims to evenly assign tasks to stations, supports workforce planning and resource optimization. In this paper, we study smoothing assembly lines and develop a problem-specific heuristic to efficiently solve large-sized instances. To build solutions, the algorithm uses a number of well-known priority rules for task assignment in conjunction with a probabilistic decision-making procedure for closing workstations. We conduct an experimental design for selecting the best performing priority rules and for tuning the probabilistic decision-making procedure. The efficiency of our algorithm is tested and demonstrated through an extensive experimental study
The chopsticks debacle: how brand hate flattened Dolce & Gabbana in China
No full textInternational audiencePurpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the development of brand hate based on the case of Italian luxury fashion house Dolce & Gabbana in China. Design/methodology/approach The strategy adopted in this study is a single in-depth case study. Qualitative methods are applied in both the data collection and analysis. Findings The findings identified six distinct stages through which brand hate can develop: awareness, anger, amplification, antagonism, action and apathy. Research limitations/implications The case is specific to a luxury brand and the Chinese cultural context. Practical implications Practitioners need to consider how business strategies can be adapted to manage the six stages of the manifestation of brand hate. A “proactive” approach is needed to avoid arousing brand hate, while a “reactive” approach is needed to manage its potential ramifications. Originality/value There has been a paucity of anti-consumption research within the business strategy literature. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the focus on China makes this the first study to investigate brand hate within a Chinese cultural context
Designing creative teams from creative members: the role of reward interdependence and knowledge sharing
No full textInternational audienceThis paper aims to extend understanding of how team creative potential translates into team creativity. Drawing on social exchange theories, the authors propose that reward interdependence produce cooperative intra-team interactions, which in turn enables aggregate levels of individual member creativity to translate into team creativity. Further, the authors propose that reward interdependence enhances this link indirectly by motivating collective norms around knowledge sharing
Do mutual funds have consistency in their performance?
No full textInternational audienceUsing a comprehensive data set of 714 Chinese mutual funds from 2004 to 2015, the study investigates these funds’ performance persistence by using the Capital Asset Pricing model, the Fama-French three-factor model and the Carhart Four-factor model. For persistence analysis, we categorize mutual funds into eight octiles based on their one year lagged performance and then observe their performance for the subsequent 12 months. We also apply Cross-Product Ratio technique to assess the performance persistence in these Chinese funds. The study finds no significant evidence of persistence in the performance of the mutual funds. Winner (loser) funds do not continue to be winner (loser) funds in the subsequent time period. These findings suggest that future performance of funds cannot be predicted based on their past performance