Founding conditions influence level of benefit offerings at US startups

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (7) ◽  
pp. 12-14

Purpose The purpose of the paper is to find out if four founding conditions of US startups – total assets, the founder’s level of education, and industry experience, and the founder’s startup experience – influenced the generosity of employee offerings, such as healthcare insurance and paid holidays. Design/methodology/approach To test their four hypotheses, they studied a sample of 4,148 firms from a longitudinal panel database. All the data came from the KFS data set provided by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC). The authors studied the KFS data for indicators of seven HR benefits. Findings The data revealed positive associations for each of the first five years between total assets and HR benefits, between education and HR benefits, as well as between industry experience and HR benefits. In the first year, a positive association was found between startup experience and HR benefits. Originality/value The two authors argued that the results should be studied by startup founders. In a highly competitive market, it would help them to understand the importance of human resources as a source of advantage and understand their own attitudes to benefits. Implementing attractive compensation packages and benefit packages makes it easier to recruit talented people and retain the best employees.

2016 ◽  
Vol 76 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie-Christine Bélanger

Purpose – This paper is based on a crop insurance implementation currently undergoing in Haiti. The purpose of this paper is to present the development of a program tailored to rice production in the Artibonite Valley, the challenges and opportunities that are arising from the exercise as well as pitfalls and ways to avoid them. Design/methodology/approach – The Système de Financement et d’Assurances Agricoles en Haïti’s approach for the development of crop insurance is in accordance with 13 concepts considered essential in the implementation of agricultural insurance programs. The case study is presented through each of these 13 fundamental concepts. Findings – The paper provides an insight on challenges any organization will face when implementing crop insurance for smallholder farmers. It points out notably that close collaboration of executing agencies with local partners is essential from data collection through insurance development and delivery and that all participants should receive a specific training tailored to their level of education and understanding. Social implications – Haiti is one of the poorest countries on the planet. Smallholder farmers could benefit a lot from crop insurance. It could help them stabilize their income when facing crop losses due to natural hazards or uncontrollable natural events. Originality/value – This paper fulfills an identified need to share real case studies exposing challenges faced when implementing crop insurance for smallholder farmers.


2017 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 66-74
Author(s):  
Yufeng Ma ◽  
Long Xia ◽  
Wenqi Shen ◽  
Mi Zhou ◽  
Weiguo Fan

Purpose The purpose of this paper is automatic classification of TV series reviews based on generic categories. Design/methodology/approach What the authors mainly applied is using surrogate instead of specific roles or actors’ name in reviews to make reviews more generic. Besides, feature selection techniques and different kinds of classifiers are incorporated. Findings With roles’ and actors’ names replaced by generic tags, the experimental result showed that it can generalize well to agnostic TV series as compared with reviews keeping the original names. Research limitations/implications The model presented in this paper must be built on top of an already existed knowledge base like Baidu Encyclopedia. Such database takes lots of work. Practical implications Like in digital information supply chain, if reviews are part of the information to be transported or exchanged, then the model presented in this paper can help automatically identify individual review according to different requirements and help the information sharing. Originality/value One originality is that the authors proposed the surrogate-based approach to make reviews more generic. Besides, they also built a review data set of hot Chinese TV series, which includes eight generic category labels for each review.


2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas L. Hogan ◽  
Neil R. Meredith ◽  
Xuhao (Harry) Pan

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to replicate Avery and Berger’s (1991) analysis using data from 2001 through 2011. Although risk-based capital (RBC) regulation is a key component of US banking regulation, empirical evidence of the effectiveness of these regulations has been mixed. Among the first studies of RBC regulation, Avery and Berger (1991) provide evidence from data on US banks that new RBC regulations outperformed old capital regulations from 1982 through 1989. Design/methodology/approach – Using data from the Federal Reserve’s Call Reports, the authors compare banks’ capital ratios and RBC ratios to five measures of bank performance: income, standard deviation of income, non-performing loans, loan charge-offs and probability of failure. Findings – Consistent with Avery and Berger (1991), the authors find banks’ risk-weighted assets to be significant predictors of their future performance and that RBC ratios outperform regular capital ratios as predictors of risk. Originality/value – The study improves on Avery and Berger (1991) by using an updated data set from 2001 through 2011. The authors also discuss some potential limitations of this method of analysis.


2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (9) ◽  
pp. 1942-1955 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fei Sun ◽  
Junjie Hong ◽  
Xiuying Ma ◽  
Chengqi Wang

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine how subnational institutions within a country explain the performance consequences of open innovation (OI) in emerging market enterprises (EMEs). Design/methodology/approach The paper conducts a regression analysis by using a novel panel data set comprising of 438 innovative Chinese firms over the period of 2008-2011. Findings The authors show that although on average openness to external actors improves innovation performance this effect is pronounced for EMEs that operate in subnational regions with a higher level of intellectual property rights (IPR) enforcement and of factor market development. The findings point to the context-dependent nature of OI strategy and the complementary effect of institutional parameters in emerging markets and help to reconcile the contrasting findings regarding the effect of OI in the prior literature. Originality/value This paper extends the literature on OI by suggesting that the analysis of the performance consequences of OI strategy should go beyond the nexus between OI and firm performance, and instead, focus on subnational-specific institutions, such as region-specific IPR enforcement, factor market development and intermediation market development, that may facilitate or constrain the effect of OI model.


2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-169
Author(s):  
Alberto Fuertes ◽  
Jose María Serena

Purpose This paper aims to investigate how firms from emerging economies choose among different international bond markets: global, US144A and Eurobond markets. The authors explore if the ranking in regulatory stringency –global bonds have the most stringent regulations and Eurobonds have the most lenient regulations – leads to a segmentation of borrowers. Design/methodology/approach The authors use a novel data set from emerging economy firms, treating them as consolidated entities. The authors also obtain descriptive evidence and perform univariate non-parametric analyses, conditional and multinomial logit analyses to study firms’ marginal debt choice decisions. Findings The authors show that firms with poorer credit quality, less ability to absorb flotation costs and more informational asymmetries issue debt in US144A and Eurobond markets. On the contrary, firms issuing global bonds – subject to full Securities and Exchange Commission requirements – are financially sounder and larger. This exercise also shows that following the global crisis, firms from emerging economies are more likely to tap less regulated debt markets. Originality/value This is, to the authors’ knowledge, the first study that examines if the ranking in stringency of regulation – global bonds have the most stringent regulations and Eurobonds have the most lenient regulations – is consistent with an ordinal choice by firms. The authors also explore if this ranking is monotonic in all determinants or there are firm-specific features which make firms unlikely to borrow in a given market. Finally, the authors analyze if there are any changes in the debt-choice behavior of firms after the global financial crisis.


2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 242-253 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yvonne Zeegers ◽  
Ian Francis Clark

Purpose – This study investigated whether a course which focused on raising students' awareness of sustainability, from a balanced perspective, that is, one which gives equal consideration to the social and economic aspects as well as the environmental would produce graduates with the knowledge and commitment required to drive the sustainability agenda forward. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – An analysis of students' final entries in their reflective journal was used to explore whether their views on sustainability reflected a balanced view. Findings – The findings of this research confirmed previous studies showed that initially students do have an enviro-centric bias. It also showed that despite experiencing a pedagogical approach which challenged views by encouraging discussion, debate, and reflection and which provided what was considered to be a balanced view of sustainability, many of the students still leaned towards an environmentally focused perspective of sustainability. Research limitations/implications – The conclusions are based on one data set but are supported by other data described in the paper. Practical implications – The finding led the authors to conclude that a concerted holistic effort within and across courses is needed within tertiary institutions if students' views about sustainability are to be challenged. Originality/value – The outcomes demonstrate that students' reflective journals can be used to gather information about the change in students' perceptions about sustainability.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulpiana Kocollari ◽  
Alessia Pedrazzoli ◽  
Maddalena Cavicchioli ◽  
Andrea Girardi

PurposeThe authors investigate the contributions of social capital (SC) dimensions (bridging, bonding and linking) in crowdfunding campaigns by comparing the dynamics of agri-food businesses with those of two other sectors – cultural and technological.Design/methodology/approachThe authors develop linear regressions on a proprietary data set of 5,290 projects launched on the Italian platform “Produzionidalbasso.com”, from 2014 to 2020.FindingsThe authors’ findings suggest that combining the three social capital dimensions (bridging, bonding and linking) has a more substantial overall effect on the number of backers involved in agri-food projects than in cultural and technological projects. Agri-food entrepreneurs effectively mobilize all resources embedded in the SC dimensions and therefore create the conditions to develop new ties that financially support the project.Practical implicationsAgri-food entrepreneurs may benefit from those results improving their funding strategies. Therefore, agri-food entrepreneurs can explore and exploit the instruments available on the CFD platform – video and rewards associated with the campaign – gaining more benefit from the backers involved compared with other project categories.Originality/valueThe study proposes a broader perspective regarding SC that encompasses the proponent, the company and the campaign with three different types of ties: bonding, bridging and linking. These SC dimensions can differently shape diverse sectors and this eclectic configuration can differentiate the effects of SC in crowdfunding campaigns. This study pinpoints how crowdfunding determinants change, based on project categories.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yusuf Dinç ◽  
Rashed Jahangir ◽  
Ruslan Nagayev ◽  
Fahrettin Çakır

Purpose The emerging markets have been witnessing a remarkable revival of rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs) serving as alternative informal financing and investment platforms, also known as savings-based finance (SBF) in Turkey. The purpose of this study is to present the SBF model mathematically, analyse the performance of the SBF sector and propose a new Sharīʿah-compliant SBF model for the acquisition of durables. Design/methodology/approach The paper thoroughly reviews the concept and practice of ROSCA across the globe, mathematically models and empirically analyses the performance of Turkish SBF companies using a unique data set. Findings The study formulates a two-person SBF model and proposes a Mudarabah-Wakalah hybrid model with a new investment feature. It is found that the concept of ROSCA is being operationalized in 105 countries across the globe under different names with slight business model modifications. The research also reveals that the demand for financing of durables in Turkey significantly increased in recent years with the demand for housing is twice greater compared to vehicles. Most importantly, a strong significant inter- and intra-comovement is observed between these durables implying that the success of the sector in one segment has attracted the customers to other SBF products. It shows that the SBF institutions can effectively serve as the alternative financing houses for pooling savings and financing the durables, and they have strong potential to capture a larger financial market share in Turkey and even globally. Originality/value The study constructs mathematical models and proposes a new investment wing to an existing SBF wealth fund.


2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 150-154
Author(s):  
Charles Hipps

Purpose Change is no longer an event in HR. Competition is tougher than ever, and this battle for top talent is a vicious cycle that doesn't stop but reinvents itself all the time. The recruitment market needs to be more responsive to the continuous cycle of innovation and recognise the increasingly competitive marketplace that is rapidity getting tighter. Design/methodology/approach With more than 20 years as the founder of a leading recruitment technology vendor, the detail and content supplied in the feature are all of the author’s own thoughts and experiences, drawn from his own expertise and learning from others he has met en route. Findings More often than not, recruitment teams are doing what they have always done – seeing the same candidates and visiting the same events. Change, or more specifically in this case, technology, actually has the ability to speed up the process, enhance the candidate experience and give time back to recruiters to spend with the candidates. Originality/value It is widely known that talented people have higher expectations and opportunities than ever before. That makes it crucial for companies to reach them, deliver a highly engaging candidate experience and nurture a relationship well ahead of open opportunities.


2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 97-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agata Debowska ◽  
Daniel Boduszek ◽  
Dominic Willmott ◽  
Adele D. Jones

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate the None in Three Victim Responsiveness Assessment (Ni3: VRA) examining affective and cognitive responsiveness toward victims of intimate partner violence. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected at two time points in a sample of 359 young people from Barbados and Grenada (56.27 percent female; M age=12.73 years). Findings Confirmatory factor analysis results indicated that the Ni3: VRA scores are best captured by a two-factor solution, including affective and cognitive dimensions. A test-retest correlation confirmed the reliability of the Ni3: VRA over time. Affective responsiveness formed a significant positive association with caring/cooperative behavior. Originality/value The Ni3: VRA can be used for the evaluation of preventive strategies aimed at reducing the rates of IPV.


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