330 Wirtschaft
Refine
Year of publication
- 2024 (39)
- 2023 (114)
- 2022 (139)
- 2021 (151)
- 2020 (145)
- 2019 (68)
- 2018 (66)
- 2017 (42)
- 2016 (32)
- 2015 (39)
- 2014 (29)
- 2013 (42)
- 2012 (20)
- 2011 (40)
- 2010 (24)
- 2009 (13)
- 2008 (18)
- 2007 (24)
- 2006 (31)
- 2005 (25)
- 2004 (21)
- 2003 (22)
- 2002 (7)
- 2001 (6)
- 2000 (12)
- 1999 (28)
- 1998 (12)
- 1997 (16)
- 1996 (17)
- 1995 (13)
- 1994 (8)
- 1993 (6)
- 1992 (5)
- 1991 (4)
- 1990 (5)
- 1989 (2)
- 1987 (1)
- 1986 (1)
- 1985 (2)
- 1984 (1)
- 1983 (3)
- 1982 (4)
- 1981 (3)
- 1979 (2)
- 1978 (2)
- 1977 (1)
- 1976 (1)
- 1975 (1)
Document Type
- Article (462)
- Working Paper (187)
- Monograph/Edited Volume (182)
- Doctoral Thesis (177)
- Postprint (116)
- Conference Proceeding (73)
- Part of a Book (69)
- Other (10)
- Master's Thesis (8)
- Report (8)
Keywords
- entrepreneurship (20)
- experiment (18)
- COVID-19 (14)
- Entrepreneurship (10)
- Germany (10)
- Industrie 4.0 (10)
- Digitalisierung (9)
- communication (9)
- digitalization (9)
- gender (9)
Institute
- Wirtschaftswissenschaften (699)
- Fachgruppe Betriebswirtschaftslehre (284)
- Fachgruppe Volkswirtschaftslehre (155)
- Center for Economic Policy Analysis (CEPA) (77)
- Extern (71)
- Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Fakultät (43)
- Sozialwissenschaften (24)
- Fachgruppe Politik- & Verwaltungswissenschaft (18)
- Bürgerliches Recht (17)
- Fachgruppe Soziologie (17)
Purpose
With shorter product cycles and a growing number of knowledge-intensive business processes, time consumption is a highly relevant target factor in measuring the performance of contemporary business processes. This research aims to extend prior research on the effects of knowledge transfer velocity at the individual level by considering the effect of complexity, stickiness, competencies, and further demographic factors on knowledge-intensive business processes at the conversion-specific levels.
Design/methodology/approach
We empirically assess the impact of situation-dependent knowledge transfer velocities on time consumption in teams and individuals. Further, we issue the demographic effect on this relationship. We study a sample of 178 experiments of project teams and individuals applying ordinary least squares (OLS) for regression analysis-based modeling.
Findings
The authors find that time consumed at knowledge transfers is negatively associated with the complexity of tasks. Moreover, competence among team members has a complementary effect on this relationship and stickiness retards knowledge transfers. Thus, while demographic factors urgently need to be considered for effective and speedy knowledge transfers, these influencing factors should be addressed on a conversion-specific basis so that some tasks are realized in teams best while others are not. Guidelines and interventions are derived to identify best task realization variants, so that process performance is improved by a new kind of process improvement method.
Research limitations/implications
This study establishes empirically the importance of conversion-specific influence factors and demographic factors as drivers of high knowledge transfer velocities in teams and among individuals. The contribution connects the field of knowledge management to important streams in the wider business literature: process improvement, management of knowledge resources, design of information systems, etc. Whereas the model is highly bound to the experiment tasks, it has high explanatory power and high generalizability to other contexts.
Practical implications
Team managers should take care to allow the optimal knowledge transfer situation within the team. This is particularly important when knowledge sharing is central, e.g. in product development and consulting processes. If this is not possible, interventions should be applied to the individual knowledge transfer situation to improve knowledge transfers among team members.
Social implications
Faster and more effective knowledge transfers improve the performance of both commercial and non-commercial organizations. As nowadays, the individual is faced with time pressure to finalize tasks, the deliberated increase of knowledge transfer velocity is a core capability to realize this goal. Quantitative knowledge transfer models result in more reliable predictions about the duration of knowledge transfers. These allow the target-oriented modification of knowledge transfer situations so that processes speed up, private firms are more competitive and public services are faster to citizens.
Originality/value
Time consumption is an increasingly relevant factor in contemporary business but so far not been explored in experiments at all. This study extends current knowledge by considering quantitative effects on knowledge velocity and improved knowledge transfers.
Dieser Beitrag vergleicht die kommunale Verwaltungsdigitalisierung in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz (DACH-Länder) als Vertreter der kontinentaleuropäisch-föderalen Verwaltungstradition bei zugleich unterschiedlichen Digitalisierungsansätzen und -fortschritten. Basierend auf Interviews mit 22 Expert*innen und Beobachtungen in je einer Kommune pro Land sowie Dokumenten-, Literatur- und Sekundärdatenanalysen untersucht die Studie, wie Verwaltungsdigitalisierung im Mehrebenensystem organisiert ist und welche Rolle dabei das Verwaltungsprofil spielt sowie welche Innovationsschwerpunkte die Kommunen im Hinblick auf die Leistungserbringung und die internen Prozesse setzen. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass der hohe Grad lokaler Autonomie den Kommunen ermöglicht, eigene Akzente in der Verwaltungsdigitalisierung zu setzen. Zugleich wirken die stark verflochtenen komplexen Entscheidungsstrukturen und hohen Koordinationsbedarfe in verwaltungsföderalen Systemen, die in Deutschland am stärksten, in Österreich etwas schwächer und in der Schweiz am geringsten ausgeprägt sind, als Digitalisierungshemmnisse. Ferner weisen die Befunde auf eine unitarisierende Wirkung der Verwaltungsdigitalisierung als Reformbereich hin. Insgesamt trägt die Studie zu einem besseren Verständnis dafür bei, welche Problematik die Verwaltungsdigitalisierung für föderal-dezentrale Verwaltungsmodelle mit sich bringt.
This article analyses incremental institutional change and subsequent organizational and performance outcomes of the digital transformation from a comparative perspective. Through 31 expert interviews, the authors compare two digitalized public services in Germany. Two digitalization approaches are identified. The voluntary, decentralized bottom-up approach involves layering of new rules, limited organizational restructuring, and performance deficits. Conversely, the compulsory, top-down approach with centralized control facilitates displacement of existing rules and far-reaching organizational change; in this study, it is also associated with improved performance.
Die Digitalisierung ist ein wesentlicher Bestandteil aktueller Verwaltungsreformen. Trotz der hohen Bedeutung und langjähriger Bemühungen bleibt die Bilanz der Verwaltungsdigitalisierung in Deutschland ambivalent. Diese Studie konzentriert sich auf drei erfolgreiche Digitalisierungsvorhaben aus dem Onlinezugangsgesetz (OZG) und analysiert mittels problemzentrierter Expertenbefragung Einflussfaktoren auf die Umsetzung von OZG-Vorhaben und den Einfluss des Managements in diesem Prozess. Die Analyse erfolgt theoriegeleitet basierend auf dem Ansatz der begrenzten Rationalität und der ökonomischen Theorie der Bürokratie. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass anzunehmen ist, dass die identifizierten Einflussfaktoren unterschiedlich auf Nachnutzbarkeit und Reifegrad von Verwaltungsleistungen wirken und als Folgen begrenzter Rationalität im menschlichen Problemlösungsprozess interpretiert werden können. Managerinnen unterstützen die operativen Akteure bei der Umsetzung, indem sie deren begrenzte Rationalität mit geeigneten Strategien adressieren. Dazu können sie Ressourcen bereitstellen, mit ihrer Expertise unterstützen, Informationen zugänglich machen, Entscheidungswege verändern sowie zur Konfliktlösung beitragen. Die Studie bietet wertvolle Einblicke in die tatsächliche Managementpraxis und leitet daraus Empfehlungen für die Umsetzung öffentlicher Digitalisierungsvorhaben sowie für die Steuerung öffentlicher Verwaltungen ab. Diese Studie liefert einen wichtigen Beitrag zum Verständnis des Einflusses des Managements in der Verwaltungsdigitalisierung. Die Studie unterstreicht außerdem die Notwendigkeit weiterer Forschung in diesem Bereich, um die Praktiken und Herausforderungen der Verwaltungsdigitalisierung besser zu verstehen und effektiv zu adressieren.
We examine how the gender of business owners is related to the wages paid to female relative to male employees working in their firms. Using Finnish register data and employing firm fixed effects, we find that the gender pay gap is—starting from a gender pay gap of 11 to 12%—two to three percentage points lower for hourly wages in female-owned firms than in male-owned firms. Results are robust to how the wage is measured, as well as to various further robustness checks. More importantly, we find substantial differences between industries. While, for instance, in the manufacturing sector, the gender of the owner plays no role in the gender pay gap, in several service sector industries, like ICT or business services, no or a negligible gender pay gap can be found, but only when firms are led by female business owners. Businesses with male ownership maintain a gender pay gap of around 10% also in the latter industries. With increasing firm size, the influence of the gender of the owner, however, fades. In large firms, it seems that others—firm managers—determine wages and no differences in the pay gap are observed between male- and female-owned firms.
We use worldwide gridded satellite data to analyse how population size and density affect urban PM 2.5 pollution. We find that more populated and denser grid cells are more exposed to pollution. However, across urban areas, exposure increases with cities’ population size but decreases with density. Moreover, the population effect is driven mostly by population commuting to core cities rather than the core city population itself. We analyse heterogeneity by geography and income levels. A counterfactual simulation shows that exposure could fall by up to 40% if population size were equalized across all cities within countries, but the relocation of population from large to small cities that maximizes welfare would be small.
Workplace friendships
(2023)
Workplace friendships, i.e., when work colleagues are also friends, are a widespread phenomenon in organizations which has attracted increasing research interest in recent decades. Numerous studies have investigated consequences of workplace friendships and found positive outcomes, such as increased employee job satisfaction or organizational performance, as well as negative outcomes, such as decreased knowledge-sharing between different friendship cliques. Other studies have examined what shapes workplace friendships, focusing on determinants such as personality or the spatial composition of organizations. Finally, an increasing number of studies focus on multiplex workplace friendships, where employees who are friends are also linked by a specific work-focused relationship. In this chapter, we first take stock of the literature on workplace friendships by providing an overview of their antecedents and consequences at the individual, the group, and the organizational level, and review the smaller body of research on multiplex workplace friendships. Second, we critically discuss practical implications of workplace friendships, focusing on their relevance to three current challenges for employees and organizations: the increase in virtual work, social inequalities in organizations, and the increased overlap of professional and private life. Finally, we provide recommendations for organizations on how to address these challenges and effectively manage workplace friendships.
In this paper, we study how the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG) used different legitimacy strategies between 2004 and 2021 to secure its organisational survival. Although EFRAG is now an established player within the regulatory space of corporate reporting, the organisation’s path towards this position was not straightforward. Based on 20 interviews with current and former members of EFRAG and archival documents, we investigate how EFRAG initially gained and maintained its legitimacy and how it responded to a legitimacy crisis arising in the aftermath of the 2008–2009 financial crisis. Based on prior research on organisational strategies for legitimising actions, we derive a framework for our analysis and show how EFRAG has adapted various legitimacy strategies over time. We further find that the use of legitimacy strategies is constrained by various systemic factors and show how EFRAG’s adaptations to its legitimacy strategies led to new tensions. Our findings contribute to the literature on private regulatory organisations’ legitimacy and the political economy of standard setting.
Breaking down barriers
(2024)
Many researchers hesitate to provide full access to their datasets due to a lack of knowledge about research data management (RDM) tools and perceived fears, such as losing the value of one's own data. Existing tools and approaches often do not take into account these fears and missing knowledge. In this study, we examined how conversational agents (CAs) can provide a natural way of guidance through RDM processes and nudge researchers towards more data sharing. This work offers an online experiment in which researchers interacted with a CA on a self-developed RDM platform and a survey on participants’ data sharing behavior. Our findings indicate that the presence of a guiding and enlightening CA on an RDM platform has a constructive influence on both the intention to share data and the actual behavior of data sharing. Notably, individual factors do not appear to impede or hinder this effect.
Social media constitute an important arena for public debates and steady interchange of issues relevant to society. To boost their reputation, commercial organizations also engage in political, social, or environmental debates on social media. To engage in this type of digital activism, organizations increasingly utilize the social media profiles of executive employees and other brand ambassadors. However, the relationship between brand ambassadors’ digital activism and corporate reputation is only vaguely understood. The results of a qualitative inquiry suggest that digital activism via brand ambassadors can be risky (e.g., creating additional surface for firestorms, financial loss) and rewarding (e.g., emitting authenticity, employing ‘megaphones’ for industry change) at the same time. The paper informs both scholarship and practitioners about strategic trade-offs that need to be considered when employing brand ambassadors for digital activism.
Disinformation campaigns spread rapidly through social media and can cause serious harm, especially in crisis situations, ranging from confusion about how to act to a loss of trust in government institutions. Therefore, the prevention of digital disinformation campaigns represents an important research topic. However, previous research in the field of information systems focused on the technical possibilities to detect and combat disinformation, while ethical and legal perspectives have been neglected so far. In this article, we synthesize previous information systems literature on disinformation prevention measures and discuss these measures from an ethical and legal perspective. We conclude by proposing questions for future research on the prevention of disinformation campaigns from an IS, ethical, and legal perspective. In doing so, we contribute to a balanced discussion on the prevention of digital disinformation campaigns that equally considers technical, ethical, and legal issues, and encourage increased interdisciplinary collaboration in future research.
Virtual reality promises high potential as an immersive, hands-on learning tool for training 21st-century skills. However, previous research revealed that the mere use of digital tools in higher education does not automatically translate into learning outcomes. Instead, information systems studies emphasized the importance of effective use behavior to achieve technology usage goals. Applying the affordance network approach, we investigated what constitutes effective usage behavior regarding a virtual reality collaboration system in digital education. Therefore, we conducted 18 interviews with students and observations of six course sessions. The results uncover how affordance actualization contributed to the achievement of learning goals. A comparison with findings of previous studies on other information systems (i.e., electronic medical record systems, big data analytics, fitness wearables) allowed us to highlight system-specific differences in effective use behavior. We also demonstrated a clear distinction between concepts surrounding effective use theory facilitating the application of the affordance network approach in information systems research.
Between reality & fantasy
(2023)
Synthetische Medien ermöglichen die zunehmend automatisierte Erstellung virtueller Influencer, von denen bereits einige Millionen Follower in sozialen Medien gewonnen haben. Unter der Leitung von Professor Stefan Stieglitz und Sünje Clausen (Universität Potsdam) und in Kooperation mit Sanofi hat ein Forschungsprojekt untersucht, wie computergenerierten Charaktere für die Influencer-Kommunikation im Unternehmensumfeld genutzt werden können. Nähere Informationen zu den Forschungsergebnissen können in der Communication Insights nachgelesen werden: eine kurze Einführung in die Influencer-Kommunikation, potenziellen Vorteile als auch Herausforderungen von virtuellen Influencern, Tipps für den Prozess der Gestaltung und Nutzung eines virtuellen Influencers.
What does the future hold for corporate communications? The Communications Trend Radar is an applied research project. On an annual basis, it identifies relevant trends for corporate communications from the fields of society, management, and technology. The research team at the University of Potsdam (Professor Stefan Stieglitz, Sünje Clausen, MS.) and Leipzig University (Professor Ansgar Zerfass, Dr Michelle Wloka) identified the following trends for 2024: Information Inflation, AI Literacy, Workforce Shift, Content Integrity, Decoding Humans. More information on the trends can be found in the Communications Trend Radar Report 2024
We would like to inform the readers and editors of the journal that we have discovered some errors in the references of our paper. These errors were brought to our attention by a reader who noticed some inconsistencies between the citations in the text and the bibliography. Upon further investigation, we realized that our literature management software had mistakenly linked some of the references to wrong or non-existent sources. We apologize for this oversight and assure you that it did not affect the validity or quality of our arguments and results, which were based on the correct sources. Below you find a list of the incorrect references along with their corresponding correct ones. We hope that this correction statement will clarify any confusion or misunderstanding that may have arisen from this mistake. The authors would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused.
Purpose
This study investigates the communication behavior of public health organizations on Twitter during the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in Brazil. It contributes to the understanding of the organizational framing of health communication by showcasing several instances of framing devices that borrow from (Brazilian) internet culture. The investigation of this case extends the knowledge by providing a rich description of the organizational framing of health communication to combat misinformation in a politically charged environment.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors collected a Twitter dataset of 77,527 tweets and analyzed a purposeful subsample of 536 tweets that contained information provided by Brazilian public health organizations about COVID-19 vaccination campaigns. The data analysis was carried out quantitatively and qualitatively by combining social media analytics techniques and frame analysis.
Findings
The analysis showed that Brazilian health organizations used several framing devices that have been identified by previous literature such as hashtags, links, emojis or images. However, the analysis also unearthed hitherto unknown visual framing devices for misinformation prevention and debunking that borrow from internet culture such as “infographics,” “pop culture references” and “internet-native symbolism.”
Research limitations/implications
First, the identification of framing devices relating to internet culture add to our understanding of the so far little addressed framing of misinformation combat messages. The case of Brazilian health organizations provides a novel perspective to knowledge by offering a notion of internet-native symbols (e.g. humor, memes) and popular culture references for misinformation combat, including misinformation prevention. Second, this study introduces a frontier of political contextualization to misinformation research that does not relate to the partisanship of the spreaders but that relates to the political dilemmas of public organizations with a commitment to provide accurate information to citizens.
Practical implications
The findings inform decision-makers and public health organizations about framing devices that are tailored to internet-native audiences and can guide strategies to carry out information campaigns in misinformation-laden social media environments.
Social implications
The findings of this case study expose the often-overlooked cultural peculiarities of framing information campaigns on social media. The report of this study from a country in the Global South helps to contrast several assumptions and strategies that are prevalent in (health) discourses in Western societies and scholarship.
Originality/value
This study uncovers unconventional and barely addressed framing devices of health organizations operating in Brazil, which provides a novel perspective to the body of research on misinformation. It contributes to existing knowledge about frame analysis and broadens the understanding of frame devices borrowing from internet culture. It is a call for a frontier in misinformation research that deals with internet culture as part of organizational strategies for successful misinformation combat.
Examining the dissemination of evidence on social media, we analyzed the discourse around eight visible scientists in the context of COVID-19. Using manual (N = 1,406) and automated coding (N = 42,640) on an account-based tracked Twitter/X dataset capturing scientists’ activities and eliciting reactions over six 2-week periods, we found that visible scientists’ tweets included more scientific evidence. However, public reactions contained more anecdotal evidence. Findings indicate that evidence can be a message characteristic leading to greater tweet dissemination. Implications for scientists, including explicitly incorporating scientific evidence in their communication and examining evidence in science communication research, are discussed.
Psychologische Sicherheit
(2023)
Durch psychologische Sicherheit am Arbeitsplatz lässt sich vieles erreichen. Sie senkt den Krankenstand, schafft Bindung zum Arbeitgeber, ermöglicht tiefere kollegiale Beziehungen und erleichtert es, voneinander zu lernen. Dabei wird aus der Perspektive des Individuums auf die Organisation geschaut und ihre personellen Vertreter, die Leader. Dieser Beitrag betont hingegen die Bedeutung der Organisation und der Grenzen, welche diese setzt. Führungskräfte können tatsächlich für psychologische Sicherheit sorgen. Allerdings nutzen sie dafür oft die falschen Mittel.
Um Mitarbeitende langfristig ans Unternehmen zu binden und das Engagement in Teams hochzuhalten, fokussieren sich viele Maßnahmen zur Verbesserung des Betriebsklimas oder der Zufriedenheit auf die Motivation der Mitarbeitenden. Meist ist es jedoch lohnenswerter, die Zumutungen der organisationalen Struktur zuerst anzufassen. Häufig liegen dort die größten Motivationskiller - und somit auch die Hebel mit dem größten Potenzial für mehr Zufriedenheit.
We analyze how conventional emissions trading schemes (ETS) can be modified by introducing “clean-up certificates” to allow for a phase of net-negative emissions. Clean-up certificates bundle the permission to emit CO2 with the obligation for its removal. We show that demand for such certificates is determined by cost-saving technological progress, the discount rate and the length of the compliance period. Introducing extra clean-up certificates into an existing ETS reduces near-term carbon prices and mitigation efforts. In contrast, substituting ETS allowances with clean-up certificates reduces cumulative emissions without depressing carbon prices or mitigation in the near term. We calibrate our model to the EU ETS and identify reforms where simultaneously (i) ambition levels rise, (ii) climate damages fall, (iii) revenues from carbon prices rise and (iv) carbon prices and aggregate mitigation cost fall. For reducing climate damages, roughly half of the issued clean-up certificates should replace conventional ETS allowances. In the context of the EU ETS, a European Carbon Central Bank could manage the implementation of cleanup certificates and could serve as an enforcement mechanism.
In Krisenzeiten ist der Ruf nach Führung besonders populär. Dabei ist gerade Führung selbst eines der unsichersten Mittel, die der Organisation zur Verfügung stehen. Hingegen wird das Potenzial von Strukturen zu wenig gesehen. Wenn in unsicheren Situationen der Wunsch nach Orientierung und Klarheit groß ist, können häufig strukturelle Entscheidungen die notwendigen Sicherheiten vermitteln.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system customization is often necessary because companies have unique processes that provide their competitive advantage. Despite new technological advances such as cloud computing or model-driven development, technical ERP customization options are either outdated or ambiguously formulated in the scientific literature. Using a systematic literature review (SLR) that analyzes 137 definitions from 26 papers, the result is an analysis and aggregation of technical customization types by providing clearance and aligning with future organizational needs. The results show a shift from ERP code modification in on-premises systems to interface and integration customization in cloud ERP systems, as well as emerging technological opportunities as a way for customers and key users to perform system customization. The study contributes by providing a clear understanding of given customization types and assisting ERP users and vendors in making customization decisions.
Eine indifferente Gemengelage unterschiedlicher Erwartungen ist im Coaching nicht selten. Jeder will etwas anderes - was genau, weiß man häufig nicht. Oftmals ist man sich noch nicht einmal sicher, was man selbst will. Das führt zu Stress und Blockaden. Und die Optionen und Handlungsmöglichkeiten geraten aus dem Blick. Diese Situation ist auch vielen Führungskräften wohlbekannt.
Wie gut ist gut?
(2022)
Fortes fortuna adiuvat*
(2022)
Der Sinn des Lebens
(2023)
Taxed fairly?
(2023)
Empirically, the poor are more likely to support increases in the level of tax progressivity than the rich. Such income-stratified tax preferences can result from differences in preferences of what should be taxed as argued by previous literature. However, it may also result from income-stratified perceptions of what is taxed. This paper argues that the rich perceive higher levels of tax progressivity than the poor and that tax perceptions affect individuals’ support for progressive taxation. Using data from an Austrian survey experiment, we test this argument in three steps: First, in line with past research, we show that individuals’ income positions are connected to individuals’ tax preferences as a self-interest rationale would predict. However, second, we show that this variation is mainly driven by income-stratified tax perceptions. Third, randomly informing a subset of the sample about actual tax rates, we find that changing tax perceptions causally affects support for redistributive taxation among those who initially overestimated the level of tax progressivity. Our results indicate that tax perceptions are relevant for forming tax preferences and suggest that individuals are more polarized in their perceptions of who pays how much taxes than in their support for who should pay how much tax.
Studies conducted in Bangladesh so far did not unequivocally identify the modus operandi of local farmers to perceive and experience the climate variability at a national scale. Hence, this study aims to decipher local farmer's perception on climate variability for the last 10 years, by constructing climate variability index (CVI). Additionally, this study demystified the socio-economic determinants for influencing farmer perception regarding climate variability as well as its impact on their livelihoods. The study was designed on a cross-sectional data through a country-wide primary survey of 16,053 households who were largely dependent on agriculture. A weighted index was constructed for mapping the regional climate variability using model-builder programming in ArcGIS. Also, a multivariable probit model was employed to identify the factors influencing farmers' perception and resulting impact of climate variability on their livelihoods. According to local farmer's perception, the CVI mapping identified that Bangladesh experienced variegated climatic variability since last 10 years. However, local farmer's perception varied with different socio-economic factors like gender, education, farmer's category, credit, monthly income and access to media. Moreover, landless, small and medium farm holders were more aware of the local climate variability and eventually, they also experienced the higher influence of climate variability on their livelihoods. Since an effective mapping of regional climate variability is a sine qua non to devise region specific policies, this study will facilitate the government to determine its priorities, formulate efficacious strategies and thereby help to adapt with future climate-induced risks and vulnerabilities.
Background: Following the rapid increase of asylum seekers arriving in the European Union in 2015/16, policymakers have invested heavily in improving their foresight and forecasting capabilities. A common method to elicit expert predictions are Delphi surveys. This approach has attracted concern in the literature, given the high uncertainty in experts’ predictions. However, there exists limited guidance on specific design choices for future-related Delphi surveys.
Objective: We test whether or not small adjustments to the Delphi survey can increase certainty (i.e., reduce variation) in expert predictions on immigration to the EU in 2030.
Methods: Based on a two-round Delphi survey with 178 migration experts, we compare variation and subjective confidence in expert predictions and assess whether additional context information (type of migration flow, sociopolitical context) promotes convergence among experts (i.e., less variation) and confidence in their own estimates.
Results: We find that additional context information does not reduce variation and does not increase confidence in expert predictions on migration.
Conclusions: The results reaffirm recent concerns regarding the limited scope for reducing uncertainty by manipulating the survey setup. Persistent uncertainty may be a result of the complexity of migration processes and limited agreement among migration experts regarding key drivers.
Contribution: We caution policymakers and academics on the use of Delphi surveys for eliciting expert predictions on immigration, even when conducted based on a large pool of experts and using specific scenarios. The potential of alternative approaches such as prediction markets should be further explored.
We conduct a laboratory experiment to study how locus of control operates through people’s preferences and beliefs to influence their decisions. Using the principal–agent setting of the delegation game, we test four key channels that conceptually link locus of control to decision-making: (i) preference for agency, (ii) optimism and (iii) confidence regarding the return to effort, and (iv) illusion of control. Knowing the return and cost of stated effort, principals either retain or delegate the right to make an investment decision that generates payoffs for themselves and their agents. Extending the game to the context in which the return to stated effort is unknown allows us to explicitly study the relationship between locus of control and beliefs about the return to effort. We find that internal locus of control is linked to the preference for agency, an effect that is driven by women. We find no evidence that locus of control influences optimism and confidence about the return to stated effort, or that it operates through an illusion of control.
Food preferences are crucial for diet-related decisions, which substantially impact individual health and global climate. However, the persistence of unfavorable food preferences is a significant obstacle to changing eating behavior.
Here we explored the effects of posthypnotic suggestions (PHS) on food-related decisions by measuring food choices, subjective ratings, and indifference points. In Session 1, demographic data and hypnotic susceptibility of participants were assessed. In Session 2, following hypnosis induction, PHS aiming to increase the desirability of healthy food was delivered.
Afterward, a task set was administrated twice, once when PHS was activated and once deactivated. The order of PHS activation was counterbalanced across participants. The task set included a liking-rating task for 170 pictures of different food items, followed by an online supermarket where participants were instructed to select enough food for a fictitious week of quarantining from the same item pool. After 1 week, Session 3 repeated Session 2 without hypnosis induction in order to assess the persistence of PHS.
The crucial dependent measures were food choices, subjective ratings, and the indifference points as a function of time and PHS condition.
We study the effect of energy and transport policies on pollution in two developing country cities. We use a quantitative equilibrium model with choice of housing, energy use, residential location, transport mode, and energy technology. Pollution comes from commuting and residential energy use. The model parameters are calibrated to replicate key variables for two developing country cities, Maputo, Mozambique, and Yogyakarta, Indonesia. In the counterfactual simulations, we study how various transport and energy policies affect equilibrium pollution. Policies may be induce rebound effects from increasing residential energy use or switching to high emission modes or locations. In general, these rebound effects tend to be largest for subsidies to public transport or modern residential energy technology.
While the economic harm of cartels is caused by their price-increasing effect, sanctioning by courts rather targets at the underlying process of firms reaching a price-fixing agreement. This paper provides experimental evidence on the question whether such sanctioning meets the economic target, i.e., whether evidence of a collusive meeting of the firms and of the content of their communication reliably predicts subsequent prices. We find that already the mere mutual agreement to meet predicts a strong increase in prices. Conversely, express distancing from communication completely nullifies its otherwise price-increasing effect. Using machine learning, we show that communication only increases prices if it is very explicit about how the cartel plans to behave.
Kollaborative, partizipative Instrumente zur Krisenbekämpfung haben in den letzten Jahren zunehmend an Aufmerksamkeit gewonnen. Ein Beispiel hierfür ist der #WirVsVirus-Hackathon, der als Reaktion auf die COVID-19-Pandemie durchgeführt wurde und über 28.000 Teilnehmer:innen erreichte. Bislang wurden die Auswirkungen solch groß angelegter, kollaborativer Ansätze zur Krisenbewältigung auf staatliches Krisenmanagement nur selten untersucht. Diese Studie analysiert den Hackathon und die daraus entstandenen Projekte aus der Perspektive des Open Governance-Paradigmas. Auf Grundlage von neun Experteninterviews untersuchen wir, wie sich digitale Open Governance auf die Regierungsfähigkeit und Legitimität in Krisenzeiten auswirkt. Unsere Analyse zeigt, dass digitale Open Governance zur Leistungsfähigkeit und Legitimität staatlichen Handelns in Krisenzeiten beitragen kann, da solche Projekte eine breite und diverse Teilnehmerschaft mobilisieren und in kurzer Zeit bürgerzentrierte, nutzbare Lösungen für krisenbezogene Probleme entwickeln können. Dem stehen allerdings Zweifel an der langfristigen Beständigkeit der Projekte, ihrer Skalierbarkeit, sowie Risiken hinsichtlich der Legitimität und Rechenschaftspflicht entgegen.
To date, sex and gender differences play only a minor role in medical research and practice, thereby putting individuals’ health at risk. Gender-specific medicine, or the practice of taking these differences into account when conducting research and treating patients so far is being discussed primarily by experts. With people increasingly using social media such as Twitter for sharing and searching for health-related information online, Twitter can potentially educate about gender-specific medicine. However, little is known about the information circulation and the structure of interactions on the Twitter network discussing this topic. Results of a network analysis show that the network exhibits a community-structure, with information exchange being limited and concentrated in silos. This indicates that there is untapped potential for acquiring new information by users through interacting with individuals outside their community. Public health officials may benefit from this insight and tailor online campaigns to enhance awareness on gender-specific medicine.
The growing use of digital tools in policy implementation has altered the work of street-level bureaucrats who are granted substantial discretionary power in decision-making. Digital tools can constrain discretionary power, like the curtailment thesis proposed, or serve as action resources, like the enablement thesis suggested. This article assesses empirical evidence of the impact of digital tools on street-level work and decision-making in service-oriented and regulation-oriented organisations based on a systematic literature review and thematic qualitative content analysis of 36 empirical studies published until 2021. The findings demonstrate different effects with regard to the role of digital tools and the core tasks of the public administration, depending on political and managerial goals and consequent system design. Leading or decisive digital tools mostly curtail discretion, especially in service-oriented organisations. In contrast, an enhanced information base or recommendations for actions enable decision-making, in particular in regulation-oriented organisations. By showing how street-level bureaucrats actively try to resist the curtailing effects caused by rigid design to address individual circumstances, for instance by establishing ways of coping like rule bending or rule breaking, using personal resources or prioritising among clients, this study demonstrates the importance of the continuation thesis and the persistently crucial role of human judgement in policy implementation.
We examine how the gender of business-owners is related to the wages paid to female relative to male employees working in their firms. Using Finnish register data and employing firm fixed effects, we find that the gender pay gap is – starting from a gender pay gap of 11 to 12 percent - two to three percentage-points lower for hourly wages in female-owned firms than in male-owned firms. Results are robust to how the wage is measured, as well as to various further robustness checks. More importantly, we find substantial differences between industries. While, for instance, in the manufacturing sector, the gender of the owner plays no role for the gender pay gap, in several service sector industries, like ICT or business services, no or a negligible gender pay gap can be found, but only when firms are led by female business owners. Businesses in male ownership maintain a gender pay gap of around 10 percent also in the latter industries. With increasing firm size, the influence of the gender of the owner, however, fades. In large firms, it seems that others – firm managers – determine wages and no differences in the pay gap are observed between male- and female-owned firms.
Enhancing higher entrepreneurship education: insights from practitioners for curriculum improvement
(2024)
Curricula for higher entrepreneurship education should meet the requirements of both a solid theoretical foundation and a practical orientation. When these curricula are designed by education specialists, entrepreneurs are usually not consulted. To explore practitioners’ curricular recommendations, we conducted 73 semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs with at least five years of professional experience. We collected 49 items for teaching and learning objectives, 37 for contents, 28 for teaching methods, and 17 for assessment methods. The respondents are convinced that students should acquire solid knowledge in business and management, legal issues, and entrepreneurship. For the latter, only some core aspects are provided. The entrepreneurs put greater emphasis on entrepreneurial skills and attitudes and consider experiential learning designs as most suitable, both in the secure setting of the classroom and in real life. The findings can help reflect on current entrepreneurship curriculum designs.
Invisible iterations: how formal and informal organization shape knowledge networks for coordination
(2024)
This study takes a network approach to investigate coordination among knowledge workers as grounded in both formal and informal organization. We first derive hypotheses regarding patterns of knowledge-sharing relationships by which workers pass on and exchange tacit and codified knowledge within and across organizational hierarchies to address the challenges that underpin contemporary knowledge work. We use survey data and apply exponential random graph models to test our hypotheses. We then extend the quantitative network analysis with insights from qualitative interviews and demonstrate that the identified knowledge-sharing patterns are the micro-foundational traces of collective coordination resulting from two underlying coordination mechanisms which we label ‘invisible iterations’ and ‘bringing in the big guns’. These mechanisms and, by extension, the associated knowledge-sharing patterns enable knowledge workers to perform in a setting that is characterized by complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity. Our research contributes to theory on the interplay between formal and informal organization for coordination by showing how self-directed, informal action is supported by the formal organizational hierarchy. In doing so, it also extends understanding of the role that hierarchy plays for knowledge-intensive work. Finally, it establishes the collective need to coordinate work as a previously overlooked driver of knowledge network relationships and network patterns. © 2024 The Authors. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Confronted with a new wave of criticism on the in effectiveness of its development programs, the World Bank embarked on a revitalization process, turning to private investors to finance International Development Association projects and widening its mandate. To explain these adaptation strategies of the World Bank to regain relevance, this piece draws on organizational ecology and orchestration scholarship. We contend that international organizations rely on two adaptation mechanisms, orchestration and scope expansion, when they lose their role as focal actors in an issue area. We find that the World Bank has indeed lost market share and has relied on these two mechanisms to revitalize itself. We show that the World Bank responded to changes in the environment by orchestrating a private sector-oriented capital increase, prioritizing private funding for development through a “cascade approach,” and expanding the scope of its mandate into adjacent domains of transnational governance, including climate change and global health.
Many prediction tasks can be done based on users’ trace data. This paper explores divergent and convergent thinking as person-related attributes and predicts them based on features gathered in an online course. We use the logfile data of a short Moodle course, combined with an image test (IMT), the Alternate Uses Task (AUT), the Remote Associates Test (RAT), and creative self-efficacy (CSE). Our results show that originality and elaboration metrics can be predicted with an accuracy of ~.7 in cross-validation, whereby predicting fluency and RAT scores perform worst. CSE items can be predicted with an accuracy of ~.45. The best performing model is a Random Forest Tree, where the features were reduced using a Linear Discriminant Analysis in advance. The promising results can help to adjust online courses to the learners’ needs based on their creative performances.
The devil in disguise
(2021)
Envy constitutes a serious issue on Social Networking Sites (SNSs), as this painful emotion can severely diminish individuals' well-being. With prior research mainly focusing on the affective consequences of envy in the SNS context, its behavioral consequences remain puzzling. While negative interactions among SNS users are an alarming issue, it remains unclear to which extent the harmful emotion of malicious envy contributes to these toxic dynamics. This study constitutes a first step in understanding malicious envy’s causal impact on negative interactions within the SNS sphere. Within an online experiment, we experimentally induce malicious envy and measure its immediate impact on users’ negative behavior towards other users. Our findings show that malicious envy seems to be an essential factor fueling negativity among SNS users and further illustrate that this effect is especially pronounced when users are provided an objective factor to mask their envy and justify their norm-violating negative behavior.
Increasingly fast development cycles and individualized products pose major challenges for today's smart production systems in times of industry 4.0. The systems must be flexible and continuously adapt to changing conditions while still guaranteeing high throughputs and robustness against external disruptions. Deep reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms, which already reached impressive success with Google DeepMind's AlphaGo, are increasingly transferred to production systems to meet related requirements. Unlike supervised and unsupervised machine learning techniques, deep RL algorithms learn based on recently collected sensorand process-data in direct interaction with the environment and are able to perform decisions in real-time. As such, deep RL algorithms seem promising given their potential to provide decision support in complex environments, as production systems, and simultaneously adapt to changing circumstances. While different use-cases for deep RL emerged, a structured overview and integration of findings on their application are missing. To address this gap, this contribution provides a systematic literature review of existing deep RL applications in the field of production planning and control as well as production logistics. From a performance perspective, it became evident that deep RL can beat heuristics significantly in their overall performance and provides superior solutions to various industrial use-cases. Nevertheless, safety and reliability concerns must be overcome before the widespread use of deep RL is possible which presumes more intensive testing of deep RL in real world applications besides the already ongoing intensive simulations.
This article explores the structural diversity of intraministerial organization over time. Based on organization theory, it proposes a generic typology for intraministerial units applicable to any hierarchically structured government organization. We empirically investigate the critical case of the German federal bureaucracy. By classifying its subunits, we analyze the longitudinal development of structural differentiation and its correspondence to denominational variety. The data stem from a novel international dataset, covering all ministries between 1980 and 2015. We find that intraministerial structure differentiates over time, across and within ministries. A stable core of traditional Weberian structure is complemented by structurally innovative intraministerial units. We conclude that the German federal bureaucracy is more diverse than suggested in previous literature. Our findings indicate that less Weberian bureaucracies are at least as structurally diverse and that more reform-driven bureaucracies will have experienced at least as many changes in structural diversity.