Challenged by the effects of organisational flexibility and high corporate real estate costs, organisations are increasingly seeking flexibility and operational efficiency in their office spaces. To date, the literature relating to flexible office spaces has focused mainly on their physical characteristics. The full effects of such spaces on human reactions and the corporate culture of organisations are less understood. The objective of this paper is to examine the influence of introducing activity-based working (ABW) on existing organisational culture. It was addressed from the perspective of the management of large corporate organisations. A mixed-method research that included a qualitative approach followed by a quantitative approach was adopted. The first stage included semistructured interviews with 19 large organisations who had introduced flexible layouts. The second stage involved a questionnaire survey of 32 organisations which had experienced office layout changes. Findings identify that the nature of workplace designs has a considerable impact on the corporate culture of an organisation and can be used to leverage and change its culture. Workplace designs directly influence culture by supporting the systems, symbols, engagement/motivation and behaviours of the organisation and employees. However, some differences between the perceptions of public and private organisations were identified. In conclusion, office layouts are artefacts that can either support, or change, the existing organisational culture. Therefore, the critical achievement of workspace design is to integrate the cultures, values and behaviours of organisations to meet their ultimate goals.

We explore how relational identification (RI) complements the influence of relational exchange within work role-relationships. In two temporally-lagged studies, we examine the contribution of RI, after accounting for relational exchange quality (REQ), in predicting organizationally-relevant behaviors and attitudes – namely, (1) interpersonal citizenship behaviors (ICBs; person-focused and task-focused), (2) job satisfaction, and (3) affective organizational commitment. Across samples of ‘non-professional’ (N = 152) and ‘professional’ (N = 197) employees, we found that RI (after accounting for REQ) significantly predicted outcomes. Indeed, we found RI to be the only predictor (after accounting for REQ) with affective commitment (‘non-professional’ sample only), person-focused ICBs (both samples), and task-focused ICBs (both samples). We discuss potential approaches for better specifying both identification and exchange as well as their unique and interactive effects within work role-relationships as well as managerial implications, limitations, and future research directions.

Do perceived obstacles about corruption matter for Indian firms when it comes to their probability to innovate? Using World Bank Enterprise Survey firm-level data, we show that a unit rise in corruption perception of firms in India lowers innovation rate by about 1 percent. The result is important in terms of policy implementation because recent studies have shown that perceived obstacles can affect firms’ probability to innovate. Such analysis is missing in the Indian context where both big and petty corruption is rampant. Our results further show that perceptions about financial barriers matter only when firms also view corruption to be bad. Perceived difficulty in accessing credit in conjunction with corruption perception lowers probability of innovation by 4 percent. This is also true for nonfinancial perceived obstacles of firms. The results remain robust to alternate identification strategies.

Disruptions in routine immunization caused by COVID-19 put African countries with large vaccine-preventable disease burdens at high risk of outbreaks. Abbas et al. (2020) showed that mortality reduction from resuming immunization outweighs excess mortality from COVID-19 caused by exposure during immunization activities. We leverage these estimates to calculate benefit-cost ratios (BCRs) of disrupted immunization and apply cost of illness (COI) and value of statistical life-year (VSLY) approaches to estimate the cost of excess child deaths from eight vaccine-preventable diseases. BCRs were computed for each country, vaccine, and Expanded Program on Immunization visit. Secondary estimates that include the cost of providing immunization are presented in scenario analysis. Suspended immunization may cost $4949 million due to excess mortality using the COI approach, or $34,344 million using the VSLY approach. Likewise, excess COVID-19 deaths caused by exposure from immunization activities would cost $53 and $275 million using the COI and VSLY approaches, respectively. BCRs of continuing routine immunization are 94:1 using COI and 125:1 using VSLY, indicating that the economic costs of suspending immunization exceed that of COVID-19 deaths risked by routine immunization. When including the costs of providing routine immunization during the COVID-19 pandemic, the BCRs are 38:1 and 97:1 using the COI and VSLY approaches, respectively.

This article empirically analyzes the effect of foreign block acquisitions on U.S. target firms’ credit risk as measured by their credit default swap (CDS) spreads. Foreign block purchases lead to a greater increase in the target firms’ CDS premia post-acquisition compared to domestic block purchases. This effect is stronger when foreign owners are geographically and culturally more distant, and when they obtain majority control. The findings are consistent with an asymmetric information hypothesis, in which foreign owners are less effective monitors due to information barriers.

Prior research finds that Dodd–Frank Act’s regulations on credit rating agencies (CRAs) increase rated firms’ risk of rating downgrades, regardless of their credit quality. Our difference-in-difference estimates suggest that after Dodd–Frank, low-rated firms, which face steep costs from a further downgrade, significantly reduce their debt issuance and investments compared to similar unrated firms. Our results are not driven by credit supply or the financial crisis. They reveal an unintended consequence of Dodd–Frank: Greater regulatory pressure on CRAs leads to negative spillover effects on firms concerned about credit ratings, regardless of their credit quality.

Interlocking directorates can encourage innovation, cooperation, and adherence to best practices or can contribute to collusion, corruption, and the stagnation of ideas. Research has identified the contingent nature of director networks, with outcomes dependent on the nature of the tie; the firms and individuals involved; and the institutional, sociopolitical, and cultural context. Distinguishing between helpful and harmful interlocks thus requires understanding the foundations on which they were built. This article is the first systematic, longitudinal analysis of the antecedents of interlocking directorates in Australia, complementing substantial international efforts to understand and compare director networks across the twentieth century. The network has been characterized by a relatively consistent long-run level of connection but substantial variation in the causes of interlocks. The director network in Australia has responded to the pragmatics of the board member occupation, with corporate governance regulations, the progress of the professions, banking and prudential practices, and the form of large organizations encouraging ties that were built on professional expertise and geographic proximity. These findings are important for policy makers, regulatory bodies, and scholars, highlighting the importance of understanding the contextual foundations of interlocks when assessing their potential for harm.

Firms with well-formulated competitive market strategies could still fail due to their lack of effective nonmarket strategy. Climate change poses significant threats to firms and presents firms’ need to develop nonmarket strategy integrated with market strategy. Relying on the unique dataset of US S&P 500 firms’ responses to climate change, this study seeks to ask why some firms attempt to engage in climate policy making, while others do not do so. The results found that firms with organizational resources and capabilities underlying their carbon market strategy are more likely to support mandatory climate policy. It sheds light on the significance of integrated market and nonmarket strategies, particularly when business opportunities are controlled more by governments than by markets.

An important piece of the capital structure puzzle has been missing, and it is not a contracting friction. It is recognition that managers do not have sufficient knowledge to optimize capital structure with any real precision. The literature critique in this paper i) identifies the conceptual sources of the main empirical failures of the leading models of capital structure and ii) shows how those failures can be repaired by taking into account imperfect managerial knowledge and several other factors. The analysis yields a compact set of principles for thinking about capital structure in an empirically supported way.