https://thesis.eur.nl/col/4301/ List of Publications en https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4877/ Wed, 01 Mar 2006 00:00:01 GMT <div>Kabura, Antoine</div> Abstract This paper is based on the assumption that entrepreneurship contributes to the economic development of a nation. Building on the determinants of entrepreneurship proposed in the Eclectic Theory of Entrepreneurship by Verheul et al. (2002), and following the Framework of determinants of entrepreneurship by Wennekers et al. (2002), the paper tries to point out to what extent economic growth in underdeveloped countries of The Great Lakes Region of Africa can be sustained through the economic phenomenon of entrepreneurship. An attempt is specifically made to bring to light the factors that hinder or favor entrepreneurship in Burundi. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5274/ Sun, 01 Oct 2006 00:00:01 GMT <div>Gerritsen, M.</div> During the first trimester of this year I followed the course Economics of Entrepreneurship. For this course you had to read a number of articles with respect to the topic entrepreneurship. The last article that you had to read for this course was “Creativity and entrepreneurship: A regional analysis of new firm formation” (Lee, Florida and Acs, 2004). This study explores whether connections exist among regional social characteristics, human capital and new firm formation. The basic hypothesis of this study is that entrepreneurship is positively associated with regional environments that promote diversity and creativity. The empirical results support this main hypothesis. New firm formation is associated with creativity and one dimension of diversity, the diversity index, but not with other types of diversity, like the melting pot index. This study was very interesting in my opinion, because it clearly made a distinction between the two types of academic approaches with respect to entrepreneurship. 1 The focus is on the entrepreneur and tries to explain why a person decides to be an entrepreneur and starts a new firm. 2 Regional variation in new firm formation is explained at an aggregate level by looking at structural variations in geographical areas. The second approach was relatively new and interesting to me, because almost all the articles you had to read during the study Economics & Business, regarding the topic entrepreneurship, were based on the first approach. That is why I wanted to know more about this second approach and how I could use it for writing my thesis. The main objective of this thesis is to conduct a similar research as mentioned above, but this time in the Netherlands. So the central question regarding this thesis is: What determinants explain new firm formation per COROP-area in the Netherlands for the years 1996-2004? https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5149/ Sat, 19 May 2007 00:00:01 GMT <div>Zeilstra, J.l</div> This research examines whether product strategies require different innovative capabilities during the first phase of the new product development process. This was formulated in the following research question: Do different product innovation strategies require different innovation capabilities during the search phase of the product development process? To answer this research question the available literature was reviewed and empirically cases were examined. The literature review starts with a reviewof the various product development. There are a variety of models but almost all recognize the importance of the idea generation phase as a frontend homework activity before starting up actual product development. During this idea generation phase there are various sources of information for ideas that can come from both in or outside of the organization. Literature also provides techniques to stimulate idea generation such as brainstorming, attribute list, morphological analysis, and scenario analysis. To be able to generate ideas succesfully certain innovate capabilities are required. A model developed by de Jong and Brouwer (1999)was selected and seven general dimensions (People, Culture, Structure, Strategy, Networks, Available means, and Company characteristics) are discussed in detail, since each dimension contains a range of capabilities required to be succesful in increasing the idea generation power of a company. More importantly, these seven dimensions can also influence each other when factors within these dimensions change. Product strategies are also reviewed. There are numerous product strategies applicable in the marketplace. However, for the relevance of this research (the focus on idea generation) it can be concluded that most product devolpment strategies tend to have either a market or a technology driven orientation. Accordingly, it is possible to categorize the variety of applied product strategies within these two strategic directions. Literature show that different core capabilities are needed during the idea generation phase when following a market or technology driven strategy. When following a market-driven strategy (the Listener) the focal point of ideas are customers which means that the focus lies on marketing capabilities to be able to gather information from and about customers. On the contrary, following a R&D driven strategy (technology driver) the focus is on developing new technologies and capitalize on their own capabilities for new ideas. At the same time it is evident that there is no standard list of 'magic' capabilities appropriate for every organization. To add to the literature review, two case studies were performed. The most important findings were that in a business-to-business environment the product develpment is strongly customer driven, the innovations were mostly incremental and that a company's position in the value chain within an industry is an important factor for the strategic direction. From a theoretical perspective a positive answer can be given to the main research question by showing that a market-driven Listener strategy requires different capabilities during the idea generation phase than an R&D driven technology driver strategy. Based on this conclusion together with the other findings from the literature and the case studies, it was possible to develop a new diagnostic tool for SMEs. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5031/ Fri, 31 Aug 2007 00:00:01 GMT <div>Bayer, A.</div> https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4874/ Fri, 07 Dec 2007 00:00:01 GMT <div>Kortekaas, Fons</div> Preface Labour is often considered as a cost instead of a resource. This negative perspective is due to a lack of insight in the returns a company will receive from labour. Labour will only be accepted as a resource, which has to be maximized, if it can be reflected by indicators of employee performance that are linked to a company’s operational and financial performance. Then, HR policy will be aimed at investments in employees in order to create value for an organisation. The high performance work system appears to be such an investment. This study examines how the HPWS will add value in an organisation but, even more important, if it applies for different types of organisations (in terms of firm size). At last, a few words of appreciation to my coordinator and co-reader: In het bijzonder ben ik dr. A. van Stel erkentelijk voor zijn inspirerende opmerkingen en onze gesprekken waarin ik mijn gedachten mede heb kunnen vormen en aanscherpen. Drs. P. van der Zwan bedank ik voor zijn bereidwilligheid om als meelezer op te treden. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5042/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Beijnen, C.</div> This thesis investigates the existence and extent of economies of scale in the European payments processing industry. SEPA aims to facilitate the emergence of a competitive, intra- European market by making cross-border payments as easy as domestic transactions. It is expected that SEPA will spur consolidations and mergers among European payments processors to more fully realize economies of scale. We find evidence for the existence of significant economies of scale using data of eight European payment processors during the years 1990-2005. This thesis also reveals that ownership structure is an important factor to explain cost differences across European Automated Clearing Houses (ACHs). https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4882/ Sat, 12 Apr 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Burger, F.</div> During the last decades public scandals surrounding charitable nonprofit organizations have increased public scrutiny and criticism. Inappropriate high executive compensation and excessive administration and fundraising costs are among the many criticisms the public has. This has resulted in an increased demand for accountability of charities and other nonprofit organizations. Accountablility is related to enduring public scrunity. It includes both the hierarchical model of mandatory accountablility and the voluntary disclosure of performance related information of nonprofit organizations to various external stakeholders of the organization. The essence of accountability is that the party accepting certain responsibilities commits to account for the way it has acted and the results that were obtained. The concept of accountability within economic literature often focuses on the asymmetrical relationship between a principal and an agent. Principal-agency theory focuses on how principals can hold agents accountable for performance that meets the principals' expectations. The principal is trying to get the agent to act in the principals' best interest, but in many situations the interests of the agent adequately implements its wishes. Besides this general accountability issue, other specific nonprofit accountability difficulties are related to identification of stakeholders, the accountability mechanisms, what kind of information to be accountable for and what extend should they be hold accountable. Accountablility is a proces of public disclosure on results and the way the organization contributes to society. Reporting performance is necessary in order to be accountable for the organizations' performance. Performance reporting is more difficult in nonprofit organizations than in for-profit organizations since no profitability information can be communicated. Nonprofits therefore tend to focus on other concepts to define performance; mainly efficiency, effectiveness, social value and impact. The main theory on nonprofit performance is described in the Organizational Effectiveness literature. Within the Organizational effectiveness literature the focus is mainly on effectiveness, which can be defined as the level of results, referring to both outputs and outcome measures. Within this literature several models defining effectiveness in different ways are described. One often mentioned model is the goal attainment model which emphasizes the attainment of organizational goals. Difficulties in all effectiveness theories are related to their actual operationalization and implementation in practice. Recently impact assessment has been suggested as a way to measure nonprofit organizational performance. This concept is related to the effectiveness concept of goal attainment, but goes one step further and focuses on impact rather than mere outcomes. Impact can be defined as "any change resulting from an activity, project or organization. It includes intended as well as unintended effects, negative as well as positive, and long-term as well as shortterm. " (Wainwright, 2003; Wainright, 2002). Impact assessment entails both qualitative impact demonstration and quantitative impact measurement. Using impact measurement as a performance measure is also surrounded by difficulties as are effectiveness concepts. Difficulties arise both in measuring the impact in a specific field of attention and in attributing part of the impact to a specific organization. Impact measurement has been suggested mainly because of the meaningfulness of this concept, as compared to traditional performance measures, it can be used as an original and meaningful way to increase accountability. In this thesis a first attempt is made to measure the impact of a specific Dutch nonprofit organization, the Nederlandse Hartstichting (NHS). The impact of the NHS is estimated on the costs related to AMI patients in the working population. This is done by first estimating the changes in the costs related to AMI, the so-called change in economic burden. Direct health care costs and indirect non-health care costs (i.e. productively costs) are taken to account. Second, a specific part of this change in costs is attributed to the NHS. The economic burden of AMI under the working population is estimated for the Netherlands for the period 1980-2005. By looking at the factors behind the decline in economic burden the impact of the NHS on this change of AMI-related costs is assessed. The results of the case study show that the economic burden of AMI under the working age population in 2005 was approximately 234,2 million euros. The costs of AMI would have been 331,0 million euros if the incidence ant death rates of 1980 would not have decreased in time and would still have been the same in 2005. On the total drecrease in economic burden the NHS has an impact of approximately 7,55 - 8,72 million euros, a relative contribution of 7,58 - 8,76% This impact has been attained by financing scientific research on AMI, prevention and education activities. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4894/ Tue, 03 Jun 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Vliet, S. van der</div> https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4884/ Thu, 14 Aug 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Statema, P.E.H.</div> https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4892/ Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Bogaert, B.</div> This thesis studies the effects of immigration on the Dutch labour market. The focus will be on the characteristics of the immigrants. Issues like: skill level or the duration of the stay both have their impact on the actual labour market effects. This thesis is guided by the following research question: What are the effects of immigration on the Dutch labour market? Whereas other studies (Roodenburg 2003) calculate the labour market effects for three different skills of immigrants this thesis pays more attention tot the characteristics of immigrants. These characteristics are studied by using the Human capital (HTC) and Dual Labour market theory (DLT). The actual labour market effects are studied in a qualitative way. This thesis first provides an overview of the Dutch labour migrations introduces the immigration topic and will also be used to test the HCT and DLT. Chapter one presents the immigration figures with regard to the: motives, age, gender, origin and education of immigrants. Most information in this chapter has been obtainend from the CBS database. An analysis of the Dutch labour market is next. By combining labour market analyses of the MEV, RWI, SZW and CBS an overviewof the expected labour market developments is presented. The labour market analysis underlined the importance of the proper labour market characteristics of immigrants. The HCT and DLT are the selected theories to analyse the characteristics of immigrants. Both theories oppose each others predictions. Were the HCT expects mainly young, healthy and high educated immigrants to enter the Dutch market, the DLT expects immigrants to be temporary low educated (guest workers). After linking the predictions of both theories to the data in chapter one the immigrant profile of the DLT turned out to have the best fit. However, both theories only seem to apply on part of the migration flow. In fact the immigrant profile that has the best fit with the reality seems to be a combination of both theories. The average migrant is low skilled and unlikely to return to his homecountry. When using this immigrant profile immigration will mainly affect the labour marktet position of low-educated residents. Given the expected entrance of Bulgarian an Romanian immigrants more immigrants are likely to match this profile in the future. Low skilled residents will have limited labour market opportunities as a result. Immigration has the most effect on residents with equal characteristics as the immigrants (De Beer 2007) Employers on the other hand can benefit from an increase labour pool. This allows them to select more productive workers. At this moment mainly the citizens from the sending countries and the employers in the receiving countries seem to benefit from the migration. However, one should not forget that an increased prosperity in countries like Poland or Romania will on the long run be beneficial for the Dutch economie as well, as this creates new market. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5106/ Wed, 15 Oct 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Velde, B. van de</div> Every day, before I go to my work or my lectures, I usually read the newspaper. Most of the time, I am in a hurry, so I only quickly read the articles that draw my attention. When I am in the train to my destination, I often read another free newspaper that can be found somewhere on, under or above my seat. This pattern occurs now for quite some years. By doing this, I form a lot of images about events in places I have never been and never really heard about. The perceptions that I have of such places, will therefore be strongly influenced by the media. These perceptions will surely influence my decisions, even if the place is much closer to home. A good example of such a place is the Palenstein district in my place of residence, Zoetermeer. I do not like to come there, though I do not really know why. Of course, I hear a lot of negative stories about the district and I read the negative messages in the newspapers; but every time I have been there, I never saw any of the social problems or the unsafety of which Palenstein is known. But still, because of these negative perceptions I have of Palenstein, I would not pass through the district if I don’t have to and I would rather not live there. A lot of choices that you make that decide whether you want to live in, visit or do business in a city, are dependent on the current images of the place. Therefore, many decision-makers of cities think it’s important for them to discover these images. This is also true for Haarlemmermeer, where I had an internship that enabled me to prepare my thesis. This period was both fun and very interesting to me and I would like to thank my supervisor Debby de Rijk for bringing me to all of the interesting facets of the city marketing process. The one day I was handing out flyers amongst the local residents, while the other day I was interviewing commuters on Schiphol or I was on a network-event amongst the upper class of the business environment of Haarlemmermeer. All of the other interesting people I have met there (especially Arthur van Dijk (alderman of city marketing affairs), Chris, Laura, Michiel and Remco) thank you all for your cooperation and the good time I had. Especially, I’d like to thank Erik Braun for his helpful supervision of this thesis. I was in the privileged position of having my supervisor working just on the opposite of my own desk. Furthermore, I’d like to thank my parents, who have always believed in me and had to tolerate a great deal for all my study hours at night. And finally, this is my last regret to my dear girlfriend Nelleke. She was hoping for me to have all the time of the world for her, on the day that she’s returned from her tour to Australia. Nelleke, I’m all yours again. My internship, my thesis, my study: it is finished… Enjoy reading! Bart van de Velde Zoetermeer, October 2008 https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4883/ Thu, 23 Oct 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Vries, G.J. de</div> This research examines a relationship of diminishing returns between a firm's number of alliances and performance. Moreover, as alliance formations increase, negative returns may set in. Rising interdependency between firms, bounded rationality constraints of management, as well as resource overlaps and possible knowledge leakage are expected to overcome the more positive learning effects as alliance experience increases. The excistence of this inverse U-shaped relationship is tested on a sample of 179 firms operating in the pharmaceutical industry from 1990 to 1999. Support for diminishing returns as well as a linear relation are found. The linear model contains a better fit to the data, rejecting a possible inverse U-shaped relationship. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4891/ Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Boer, B. den</div><div>Opstal, B. van</div> This research is a contribution to the huge amount of literature concerning executive compensation. Main goal is to empirically test the relationship between firm's economic costs of executive longterm incentive plan (LTIP) grants and firm performance, among Dutch stock market-listed companies for the period 2002-2007. Although a lot of research has been done on the subject of pay-for-performance, literature on the subject performance-based equity is -especially for the Netherlands - relatively scarce. Next to this gap in literture, this research is relevant for several other reasons. To start, executive compensation practices are increasingly criticized. In response, politicians are considering action against these compensation packages, for instance through tax measures. Secondly, evidence on the pay-performance relationship generally is quite weak. This would scientifically underpin mentioned criticism, since improving performance is te main justification of adopting performance-based compensation. Thirdly, the composition of executive compensation changed over time; variable components have become relatively more important. Moreover, concerning variable compensation, LTIPs gain a growing share. In 2007, LTIPs made up 40% of total executive compensation in the Netherlands (Hewitt, 2008). Theorically, two lines of research are generally pursued . On the one hand, the optimal contracting theory argues that agency problems are mitigated by executive compensation. The interests of utility-maximizing executives are aligned with those of shareholders through incentive-based compensation. One would expect, therefore, that variable compensation components as short - and long - term bonuses (STIs and LTIPs), are in the best interests of shareholders - provided that these bonuses are rightly implemented. On the other hand, managerial power model argues that executive compensation is, rather than a solution to the agency problem, a part of this problem itself. It is reasoned that power over directors enables executives to extract rents from shareholders, through influencing the design of their own compensation packages. This way, performance-based compensation might be used to camouflage rent extraction in times of high performance. Next, the basis on which executives LTIP grants are allocated could be of influence on the relationship between firm performance and fair value of future grants. Executive LTIP grants are regulary allocated on the basis of past performance and fair value of future grants. Executive LTIP grants are regularly allocated on the basis of past performance, a fixed number policy, of a fixed value policy. The former two reward executives for high performance with a higher value LTIP grants. The relationship between executive LTIP grants' fair value and firm performance is, therefore, investigated in two different ways. The first hypothesis expects that executive LTIP grants' fair value is of positive influence on future firm performance. The second hypothesis expects that firm performance is of positive influence on the fair value of the future executive LTIP grants. Both hypotheses are tested by using Granger causality tests. For each hypothesis, two tests are run; one including the explaining variable, and one excluding it. Hypothesis are assumed to be supported, if two conditions are met. One the one hand, model's explanatory power should increase if the explaining variable is included. On the other, the explaining variable should demonstrate a significant positive effect estimate. Time-lags are used within a range from one to five years, to control for the long-term aspect. In order to test the extend to which other factors determine the dependent variables' value, several control variables are included: firm size, excess cash flow, growth opportunities, business risk, leverage, a year-dummy, an index-dummy, and, finally a lagged value of dependent variable. Firm performance is measured by Tobin's Q, return on assets (ROA), and total shareholder return (TSR). To obtain data regarding the value of executive LTIP grants, a database provided by Hewitt Associates is used. This database contains compensation fata for Dutch stock market-listed companies. The period of analysis concerns 2002-2007. The value of executive LTIP grants is calculaated by using a Monte Carlo-simulation, taking performance criteria into account. It concerns the fair value of stock options, which indicates, rather than the provided incentives to executives (the face value), the economic costs to firms of executive LTIP grants. Empirical results supporting the first hypothesis are weak. To start, the first condition for Granger causality has not been met - all models on the subject of the first hypothesis lose some explanatory power if the fair value of lagged executive LTIPs is included. Moreover, individual effects only demonstrate a positive influence of executive LTIP grants on future firm performance to a fairly limited extent. The second hypothesis, in contrast, is generally supported by empirical results. Next to an increase in explanatory power of all models if lagged firm performance is included, individual LTIP grants. Based on these results, therefore, one may argue that executive LTIP grants among Dutch stock market-listed companies have between 2002 and 2007 rather functioned as an extension of compensation, than as motivational tool. Several suggestions are given to explain these results. To start, based on the https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5179/ Fri, 19 Dec 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Crisson, Pascal</div> Introduction All production leads to some degree of pollution. Imports cause pollution in the exporting country as a result of production. The importer gets the benefits of consumption and the producing country has to deal with the negative external effects in terms of environmental damage. In a world where ever increasing amounts of trade are a reality, it is likely that many of the products we consume are not produced in our own country, but are produced abroad. As we consume many products from abroad, the pollution associated with the production of these products is inflicted on the country of origin. This is the essence of the issue at hand. In consuming foreign products, pollution is effectively transferred to that foreign country. However, transfers of pollution are not only directly caused by international trade, but are under the influence of international capital flows as well. A main implication of foreign investments in a host economy, is that it stimulates and expands production. As production demands energy and various resources in order to realize a final product, it seems fair to assume that international investments are partly responsible for transfers of pollution. For instance, if a factory moves from one country to another, so does its demand for energy and its pressure on the environment in terms of pollution. This paper tries to link these pollution transfers to foreign direct investments. In doing so, we consider stocks of foreign direct investment and perform an import-export analysis of five transition economies in East and Southeast Asia. Considering the economic state they are in, many Southeast Asian economies depend on exports for income. Not nearly all produced goods are consumed domestically; a substantial amount is traded with other nations. The paper focuses on trade in physical products, assuming they generally cause more strain on the environment than the service sector, for example through direct air and land pollution and indirectly through a more energy intensive production. However, there isn’t a compensation for this embodied pollution, although one could argue that the reward consists of economic growth. The analysis on trade has revealed the degree of competitiveness in different sectors of production for each of the countries. The most important sectors in this paper include chemicals, petroleum, textile and food. The degree of competitiveness, measured by the ratio of imports to exports, tells something about the importance of the Asian developing nations to the outside world and vice versa. In order to approach the coherence of investments and exports embodying pollution, we make use of data on total foreign direct investment stocks and trade data on various relevant industries, and try to connect the two. Although by analysing total investment stocks rather than those in individual sectors and from different countries origin we cannot in detail approach the issue, but we can present a general image of possible pollution transfers while controlling the degree of complexity. Ultimately, we aim to present an answer to the following question: What are the effects of foreign direct investment on pollution transfers through trade in Southeast Asian transition economies? The outline of this paper is as follows. In the first chapter, we explain some of the theories and concepts relevant to this writing. Also, a general description of the role of institutions is included. This is important because of the leading role in directing the economy using policy that can alter investment, consumption, production and coherent pollution. In the second chapter, we will analyse the theory of the environmental Kuznets curve, describing an initial increase of pollution with increasing wealth before decreasing. We apply the theory to developing Asian nations and include comments and implications. The third chapter deals with the creation of national income in the primary, secondary and tertiary sector, the foreign investment stock and their influence on the state of the environment. In particular, we look at foreign investment stocks in relation to four strong subsectors of national industry; chemicals, petroleum, textile and food. The fourth chapter 3 is meant to describe the direction of trade of these four industrial sectors. Identifying dominant trading partners and environmental implications are part of the analysis. We finish with a conclusion. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4827/ Thu, 15 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Beke, Koos</div> The central topic in the present research is the relationship between outsourcing and innovation from the perspective of the firm. More specifically, the central question is to what extent outsourcing of manufacturing or Research and Development ‐RnD‐ influences the product innovation performance of organisations in the Dutch production industry. To answer this question, a theoretical framework is developed that is used to deduce hypotheses. These hypotheses are tested in ordinal regression models, with data obtained from managers who work in the Dutch production industry. The empirical evidence gathered from 112 firms indicates that offshoring manufacturing or RnD ‐as a way of outsourcing‐ has a positive effect on the innovativeness of Dutch production firms. In addition, for offshoring manufacturing this relationship was moderated by the ‘distance’ between the Netherlands and the country to which the activity was offshored. The positive effect of offshoring production can be explained by presuming that the offshored activities are simple of nature and only lead to a marginal loss in knowledge and that the gained slack resources are allocated to strengthen activities directed to innovation; the trade‐off favours innovation. For RnD activities, the gained access to a larger RnD capacity at lower cost can have inspired the positive relationship with product innovation performance. No significant effect was found for outsourcing in general. The data did not offer evidence for the assumption that the absence of a significant relationship between outsourcing and innovation was caused by a lack of absorptive capacity or dictated by the reason why the activity was sourced to an external party. A plausible explanation is that the relationship between outsourcing and innovation is highly contingent to the specific situation, distorting an unambiguous relationship. Another interesting result ‐but which is beyond the scope of the research question‐ is that the strategic intent to innovation is positively related to product innovation performance. The latter effect is quite strong and even makes the effect of absorptive capacity on product innovation performance obsolete. This finding suggests that absorptive capacity is influenced by the emphasis a firm puts on its innovation activities; it is dependent on the strategic intent to innovation. Given that some of the results are inconclusive, further research is recommended to create a more comprehensive understanding of the relationship between outsourcing and innovation. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4836/ Thu, 15 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Holsteijn, M. van</div> The Dutch purchasing profession is on the move. The strategic importance of procurement related activities is more and more widely accepted. The responsibilities of purchasing professionals have steadily increased over the last decade. Formerly, procedurement departments were often regarded as commercial staff departments. Nowadays this had shifted, which resulted in bigger responsibilities within organizational structures. Also the remuneration of purchasing professionals has increased considerably over the last years. No adequate researches have been done about the determinants of base salary of purchasing professionals working within the Netherlands. This research will reveal several surprising results about procedurement professionals' remuneration. Method In March 2007 a questionnaire has been sent to 11.857 purchasing professionals by email. The response was fantastic and resulted in a usable data set of 2.171 respondents. The size and scope of such a survey had never been so wide as compared to earlier researches on base salary compensation in the Dutch procedurement profession. Most of the responts (69.1%) were highly educated. Furthermore 45.5% of the respondents were working for large organizations. Surprising results No significant difference was found between male and female remuneration. This was most surprising, because in the Netherlands it is often acknowledged that women earn less than men. But the results of the survey indicate that the differences in remuneration of men and women can fully be explained by other personal, functional and organizational characteristics. In some cases it would be profitalbe to follow specific procedurement education at well known education centres like the NEVI in the Netherlands. Following a NEVI MIL of NEVI 1 course seems to have a negative impact on one's earnings as compared to purchase professionals who did nog follow any NEVI education. Following such education could signal low capabilities possibly. On the other hand a NEVI 2, NEVI 3 or ISFAH education do pay off, respectivily + 3.0%, +6.9% and +8.7%. Following an APICS education seems to have no effect on one's denoted base salary. From a labour mobility perspective, it can be stated that every switch from employer within the procedurement professions results in a salary increase of 1.3%. Also working abroad has a significant imact (+5.4%) on purchasers' earnings. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5245/ Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Broer, Wijnand J.</div> Abstract Deze scriptie presenteert een contingentie analyse in de context van onderhandelingen. Het onderzoek is uitgevoerd door allereerst uitgebreid in te gaan op de definiëring van onderhandelen en vervolgens de verschillen tussen ‘Distributief’ onderhandelen enerzijds en ‘Integratief’ onderhandelen anderzijds1. Daarna zijn de onderhandelingstheorieën van vijf verschillende (groepen van) auteurs bestudeerd en geanalyseerd. De onderhandelingstheorieën blijken naast het ‘Integratief vs Distributief’ continuüm op een vijftal andere punten gradueel van elkaar te verschillen. Analyse toont aan dat onderhandelingstheorieën contextspecifiek zijn. Hierbij blijken een aantal situationele factoren relevant te zijn; te weten: “de oorzaak van de onderhandeling; het doel van onderhandeling; de drie machtsfactoren: materielemacht, kennismacht en persoonlijke macht & vaardigheid; en als laatste twee: belang van de relatie en complexiteit van het onderhandel object. Geïnspireerd door de contingentie benadering is een concept opgesteld, welke vanuit de situationele uniekheid aan de hand van de zeven situationele factoren de meest optimale onderhandelingstheorie helpt te kiezen. Het concept is getoetst door een aantal casussen op het model los te laten. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4950/ Fri, 13 Mar 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Severijns, E.</div><div>Verberkmoes, S.</div> The ongoing process of internationalization and globalization have led to a genuinely borderless world economy with a strong regional focus. This paper examines the European Union and to what extent this region is economically integrated over the years spanning from 1982-2006, by mapping the nature and development of Foreign Direct Investments within the EU15. In order to study the degree of European economic integration, this paper analyzes the structural, institutional and functional mode of integration. The empirical results show that the economic structures of EU countries converged over time and that the institutional environment breeds a positive impact on the European integration process. Furthermore, the longitudinal study of intra-regional FDI data is appropriate to analyze the evolving FDI network relations in a temporal dimension. This paper indicates that the dominancy of central European countries slightly decreases, while the periphery region emerges within the EU. In addition, the nature of the intra-European production network has developed into a highly complex network with increasing interdependency among all EU countries. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/5026/ Fri, 13 Mar 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Aktas, M.</div> https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/4952/ Fri, 27 Mar 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Crawfurd, P.I.A.</div> This thesis deals with the question whether firms in an alliance perform better with regards to innovation, market performance and financial performance. This thesis begins with the discussion of several theories on this theme. Entering alliances with other firms have become a rule, rather than an exception. It is relatively difficult to acquire new knowledge or to develop, manufacture and market products individually. Using complementary assets from each other is considered a necessity to survive competition. Innovation is also regarded to be necessary in order to survive. By doing so, firms enable themselves to work more efficiently and qualitatively better than thier rivals. An often chosen way to innovate is to file patents. Theory indicates a positive effect of alliances on market-, financial- and innovative performance, which is formulated in five hypotheses. Furthermore, the relation between alliances and financialmarket- and innovative performance have in this thesis also been applied to three major high-tech industries: the biotechnology, pharmaceutics and IT industry. For the empirical research, SDC Platinum was consulted (to acquire information on worldwide alliances), Thomson One Banker (to extract financial data from) and Esp@cenet( for counting patents applied for by companies). After running an independend t-test, linear regression and bivariate correlation test for all financial rates and patents, it has turned out that the t-test and correlation test showed somewhat different results than the OLS regression does. Return on Invested Capital and Return on Sales have appeared to be higher for non-allying firms and if a firm decides to enter an alliance, those same rates are most likely to decrease. The regression results suggest that all hypotheses can be accepted, and as control variables are included, this gives stronger evidence to accept the hypotheses. Overall, the assumption that allying firms procuce a higher rate of Return on Sales, Return on Invested Capital, Sales, Research and Development to Sales and Patents, is true. On average IT firms show higher values of variables more often than firms of the pharmaceutics and biotechnology industry. All three industries demonstrate a positive linear relation between alliance and two variables: Return on Sales and Sales. Biotechnology and pharmaceutics business both show a positive linear relation between alliance and patents. The same holds for alliances and Research and Development to Sales for biotechnology and IT firms.