<p> The need for performance measurement and evaluation in supply chain management is well recognized in the literature. The timeliness of delivery is a key concern to customers and numerous empirical studies have documented the importance that on time delivery plays in the operation of the supply chain. Supply chain delivery performance models are based on the concept of the delivery window, which is defined as the difference between the earliest acceptable delivery date and the latest acceptable delivery date. In the dissertation supply chain delivery performance is evaluated from a supplier's and a buyer's prospective. </p><p> The research introduces a concept of the optimal positioning of the delivery window in a serial supply chain. Optimally positioning the delivery window minimizes the expected penalty cost due to early and late delivery. The conditions for the optimal position of the delivery window are derived for the general form of a delivery time distribution. </p><p> The research herein addresses strategies of delivery performance improvement using a cost based delivery performance model and evaluates the effect of different parameters on the expected penalty cost. An understanding of these analytical properties provides a strong foundation for identifying and integrating strategies to improve delivery performance. </p><p> Furthermore, we investigate how the timeliness of the delivery will affect the inventory cost structure of a buyer in a two stage supply chain. From the perspective of the buyer, untimely delivery can impact inventory holding and stockout costs. We formulate the supply chain delivery window problem as a stochastic model with three possible delivery outcomes (early, on time, and late delivery) and integrate this feature with an inventory model with two levels of storage (owned warehouse and rented warehouse). </p><p> This comparison and supporting analysis bridges existing gaps found in the literature and contributes to linking and coordinating the delivery and inventory sub processes within supply chains. Theoretical and managerial implications of the findings are discussed.</p>

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-11, Section: A, page: 4759. Advisers: Michael J. Shaw; Mu Xia. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 68-74) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

A network good is a product or service which becomes inherently more valuable as its adoption increases. The mechanism driving this value varies by context: for example, a software ecosystem produces more software as the “installed base” of its consumers and developers grows; the quality of content improves as a information aggregator collects information from more users; and the liquidity of an exchange-traded product increases as more investors trade the product. I begin my thesis with a puzzle: why are new network goods more likely to succeed in some markets than others? I show, both via a formal model and empirical analyses, that the likelihood of a network good's success depends on structural features of the innovation and its market. Tailoring entry and growth strategies to fit these features present new opportunities for established firms and entrepreneurs.

This dissertation is composed of three essays on innovation, strategy and competition. The first essay studies how entry of patent intermediaries known as "patent assertion entities" (PAEs) impacts behavior of other firms in the patent space. It uses deaths of individual patent owners to exogenously identify PAE patent acquisitions, and estimates its impact on follow-on citations. Finally, it shows that after being acquired by PAEs, patents lose a large portion of their follow-on citations. These effects are driven almost entirely by citing behavior of large entities and are robust to controlling for patent examiner-added citations. This effect disappears once the acquired patents expire, indicating that large entities may be acting strategically to reduce the likelihood of patent assertion. The second essay investigates patent disclosure processes at seven large Standard-Setting Organizations (SSOs) where participating entities have a choice between specific patent disclosures and broad generic disclosures. It finds that large, downstream firms who face large technology search costs prefer to use generic patent disclosures. In addition, it shows that higher quality patents are more likely to be disclosed in specific disclosures, because they are more likely to be monetized through licensing. The third essay estimates the causal impact of research expenditures on scientific output. Unexpected college football outcomes provide exogenous variation to university funds, and in turn, research expenditures in the subsequent year. Using this variation, this essay estimates the dollar elasticity of scholarly articles, new patent applications, and the citations that accrue to each.

Given increased competition with for-profit firms, the issue of the comparative advantage of non-profit organizations is renewed. While non-profits may want to differentiate themselves when faced with additional non-profit competition, it is unclear whether they would want to differentiate themselves or converge towards for-profit competitors. This paper addresses this issue by considering the different financing models, human resource systems, and objectives of non-profit organizations, as compared to for-profits, in the mixed industry of microfinance. In my first essay, I utilize an analytical model, where firms can choose profit status, sources of financing, and the borrowers they target with a given interest rate and loan size. I find that non-profit and for-profit organizations will segment the market, partly due to differences in profit status and partly due to differences in the sources of financing. I find support for the hypotheses using a large-scale panel dataset of microfinance organizations in Latin America. The second essay focuses on a particular element of the business model considered in the first essay: deposit-taking. I show that non-profits that begin taking deposits only benefit financially if they also begin making larger loans. This suggests that changes in non-profits' activities may require a change in positioning to improve financial performance. More broadly, it supports the literature on the importance of fit between product market strategy and business model, which suggests extra managerial attention be paid to whether and how to adopt activities that change the business model. The third essay considers another key distinguishing element between the non-profit and for-profit business model: the incentive and reward systems for employees. I merge the panel dataset with a cross-sectional survey on the dimensions along which the firms incentivize employees, and develop a proxy for the level of bonus pay. The results suggest that more mission-oriented firms reward employees on more dimensions, but with lower average salary and a smaller amount of bonus pay. This suggests that incentive pay may be used as a signal in more mission-oriented firms to clarify the expectations of employee behavior, whereas it is used to directly motivate and incentivize employees in less mission-oriented firms. The three essays of my dissertation combine to examine the characteristics that distinguish non-profit organizations, even in industries in which they co-exist with for-profits. The results shed light on these increasingly common mixed industries, as well as provide insight into business model competition and the fit between elements that make up a business model.

Abstract not available.

No description available.

<p> Ethical leadership can be a key driver of corporate behavior but it is an individual's sense of ethics that has an impact on business success. The specific problem was that despite the plethora of academic, government, and industry studies, it remained unclear whether investing in ethics provided a competitive advantage for businesses. The purpose of this qualitative, ethnographic case study was to examine how the internal stakeholders in a single business defined and applied ethics and what elements of the business culture and competitive environment affected decision-making. The research was a practical application of the stakeholder theory, normative ethics and competitive analysis theory. The dissertation research was conducted using JWD Technologies (pseudonym) which is a for profit engineering and manufacturing business located in the southeastern United States. Through this research, the business values and culture were demonstrated through a focus on pride in the quality of the delivered product through a disciplined, continuous improvement, cooperation and teamwork with the customer and the worksite team, and leadership excellence. Key leadership characteristics included being engaged, accessible, credible, trustworthy, stable, and able to relate to the people. The keys for optimizing the culture were moral fortitude including a strong ethical tone, voicing opinions, transparent communications, and individual accountability, consistent with prior literature. The informants demonstrated that effective ethical behavior includes going beyond the practices required by law, consistent with prior literature. Finally, the informants identified ethical values used to achieve future business to deliver a differential value. Recommendations for practice include the practical application of the stakeholder theory, normative ethics, and competitive analysis theory and recommendations on the use of ethnography in a business ethics environment. Recommendations on future research include broadening research applicability with a focus on a broader stakeholder set, competition, and competitive advantage to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and ethics theory application with a focus on reputation and ethical leadership flow down.</p>

The study establishes the value in recreational use of Florida's saltwater tourist fishery, using exact Hicksian compensating and equivalent variation methods. The Hicksian approach removes the approximating error of Marshall's consumer's surplus measures. The theoretical model underlying the angling experience emphasizes the multi-purpose nature of the tourist trip. It is based upon a Gibbs-type approach in which variable on-site cost proxies market price and travel cost enters the budget constraint. On-site cost and angling success rate are explicitly incorporated into a system of behavioral relations. Some restrictive assumptions found in similar studies are relaxed with composite goods utility. Empirical estimates for aggregated and subgroup angling categories are made with multiple equation models of identified linear and non-linear specifications. There is some evidence that shore anglers might be more and less sensitive to changes in on-site cost and success rate, respectively. Single equation models are also used, but exhibit downward coefficient bias. Results corroborate the findings of previous studies that the market and non-market values of Florida's marine recreational fishery are very large relative to state product and/or commercial sector activity. Inelastic short run price and success rate elasticity is confirmed. Hicksian methods are not shown to be significantly more accurate than most Marshallian ones, except in the case of the direct aggregate user opinion method. Sensitivity analysis offers policy implications supporting a marine tourist fishing license and stock rebuilding schemes, such as bag limits for depleted species. The unrecoverable deadweight burden to society caused by a $10 annual tourist fishing license is less than one percent of the $31 million in direct, adjusted license revenues estimated to be forthcoming annually. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-09, Section: A, page: 2917. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1984.

This study examined the effect of a postural echo delivered contingent upon selected behaviors and its influence upon a subject's preference on nonsense syllables and objects. The relationship of subject awareness, physiological reactions, and gender differences in reaction to postural echo were also examined. / Pilot studies were conducted to produce five nonsense syllables and five common objects with equal probability of being chosen in the experimental studies. / Sixty male and 60 female subjects were randomly chosen out of a representative sample of undergraduate communication courses and randomly assigned to experimenters for the studies. / Experimental Study #1 exposed subjects to five nonsense syllables for multiple thirty second time periods. Unknown to subjects, one of the five nonsense syllables was accompanied by a postural echo. Experimental Study #2 exposed subjects to five objects for single sixty second time periods. Unknown to the subjects, one of the five objects was accompanied by a postural echo. / Heart rate of subjects was monitored and recorded throughout the experimental studies. / Results showed that a contingent postural echo had no significant effects on subject preferences in dyadic communication. Postural echo operated below the level of awareness and did not exhibit the strength expected from a conditioned reinforcer. Postural echo appears to derive its strength from conversation and the interpersonal interaction but as a technique, in and of itself, postural echo is of questionable value. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 50-08, Section: A, page: 2305. / Major Professor: James C. Moore. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1989.