High‐performer turnover and firm performance: The moderating role of human capital investment and firm reputation

Research has shown a complex relationship between turnover and firm performance. Not only does it matter who leaves (e.g., high‐performing versus low‐performing employees), but the context also stands to influence this effect in complex ways. We apply human capital theory, social capital theory, and the cost–benefit perspective to propose two boundary conditions to the high‐performer turnover and firm performance relationship. Specifically, we predict that the negative impact of high‐performer turnover on firm performance will be the strongest for reputable firms and for firms who invest less in human capital (e.g., selection, training, and incentive‐based pay). We present data from 155 South Korean firms that support the hypothesized model. We discuss findings in terms of current and future theory, practical implications, and subsequent research needs. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

声誉诉求对农户亲环境行为的影响研究——以家禽养殖户污染物处理方式选择为例

面临严峻的农村面源污染形势,政府现行的"自上而下"的治理模式无法实现有效监督。构建自主治理制度,激励农户践行亲环境行为,将成为未来解决农村环境问题的路径选择之一。如何有效规范农户污染处理行为,成为目前亟待解决的问题。文章基于声誉理论构建理论分析模型,从微观层面分析了在农村"熟人社会"场域下,农户声誉诉求对其亲环境行为的影响机制。以农户家禽养殖污染处理行为为例,利用全国8个省330户家禽养殖户的调查数据,通过4个指标测度了农户社会声誉诉求的强弱,并通过主成分分析和加权平均方法分别构建了农户声誉诉求的综合指数。在此基础上,应用Probit计量经济模型,实证检验了声誉诉求对养殖户污染物废弃行为存在抑制作用的假说,并比较了现行政府规制措施的实施效果。实证研究结果表明:1农户声誉诉求对其亲环境行为存在显著的促进作用;2政府引导对养殖户污染物废弃的抑制作用显著,而政府管制措施却未表现出显著影响。基于此,本文得出如下结论:第一,个人对声誉关注程度越高,违反社会准则的成本就越高,个人就有越强的动机遵守社会规范、自我约束污染物废弃行为。"熟人社会"的农村社区中存在较强的社会规制作用和社区成员参与公共环境自觉维护的激励机制。第二,在强制性环境管制难以有效实现的农村环境下,政府通过引导和宣传诱致农户自觉践行亲环境行为,构建环境自我监督机制,或可成为农村环境治理的有效途径。强化社区成员声誉效用和社会责任意识可成为乡村环境治理相关法律和公共管理制度建设的重要补充。     

How Do Groups Solve Local Commons Dilemmas? Lessons from Experimental Economics in the Field

The use of experimental settings to observe human behaviour in a controlled environment of incentives, rules and institutions, has been widely used by the behavioural sciences for sometime now, particularly by psychology and economics. In most cases the subjects are college students recruited for one to two hour decision making exercises in which, depending on their choices, they earn cash averaging US$ 20. In such exercises players face a set of feasible actions, rules and incentives (payoffs) involving different forms of social exchange with other people, and that in most cases involve some kind of externalities with incomplete contracts, such as in the case of common-pool resources situations. Depending on the ecological and institutional settings, the resource users face a set of feasible levels of extraction, a set of rules regarding the control or monitoring of individual use, and sometimes ways of imposing material or non-material costs or rewards to those breaking or following the rules. We brought the experimental lab to the field and invited about two hundred users of natural resources in three Colombian rural villages to participate in such decision making exercises and through these and other research instruments we learned about the ways they solve - or fail to - tragedies of the commons with different social institutions. Further, bringing the lab to the field allowed us to explore some of the limitations of existing models about human behaviour and its consequences for designing policies for conserving ecosystems and improving social welfare.     

Consequential cognition: Exploring how attribution theory sheds new light on the firm‐level consequences of product recalls

It is unclear why some firms suffer greater negative consequences than others following a product recall. To shed light on this question, we extend attribution theory to the firm level to explore how consumers engage in an attributional process following product recalls that shapes their responses to firms. Integrating attribution theory and the demand side theoretical perspective, we assert that consumer judgments of responsibility toward manufacturers are shaped by causal data regarding the locus of causality (i.e., manufacturer or supplier) and controllability (i.e., prior knowledge or awareness) of a recalled product's potential for harm. We then examine the impact of product recall characteristics on judgments of responsibility and firm‐level outcomes using an experimental test involving responses from 320 subjects. Our findings suggest that judgments of responsibility are attributed to the manufacturing firm more when consumers are given causal information indicating that the firm is the source of, or is aware of, a product's defects. The results also indicate that judgments of responsibility can have costly firm‐level consequences in the form of reputational damage, diminished consumer purchase intentions, and increased legal damage recommendations. We discuss theoretical contributions, practical implications, and opportunities for further research.     

政府与排污企业间的动态激励监控关系研究

科学的监督和有效的管理是实现环境可持续发展的必由之路,政府与排污企业的博弈是一个值得关注的重要问题。基于声誉理论,论文建立了政府与排污企业问的静态与动态激励监控模型,结论认为在动态激励监督下政府的总效用实现了帕累托改善,研究表明考虑以往业绩的两阶段最优契约对排污企业具有明显的声誉激励效应,同时表明监控机制和激励契约具有互补性,最后对机制设计中的控制参数的灵敏度以及模型的鲁棒性进行了探讨,可为政府制定合理的激励监督措施提供理论参考依据。