Revista Europea de Dirección y Economía de la Empresa最新文献

Information Systems Outsourcing is a common practice in companies with unstoppable growth. It is therefore essential to know in depth what are the reasons that lead companies to outsource and what the major risks are inherent in this practice. This paper makes a proposal for these reasons and risks and it assesses them in the case of the major Spanish companies through a survey that was replicated twice. The longitudinal analysis allows to draw trends and to assess continuity and change in the reasons and risks of outsourcing. Although the reasons are fairly stable the risks have changed, in terms of their valuation trend in recent years. In any case the proposed reasons and risks should be taken into account by management, prior to any outsourcing decision.

The present research paper has as its aim to try and identify the main research streams within the human resource management scientific field or domain through the analysis of all the research papers published in The International Journal of Human Resource Management (IJHRM) during the period comprised between 2000 and 2012. In other words or expressed differently, the »intellectual structure» of the discipline under study —the HRM discipline. The authors utilize bibliometric methods to achieve that aim, in particular, author citation and co-citation analyses (ACA). Social networks analysis (SNA) was also used to proceed with the visualization of that knowledge structure or base. As for results, the analysis developed would have allowed us to define the different research lines or fronts which shape the intellectual structure of the research carried out in the field of human resource management.

Previous empirical evidence has suggested that knowledge management and human resource practices can interact in order to improve firm performance. Based on this idea, the purpose of this study is to propose and test an integrative model that examines strategic human resource practices as a catalytic mechanism influencing the effectiveness of knowledge management. Our findings confirm that knowledge management strategies positively influence firm performance through certain high work performance practices – selective staffing, intensive training, active participation, comprehensive performance appraisal, and performance-based compensation – highlighting the mediating role of human resource management in this relationship and the need to align human resource practices with organizational strategies.

Taking the assumptions of the resource dependency theory as our starting point, the main objective of this investigation is to gain an understanding of how and in what way board members who serve on multiple boards (interlocks) can affect a firm's profitability, and whether it is useful to consider the derivation of these interlocks according to the type of board member (executive or non-executive) who possesses them. Using dynamic panel data analysis (GMM) and a sample of 88 firms quoted on the Spanish Continuous Market for the period 2005–2008, our results confirm the existence of a curvilinear (inverted-U) relation between interlocks and firm performance. The results demonstrate that this relation is only significant if we include the total number of external ties rather than just the number of links generated by non-executive directors. We can also confirm that the degree of familiarity and shared knowledge between board members (measured by average board tenure) affects this relationship.

The aim of this paper is to analyze the influence of family character on the level and type of diversification, additionally considering the effect of ownership concentration that exists in family business. The study uses a sample of 99 listed companies, parent companies of business groups, with business group being considered as the unit of analysis (parent company and subsidiaries firms). The results show that family groups have lower average levels of total diversification and unrelated diversification, and they show the negative influence of family character in unrelated diversification level. The existence of a nonlinear U-shaped relationship between the level of diversification (total and unrelated) and the ownership concentration in family group is also observed, thus confirming a different behavior depending on the capital held by the main shareholders. The results obtained provide new evidence for the academic literature on family firms and business groups, as well as on the diversification strategies adopted by the family groups.

An analysis has been performed, from a financial perspective, on the behaviour of the recently constituted Spanish REITs (SOCIMIs) compared to equivalent investment vehicles in other markets. The aim is to broaden this research field, which has barely been studied so far. It is shown that the creation of a SOCIMI is an effective alternative for companies to obtain liquidity through their real estate assets, compared to other more common alternatives such as the disposal of assets or obtaining bank finance. Furthermore, a model has been defined that can forecast the ratio obtained when dividing market capitalization by the Net Asset Value (P/NAV) of a SOCIMI, which is a key variable for both investors and companies interested in establishing a SOCIMI. Finally, it is concluded that SOCIMI, as an investment vehicle, currently show moderate liquidity levels, nevertheless, a progressive liquidity improvement can be foreseen in the short term once larger SOCIMI are created and historical series about their performance will be available.

This study investigates the informational role of option trading in price discovery process around the dissemination of earnings news. The effect of options markets are examined first by analysing stock market reaction to earnings news conditional on the availability of option markets. Study methodology has been used and distribution functions compared. Option trading activity around the release of earnings news was then examined. Results show that, when option trading is available the option market enhances the price efficiency of equity markets. Moreover, the dissemination of earnings news is associated with a significant unusual activity in market option. The results support the improvement of the efficiency of equity markets after options listing, and that informed agents trade in options markets in order to take advantage of relevant company information.

This paper describes the evolution of the corporate social responsibility in small and medium enterprises research over the period 1976-2013. A database has been complied of the 321 articles focused on this field published in journals included in the Social Science Citation Index. Bibliometric methods and techniques are used to describe the evolution of scientific activity, the most active countries and institutions, the most productive authors, the methodologies and the main topics investigated in order to describe trends, and the status and evolution of literature in this field. Based on these analyses, potential avenues for future research are proposed to advance the consolidation of the field as a scientific discipline.