Tékhne最新文献

The audit market concentration has been the subject of some studies in Portugal. Carmo Gonçalves, 2009a, Carmo Gonçalves, 2009b and Almeida (2012) concluded that there was strong concentration among public companies. After these studies four important events emerge: the liberalization of fees, changes in the number of companies subject to audit, the auditors of public interest entities are required to publish an annual transparency report and Portuguese economy stepped into an economic and financial crisis. This work is based in the information disclosed in the transparency reports from 2010 to 2014. This information allowed us to analyze the concentration in the Portuguese audit market both in terms of revenues and in terms of clients. Data was treated according to the following methodology: Concentration Ratio, Herfinthal Index, Gini Index and Lorenz Curve. We conclude that, according to international trend, there is a concentration of the audit market, that is been increasing in the last years.

The main objective of this paper is to study the capital structure determinants of SMEs in the footwear industry and their indebtedness. Using panel data methodology and considering a sample of 70 firms we study the capital structure determinants between 2010 and 2013. The paper examines the indebtedness level in light of the two main theories – the Trade-off theory and the Pecking Order theory and we chose the footwear sector because of its importance in the Portuguese economy. In addition to total indebtedness we extend the literature by analyzing the differences between short-term and long-term indebtedness and the impact of the presence in foreign markets on debt structure. The results suggest that profitability, growth, total liquidity, risk and presence in foreign markets are key factors affecting the capital structure of footwear firms and that Pecking Order theory seems more suited to those firms.

Employees play an important role in the public procurement of innovation (PPI). Based on institutional theory, this study aims to determine how specific institutional factors and various endogenous institutions can impact the use of an innovation by the employees of a public organization. The institutional factors come from the theories on the types of organizational culture developed by Goffee and Jones, 1996, Goffee and Jones, 2003 and from the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (CBAM) (George et al., 2006, Hall et al., 2006). These theories were applied to Olympic, a former national airline. Data were collected using a questionnaire (N = 102), and multiple regression analysis was then used to statistically analyze the data. The study's findings showed that (a) increased employee interest in an innovation, (b) organizational cultures characterized by high sociability and high solidarity, and (c) active employee participation in the introduction of an innovation positively affected subsequent employee use of the innovation.

This paper aims to present an historical review on the evolution of Balanced Scorecard's use in Portuguese largest companies, since its appearance until the present day, and also to perform an analysis of the current situation regarding the use of this management tool in Portuguese territory. The question to be studied is – how has the use of the BSC performed and evolved in Portugal, in the last 20 years, and how the application of the tool contributes to changes in management. Initially it has been conducted research on studies carried out in Portugal about the application of the BSC, having been identified three major studies performed within the territory: the first starting the end of 1999, the second carried from 2004 onwards, the last study was conducted throughout 2009. To complete the information provided by these studies it was conducted another research on the current conditions of the use of the BSC as well as of relevant level of application depth, and its relations to organizational change and evolution on management practices. This was pursued by identification of both academic works on the subject and main technical books printed in Portugal on the theme. Thus we were able, as a result of the present study, to present a clear picture about the use of BSC in Portugal since its listing and disclosure until the present day.

Although organizational innovativeness has been regarded as propelling the market, entrepreneurial and learning orientation, as well as innovativeness relationships, much of the evidence to date remains anecdotal and speculative. In other words, little is known empirically about how these orientations contribute to a firm innovation. This leads to reductionism in modeling and thwarts the full exploration of the potentially multifaceted relationships among these concepts and their impact on firm innovation. In this context, a systematic framework was devised which tested the postulated market, entrepreneurial and learning orientations relationships collectively, their effect on innovativeness and the subsequent effect of innovativeness on business performance. Utilizing a sample of 238 Swiss watch manufacturing firms, we empirically examine the antecedents of firm innovativeness in this context. The findings confirm the validity of the model and afford various insights on the role of innovativeness and the impact it has on business performance in the proposed relationships. Finally, implications are shown for the antecedents and consequences of organizational innovativeness.

The objective of this study is to determine the perceptions of the auditors and teachers in relation to the issue of independence in auditing. We used appropriate statistic instruments and gathered the opinions of a sample of 1275 questionnaires given to these professionals, which obtained an answer rate of 35% and correspond to 447 questionnaires fully answered. The results allow us to conclude that there are particular specificities, not very efficient control structures, profound differences regarding this concept depending on the group under study, and a set of similarities with the international research. The research is innovative, nationally and internationally, due to the richness given by the diversity of the perceptions. As for the contributions, we enhance that this is the first study with an empirical basis ever done in Portugal and that it allows us to alert the professional orders and institutions to improve the safeguard of independence mechanisms.

This study explores previous research studies in the area of quality management and innovation performance. The study explains why different quality practices like leadership, process management, supplier relationship, customer focus and strategic planning are used for better innovation performance in firms and also explains different scenarios in which the quality practices have a positive or negative influence on innovation performance. The paper firstly categorized these studies according to the journal in which these studies are published then further divide them according to their research design into quantitative, qualitative and review types. The studies are analyzed on set criteria of industry, quality indicators, outcome indicators and results. The trends identified in this paper shows that irrespective of type of industry most studies have found a positive relationship between quality practices and firms innovation performance and in cases where the relationship is weak or negative is because of various contextual factors like uncertainty in business environment, firm size, financial resources and firms culture that has modified this relationship.

The paper examines the long-run relationship between bond market development and economic growth in G-20 countries for the period 1990–2011. We use four sets of bond market indicators for studying this relationship. Using vector autoregressive (VAR) model for testing the Granger causalities, the study finds the presence of both unidirectional and bidirectional causality between bond market development and economic growth. The policy implication of this study is that the economic policies should recognize the differences in the development of bond market and economic growth in order to maintain sustainable development in the G-20 countries.

The way an employee behaves in his work can be influenced by the organisational and professional commitment. Nurses are professionals who are guided by organisational and professional goals and values. Among nurses, professional commitment may be an important antecedent of organisational citizenship behaviours.

The study shows how organisational and professional commitment is related with nurses’ organisational citizenship behaviours. Data from a sample of 420 nurses working in two hospitals – the Hospital of St. Marcos, Braga and the Hospital Centre of Alto Ave, Guimarães and Fafe units were collected. The main findings are as follows: (a) organisational commitment and professional commitment contribute to the explanation of nurses’ organisational citizenship behaviours, (b) affective organisational commitment, continuance organisational commitment – personal sacrifice, affective professional commitment and continuance professional commitment explain 28.6% of variance of organisational citizenship behaviours.

This study analyzes the direct and indirect relation between the governance rules and information asymmetry, through the voluntary disclosure and organizational performance, using Iberian Peninsula listed companies. The results show that for firms with high levels of disclosure the bid–ask spread is lower. However, in firms with a high ownership concentration investors tend to increase the bid–ask spreads and trade less. The results show us how the governance rules exert influence on the proxies of information asymmetry in the market. The failure to find the relationship between voluntary disclosure of information and the turnover ratio shows us that the liquidity of shares is more related to the greater or lesser concentration of shareholders, with the performance of their companies than with the access to information. Moreover, it is clear that the role that information disclosure plays in these markets is mainly at the level of price formation.