Business Commons^™

Improving Safety Service Patrol Performance, Mecit Cetin, Hong Yang, Kun Xie, Sherif Ishak, Guocong Zhai, Junqing Wang, Giridhar Kattepogu

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Safety Service Patrols (SSPs) provide motorists with assistance free of charge on most freeways and some key primary roads in Virginia. This research project is focused on developing a tool to help the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) optimize SSP routes and schedules (hereafter called SSP-OPT). The computational tool, SSP-OPT, takes readily available data (e.g., corridor and segment lengths, turnaround points, average annual daily traffic) and outputs potential SSP configurations that meet the desired criteria and produce the best possible performance metrics for a given corridor. At a high level, the main components of the developed tool include capabilities to: …

Competition And Sensegiving: Nonprofit Markets And Organizational Signaling, Adam Eckerd, Jacob Fowles, Jamie Levine Daniel, Riley Sandel

School of Public Service Faculty Publications

In this paper, we investigate how an organization’s position within its nonprofit marketplace influences how nonprofits convey images about themselves to their stakeholders. We discuss the nature of competition in the nonprofit sector and explore the different competitive positions that nonprofits find themselves in. We assess how this positionality affects the ways that nonprofits attempt to convey images, or senses, of themselves to external audiences. We find that these sensegiving approaches are affected by competition, particularly when considered together with the stage of the organization’s lifecycle.

Machine-Learning-Based Vulnerability Detection And Classification In Internet Of Things Device Security, Sarah Bin Hulayyil, Shancang Li, Li Da Xu

Information Technology & Decision Sciences Faculty Publications

Detecting cyber security vulnerabilities in the Internet of Things (IoT) devices before they are exploited is increasingly challenging and is one of the key technologies to protect IoT devices from cyber attacks. This work conducts a comprehensive survey to investigate the methods and tools used in vulnerability detection in IoT environments utilizing machine learning techniques on various datasets, i.e., IoT23. During this study, the common potential vulnerabilities of IoT architectures are analyzed on each layer and the machine learning workflow is described for detecting IoT vulnerabilities. A vulnerability detection and mitigation framework was proposed for machine learning-based vulnerability detection in …

From Market Making To Matchmaking: Does Bank Regulation Harm Market Liquidity?, Gideon Saar, Jian Sun, Ron Yang, Haoxiang Zhu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Post-crisis bank regulations raised market-making costs for bank-affiliated dealers. We show that this can, somewhat surprisingly, improve overall investor welfare and reduce average transaction costs despite the increased cost of immediacy. Bank dealers in OTC markets optimize between two parallel trading mechanisms: market making and matchmaking. Bank regulations that increase market-making costs change the market structure by intensifying competitive pressure from non-bank dealers and incentivizing bank dealers to shift their business toward matchmaking. Thus, post-crisis bank regulations have the (unintended) benefit of replacing costly bank balance sheets with a more efficient form of financial intermediation.

Cheating Constraint Decisions And Discrimination Against Workers With Lower Financial Standing, Grace J. H. Lim, Marko Pitesa, Abhijeet K. Vadera

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Workers with lower financial standing face many personal challenges due to the relatively lower level of material resources they have at their disposal. We propose that lower financial standing not just impacts workers themselves, but also engenders discrimination from supervisors. Drawing on social cognition principles, we forward a situational inference perspective whereby supervisors make a naïve inference that workers with lower financial standing pose a higher risk of cheating which leads them to subject such workers to more negative treatment and deprive them of opportunities. We focus on two ubiquitous ways in which organizations constrain cheating behavior: worker surveillance and …

Intentionality, Not Just Agency: Bringing Intended Meaning Back Into The Micro–Macro Institutionalization Processes, Yuan Li

School of Economics and Business Administration Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

How Social Media Influencer Collaborations Are Percieved By Consumers, Veronica L. Thomas, Kendra Fowler, Faegheh Teheran

Marketing Faculty Publications

Within the social media community, influencers engage in a variety of collaborative practices such as tagging, reposting content from, or forming partnerships with other influencers and brands. While such collaborative efforts are a known practice, less is understood about how influencer collaborations affect consumers' perceptions of the partnering influencers, specifically when a status differential exists within the collaboration. We suggest that such collaborative practices, specifically those where the focal influencer has a higher status than the collaborating partner, may help to weaken consumers' perceptions that the influencer's actions are purely self‐focused. A pilot study, analyzing both influencer–influencer collaborations and influencer–brand …

Esg Scores As A Measure Of Risk: The Relationship Between Environmental, Social, And Corporate Governance Ratings And The Financial Performance Of U.S. Oil And Gas Companies, Lauren Kim

Scripps Senior Theses

This study investigates the association between ESG (environmental, social, corporate governance) scores on the financial performance of U.S. oil and gas companies, an industry facing significant ESG-related pressures. ESG scores evaluate a firm’s environmental impacts, social responsibility, and corporate governance practices and can be used as a form of evaluating a firm’s risk mitigation efforts. However, there is not sufficient evidence to conclude that there exists a relationship, positive or negative, between ESG scores and firm performance in this industry. Overall, the findings of this study highlight the growing interest in ESG investing and is useful for investors and firms …

Towards Smart Cities As Innovation Systems: The Case Of Macau Sar, Yujia He

Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce Faculty Publications

Smart cities are emerging as major engines for deploying intelligent systems to enhance urban development and contribute to the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. The rise of smart city initiatives is not only seen in North America and Europe but also increasingly in Asia and across the developing world which faces rapid urbanization and technological change. Home to the UNU Institute in Macau, the city of Macau is a special administrative region (SAR) of China where “the East meets the West” in local governance, economy, and society. Our research article, recently published in the Journal of Urban Affairs, …

Are Social Media Users Blindly Following Influencers’ Recommendations On Investing?, Zuliani Dalimunthe, Ananda Chairunnisa, Rachmadi Agus Triono

The Indonesian Capital Market Review

Previous studies show that general information shared by an influencer through social media has been received without sufficient validity testing. However, hardly any study has evaluated whether a stock recommendation by a social media influencer will also be followed blindly. This study evaluates the impact of the credibility of stock influencers on investors’ intention to invest in recommended stocks and whether the relationship can be explained by the perception that the influencer has inside infor- mation or is solely due to fear of missing out (FoMO). This study uses primary data from investors in the Indonesian model market. We collected …

The Intention To Use Mobile Banking As A Financial Technology Service Among Islamic Bank Users, Ratna Juwita, Adam Darma Kusumah, Tiara Syahrani Aqila, Hanan Tsabitah, Muhammad Farhan Syauqi

The Indonesian Capital Market Review

The development of Financial Technology (FinTech) in Islamic banks has not brought increasing us- ers. Therefore, it is necessary to determine which factors influence intention to use FinTech from the demand side or the customers’ side. For this study, we chose mobile banking as our research object, considering that the largest digital transactions in Islamic banks come from mobile banking. Mobile banking also provides banks various benefits to banks such as increased long-term profitability, cus- tomer loyalty, and financial inclusion. The objective of this study is to observe the determinant factor by using the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and …

Pre-Purchase And Post-Purchase Sales Promotions On E-Commerce Platforms: The Effects Of Promotional Benefits On Customer-Based Brand Equity, Ting Zhu, Yaobin Lu, Bin Wang, Lijuan Zhao

Information Systems Faculty Publications

This research examines the impacts of electronic commerce platforms' sales promotions' benefits on customer-based brand equity (platform brand awareness and platform brand association) and how these relationships are moderated by the promotion stage. Based on the two functions of sales promotions (stimulation vs. maintenance), we propose a five-benefit framework consisting of exploration, convenience, savings, social bonds and structural bonds. Our results reveal the two functions of sales promotions and the positive effects of the benefits on customer-based brand equity (CBBE). The differences between pre- and post-purchase sales promotions are also significant. We discuss the managerial and theoretical implications of these …

Constructing The ‘Public Interest’: (De)Legitimizing The Acquisition Of Aer Lingus By Iag, Joseph K. Fitzgerald

Articles

This article assesses how the ‘Public Interest’ was used to (de)legitimize the acquisition of a national airline. It does this by adopting a case study approach that analyses the acquisition of Aer Lingus by International Consolidated Airlines Group (IAG). This acquisition is part of a broader trend of international consolidation that the aviation industry has experienced in recent years. The article also critiques whether the ‘Public Interest’ was constructed on valid grounds. Its analysis found that the public interest was constructed as the continuance of routes between Irish airports and London Heathrow as a means for Ireland to maintain international …

Entrepreneurial Competencies In Action: Online Fundraising Initiatives By University Students, Thomas M. Cooney, Martina Brophy

Articles

It has been argued that entrepreneurship educators are inclined to let students learn in a safe controlled environment, with no pressure except to pass the module. Students working in groups of three were given 12 weeks (Target 1) to develop a fundraising initiative, work with various stakeholders, and execute their online fundraising initiative to meet a target goal of €2000 (Target 2) per group. Employing approaches such as Effectuation, Lean Start-Up and the Business Model Canvas, a self-directed learning approach ensured students were able to take ownership of their learning journey with the lecturer acting as coach or facilitator. The …

Developing Entrepreneurial Skillsets Amongst Rural Women In Uganda, Sylvia Gavigan, Thomas M. Cooney, Klavs Ciprikis

Articles

Purpose: Rural women in Africa have less entrepreneurship opportunities than men. This is mainly due to societal expectations of women, but it may also be caused by a lack of entrepreneurial knowledge and skills due to their work in agriculture-related activities. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine the impact of entrepreneurship training on entrepreneurial skillsets of rural women working in Uganda and how such training influences their entrepreneurial activity.

Design/methodology/approach: The primary data set for this study comes from surveys of rural women working in agriculture who participated in a specific entrepreneurship training programme in Uganda. A …

Component Maintenance Strategies And Risk Analysis For Random Shock Effects Considering Maintenance Costs, Chao Zhang, Yadong Zhang, Hongyan Dui, Shaoping Wang, Mileta Tomovic

Engineering Technology Faculty Publications

Maintenance can improve a system’s reliability in a long operation period or when a component has failed. The reliability modeling method that uses the stochastic process degradation model to describe the system degradation process has been widely used. However, the existing reliability models established using stochastic processes only consider the internal degradation process, and do not fully consider the impact of external random shocks on their reliability modeling. Furthermore, the existing theory of importance does not consider the actual factors of maintenance cost. In this paper, based on the reliability modeling of random processes, the degradation rate under the influence …

Digital Energy Platforms Considering Digital Privacy And Security By Design Principles, Umit Cali, Marthe Fogstad Dynge, Ahmed Idries, Sambeet Mishra, Ivanko Dmytro, Naser Hashemipour, Murat Kuzlu, Aleksandra Mileva (Ed.), Steffen Wendzel (Ed.), Virginia Franqueira (Ed.)

Engineering Technology Faculty Publications

The power system and markets have become increasingly complex, along with efforts to digitalize the energy sector. Accessing flexibility services, in particular, through digital energy platforms, has enabled communication between multiple entities within the energy system and streamlined flexibility market operations. However, digitalizing these vast and complex systems introduces new cybersecurity and privacy concerns, which must be properly addressed during the design of the digital energy platform ecosystems. More specifically, both privacy and cybersecurity measures should be embedded into all phases of the platform design and operation, based on the privacy and security by design principles. In this study, these …

An Integrated Framework On Human-In-The-Loop Risk Analytics, Peng Liu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Risk analytics is an integral component in the overall assessment of the risk profile for potential and existing obligors. For example, credit worthiness is often assessed via the use of scorecards, which are regulatory credit risk models developed based on historical data and domain expertise in banks and financial institutions. A pure statistical model, however, often fails to entertain regulatory requirements on both predictiveness and interpretability at the same time. Instead, practical risk models are developed by incorporating expert opinions within the development process, such as forcing the direction of travel for certain financial factors. In this article, the author …

Jump To Platform Faster? Gender, Institutional Change, And Pre-Entrant Entrepreneurial Attempt, Lei Xu, K. Praveen Parboteeah, Chevy-Hanqing Fang

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Purpose: The authors enrich and extend the existing institutional anomie theory (IAT) in the hope of sharpening the understanding of the joint effects of selected cultural values and social institutional changes on women's pre-entrant entrepreneurial attempts. The authors theorize that women are culturally discouraged to pursue pre-entrant entrepreneurial attempts or wealth accumulation in a specific culture. This discouragement creates an anomic strain that motivates women to deviate from cultural prescriptions by engaging in pre-entrant entrepreneurial attempts at a faster speed. Building on this premise, the authors hypothesize that changes in social institutions facilitate the means of achievement for women due …

Pepper, Just Show Me The Way! How Robotic Shopping Assistants Should Look And Act, Nobuyuki Fukawa, Yu Shan Huang, Barry J. Babin

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Artificial intelligence enables modern robots to serve as service and sales assistants. Today's robotic shopping assistants (RSAs) can appear either humanoid or non-humanoid and possess utilitarian and/or hedonic attributes. However, many questions remain unexplored regarding an effective customer-centric RSA design. Do customers prefer a humanoid or non-humanoid RSA with hedonic or utilitarian attributes? To answer those questions, the research deploys a mixed-method approach involving a survey of customers who have interacted with the Pepper Robot, a humanoid robot (Study 1), and follow-up experiments examining customer responses to a humanoid/non-humanoid RSA with hedonic/utilitarian attributes (Studies 2 and 3). The research employs …

Reassessing Theories Of Capital Structure: Empirical Insights From Companies Listed In Vietnam, Ya Dai, Liang Guo, Chang Guo, Hongxian Zhang

Business and Information Technology Faculty Research & Creative Works

Over the past decade, the Vietnamese capital market has undergone a remarkable transformation, with a significant focus on its stock market that has displayed substantial expansion since 2012. This research delves into the impact of this market progression on the choices pertaining to capital structure made by companies listed in Vietnam. By analyzing a range of trade-off and pecking order models and amalgamating them into a unified regression framework, we gauge their capacity to elucidate these decisions. Our study outcomes unveil that the trade-off theory offers a more robust rationale for the capital structure determinations of Vietnamese companies, particularly during …

Explicating The Influence Of Religion In Forming Corporate Governance: Insights From The Philippines, Leveric T. Ng, John Paolo Rivera

Graduate School of Business Publications

Religion plays a role in shaping personal values and directing an organization’s moral filter. It is an avenue to impose social morality that may impact corporate governance. We examined the influence of religion in the formation and development of good corporate governance through ethical leadership in the Philippines – a country that has strong religious culture. Invalidating scholarly literature on religion and enterprise; we looked into the conception and interpretation of religion and corporate governance through a key informant interview of 30 executive directors from private corporations in the country.We found that corporate governance may arise from religious convictions; where …

Pricing And Green Promotion Decisions In A Retailer-Owned Dual-Channel Supply Chain With Multiple Manufacturers, Yaping Zhao, Wenjie Huang, Endong Xu, Xiaoyun Xu

Graduate School of Business Publications

This paper studies the pricing and green promotion effort decisions in a retailer-owned dual-channel supply chain consisting of multiple manufacturers and one retailer. Specifically, we consider the general version of the problem where multiple inter-correlated products are sold through both the online and the offline retail channels, and customer demands are jointly affected by product retail prices and green promotion efforts. With the objective of maximizing the members’ profits, game theoretic models are built to obtain the optimal decisions on wholesale prices, retail price markups and green promotion efforts under different power structures including manufacturer-Stackelberg, retailer-Stackelberg, Nash and integrated power …

Servant Leadership, Followers Job Satisfaction, Empowerment And Performance: The Moderating Effect Of Gender, Sina Eslamdoust, Sasan Mahmoudinazlou

Business Analytics Faculty Publications

Leadership is the skill and art of inspiring an organization’s followers to carry out their duties with passion to achieve the organization’s objectives and cultivate group development. Referring to the golden age and context of globalization, technological boost, and socioeconomic prosperity, contemporary organizations have experienced drastic changes over the past decades. These revisions have presented management with unexpected challenges that have forced them to pursue new routes in organizational leadership and management. Nowadays, leadership theorists have put more attention and emphasis on humility and servility in the leadership context. Servant leadership is a blossoming new research field and leadership paradigm …

It's All Personal - A Study On Consumer Attitudes Towards Data Collection And Usage, Publishers Clearing House, Tiffany Johnson, Daniela Molta, Evan Shapiro

Media Studies - Open-Access Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Moderating Effects Of Relationship Length And Contact Frequency On Customer Citizenship Behaviors, Laee Choi, Mi Ran Kim

ICHRIE Research Reports

Studies show that contact frequency and relationship length impact co-creative and in-role behaviors with service providers. However, their influence on extra-role or customer citizenship behaviors (CCBs) remains unexplored. This study delves into the moderating role of relationship length and contact frequency within the CCB model. Utilizing an online survey (n = 665), the study unveils that perceived justice’s impact on affective commitment is not moderated by contact frequency, whereas the impact is stronger in short-term than in longer-term relationships. The perceived support-affective commitment-CCBs relationship is stronger in high contact than in low contact group. Similarly, the relationship is stronger for …

Showcasing College-Funded Databases: Collaborations Between College Of Business And Business Librarian, Sandy Kizer, Marina Narvaez

Faculty Scholarship

This visual represents a study that took place at University of Arkansas – Fayetteville regarding a collaboration between Walton School of Business, IT Director and the Millins Library, Business Librarian. Wanting to reevaluate the 30+ college funded databases, available only to the Walton community, Kizer and Narvaez implemented a series of two questionnaires which were designed in Qualtrics and distributed to the Walton Research Committee members consisting of representatives from each department; who then forwarded the surveys to their colleagues. Meanwhile, a web page showcasing the databases, primarily utilized by faculty and graduate students, launched on Walton’s website. As survey …

Impact Of Sports Gambling Legality On U.S. States’ Real Gdp Per Capita, Emilian Ardeljan

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This paper analyzes the impact of the Supreme Court’s decision in 2018 to allow states and Washington D.C. to implement state-sponsored sports gambling on that state’s real GDP per capita. In addition, this paper also analyzes if there is a statistically significant difference in the measures of the real GDP per capita between the various levels of legalization states have incorporated including retail-only, online-only, and fully legalized. The motivation for this research stems from the recent increase in the number of states that have legalized sports gambling to some degree as well as the growing popularity of the sports betting …

Team 2​ Honors Project:​ Sugardale​, Nyan Lwin, Ava Updegraff, Benjamin Nagy, Jacquelynn Scheatzle, Karleighana Jones

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

In this project, we strive to market Sugardale's Products to a consumer group that they have had trouble marketing to in the recent years. In this submission, the outline of the project is laid out. The file included lays out the project's marketing goals and the research questions.

Our Findings And Sugardale's Next Steps, Laura Tucker, Greyson Droste, Luke Caruso, Isaiah Nichols

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

We were given the opportunity to work with a client this year, Sugardale. We collected secondary research through online databases. Then we performed interviews, focus groups, and surveys to get the primary research. This presentation is a collection of our primary and secondary research on the company and the recommendations we made to help the target demographic.