Business Administration, Management, and Operations Commons^™

Daniels Distinction Portfolio By Adrian Minde Hunshammer, Adrian Minde Hunshammer

Finance: Undergraduate Distinction Portfolios

A Daniels Distinction Portfolio of experiential education by Adrian Hunshammer.

Daniels Distinction Portfolio By Maggie Schoeny, Maggie Schoeny

Finance: Undergraduate Distinction Portfolios

A Daniels Distinction Portfolio of experiential education by Maggie Schoeny

Reclamation Of Unused Coal Fields Through Bluegrass Adventures, Lydia R. Deaton, Anya M. Deaton, Leanna Shelton, Haley Turner, Sheridan Combs, Rachel Blackwell, Fatma Mohamed, Ahmad Hassan

Posters-at-the-Capitol

Reclamation Of Unused Coal Fields Through Bluegrass Adventures

Throughout the last century, Eastern Kentucky has been pivotal in the coal production for the united states. As such many jobs and economic opportunities were largely formed through coal mining. In recent years, however, coal production has shifted elsewhere leaving the rural communities of eastern Kentucky at risk of economic failure. This project was focused on providing a redevelopment plan for an abandoned coal mine in eastern Kentucky. The Entrepreneurial Coal Lands Redevelopment Program (ECLRP) is focused on reclaiming abandoned coalmines to encourage economic evolution and development in low-income communities. Redevelopment of …

Women Entrepreneurs In Egypt: A Qualitative Study Of Perceptions And Challenges, Rwan Zakria Abdelrhman

Theses and Dissertations

Although all entrepreneurs and business owners encounter obstacles and barriers, the challenges that female entrepreneurs face in Egypt are surmount. Female entrepreneurs in Egypt lack the requisite training and basic advising services that would keep them updated with new technological skills. Moreover, women are more likely to discontinue their businesses due to limited access to finance. Furthermore, women face restrictive legal and institutional burdens when establishing their business or when starting a new one. In addition, cultural constraints are another challenge that negatively influence women's credibility, their empowerment and self-confidence. The current study, intends to investigate the challenges that female …

Intuit, Inc.'S Small Business And Self Employed Unit: A Strategic Analysis, Cat Nyberg

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Intuit, Inc. is a business and personal finance software company founded in 1983 by Scott Cook and Tom Proulx. It is headquartered in Mountain View, California, and has offices around the United States and internationally. Intuit’s primary mission is to ‘power prosperity’, whether for small business owners, individuals, or accounting professionals.

Intuit has three major business units: Small Business and Self Employed, Consumer, and Strategic Partner. Each business unit offers one or more flagship software platforms, optimized for specific customer needs in business accounting, professional tax preparation, and individual tax filing. Intuit’s major software flagships are QuickBooks (business accounting and …

The Impact We Can Make Through Investment: Securing Financial Freedom By Serving Others, Miles A. Flett

Honors Projects

Wage disparity is a major political issue in the United States, but it has far more to do with the health of the economy as a whole. Statistically speaking, it is very difficult for women to participate equally in an economy where they are systematically marginalized. This hurts businesses, it hurts global markets and it damages overall GDP. Statistical data drawn primarily from the Bureau of Labor Statistics underline the differences that women face from various standpoints. Race is a primary influencer, but across the board all women make significantly less than men of the same background for the same …

Institutional Sustainable Purchasing Priorities: Stakeholder Perceptions Vs Environmental Reality, Madeleine Pullman, Robin Wikoff

Business Faculty Publications and Presentations

Purpose This purpose of this paper is to understand the environmental impacts of stakeholder-driven sustainable purchasing policies in institutional settings. Design/methodology/approach The research is framed using stakeholder and life cycle assessment (LCA) theories. The study uses a multi-method approach. Starting with interviews to understand the breadth of sustainability issues and significant food purchases facing institutional purchasing managers, the authors subsequently perform LCA of these various policies using the most popular food item in different categories. Findings From the interview results, the authors found that food purchasers focus predominately on cost, thus, are committed to food and packaging reduction. They are …

Why Do Smes Go Green? An Analysis Of Wine Firms In South Africa, Ralph Hamann, James Smith, Peter Tashman, R. Scott Marshall

Business Faculty Publications and Presentations

Studies on why small and medium enterprises (SMEs) engage in pro-environmental behavior suggest that managers’ environmental responsibility plays a relatively greater role than competitiveness and legitimacy-seeking. These categories of drivers are mostly considered independent of each other. Using survey data and comparative case studies of wine firms in South Africa, this study finds that managers’ environmental responsibility is indeed the key driver in a context where state regulation hardly plays any role in regulating dispersed, rural firms. However, especially proactive firms are also characterized by expectations of competitiveness gains. The authors thus emphasize the role of institutional context and potential …

Moderating Effects Of Institutional Logics On Strategic Response To Coercive Institutional Change, Leon Paul Weeks

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

Using institutional theory, the study examines the relationship between compliance behaviors and attitudes of small business owners and managers toward external coercive institutional change pressures. Organizations can experience conflicting institutional pressures (Pache & Santos, 2010). Variation in change pressures suggest heterogeneous impacts from institutional demands for change (e.g. Herremans, Herschovis, & Bertels, 2009). This study traces Internal Revenue Service regulatory, normative and cognitive-cultural changes targeting the tax preparation industry and examines the relationship between owner/managers attitudes about the changes and their compliance behaviors. Additionally this study traces the historical development of commercial and professional institutional logics in tax preparation and …

Data Visualization In Exploratory Data Analysis: An Overview Of Methods And Technologies, Yingsen Mao

Business Administration Theses - Archive

Exploratory data analysis (EDA) refers to an iterative process through which analysts constantly ‘ask questions’ and extract knowledge from data. EDA is becoming more and more important for modern data analysis, such as business analytics and business intelligence, as it greatly relaxes the statistical assumption required by its counterpart—confirmation data analysis (CDA), and involves analysts directly in the data mining process. However, exploratory visual analysis, as the central part of EDA, requires heavy data manipulations and tedious visual specifications, which might impede the EDA process if the analyst has no guidelines to follow. In this paper, we present a framework …

دور فجوة الهو ةٌ التنظ مٌ ةٌ ف ز اٌدة سلوك العمل المنحرف دراسة تحل لٌ ةٌ لآراء ع نٌة من العامل نٌ ف معمل سمنت الكوفة, عامر علي حسين العطوي, خيرية عبد فضل الخالدي

Muthanna Journal of Administrative and Economics Sciences

المستخلص يهدف هذا البحث إلى اختبار دور فجوة الهوية التنظيمية في زيادة سلوك العمل المنحرف لعينة من العاملين في معمل سمنت الكوفة , إذ تم توزيع (307) استمارة استبيان على العاملين ورؤساء الأقسام في معمل سمنت الكوفة. وبعد تفحص الاستمارات المسترجعة استبعدت (15) استمارة لعدم صلاحيتها وعدم تحقيق الشروط المطلوبة للإجابة عن الاستبيان، وبذلك يكون عدد الاستمارات الصالحة للدراسة والتحليل (292) استمارة. يضم مفهوم فجوة الهوية التنظيمية متغيرين هما خصائص هوية المنظمة الحالية وخصائص هوية المنظمة المثالية او المرغوبة اما متغير سلوك العمل المنحرف فيتكون من ثلاث أبعاد رئيسة هي: سلوك العمل المنحرف تجاه المنظمة، و سلوك العمل المنحرف تجاه …

دور فجوة الهو ةٌ التنظ مٌ ةٌ ف ز اٌدة سلوك العمل المنحرف دراسة تحل لٌ ةٌ لآراء ع نٌة من العامل نٌ ف معمل سمنت الكوفة, عامر علي حسين العطوي العطوي, عبد فضل الخالدي

Muthanna Journal of Administrative and Economics Sciences

المستخلص يهدف هذا البحث إلى اختبار دور فجوة الهوية التنظيمية في زيادة سلوك العمل المنحرف لعينة من العاملين في معمل سمنت الكوفة , إذ تم توزيع (307) استمارة استبيان على العاملين ورؤساء الأقسام في معمل سمنت الكوفة. وبعد تفحص الاستمارات المسترجعة استبعدت (15) استمارة لعدم صلاحيتها وعدم تحقيق الشروط المطلوبة للإجابة عن الاستبيان، وبذلك يكون عدد الاستمارات الصالحة للدراسة والتحليل (292) استمارة. يضم مفهوم فجوة الهوية التنظيمية متغيرين هما خصائص هوية المنظمة الحالية وخصائص هوية المنظمة المثالية او المرغوبة اما متغير سلوك العمل المنحرف فيتكون من ثلاث أبعاد رئيسة هي: سلوك العمل المنحرف تجاه المنظمة، و سلوك العمل المنحرف تجاه …

An Analysis Of The Interplay Between Goal Orientation And Ethical Leadership And The Theoretical Processes Through Which Ethical Leadership Influences Work Outcomes, Dennis John Marquardt

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

Due to recent heightened public awareness of ethics and ethical scandals inbusiness, the ethical leadership construct has become increasingly popular. However, scholars still know little about the predictors of ethical leadership and the specific processes through which ethical leaders influence their followers. Across three different papers, I contribute to the literature by addressing these gaps. The first paper consists of a theoretical review of goal orientation and ethical leadership with specific focus on the interplay between the two constructs. In the second paper I use latent path analysis with a sample of 234 supervisor/subordinate dyads and find leader trait-avoid goal …

Generational Cohort Differences In Types Of Organizational Commitment Among Nurses In Alabama, April Lavette Jones

Presidential Alumni Research Dissemination Award

In hospitals in the United States, the ratio of nurses to patients is declining, resulting in an increase in work demands for nurses. Consequently, organizations face challenges with nurses' organizational commitment. Studies have revealed generational differences, as determined by birth year, in employee levels of organizational commitment in a number of organizational settings. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding the impact of generational cohorts on the organizational commitment of nurses. The purpose of this quantitative, nonexperimental, cross-sectional design was to address whether generational cohorts of nurses differed in their levels of organizational commitment, and to investigate whether …

Effects Of Operations And Innovation Strategy Fit On Company Performance, James Edward Brown

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

For a company to survive long-term, it must be able to innovate and develop new products and services. There are two types of broad innovation classifications: exploration and exploitation. These two types of innovation require different resources, have different risks, and have different time horizons for the company to receive the benefits. Operations strategies impact the type and quantity of resources available. The concept of fit has been used to match operations strategy and corporate strategy. This dissertation will extend this concept to the relationship between innovation strategy and operations strategy. Building on The Resource Based View and Punctuated Equilibrium, …

A Review Of Team Learning, Sunhyung Lee

Management Theses - Archive

The purpose of this thesis is to review literature on team learning published from 1985 to 2013. The papers were selected from academic journals from business, as well as psychology, education and management. I examine the various terms and definitions used for team learning, as well as measurement methods. I discuss models of team learning as a process of learning and its placement within the three levels of learning: individual, team, and organizational. I also suggest future directions and areas of focus for future research into team learning and its merits in the workplace.

Negative Exchange Spirals: A Process Model Of Incivility Among Coworkers, Jennifer Grace Manegold

Management Dissertations - Archive

Increasing instances of incivility (e.g. rudeness or disrespect) in the workplace have led to the growing popularity of incivility research within the mistreatment literature. It is believed that incivility may encourage reciprocated behaviors that escalate in intensity. However, the underlying processes by which these `incivility spirals' occur are not yet well understood. Therefore, based on social exchange theory and theories of emotion and organizational justice, I propose and test a multilevel model that examines the effects of daily experienced incivility on daily negative behaviors (e.g. instigated incivility and counterproductive behaviors) via a desire for revenge and state anger. In addition, …

It's A Matter Of Give And Take: Exploring The Role Of Knowledge Transfer In The Supply Chain, Kimberly Whitehead

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

Firm interdependence within supply chains continues to grow. This is driven by the need to leverage tangible and intangible resources within the supply chain for innovation, process management, customer satisfaction and meeting diverse stakeholder expectations. This research expands our understanding of supply chain collaboration by introducing new knowledge-based constructs that operationalize the abilities of a firm to transfer knowledge. These abilities are referred to as distributive capabilities. The distributive capabilities of an organization represent its ability to transfer commercially relevant knowledge through collaboration to a known recipient firm. Earlier research in this domain has focused on the abilities of a …

Age Differences In Attraction To Instrumental And Symbolic Organziational Attributes, Katherine Joan Roberto

Management Dissertations - Archive

As the demographic landscape in business continues to get more diverse, the need to examine what attracts individuals of different demographic attributes to organizations becomes increasingly more important. This study examined the extent to which individuals across different age groups were attracted to organizations offering different incentives. Specifically, it examined whether the presence of symbolic attributes (work-life balance or corporate social responsibility statements) affected people of different ages in their ratings of attraction to organizations. It also looked at the effect of these symbolic attributes on attraction to an organization over and above the instrumental attribute of pay. The results …

Antecedents Of Foreign Corporate Political Activity In American Politics, Lee Warren Brown

Management Dissertations - Archive

International firms compete in the United States in both the market and non-market arenas (Doh, & Lucea, 2013). The international management literature has a long history of research focused on market competition but, non-market competition has been largely ignored (Lawton, McGuire & Rajwani, 2013). At the same time, there is a large and increasing amount of money being spent by foreign firms on lobbying and other non-market activities in America. In an effort to aid in our understanding of foreign firms who engage in corporate political activity (CPA) in the United States, I investigated foreign firms that engage in CPA …

A Stochastic Walk Along Mexico's Mesoamerican Frontier, Gregory Brock, Constantin Ogloblin

Economics: Faculty Presentations (1988-2021)

No abstract provided.

Labor Mobility And Hypercompetition: Another Challenge To Sustained Competitive Advantages?, Jeffrey E. Stambaugh, Yongjing Zhang, Timothy Degroot

Business Faculty Publications

Researchers have suggested globalization, technological advances, and the rise of entrepreneurship have ushered in a new era of hypercompetition where competitive advantages are hard to attain and sustain. In this paper we propose another source of hypercompetition—a sudden increase in labor mobility within an industry—by drawing on the resource-based view of what leads to a sustainable competitive advantage. Using data from the National Football League, which had a substantial change in the player mobility in 1993, we use the two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov test to stratify teams according to their demonstrated level of competitive (dis)advantage based on their on-field performance. We found …

Exploring Best Practice Skills To Predict Uncertainties In Venture Capital Investment Decision-Making, David Arthur Blum

Presidential Alumni Research Dissemination Award

Algae biodiesel is the sole sustainable and abundant transportation fuel source that can replace petrol diesel use; however, high competition and economic uncertainties exist, influencing independent venture capital decision making. Technology, market, management, and government action uncertainties influence competition and economic uncertainties in the venture capital industry. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to identify the best practice skills at IVC firms to predict uncertainty between early and late funding stages. The basis of the study was real options theory, a framework used to evaluate and understand the economic and competition uncertainties inherent in natural resource investment and …

Hire For Personality, Train For Skill: The Relationship Between Cognitive And Non-Cognitive Human Capital, Desired Employee Behaviors, And Performance, Brian Martinson

Management Dissertations - Archive

This study proposes to examine the relationship between cognitive and noncognitive human capital and work performance as mediated by desired employee behaviors. The study will also explore the moderating effects of high performance work practices (HPWPs) on this relationship. The goal of this study is to explain the distal relationship between human capital and firm performance through the more proximal relationship of the human resources practices used to manage human capital by activating individual employee behaviors. The study uses the individual level inputs of knowledge, skills, abilities, personality, and values, combined with application of HPWPs to test a set of …

Tmt Characteristics That Position Family Firms For Success: Examining The Effects Of Human Capital, Non-Familiness, Entrepreneurial Orientation, And Transactive Memory Systems, Drake Stevenson Mullens

Management Dissertations - Archive

Entrepreneurship is critical to family firm growth, profitability, and survival (Zahra 2005); however, entrepreneurship remains understudied in the family business context (Zahra and Sharma, 2004). Limited extant research suggests family firms act less entrepreneurially than their non-family counterparts but performance enhancements result from entrepreneurial actions (Litz and Klesen, 2001). Consequently, I explored the effects of human capital and non-familiness in the top management team on the group's transactive memory system (Wegner, 1987) and the organization's entrepreneurial orientation. In my sample, human capital in the top management team was positively related to the team's transactive memory system. Similarly, human capital was …

Individual Human Capital And Performance: An Empirical Study In Thailand, Pakorn Sujchaphong

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

According to the resource-based view of the firm, human capital is a source of sustained competitive advantage of the firm (McMahan, Virick, & Wright, 1999; Wright & McMahan, 1992; Wright, McMahan, & McWilliams, 1994; Wright & McMahan, 2011). Based on micro-foundations, it is essential that one must begin with and understand the individuals that make up the organization before exploring it at the organizational level (Felin & Foss, 2005; Wright & McMahan, 2011). Hence, this study focuses on the individual level of human capital. The first research question of this study is "How does human capital affect the performance of …

A Management Dashboard Model For Supply Chain Cost Estimations, Brad Masters

Business Administration Dissertations - Archive

As many organizations are unable to alter existing accounting systems for an Activity Based-type costing requirement, a "Dashboard" Costing Model is proposed. The model will 1) empirically verify management assumptions regarding actual Supply Chain costs, 2) satisfy management's objectives for acceptable accuracy and simplicity and 3) contribute to the current body of research by providing alternative methods of estimating Supply Chain costs within the Transaction Cost Economics framework. Future studies can expand upon this costing methodology, and test its applicability with other organizations in other industries for accuracy improvement and refinement.

A Middle Management Perspective On Strategy Implementation, Ahmad Salih

Presidential Alumni Research Dissemination Award

Strategic management researchers have established the key role middle managers play in the implementation of organizational strategies. However, there is little information regarding middle managers' views and perceptions of strategy implementation and the challenges associated with implementing organizational strategies. Drawing from activity theory and inspired by the strategy-as-practice perspective, the purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to understand the views and perceptions of 12 middle managers and 3 management consultants on the factors influencing organizational strategy implementation. The research questions addressed in this study included the views of middle managers on: (a) the key challenges associated with strategy implementation, …

Antecedents And Outcomes Associated With The Individual Stress Response, Matthew Blake Hargrove

Management Dissertations - Archive

This dissertation explores the antecedents and outcomes associated with the individual stress response. It begins with an extensive literature review of three conceptualizations of stress in organizations. Next, the construct psychological capital is explored as a potential moderator of the stressor-stress response relationship. A review of the psychological capital literature is presented including the potential and limitations of current interventions designed to develop psychological capital. A synthetic model for organizational stress is developed and presented. Hypotheses are formulated based on this model. In order to test hypotheses, two tools are developed. First, Psychological Capital Training (PCT), a multimodal intervention designed …

The Road Less Traveled: The Moderating Effects Of Relational Coordination On The Relationships Among Human Capital, Employee Behaviors And Performance, Alankrita Pandey

Management Dissertations - Archive

This dissertation studies the micro-foundations of Strategic Human Resource Management by examining the relationships between human capital, employee behaviors, relational coordination, and performance among individuals within a firm. Multilevel modeling is used to empirically investigate and find evidence for the mediated relationship among human capital, in-role and extra-role behaviors and performance for a sample of 126 registered nurses from a large surgical care hospital in the southwestern United States. To the Strategic Human Resource Management framework, this dissertation also introduces an element of social capital, role-coordination among the registered nurses and others performing the same job, in the same work …