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ABSTRACTWe consider inventory management of a firm that orders periodically from a distantly located supplier and faces random delays in shipment. We analyze various response strategies that the firm may employ to mitigate the risk of demand–supply mismatch resulting from shipment delays. We categorize these strategies along two dimensions: operational flexibility, defined by the flexible resource employed; and lead‐time visibility, defined by the availability of information on shipment delays. For each of the response strategies, we provide analytical characterization of the optimal inventory policy. By comparing the optimal policies across response strategies, we offer insights into the effect of operational flexibility and lead‐time visibility on firm's inventory performance. Using an extensive set of numerically solved examples, we provide cost comparison across these strategies—we show that while the operational flexibility mitigates the adverse effect of long lead‐times, the lead‐time visibility provides protection from lead‐time uncertainty. Further, operational flexibility and lead‐time visibility enhance each other's values, hence must be employed together to gain their full benefits.

AbstractA firm making quantity decision under uncertainty loses profit if its private information is leaked to competitors. Outsourcing increases this risk as a third party supplier may leak information for its own benefit. The firm may choose to conceal information from the competitors by entering in a confidentiality agreement with the supplier. This, however, diminishes the firm's ability to dampen competition by signaling a higher quantity commitment. We examine this trade‐off in a stylized supply chain in which two firms, endowed with private demand information, order sequentially from a common supplier, and engage in differentiated quantity competition. In our model, the supplier can set different wholesale prices for firms, and the second‐mover firm could be better informed. Contrary to what is expected, information concealment is not always beneficial to the first mover. We characterize conditions under which the first mover firm will not prefer concealing information. We show that this depends on the relative informativeness of the second mover and is moderated by competition intensity. We examine the supplier's incentive in participating in information concealment, and develop a contract that enables it for wider set of parameter values. We extend our analysis to examine firms' incentive to improve information. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 62:1–15, 2015

To achieve sustainable progress in workplace and societal functioning and development, it is essential to align perspectives for the management of health, safety and well-being. Employers are responsible for providing every individual with a working environment that is safe and does not harm their physical or mental health. However, the current state of the art indicates that approaches used to promote health, safety and well-being have not had the anticipated results. At the level of the enterprise it is widely understood and accepted by all stakeholders that employers share the responsibility of promoting and managing the health of their workers. Evidence indicates that most employers put in place procedures and measures to manage workers' health and create healthy workplaces to meet legal requirements, as a response to requests by employees, as a need to improve company image/reputation, and to improve productivity. This highlights that in addition to legal requirements, the key drivers for companies also include the ethical and business case. While much has been written about role of legislation and the business case for promoting health, safety and well-being, not much is known about the 'ethical case' for promoting employment and working conditions. In this context, this book examines the potential of the link between responsible and sustainable workplace practices, human rights and worker health, safety and well-being and explores how complementary approaches can be used to promote employment and working conditions and sustainability at the organizational level. It offers a framework for aligning different approaches and perspectives to the promotion of workers' health, safety and well-being and provides recommendations for introducing such an approach at the enterprise level.

© 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This study aims to investigate the relationship between several job design variables and innovative work behaviour (IWB). Guided by the Job Demands Resources model, the aim was to evaluate the relationship between work demands (time constraints), resources (autonomy and social support), and other work factors (task monotony, complexity, and dealing with unforeseen circumstances) with idea generation and idea implementation behaviours in a sample of 12,924 participants from the 27 European Union member states in 2010. We also wished to investigate if individual IWB, at the country level, is associated with country innovative performance (an aggregate of process/product and marketing/organizational innovation). We employed a multilevel generalized structural equation model to test our hypotheses. In our final model autonomy, manager encouragement and dealing with unforeseen problems showed the highest positive relationship with idea generation and idea implementation. Conversely, monotonous tasks and working at high speed were negatively related to IWB. Furthermore, we have found strong indications that country-level IWB positively relates to the odds of a country scoring higher on the aforementioned innovation indicators. Between-country unexplained variance in IWB was reduced from 17.1% in our initial model, to 1.9% in our final iteration. Limitations, implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

AbstractCorporate social responsibility (CSR) research has been largely interested in answering the question of why more women at work is good for business, leaving unattended the question of how to achieve this, and how feminist theories can be integrated with this purpose. This paper puts forward some conceptual propositions for advancing these questions by examining the linkages between the doing and undoing gender concepts from the feminist organization studies, and the role of CSR. The paper follows a conceptual approach to develop and support propositions. We propose that gender strategies will vary in organizations according to what CSR orientation they assume (compliance or proactive CSR), and how they navigate the un/doing gender continuum. By doing so, a two‐axis model is portrayed and four specific gender strategies identified. The model can support research aiming at exploring how CSR can be a tool for achieving gender equality at work, and managers looking at implementing or evaluating their gender responsible strategies.

Work-related psychosocial hazards are recognised as a key priority in the future of work. Even though European Union (EU) legislation requires employers to assess and manage all types of risks to workers' health and safety associated with all types of hazards in the work environment, it does not include clear reference to psychosocial risks and work-related stress. In several EU member states, there is now more specific legislation on psychosocial risks that clarifies employer responsibilities. The aim of this study is to explore whether the introduction of specific legislation on psychosocial risks and/or work-related stress is related to organisations implementing action plans to prevent work-related stress, and in turn, better psychosocial working conditions (job demands and resources), and less reported work-related stress in the workforce. It does so by comparing EU member states and candidate countries that have introduced more specific legislation to those that have not, conducting multilevel modelling analysis by linking two representative European-level datasets, the 2014 employer European Survey of Enterprises on New & Emerging Risks and the 2015 employee European Working Conditions Survey. Findings indicate that the presence of specific national stress legislation is associated with more enterprises having a work-related stress action plan. The existence of action plans was found to be associated with increased job resources but not decreased job demands. Furthermore, only in those countries with specific national legislation on stress, job resources were found to be associated with less reported stress through the existence of organisational action plans. Findings lend support to the argument for more specific legislation on psychosocial risks/work-related stress in the EU. However, they also raise questions on whether current interventions implemented at organisational level to deal with work-related stress may be geared more towards the development of individual resources and less towards ...