Showing papers by "Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad published in 1979"

An International Study of Management Perceptions of the Working Capital Process

Abstract: Working capital literature is rather limited and the process of managing short‐term resources is not understood well by academicians. In contrast, corporate managers are continuously involved in the working capital decision-making process, but their perspective is limited to the practices within their firm. In order to fill this gap in the working capital literature, a study of management perceptions of the working capital process was undertaken. A survey was used to collect the information from the sample of marketing, production, and financial executives in large corporations in Belgium, France, India, and the United States. The study intercepts management ranking of working capital objectives and indicates the need to improve finacial planning models to include explicitly short–run objectives; further, predictability of cash inflows and outflows is examined and the potential factors affecting the predictability are evaluated. Finally, this study examines management perceptions of long-range objectives in order to provide a proper perspective to the short-run financial planning.

Integrated Production Inventory Policies for Multistage Multiproduct Batch Production Systems

Abstract: An integrated production inventory model is considered in this paper, for a flow shop type multiproduct batch production system, with a multifacility structure. Instantaneous production is allowed in each facility. The model aims to determine simultaneously the optimal manufacturing cycle for the multiple products and the corresponding optimal procurement policies for the raw material. The cycle concept of multiproduct batch processing is extended to multifacility system and is integrated with the concept of production-inventory system for a single product, single facility system.

Triangle effect and the connotative meaning of trust in prisoner's dilemma: a cross cultural study

Abstract: Two hundred and forty-nine male postgraduate students of management played the Prisoner's Dilemma Game (Deutsch 1960) and filled out a postgame questionnaire measuring attitude toward the ‘other player’. Striking differences resulted between trusting and trustworthy subjects on the one hand and suspicious and untrustworthy subjects on the other with respect to different meanings given to the dimension of trust (cooperation) in the interaction. As predicted, trusting behavior of the other player was given a positive evaluative meaning - good versus bad - by the trusting and trustworthy subjects and negative dynamism meaning – weak versus strong – by the suspicious and untrustworthy subjects. The trusting players expected the typical other to make either trusting or suspicious moves, whereas the suspicious subjects expected the typical other to be uniformly suspicious, yielding a high Triangularity index (Kelley and Stahelski 1970). Most provocatively, while 51% of trusting subjects thought that th...

An Examination of Alternative Forms of Regulatory Mechanisms: The Case of the Health Care Industry

Abstract: Publisher Summary A survey of the literature on regulation indicates that economists and public policy analysts have examined only two sets of alternatives explicitly, that is, no regulation versus direct regulation by the government. There are, however, other, possibly more effective, regulatory mechanisms that must be given the attention that they deserve. This chapter discusses some of these alternatives and describes self-regulation as an alternative regulatory mechanism that can, in many situations, be more effective and efficient than direct regulation by the government. Literature survey indicates that the regulation of organizational activity is an under-researched area despite the fact that in the U.S., even outside of utilities, a number of industries, such as natural gas, transportation, and banking, have continued to be subject to some form of governmental regulation. A few attempts have been made by economists to deal with the theory and practice of the regulation of natural monopolies such as utilities.

Corporate Strategy: Concepts and its Relevance in the Indian Context

Abstract: Corporate strategy has become a widely used business concept in the industrially advanced countries of the West The ideas on which this concept is based were evolved through field studies of hundreds of business organizations, mostly in the economically advanced countries Some practitioners, considering the difference in the socio-economic and political milieu between developed countries and India, have expressed doubts about the applicability of this concept in the Indian context This paper traces the theoretical origins of the concept of corporate strategy and illustrates with Indian examples that the concept is equally applicable in India Shekhar Chaudhury is a final year student of the Fellow Programme in Management at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad Before joining the programme, he worked for Larsen and Toubro Limited in various functional areas His research interest is in corporate planning, design of complex organizations, and management of technology

Between traditional classification and coordinate indexing

Abstract: An ordering system for a global information network is necessary in order to enable the user to retrieve the particular information he is looking for. Classification has been one of the methods of ordering. The principle of traditional classification has been based on the idea of partitioning the universe of knowledge in mutually exclusive classes, i.e. subjects. A particular topic is defined by narrower classification within a class following the principle of ‘genusspecies’ relationship. Ranganathan's system of faceted classification has only replaced the classification of terms into subjects and sub-subjects by classification of terms into five ambiguous categories. Taube's system of coordinate indexing gives full freedom to the user to combine any number of terms of his choice. To be effective for social sciences such a system has to overcome some difficult problems of semantics. The system MANIS described here maintains the traditional classification and yet allows the user to combine terms of his choice, where the choice is restricted to the terms belonging to the system of traditional classification.

Managing versus Doing in Government

Abstract: It is argued that a large number of public field personnel in India have been associated with doing rather than managing jobs. There is need for conceptualizing the doing and managing tasks and clearly focusing on different types of tasks which involve a high degree of managerial skills and those which do not. Unfortunately, non-realization of this distinction between doing and managing jobs in government has led to wrong selection, training, and placement of public personnel. One is not sure whether public service systems need more of man agers than doers or a varying proportion of both.

Predicting New Product Success: Role of Product Category Related Perceptual Variables

Abstract: Which new products a firm should introduce is a question of considerable importance. It is now well known that new products are difficult to introduce and often fail to to take off. It is also observed that, in certain categories, it is easier to enter the market with new products, while establishing them in other categories poses serious difficulties. This paper is concerned with the decision-making processes of consumers when faced with a new brand situation in a familiar product category. It relates intention to buy a new brand with a number of different perceptual variables regarding the product category and compares these relations across different product categories.

Coaching Stock Utilization on Indian Railways

Abstract: One of the major problems facing the Indian Railways is shortage of coaches for passenger services. The indicator now used is coaching stock utilization which is defined in terms of vehicle kilometers per day per coach. In this paper we develop a more meaningful indicator to monitor operations and predict the efficiency of any proposed modification. With suitable modifications, the same indicator can be used for analysing utilization of other transportation units also. Any meaningful indicator of coaching stock utilization should provide answer to two questions: What is the optimal value for this indicator? How does the actual value compare with the optimal value? The indicator now used does not answer these questions and hence its utility is very limited. It is computed as U=X/H (1)

Some bayes tests and their asymptotic properties for the multivariate, multisample goodness‐of‐fit problem

Abstract: Independent samples are taken from C multivariate populations with continuous but unknown cumulative distribution function c.d.f.). The problem is to test the hypothesis that the C population c.d.f's are identical to a specified c.d.f. We approach this problem by first transforming the data so that the hypothesis being tested is that the common distribution is uniform over a unit hypercube. We then construct some Bayes tests and investigate their asymptotic properties. These tests are based on the asymptotic normality of the number of observations falling in the “asymptotically sufficient groupings”.

Effect of (Sexual Illustrations on Brand–Products Recall

Abstract: Following trends in the western world, Indian marketers have of late resorted to using sex appeal in advertisements. This study was conducted to test a few hypotheses relating to brand recall by broadening the concept of brand recall. Advertisements representing sexual and non-sexual illustrations were used. The study reveals that more correct recalls were made for advertisements containing a non sexual scene than for those with female illustrations of varying suggestiveness. When recall is the primary objective of advertising, human illustrations are more effective than landscapes.

Decentralized Sectors: A Managerial Framework

Abstract: Decentralized industrial sectors occupy a prominent place in many developing economies. This paper explains the rationale for setting up decentralized sectors and illustrates the employment and developmental significance of such sectors in the Indian context. The conceptual framework attempts to illustrate an operating scheme by which various functions like marketing, etc., can be split into purely commercial, purely developmental and development oriented commercial sub-functions.