Showing papers by "Indian Institute of Management Bangalore published in 2006"

Adoption of Bt Cotton and Impact Variability: Insights from India

Abstract: There is a growing body of literature about the impacts of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton in developing countries. While many studies show remarkable benefits for farmers, there are also reports that question these results. Most previous studies consider impacts in deterministic terms, neglecting existing variability. Here we explain the main factors influencing the agronomic and economic outcomes. Apart from differences in pest pressure and patterns of pesticide use, germplasm effects can play an important role. Theoretical arguments are supported by empirical evidence from India. Better understanding of impact variability can help explain some of the paradoxes in the recent controversy over genetically modified crops.

Comparing correlates of organizational citizenship versus in‐role behavior of sales representatives in India

Abstract: Using a sample of 103 Indian supervisor‐pharmaceutical sales representative dyads, this study hypothesized that procedural justice, distributive justice, perceived organizational support, and communication satisfaction with supervisor would have a stronger positive relationship to organizational citizenship behavior than to in‐role behavior. Supportive result was found for one variable, i.e., communication satisfaction with supervisor had a stronger relationship to organizational citizenship behavior.

Engineering the software requirements of nonprofits: a service-learning approach

Abstract: This paper is a cross-study of service-learning projects executed by student groups in a 10-week course on software engineering. The principal benefits of service-learning are demonstrated by the groups in this setting. The course is structured to support the project activities; timely brainstorming and negotiation roleplay exercises help the teams arrive at pragmatic baselines with their clients. The study highlights overlaps in the software requirements of nonprofits. The paper apprises the reader of some common mistakes committed by the various stakeholders, some of which can eventually undermine the project's mission.

Evaluation of e-government systems: project assessment vs development assessment

Abstract: Most reported literature on evaluation of e-government systems tend to focus on narrow aspects of project design and implementation. The larger context of development and related issues are not used for assessment. This paper presents a case for evaluation of e-government projects by using development theory as propounded by Amartya Sen. A single e-government system, the Bhoomi system of Karnataka, India, is used as a case, and it is evaluated using both a project assessment approach and a development assessment approach. The two approaches lead to different conclusions, providing insights as to the value of each.

Intellectual property rights and bio commons: open source and beyond

Abstract: For many years seeds and plant varieties were beyond the purview of intellectual property rights. But since the 1930s intellectual property rights have covered them. Till the advent of trade-related intellectual property rights under the World Trade Organisation, nations had no obligation to extend intellectual property rights to them, unless they were members of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants. Apart from provisions of trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights, changes in laws, technological advances, and judicial interpretations of laws have resulted in the strengthening of the rights of patent holders and breeders, while farmers' rights have been diminished or effectively nullified. This has other implications like restriction on the researchers' freedom to invent and innovate and for North–South trade in seeds and grains, particularly in GM crops such as soya. In this article, open source is suggested as a solution and a BioLinux model is put forth as an alternative. While it is not claimed that open source will be a panacea, this article highlights some of the possibilities that are opened up by open source. It also suggests that open source will be very useful in finding a solution to anti-commons problems while promoting innovations.

Antecedents and Consequences of 'Burnout' In Services Personnel: A Case of Indian Software Professionals

Abstract: Past studies reveal that services professionals experience high level of burnout, which has negative physical, emotional and interpersonal consequences. This study focuses on organizational politics and coordination expertise, which can cause burnout but have been ignored in the extant literature. Further, the relative influence of components of burnout on individual work performance is also investigated. This study is conducted in the context of Indian software services industry, which has provided high impetus to the Indian economy in a very short period of time through provision of manpower services. It is therefore important to study the factors, which influences the performance of individuals working in this industry. The proposed model is tested using structural equation modeling. Results suggests that software professional's perception of higher level of organizational politics has adverse influence on their burnout level, but a higher level of coordination expertise in teams, reduces burnout level. Although most of the hypotheses are supported, some of the hypotheses are found to be quite contradictory, which further raises some interesting research issues for future research. Finally, a number of implications based on these findings are discussed.

Management Education in India: A Perspective on Quality Improvement

Abstract: The paper reviews the status of Management Education in India and finds that most schools are trapped in a cost-quality vicious cycle, even though there are few institutions of excellence that are comparable to the best in the class. The constraints and opportunities facing the different types of business schools in India are briefly discussed and recommendations are made for improving their performance through a variety of internationally bench-marked programs and activities.

Development of Hybrid Classification Methodology for Mining Skewed Data Sets - A Case Study of Indian Customs Data

Abstract: At present, detecting customs declaration frauds with limited examination of imported goods by available scarce resources is posing considerable challenge to the customs authorities world over. Data mining techniques could be utilized to sift through the past data and develop predictive model for examination of limited goods with higher probability of fraud. However, this requires handling large, skewed data sets with variable error of each misclassification. Literature suggests various data level and algorithm level interventions for addressing these issues. Successive application of combination of both the types of interventions on the classification tree technique is devised in this paper to improve the predictive accuracy of the model. Furthermore, the predictions of this classification tree model are then fed into an artificial neural classification model, which gives the flexibility to modulate the predictive accuracy of a particular class label to suit the end objective. This methodology can be effectively applied to other similar situations such as detecting insurance fraud, credit card fraud, telecom churning and frauds etc.

Understanding Employee Cycle Through Exit Interviews: Conceptual Framework And Case Illustration

Abstract: In this age of "knowledge workers", people are the most important assets for the continual success of the organizations. The big question for organizations is "What are the determinant factors to attract and retain the best talent". Nothing less than a complete system of employee communication tools could serve to enhance an organization's ability to retain its top talent. These communication tools are employed by organizations to understand the employee cycle, which helps in attracting and retaining talent by providing best fit. This paper conceptualizes the methodology for understanding the employee cycle by using the information generated through the exit interviews. Previous research has focused on quantitative analysis of the data collected through exit interviews ignoring the insights that qualitative analysis could have provided. Qualitative data collected through open-ended questions are source of well-grounded and rich descriptions, and explanations of processes in identifiable local contexts. With qualitative data one can preserve chronological flow, see precisely the consequences of each event, and derive fruitful explanations. Qualitative research framework to analyze the rich data collected through exit interviews is developed to gain a holistic (systematic, encompassing and integrated) overview of the employee cycle: its logic, its arrangements, and its explicit and implicit rules. The framework developed is illustrated by taking a case of a Software Company in India.

Derivatives in Asia-Pacific Markets:

Abstract: Asian derivative markets today account for one-third of the worldwide foreign exchange and over 40 per cent of equity derivative trading. Korea hosts the world’s largest derivative exchanges, while India has the world’s fastest growing exchange. Derivatives have made Asian capital markets more competitive. They also have significant developmental benefits, for example, as hedging tools for commodity producers and as cheaper financing tools for corporations. Policymakers all around the world have learned to emphasise good regulation, governance and risk management through central counterparties in order to minimise potential threats to financial stability. BIS reports that the over-the-counter (OTC) derivative markets have grown ten-fold over

Use of ICTs for Encouraging Participative Development: A Critique of the Indian Experiment

Abstract: The present fascination of governments with use of ICTs for propelling development has not led to an improvement in the quality of life of a significant number of people. It becomes important to understand the conception of development that gets invoked in the design of such interventions. In this paper, we look at historical trajectories guiding the policy space to gain insights into the current imperatives motivating ICT usage. Justification for using ICTs has often been attributed to its inherent potential for enabling beneficiary participation. However, not many project designs, especially those in India, reflect such a motivation. We try to investigate whether the ICT policy of the Indian government attempts to encourage participatory development with specific reference to the relations between the governments at the centre and the provinces.

Novel organization form as a growth driver

Abstract: Scholars have conceptualized the competitive landscape confronting modem organizations as business ecosystems. An ecosystem is well suited to describe the complex interdependencies that exist among specialist organizations operating in a dynamic environment. Is a business ecosystem similar to a network form of organization? We do not think so. Based on our research on the relational network that exists between Indian software service organizations and their clients, we distill two features that distinguish a business ecosystem from traditional networks. These are (1) the ability of the relationship to simultaneously accommodate collaboration - a definitive feature of networks (Powell, 1990) with competition, a definitive feature of markets and (2) the involuntary nature of the interdependencies that prevail amoog the network players. We present our arguments through description and analysis of a novel organization form witnessed in the Indian software services industry - the Offshore Development Centre. In the process, we locate the competitive advantage of Indian software services organizations in their ability to create innovative organization structures and processes that enabled them to achieve rapid scaling even in the face of business volatility and technology chum.

Corporation and its Shareholders: What Should B-Schools Teach?.

Abstract: Presents a colloquium on the role of business schools in teaching students about the kind of objectives the top managers should pursue. Principles behind the corporation and its shareholders; Purpose of business school instruction; Need for business schools to articulate their position and reflect the same in their curriculum, culture and incentive and punishment systems.

Investigations into Relatedness-based Interestingness of Association Rules: A Transaction-driven Analysis

Abstract: An important problem in Association Rule (AR) mining is the identification of interesting ARs. In a retail market basket context, items may be related through various relationships like mutual interaction, `substitutability? and `complementarity ?. We deJine them and present a classification of these relationships. We propose `Item-Relatedness' of an item-pair as a composite of these relationships. We then present a structural decomposition of the relatedness of an item pair, based on its co-occurring transactions, co-occurring and non co-occurring item-neighborhoods. We identify those relationships that can be discerned solely from transaction data analysis. ARs that contain unrelated or weakly related item-pairs are likely to be interesting. The structural decomposition helps in clarifying components of relatedness. We finally analyze a typical scenario that contains objects revealing various shades of relatedness.

From Country of Origin Liability to Country of Origin Advantage

Abstract: 'Liability of origin' and resource constraints make it extremely challenging for firms from emerging economies to participate in advanced markets This paper describes how firms from the Indian software and pharmaceutical industries overcame such challenges by leveraging renowned public institutions and competed successfully in advanced markets Their success transformed India into a location of business advantage compelling global competitors in these industries to modify their business models This research contributes to theory building about internationalization of firms from emerging economies - a relatively unexplored domain in international business research

How Much Demand Should be Fulfilled

Abstract: We study the inventory replenishment of a product whose demand can be manipulated by restricting the supply. This research is motivated by a novel marketing tactic employed by manufacturers of fashion and luxury items. Such a tactic combines innovative marketing with deliberate understocking in an attempt to create shortages (i.e., waitlists) that add to the allure and sense of exclusivity of a product and stimulate its demand. We model the problem as a finite-horizon, periodic-review system where demand in each period is a decreasing function of the net ending inventory in the previous period. Although the optimal structure can be complex in general, under certain conditions we are able to characterize the optimal policy as a state-dependent, monotone, base-stock policy. We compare this policy with the optimal policy for the case in which demand is independent of the net inventory. We also show that understocking is optimal in various scenarios. We then propose a novel strategy, called the inventory-withholding strategy, to further explore the wait-list effect by making customers wait even when there is inventory on hand to satisfy them. Our numerical experiments study the impact of various model parameters in combination with the wait-list effect on the optimal policy and the corresponding expected profits.

Internationalization from Emerging Nations: Evidence of Strategic Entrepreneurship

Abstract: This study focuses on firms from emerging economies competing in global markets. Such internationalization initiatives are intensely risky because of certain characteristics specific to emerging nations such as resource scarcity. Drawing inferences from our case based research on two firms from the Indian pharmaceutical industry, we propose that firms need to exhibit entrepreneurial behaviour in order to grapple with the risks that they confront while entering and competing in highly advanced global markets. Specifically, firms were found to adopt a strategy of 'fund as you go' to overcome resource constraints over and above the model of 'learn as you go', as suggested by incremental models of internationalization. Case analysis, however, reveals that entrepreneurial behaviour must be complemented by strategic behaviour. Strategic entrepreneurship, i.e., an integration of entrepreneurial and strategic behaviour was found to create sustainable competitive positions in advanced international markets. Propositions are developed pertaining to internationalization efforts of firms from emerging markets that contributes to theory building on this relatively unexplored domain of international business.