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The purpose of this paper is to propose and evaluate a new matching sample comparison method, the industry size peer matching method.

Based on archival financial data from Compustat and econometric methods, the paper first validates that such a method will result in firms being divided into more homogenous groups, making peer‐performance comparison more meaningful. Then it compares this new peer matching method with previous methods through two resource‐based related studies in the IT valuation context.

The results show that the industry size matching method is a better method because: it is theoretically grounded, addressing industry, size, and random shock effects and, at the same time, avoids the selection bias caused by using a single firm as benchmark; and empirically such a technique results in more homogeneous groups and can explain more firm‐level returns than the industry‐only classification.

Matched sample comparison group analysis is widely used in both academy and industry. The paper's theoretically grounds and empirically validated matching sample comparison method provides researchers and practitioners with a tool for their future research, performance evaluation, earning management detection, or compensation contract design, when selecting the right peers is called for.

This study evaluated the effectiveness of prison‐based cognitive skills programmes in England and Wales in reducing reconviction. Two‐year reconviction rates were compared for adult male offenders who had participated in a cognitive skills programme between 1996 and 1998 (N = 649) and matched adult male offenders who had not participated (N = 1,947). There were no significant differences in the rates of reconviction between the treatment and matched comparisons. This contrasts with a previous study of prison‐based cognitive skills programmes. Possible explanations for the current finding are discussed. For example, these results may merely reflect expected variation; international experience mirrors the variable reductions in reconviction rates found so far in the evaluation of prison‐based programmes. This evaluation relates to a period when programmes were expanded rapidly, and this may have affected the quality of programme delivery.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the state funded business counselling on firm growth.

A quasi-experimental difference-in-difference estimation of treatment effects, using a matched sample of comparable untreated firms.

Firms that have been granted counselling vouchers have a higher growth in value added than comparable untreated firms. This effect is mainly due to increased use of labour and capital, rather than increased efficiency. Results are upwardly biased due to sample selection among treated firms.

An improved strategy for identifying potential comparison firms from the pool of all firms may be necessary for further impact evaluations on business development programmes.

Policy makers may have to reconsider the programme design, since the programme currently suffer from a large potential for crowding-out, and low additional value of business counselling.

The paper uses a matching procedure in order to infer causal effects of business counselling and compares the effect of, respectively, contamination and selection on estimated impact on firm growth and survival. The data used are an original, rich micro-level data set on state investment support to businesses.

This paper aims to examine the impact of vocational training on unemployed workers not typically studied: women enrolled in engineering or computer programming training and high school dropouts.

Using data from New Jersey's Individual Training Grant (ITG) program and a quasi‐experimental design, the study compares the ITG groups' re‐employment and wage recovery rates with a matched comparison group.

The article finds that women enrolled in the male‐dominated fields of engineering or computer programming experience re‐employment rates that are lower than or similar to those in the comparison group, but they experience higher wage recovery in 8th and 12th quarters after claiming unemployment insurance (UI). Hispanic high school dropouts experience both higher re‐employment and wage recovery rates than their comparison group, but the wage recovery advantage disappears when those enrolled in truck driving training are removed from the sample. Further, white and black high school dropouts experience no re‐employment or wage recovery advantage. For all participants, the study finds participants experience a higher re‐employment rate than the comparison group beginning in the fifth quarter and experience no wage recovery advantage.

To address the concern of selection bias, a difference‐in‐difference wage model controls for time‐variant differences in unobservables and an employment regression model controls for remaining differences in the matching variables.

These results suggest that training improves re‐employment chances and that type of training matters with respect to wage recovery. In this sample, those enrolled in truck driving training, engineering, and computer programming tended to experience higher wage recovery than their comparison group.

This paper examines the impact of vocational training on unemployed workers not typically studied.

In this chapter, we evaluate the employment effects of job-creation schemes (JCS) on the participating individuals in Germany. JCS are a major element of active labour market policy in Germany and are targeted at long-term unemployed and other hard-to-place individuals. Access to very informative administrative data of the Federal Employment Agency justifies the application of a matching estimator and allows us to account for individual (group-specific) and regional effect heterogeneity. We extend previous studies for Germany in four directions. First, we are able to evaluate the effects on regular (unsubsidised) employment. Second, we observe the outcomes of participants and non-participants for nearly three years after the programme starts and can therefore analyse medium-term effects. Third, we test the sensitivity of the results with respect to various decisions that have to be made during implementation of the matching estimator. Finally, we check if a possible occurrence of a specific form of ‘unobserved heterogeneity’ distorts our interpretation. The overall results are rather discouraging, since the employment effects are negative or insignificant for most of the analysed groups. One exception are long-term unemployed individuals who benefit from participation at the end of our observation period. Hence, one policy implication is to address the programmes to this problem group more closely.

This is a longitudinal study exploring the effect of ISO 9000 certification on firm's financial performance in the pre-crisis period and the 2008 financial crisis period.

The empirical analysis is based on a 22-year dataset with balance sheet data from 136 Greek listed firms covering the period 1992–2013. A matching technique is applied to properly estimate potential differences in the impact of ISO 9000 on firm's financial performance between the groups of certified and matched non-certified (control) firms in the entire period but, most importantly, in pre-crisis vs crisis periods, using the difference-in-differences econometric approach.

The findings indicate that certified firms exhibit significantly higher financial performance relative to the matched non-certified group in both the pre-crisis and crisis periods, which tends to persist for several years post-certification. The financial crisis has a negative and statistically significant effect on firm performance in both the certified and matched non-certified groups, which nevertheless did not differ significantly between them. Controlling for sectoral and technological differences did not harm the higher performance of certified firms relative to the matched control peers. The results remain in the same direction when the authors test the ISO 9000 effect in the sub-group of certified firms that obtained the certification at the firm-level.

The study is original in its sample design and hypothesis testing. The matched sample created from a sufficiently long and continuous time dataset enabled the authors to properly estimate firm performance differences of ISO 9000 between pre-crisis and crisis periods. Of additional value is the testing of sectoral/technological differences and the distinction between firm-level and plant-level certification.

The purpose of this paper is to report the results of a matched sample comparison group study of elements of organizational culture that enable knowledge processes to drive superior firm performance.

A matched sample comparison group approach was used to compare firm performance among matched pairs of public companies. Companies demonstrating high levels of trust (benchmark group) were matched with firms of similar size in the same industries demonstrating lower levels of trust (control group).

The benchmark group generated significantly superior value, operating performance, and had higher average annual growth rates than matching firms in the control group. Firms with higher relative levels of trust embedded in the organizational culture are more likely to outperform similar firms with lower levels of trust.

The findings are based on surveys and financial performance of companies with securities traded on stock exchanges in the USA and may not represent other organizational forms, other geographic, economic, or cultural environments.

This study begins to identify a link between knowledge management, organizational learning, and knowledge creation (collectively knowledge processes) with firm performance.

Identifying elements of organizational culture that link knowledge processes with firm performance is essential to developing a leadership model that reinforces enabling cultural attributes.

Many researchers have identified a lack of empirical research linking knowledge processes with firm performance. This study begins to fill the research gap with evidence that elements of organizational culture, specifically trust, enable firms to convert knowledge and learning initiatives into tangible performance recognized by financial markets.

There is a widely held belief that open government data (OGD) have the potential to generate both economic and social value. This study aims to empirically unpack the relationship between OGD, diversification activities and innovation in the pursuit of economic value creation by firms.

Using a matched sample comparison method and difference-in-differences analyses, the authors study the impact of OGD on innovation over time in the USA. The authors considered the open government directive in the end of 2009 in the USA as a policy intervention and collected 10 years of financial data of 79 firms that use OGD and 79 matched control firms in the USA. The authors compare US firms using OGD, with matched control firms, regarding the firms’ level of product diversification as a measure of innovative use of OGD.

The authors provide empirical evidence that OGD policy contributes toward innovation, and hence economic value creation, through product diversification. Firms that leverage OGD show superior product diversification in comparison to the matching control firms. The results suggest that OGD contribute to firms’ innovation and pursuit of economic value, as evidenced by their increased product diversification.

Although the extant literature concerning OGD has underscored the impact of OGD on innovation and economic value generation, there is a lack of empirical evidence in the literature. This study seeks to add to the extant literature by providing empirical evidence that contributes to the understanding of the relationship between OGD, diversification and innovation in the pursuit of economic value creation.

Jim Collins' Good to Great is but one of many popular press books on management. In his book, Collins discusses the keys to success for today's corporations. Many managers flocked to bookstores to discover what they might be missing in making their organization great. This paper aims to use methodologies more commonly found in the finance literature to validate the results of Collins' study.

This paper uses methodologies more commonly found in finance literature (e.g. event study methodology, Fama‐French three‐factor model with momentum, buy‐and‐hold abnormal returns) to validate the results of Collins' study.

The results show that the Good to Great firms had unexceptional performance when compared to other benchmark lists of firms, on an ex‐ante or ex‐post basis.

From a management perspective, the advice that one might obtain from Good to Great should be carefully examined by managers before they implement it, only to find that great is not really so great.

The paper is original in its methodological design and is valuable to managers who are seeking advice for opportunities that enhance shareholder wealth.

Lechner and Miquel (2001) approached the causal analysis of sequences of interventions from a potential outcome perspective based on selection-on-observables-type assumptions (sequential conditional independence assumptions). Lechner (2004) proposed matching estimators for this framework. However, many practical issues that might have substantial consequences for the interpretation of the results have not been thoroughly investigated so far. This chapter discusses some of these practical issues. The discussion is related to estimates based on an artificial data set for which the true values of the parameters are known and that shares many features of data that could be used for an empirical dynamic matching analysis.