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The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of sheepskin effects in the return to education in Japan.

The paper provides a short description of the Japanese schooling and recruitment system. It then describes the data set and the empirical approach. Estimation results are presented for the various specifications. The baseline specification closely follows existing studies for the USA to facilitate comparability across the two countries. The paper further investigates whether there are significant firm‐size differences in the estimated sheepskin effects and whether sheepskin effects disappear with increasing job tenure.

The estimation results indicate that sheepskin effects explain about 50 percent of the total returns to schooling. The paper further finds that education as a signal is only important for workers in small firms with the size of these effects being similar to comparable estimates for the USA. Finally, the estimated degree effects decrease with firm tenure, in particular for small firms. These results could be explained by the particular recruitment system of large firms in Japan, which makes university diploma as a screening device unimportant for large firms and the admission policy of Japanese universities.

By investigating the role of sheepskin effects in a labor market that differs substantially from the labor market in the USA, the paper provides additional insights to the human capital theory‐screening hypothesis debate.

Nobody concerned with political economy can neglect the history of economic doctrines. Structural changes in the economy and society influence economic thinking and, conversely, innovative thought structures and attitudes have almost always forced economic institutions and modes of behaviour to adjust. We learn from the history of economic doctrines how a particular theory emerged and whether, and in which environment, it could take root. We can see how a school evolves out of a common methodological perception and similar techniques of analysis, and how it has to establish itself. The interaction between unresolved problems on the one hand, and the search for better solutions or explanations on the other, leads to a change in paradigma and to the formation of new lines of reasoning. As long as the real world is subject to progress and change scientific search for explanation must out of necessity continue.

The aim of this paper is threefold: to provide an overview of organizational socialization (OS) research; to present a new model of OS focusing on successful outcomes; and finally to draw from both of these to suggest practical steps for both organizations aiming to socialize newcomers, and for newcomers themselves.

A summary literature review of the OS literature post‐entry, focusing on organizational, insider and newcomer actions.

The literature is used to develop and propose a new model of OS success, with five OS success indicators. Testable relationships are proposed between these indicators and both five learning domains and five learning sources.

The research model has not been tested empirically. Further, the fifth success indicator, external representation, is a new and untested concept in the OS literature.

The paper provides a model that managers and newcomers may find useful to successfully negotiate the OS process. Further, the third section of the manuscript extensively discusses practical implications from the model and more broadly from the initial literature review.

The model proposed is novel and raises the important issue of appropriate OS success indicators. New propositions are made regarding relationships between learning sources and domains with these success indicators. This testable model is a valuable resource for researchers. Further, for managers, whether newcomers themselves or responsible for newcomers, the model provides a framework for considering what they are aiming to achieve and how they might get there.

This systematic literature review analyses the determinants and consequences of executive compensation-related shareholder activism and say-on-pay (SOP) votes. The review covers 71 empirical articles published between January 1995 and September 2017. The studies are reviewed within an empirical research framework that separates the reasons for shareholder activism and SOP voting dissent as input factor on the one hand and the consequences of shareholder pressure as output factor on the other. This procedure identifies the five most important groups of factors in the literature: the level and structure of executive compensation, firm characteristics, corporate governance mechanisms, shareholder structure and stakeholders. Of these, executive compensation and firm characteristics are the most frequently examined. Further examination reveals that the key assumptions of neoclassical principal agent theory for both managers and shareholders are not always consistent with recent empirical evidence. First, behavioral aspects (such as the perception of fairness) influence compensation activism and SOP votes. Second, non-financial interests significantly moderate shareholder activism. Insofar, we recommend integrating behavioral and non-financial aspects into the existing research. The implications are analyzed, and new directions for further research are discussed by proposing 19 different research questions.

The purpose of this paper is to provide empirical evidence on the gender wage differential of labor market entrants and the determinants of their starting wages.

The paper makes use of a unique data set on graduates in economics from a large German university that contains detailed information on the graduates’ course of study, their additional qualifications and their transition from university to the labor market. Based on these data, Mincer-type earnings functions as well as wage decompositions as proposed by Blinder (1973) and Oaxaca (1973) are performed.

The paper finds a significant gender wage differential of 7 percent. Blinder-Oaxaca decompositions suggest that the major part of this gap remains unexplained by gender differences in observable characteristics.

The main feature of our analysis – having a highly homogeneous sample of graduates from a single university – comes at the costs of reduced ability to draw generalized conclusions from our findings.

This paper investigates the determinants of entry wages for a homogeneous group of high-skilled workers using a unique data set of graduates in business and economics from a large German university. Concentrating on a highly homogeneous sample limits the problem of unobserved heterogeneity, which results in an overestimation of the unexplained component of standard decompositions analyses. Hence, the finding that a large part of the gender pay gap remains unexplained can be considered as an indicator for gender discrimination in the labor market for economics graduates.

The purpose of this study is to review and understand the dimensionality of hypercompetition, factors causing a hypercompetitive environment and the consequences of hypercompetition on markets. Thereby, the purpose of the study is to cover the main contributors in the research field of hypercompetition and explore their findings and different views on hypercompetition.

Systematically review 131 conceptual and empirical studies published or presented at a conference in the past 25 years, with the focus on the definitions, causes and consequences (or presumed effects) of hypercompetition. In the paper, I follow the well-known systematic literature review method by Tranfield et al. (2003).

The contribution of the study is to advance the knowledge of researchers and managers, in such a way that it becomes easier for them to select relevant variables to measure hypercompetition and identify strategies for gaining temporary competitive advantages in hypercompetitive environments. The construct of hypercompetition required a consolidation of commonalities in the definitions and characteristics used by scholars, to ensure that proper assumptions and variables are being used to measure hypercompetition in future research. Several ways to measure the effects of hypercompetition on firms, industries and individuals have been proposed, but the field still lacks of a clear definition on how to directly measure the construct.

In this paper, I highlight three managerial implications of hypercompetition as follows: action-based strategy, the determinants of hypercompetition and the importance for managers of accurately establishing their firm’s competitive situation.

Previous reviews in the area have either focussed on specific components or effects of hypercompetition. The present study collectively takes into consideration the definitions, causes and consequences of hypercompetition on firms, industries and individuals. The contribution of the paper is to indicate future opportunities and challenges within research on hypercompetition.

This study aims to test the propositions of socialization resources theory, specifically focusing on social capital resources and their prediction of proximal (relational learning) and distal (job satisfaction and intent to quit) outcomes. The authors include the job design characteristic of job autonomy as a moderator of these associations.

Cheung et al.’s (2021) four-step SEM procedure was used to test our mediation, moderation and moderated mediation hypotheses. The sample consisted of newcomers (N = 175) measured at two time points.

The results support the proposed model. Relational learning mediates the associations between social capital resources and outcomes; the utility of these social capital resources is stronger when job autonomy is lower.

Organizations can use social capital resources to reduce newcomers' uncertainty during socialization, facilitating learning and positive outcomes. Organizations should also carefully consider the amount of job autonomy they grant to newcomers, as too much can be detrimental.

Despite the acknowledged importance of workplace resources and relationships, few studies have focused on social resources provided during socialization. Moreover, job design is rarely included in socialization research, despite its influence on workplace processes. Thus, this study provides information about two novel areas of investigation: socially-oriented socialization resources and the impact of job autonomy.

A collection of essays by a social economist seeking to balance economics as a science of means with the values deemed necessary to man′s finding the good life and society enduring as a civilized instrumentality. Looks for authority to great men of the past and to today′s moral philosopher: man is an ethical animal. The 13 essays are: 1. Evolutionary Economics: The End of It All? which challenges the view that Darwinism destroyed belief in a universe of purpose and design; 2. Schmoller′s Political Economy: Its Psychic, Moral and Legal Foundations, which centres on the belief that time‐honoured ethical values prevail in an economy formed by ties of common sentiment, ideas, customs and laws; 3. Adam Smith by Gustav von Schmoller – Schmoller rejects Smith′s natural law and sees him as simply spreading the message of Calvinism; 4. Pierre‐Joseph Proudhon, Socialist – Karl Marx, Communist: A Comparison; 5. Marxism and the Instauration of Man, which raises the question for Marx: is the flowering of the new man in Communist society the ultimate end to the dialectical movement of history?; 6. Ethical Progress and Economic Growth in Western Civilization; 7. Ethical Principles in American Society: An Appraisal; 8. The Ugent Need for a Consensus on Moral Values, which focuses on the real dangers inherent in there being no consensus on moral values; 9. Human Resources and the Good Society – man is not to be treated as an economic resource; man′s moral and material wellbeing is the goal; 10. The Social Economist on the Modern Dilemma: Ethical Dwarfs and Nuclear Giants, which argues that it is imperative to distinguish good from evil and to act accordingly: existentialism, situation ethics and evolutionary ethics savour of nihilism; 11. Ethical Principles: The Economist′s Quandary, which is the difficulty of balancing the claims of disinterested science and of the urge to better the human condition; 12. The Role of Government in the Advancement of Cultural Values, which discusses censorship and the funding of art against the background of the US Helms Amendment; 13. Man at the Crossroads draws earlier themes together; the author makes the case for rejecting determinism and the “operant conditioning” of the Skinner school in favour of the moral progress of autonomous man through adherence to traditional ethical values.

Socialization is one of the fundamental processes that define how collectivities emerge. Socialization underpins the social structures that shape not only how social actors interact in community but also the boundaries of action and the rules of engagement. In the context of organizations, socialization is a process that significantly shapes organization in the way core practices shape how things are done and why they are done in particular ways. This emphasis on consistency within and between practices is seen to be greatly facilitated by specific practices like staff induction. The purpose of this paper is to review the current conceptual and empirical research on staff induction as a process of organizational socialization and outlines some of the areas for future research particularly if a social practice perspective is adopted.

The paper presents a systematic review of the relevant literature on organizational socialization and staff induction and outlines themes to which the debate can usefully be extended.

This paper focuses on how staff induction practices provide valuable insights about how social agents (especially newcomers) get socialized in organizations.

This paper provides a foundation for the various staff induction practices that other papers in this issue will be presenting. By outlining the current debate and insights from previous empirical research on staff induction, the objective is to extend the debate by outlining some new avenues for research that papers in the special issue both respond to and further explicate.

This paper explores staff induction and organizational socialization as a practice that can provide new insights into the dynamics of social interaction within organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to present researcher's reflexive writing about emergent events in research collaborations as a way of responding to the process-figurational sociology of Norbert Elias in the practice of organizational ethnography.

Drawing parallels between Norbert Elias' figurative account of social life and auto-ethnographic methodology, this paper re-articulates the entanglement of social researchers in organizational ethnographic work. Auto-ethnographic narration is explored as means to inquire from within the emerging relational complexity constituted by organizational dynamics. Writing about emergent events in the research process becomes a way of inquiring into the social figurations between the involved stakeholders; thus nurturing sense-making and increasing the awareness and sensitivity of the researcher to her own entanglement with the relational complexity of the organization under study.

In the paper, we argue that the writing of auto-ethnographic narratives of emergent field encounters is a process of inquiry that continuously depicts the temporal development of the relational complexity in organizations. Viewing that from the perspective of Elias' concept of figuration, we find a common commitment to the processual nature of research processes, which insists on moving beyond objectifying empirical insights.

This paper encourages awareness of the interdependency between ourselves as social researchers and field actors as we engage with the field. It moves beyond simplifying the ethnographic research agenda to that of “studying” and “describing” organizations. It offers unique insights into the organizational context, and increased sensitivity toward the social entanglement of the experiences that we, ourselves, as researchers are part of.