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The article highlights potential mismeasurement in working capital allocations among academicians and practitioners and revisits the relationship between firms' working capital and productivity, as evident from their values.

The research design acknowledges the relative role of firms' working capital vis-a-vis other assets in generating revenue, thereby effectively accounting for the overall asset efficiency in influencing firm value. The authors use a multivariate framework to draw inferences from the marginal impact of working capital and its components on firm value while controlling for asset utilization.

The authors find that, after accounting for asset utilization, the marginal impact of working capital and its components on firm value is quite weak. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that firms' trade-off between short-term and long-term assets per se should not have any value implications. After controlling for their asset turnovers, the authors find that higher allocations to working capital relative to other assets are not necessarily value-destructive. The findings contrast with the past literature.

The article, through its analytical and empirical insights, suggests that working capital allocations should be measured by managers and academicians relative to firms' other asset rather than their sales. Firm values should, therefore, be compared based on firms' overall asset utilization rather than inter-temporal allocations to short-term versus long-term assets.

Contrary to the existing literature so far, the article explicitly acknowledges the relative role of firms' other assets, and hence the overall asset utilization, to infer the marginal impact of working capital on firm value.

This review article focuses on the factors that affect the selection and implementation of three principles of distributive justice (i.e., equity, equality, and need) to reward systems in group and organizational settings. After presenting an overview of the assumptions, goals, and possible consequences associated with each of the three perspectives, the article then describes the moderating factors influencing distribution rule preferences across four levels of analysis: (1) the interorganizational, (2) the intraorganizational, (3) the work group, and (4) the individual. Some of the variables discussed include cross‐cultural differences, reward system implementation, task interdependency, work group climate, and individual characteristics. This material is then summarized through the use of a new conceptual model for describing allocation rule preferences. The article concludes with suggestions for future research.

During the transition to parenthood, the gender division of paid and unpaid work undergoes a profound redefinition in response to both attitudes and resources. These attitudes may be concordant or discordant between two partners, they may or may not clash with perceived financial or labour market constraints, and they may or may not provoke explicit conflicts and negotiations. In this study, by combining quantitative and qualitative data, we focus on Italian couples with young children or in transition to first child, and we explore what happens when partners have discordant views. The findings show that the division of domestic and care work seems more resistant to change and more responsive to the husband’s attitudes than does the division of paid work, as the latter is mainly driven by the woman’s education and attitudes. The findings also show that very few couples overtly disagree. If they do so, the main issue in dispute is the allocation of domestic work and the main solution consists more in hiring external help than in obtaining the husband’s greater participation. Compared with domestic work, the allocation of care is a less disputed and more flexible issue: when women start negotiations on a more equal sharing, men are more willing to increase their participation. However, when a more equal sharing is not attained, couples’ narratives tend to give the “cause” to the constraints of the man (typically his work) than of the woman, while they point at a redefinition (for the best of the family) of her rather than his preferences.

The purpose of this paper is to study the allocation of time to paid work, unpaid work and non-work by women in Britain in 1998-1999. To infer the labor supply from the other time-use expressions.

The paper uses weekly diary data to estimate the unpaid work and non-work functions. It infers the (residual) paid work expression. As the latter is recovered from uncensored regressions, it makes direct use of the complete set of observations. Hence, it contains more information than the conventional labor supply functions that are estimated from the data obtained from paid work participants via the Tobit and Heckit or selection-bias correction (SBC) techniques.

The women surveyed generally allocated 69 percent of their time toward non-work, 18 percent to unpaid work, and 13 percent to paid work. The non-work function is dominated by the autonomous component, and all three functions depend on subjects’ age, wage, non-labor income, household composition, the unpaid work contributions of adult relatives and region of residence. The unpaid work and non-work functions are more consistent with the SBC rather than the Tobit version of the labor supply. Moreover, the Tobit predicts unrealistic paid work allocations for women engaging in very little non-work.

The unpaid work and non-work functions are regressed separately, as often the case in the literature. Their consideration within a seemingly unrelated regression framework necessitates a reduction in the number of observations to match those considered in the Tobit and SBC versions of the labor supply. Nuances may arise when the time reported in the diaries does not add up to 24 daily hours for all respondents. Knowledge of the recovered regional, age, household member and other effects on women time allocation might had come handy to economic development authorities who sought to attract women out of the household into market production, and from part-time to full-time employment in the context of the 2000-2010 Lisbon Strategy. Similar lessons may be valid today.

The data set derives from a survey that has not been used before. It relies on week-long diaries in order to avoid the occurrence of many zeros in a good number of activities (which is the norm in short diaries), and to ensure the study of a censored time-use function through its uncensored complements. The findings are compared to those of a weekly diary survey conducted in 1987 that solicited similar information. Hence, the study fills a gap in time-use analysis. Identifying the factors which influence the number of hours that women engage in work (both paid and unpaid) and non-work is useful for economic policy purposes. The study exposes a limitation in the conventional estimation of the labor supply which, in turn, casts doubt on the reliability of empirical results for policy making.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a computer simulation model to evaluate the bowl phenomenon and the allocation at the end of the line of stations with either greater mean operation times or higher variability of operation times.

The model was developed on the basis of a realistic case problem and applied to a six‐station assembly line. The evaluation criteria were the: minimization of the total elapsed time; maximization of the average percentage of working time; and minimization of the average time in the system.

The performance of an assembly line with independently normally distributed operation times could be improved by applying the bowl phenomenon. The allocation of large operation mean times to stations located near the end of the line did not produce improved results. Instead a more balanced allocation proved to be more significantly effective. On the other hand, the assignment of larger variability of operation times to the stations near the end of the line improved the performance of the assembly line.

The investigation contributed to the computer simulation approach to solving assembly line problems that dealt with the impact of normally distributed operation times on the bowl phenomenon and assembly lines with increasing mean operation times and higher variability of operation times at the end of the line of stations.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the job satisfaction level of universal bank employees in India. It focusses on identifying the factors of job satisfaction and their influence on the overall job satisfaction of universal bank employees.

Data were collected from a sample of 380 bank employees using convenience sampling technique.

The results of exploratory factor analysis reveal that eight factors, i.e. workplace environment, supervision, cooperation from peers, work discrimination, employee acceptance, work allocation, job security and remuneration extracted as important determinants of job satisfaction. The results of multiple regression analysis shows that supervision, cooperation from peers, work allocation and employee acceptance (independent variables) influences the level of job satisfaction (dependent variable of bank employees.

Since liberalization, banking sector is considered to be one of the major recruiters. People prefer bank as a career and social status. In order to further improve the satisfaction level of bank employees, bank management should provide regular feedback to the employees about their performance. In the absence of feedback, employees will be discouraged because they do not know how they are doing or may believe their contribution is unacknowledged. The most important factor effecting employee satisfaction with their job is their immediate supervisor. Many employees dislike their supervisor though they like the work they do. To make employees happier in their position, stay longer and the most important to ensure that customers receive better services, banks must start improving the management skills of supervisors.

Studies of teamworking suggest that, for it to be successful, fundamental changes must take place in many aspects of an organization’s structure and operations. This study of the Inland Revenue reveals that only in a few aspects does its operation of teamworking follow this model. The range of work is little changed; employees exercise little in the way of new skills; they appear reluctant to adopt responsibility for the work of others; and the performance management system operates on the basis of individual performance. Nonetheless, teamworking appears to work in the Inland Revenue. It does so by having a team rather than an individual allocation of work, and by encouraging individual identity with the team target. This suggests that, although a limited version of teamworking exists, this might be all an organization needs. Thus what is needed is a more sophisticated understanding of teamworking, its objectives, and the relationship between the two.

This study aims to explain how negative workplace interactions are formed by the application of a performance management system (PMS).

The study draws from unique in-depth interviews with service workers who resigned from an accounting shared service centre (SSC), discussing the reasons behind the resignations. Following an abductive approach, organisational justice theory is used to analyse the service workers' perceptions of negative interactions and to link the negative interactions to the use of the PMS.

The findings suggest that negative workplace interactions are characterised by cost consciousness, inequality and competitiveness. These interactions are attributed to the use of a PMS in the centre and are related to perceptions of distributive, procedural and interactional injustice.

Managers and leaders of shared service–type organisations should not rely on PMSs as an all-encompassing solution; instead, they should acknowledge the fairness of the use of PMSs. Moreover, HR professionals should choose and train employees to apply PMSs fairly. Fairness is important in work allocation, resourcing, monitoring, giving feedback, recognising good performance, promotion and interaction between peers.

This study contributes to the literature by taking an overall perspective on PMSs to analyse and explain the unintended negative consequences of a PMS in a highly scripted and monitored work environment that is usually considered appropriate for such a system's use. Through the analysis, the study highlights pitfalls in the use of a PMS and the importance of interactional injustice not only between but also within organisational levels.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the understanding of projects in permanent organizations. Previous research has captured organizational contexts where either a project logic dominates or projects support recurrent, ongoing operations. Through a case study, the author shows how projects and non-projects coexist over time in the core of the organization in a balanced manner, addressing the specific tensions in such an organization.

The author has undertaken a case study of the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate. The analysis is based on several types of data: internal reports, descriptions of structure and roles, internal handbooks and other documents from the period 1998–2018; interviews with ten persons in different roles in the organization; and a survey of 190 employees and middle managers (response rate: 84 percent).

The author finds that the balance of projects and non-project work, work units and rationale has been an institutional and stabile characteristic, rather than a transitory state of a Norwegian state directorate. It is also found that two types of products or set of tasks are reflected in two types of work groups: long-term work groups and project work groups. There is a subjective element regarding whether a new task should be integrated into an existing long-term unit or serve as the basis of creating a new project. The analysis of work organization, leadership and employee perceptions has revealed a number of similarities and differences between the two work contexts: the long-term work groups and the projects. The balance of projects and non-projects is maintained through shared beliefs and the process of allocation of personnel. This balance is threatened through actual practice in the organization.

A case study does not allow for statistical generalizations. The implication of the study is the revelation of a potential research gap “between” a project-based organization (PBO), on the one hand, and a project-supported organization (PSO), on the other hand.

For organizations that combine projects and non-projects in the core, the paper could contribute to the understanding of tensions and the way to handle them, and provide inspiration regarding mechanisms for resource allocation.

This paper identifies and empirically describes an organization where both projects and non-projects are of great importance in the core activities of the firm, thus filling a “gap” between the PBO and PSO. A number of aspects of this organization are analyzed, including how the balance of the two logics has been maintained over the two decades. The study could provide the basis for a number of research questions on the coexistence of and tensions between projects and non-projects in the core of an organization.

A growing body of research finds that gig economy platforms use gamification to enhance managerial control. Focusing on technologically mediated forms of gamification, this literature reveals how platforms mobilize gig workers’ work effort by making the labour process resemble a game. This chapter contends that this tech-centric scholarship fails to fully capture the historical continuities between contemporary and much older occurrences of game-playing at work. Informed by interviews and participatory observations at two food delivery platforms in Amsterdam, I document how these platforms’ piece wage system gives rise to a workplace dynamic in which severely underpaid delivery couriers continuously employ game strategies to maximize their gig income. Reminiscent of observations from the early shop floor ethnographies of the manufacturing industry, I show that the game of gig income maximization operates as an indirect modality of control by (re)aligning the interests of couriers with the interests of capital and by individualizing and depoliticizing couriers’ overall low wage level. I argue that the new, algorithmic technologies expand and intensify the much older forms of gamified control by infusing the organizational activities of shift and task allocation with the logic of the piece wage game and by increasing the possibilities for interaction, direct feedback and immersion. My study contributes to the literature on gamification in the gig economy by interweaving it with the classic observations derived from the manufacturing industry and by developing a conceptualization of gamification in which both capital and labour exercise agency.