We investigate whether firms' "global engagement", either in the form of exporting or opening up affiliates abroad, is related to the change in their management performance. We use new and unique data from a recent large scale firm survey of management practices in Germany. We calculate...

We investigate whether firms' "global engagement", either in the form of exporting or opening up affiliates abroad, is related to the change in their management performance. Using new and unique data from a recent large scale firm survey of management practices in Germany, we calculate...

Partnering with the Census we implement a new survey of "structured" management practices in 32,000 US manufacturing plants. We find an enormous dispersion of management practices across plants, with 40% of this variation across plants within the same firm. This management variation accounts for...

We develop a new monthly panel survey of business executives and a new question design that elicits subjective probability distributions over own-firm outcomes at a one-year lookahead horizon. Our Survey of Business Uncertainty (SBU) began in 2014 and now covers 1,500 firms drawn from all 50...

There is a lack of comprehensive information on the quality of management in Finland as compared to other countries. Funded by the Strategic Research Council, the Skills, Education and the Future of Work research project has started filling this gap. As part of the project, an extensive survey...

Productivity differences across firms and countries are surprisingly large and persistent. Recent research reveals that the country-level distributions of productivity and quality of management are strikingly similar, suggesting that management practices may play a key role in the determination...

Can decentralization of firms be successful in an environment with weak institutions? Decentralization can do a great job for improving firms' efficiency and competitiveness by creating opportunities for quicker and more competent decision-making and enhancing motivation of employees. However,...

Many scholars underline the significance of clusters for knowledge spillovers and related benefits in terms of innovation and firm competitiveness. The Industry 4.0 technological scenario emphasizes dispersed technologically interconnected activities and distributed knowledge management...

Are some management practices akin to a technology that can explain company and national productivity, or do they simply reflect contingent management styles? We collect data on core management practices from over 11,000 firms in 34 countries. We find large cross-country differences in the...

This paper uses a novel firm level data set to investigate the impact of a unique quality management practice on the production and productivity of a large-scale garments manufacturer in Pakistan. The analysis provides evidence that production complexity is an important element in determining...