Our Research:
Publication Types: |
Productivity and Performance
Within AIM we are seeking to unpack the productivity problem. Initial research explored the sectors that contribute most to the productivity gap and observed that while the size of the gap has remained relatively constant in the last decade, the relative productivity performance of different sectors in the UK has changed markedly (Griffith et al 2003).
Productivity and Performance Projects:
Rachel Griffith and Mari Sako - Business Service Sectors
This project will explore the determinants of this growth. The sorts of factors will focus on include changes in the composition of activities undertaken within the sectors, change in the competition and the entry and exit of plants, improved efficiency due to scale effects, the adoption of new technologies along with other factors.
This work will develop and extend current economic models of firm's behaviour and the boundaries of the firm, based largely on the Property Rights Theory of the firm. The model will address the issues around what determines why some managers outsource but others don't and what are the main costs and benefits of outsourcing?
This project will extend a previous ESRC-funded study, which called for the dimensions of consumer choice it had identified to be developed into valid, and reliable quantitative measures of the choices brought about by retail competition at the micro-level (see Clarke et al, 2006; Jackson et al, 2006).
These issues will be addressed by developing robust consumer-based measures of local retail competition using the differences between actual and theoretical choices of different groups of consumers to develop insight into the effect of local store assortment on consumer perceptions of the adequacy, or inadequacy, of retail provisions.
AIM's Deputy Director, Andy Neely and AIM Senior Fellow, Rachel Griffith led the study which examined the launch of performance measurement systems modeled on the Balanced Scorecard at the international building product firms, the Worseley Group.The Balanced Scorecard is one of the most widely used management performance tools in the world, made popular by Professor Robert Kaplan and consultant, David Norton.
This study comprises an academic re-analysis and extensive of the first ever-major longitudinal investigation into ways in which individual and group perceptions of competition impact on the development of strategy at the individual, group and industry levels of analysis.
This project will study the links between managerial practices and UK productivity - initially in the manufacturing sector, but later in the service sector. It will link managerial databases with government productivity databases in manufacturing.
Using OECD data, this project will make international comparisons of productivity using micro data for as many industries as possible, comparing entry and exit rates, cohort productivity rates and long tails.
Theoretical work on the impact of policies that affect the institutional and economic environment in which firms operate on the incentives firms face to innovate and adopt best practice has made contradictory predictions. Empirical work has largely been at odds with the dominant theories.
The study is analysing three sectors (food manufacturing, ICT, and the media). A total of 89 firms are being studied, embracing a detailed questionnaire survey of 384 employees. Issues addressed include: the quality of jobs; firm's employment strategies; and links with business networks.
In this research we aim to understand the impact of outsourcing on plant and firm level productivity. While outsourcing is accepted as a growing phenomenon there is little systematic quantification of what types of activities and to whom.
What are the drivers of productivity in retail? This research aims to improve our understanding of what behaviours and businesses processes might be contributing to the underperformance of this sector in the UK. We will compare firms and consumer behaviour in the UK to the US using micro data.
Survey of MNCs with UK operation, based on first reliable population of MNCs. The focus is 4 sets of HR practices and the degree of local decision-making autonomy, together with the organizational and structural context of these practices.
Analytical and conceptual studies of the organization of conflict and co-operation in the workplace, together with links between workplaces and firms and markets. The project builds on observational studies of workplaces, conducted by the authors and others, to develop a theoretical framework.
Nick Bloom - Productivity, Management Practises
This project develops an international management data set to address such questions, building on the authors’ previous work that surveyed management practices in around 750 medium-sized manufacturing firms in the UK, France, Germany and the US. This fellowship enhances the previous project in three ways.
This project uses the Survey of Employment Tribunal Applications to access the distinctive experience of small firms. Small firms are predicted (1) to experience more claims than large ones, (2) to be subject to particular types of claim, (3) to be more likely to settle prior to reaching a tribunal, and (4) to be more likely to lose those cases reaching a tribunal.
The analystical nature of the field of employment relations, including the contribution to critical realism; the public policy implications.
Why do some firms create more knowledge than others? In this paper we estimate knowledge production functions for a cross- section of UK firms covering their operations from 1998 through to 2000. We focus in particular on the hypothesis from the trade literature that globally engaged firms - wither multinationals or exporters - have access to larger knowledge stocks.
This research aims to provide a context for many of the AIM research projects and help us gain a deeper understanding of why UK productivity continues to lag behind other major industrial economies. We began by providing a sectoral decomposition of the UK productivity gap with the US.
Developing new products and services often requires organisations to work and share ideas with many different organisations. However, many organisations appear to suffer from the 'not invented here' syndrome, closing themselves off from opportunities to collaborate with those outside their firm. In order to overcome this myopia, organisations have been advised to become 'open innovators', building new collaborative relationships with many external actors.
This research programme attempts to investigate the nature of long-run technological change and productivity growth in service industries, and to establish whether and how they differ from manufacturing, by linking qualitative and quantitative expertise from three different disciplines: business history/management science (organisation level), industrial economics (industry level), and economic history (long-run productivity effect on economy).
For further information relating to Productivity and Performance Projects, please contact aim@wbs.ac.uk
This project will extend a previous ESRC-funded study, which called for the dimensions of consumer choice it had identified to be developed into valid, and reliable quantitative measures of the choices brought about by retail competition at the micro-level (see Clarke et al, 2006; Jackson et al, 2006).
These issues will be addressed by developing robust consumer-based measures of local retail competition using the differences between actual and theoretical choices of different groups of consumers to develop insight into the effect of local store assortment on consumer perceptions of the adequacy, or inadequacy, of retail provisions.
AIM's Deputy Director, Andy Neely and AIM Senior Fellow, Rachel Griffith led the study which examined the launch of performance measurement systems modeled on the Balanced Scorecard at the international building product firms, the Worseley Group.The Balanced Scorecard is one of the most widely used management performance tools in the world, made popular by Professor Robert Kaplan and consultant, David Norton.
This study comprises an academic re-analysis and extensive of the first ever-major longitudinal investigation into ways in which individual and group perceptions of competition impact on the development of strategy at the individual, group and industry levels of analysis.
This project will study the links between managerial practices and UK productivity - initially in the manufacturing sector, but later in the service sector. It will link managerial databases with government productivity databases in manufacturing.
Using OECD data, this project will make international comparisons of productivity using micro data for as many industries as possible, comparing entry and exit rates, cohort productivity rates and long tails.
Theoretical work on the impact of policies that affect the institutional and economic environment in which firms operate on the incentives firms face to innovate and adopt best practice has made contradictory predictions. Empirical work has largely been at odds with the dominant theories.
The study is analysing three sectors (food manufacturing, ICT, and the media). A total of 89 firms are being studied, embracing a detailed questionnaire survey of 384 employees. Issues addressed include: the quality of jobs; firm's employment strategies; and links with business networks.
In this research we aim to understand the impact of outsourcing on plant and firm level productivity. While outsourcing is accepted as a growing phenomenon there is little systematic quantification of what types of activities and to whom.
What are the drivers of productivity in retail? This research aims to improve our understanding of what behaviours and businesses processes might be contributing to the underperformance of this sector in the UK. We will compare firms and consumer behaviour in the UK to the US using micro data.
Survey of MNCs with UK operation, based on first reliable population of MNCs. The focus is 4 sets of HR practices and the degree of local decision-making autonomy, together with the organizational and structural context of these practices.
Analytical and conceptual studies of the organization of conflict and co-operation in the workplace, together with links between workplaces and firms and markets. The project builds on observational studies of workplaces, conducted by the authors and others, to develop a theoretical framework.
Nick Bloom - Productivity, Management Practises
This project develops an international management data set to address such questions, building on the authors’ previous work that surveyed management practices in around 750 medium-sized manufacturing firms in the UK, France, Germany and the US. This fellowship enhances the previous project in three ways.
This project uses the Survey of Employment Tribunal Applications to access the distinctive experience of small firms. Small firms are predicted (1) to experience more claims than large ones, (2) to be subject to particular types of claim, (3) to be more likely to settle prior to reaching a tribunal, and (4) to be more likely to lose those cases reaching a tribunal.
The analystical nature of the field of employment relations, including the contribution to critical realism; the public policy implications.
Why do some firms create more knowledge than others? In this paper we estimate knowledge production functions for a cross- section of UK firms covering their operations from 1998 through to 2000. We focus in particular on the hypothesis from the trade literature that globally engaged firms - wither multinationals or exporters - have access to larger knowledge stocks.
This research aims to provide a context for many of the AIM research projects and help us gain a deeper understanding of why UK productivity continues to lag behind other major industrial economies. We began by providing a sectoral decomposition of the UK productivity gap with the US.
Developing new products and services often requires organisations to work and share ideas with many different organisations. However, many organisations appear to suffer from the 'not invented here' syndrome, closing themselves off from opportunities to collaborate with those outside their firm. In order to overcome this myopia, organisations have been advised to become 'open innovators', building new collaborative relationships with many external actors.
This research programme attempts to investigate the nature of long-run technological change and productivity growth in service industries, and to establish whether and how they differ from manufacturing, by linking qualitative and quantitative expertise from three different disciplines: business history/management science (organisation level), industrial economics (industry level), and economic history (long-run productivity effect on economy).
For further information relating to Productivity and Performance Projects, please contact aim@wbs.ac.uk
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