Faculty & Research
Fay's probabilistic selling, inventory management research to appear in Management Science
Research by Scott Fay, associate professor of marketing at the Martin J. Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University, and Jinhong Xie, professor and JCPenney Eminent Scholar Chair at the Warrington College of Business Administration at the University of Florida, has been accepted for publication by the academic journal Management Science.
The paper, titled “Timing of Product Allocation: Using Probabilistic Selling to Enhance Inventory Management,” examines whether probabilistic selling (PS) can help a seller better manage their inventories. While it’s intuitive that PS can help in inventory management when allocations are not made until the seller learns which item is less appealing to consumers, the researchers demonstrate that PS can be effective even if the firm allocates products before knowing which product will be more popular, and thus, scarcer.
“It can be more profitable to allocate products to consumers before, rather than after, learning the true demand for a product because it enables the firm to charge higher prices,” says Fay. “Early allocation effectively allows the seller to commit to random assignments, whereas under late allocations, consumers expect to receive a less popular item.”
Fay and Xie also explore how optimal inventory levels change as a seller introduces probabilistic goods, and show that PS can simultaneously increase both profit and social welfare.
You are what you put on display: Byron's research examining personalized workspaces to appear in Academy of Management Journal
Research co-authored by Kris Byron, associate professor and chair of the Department of Management at the Martin J. Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University, and Greg Laurence, an assistant professor of management at the University of Michigan, Flint, has been accepted for publication by the Academy of Management Journal.
The paper, titled, “Diplomas, Photos, & Tchotchkes As Symbolic Self-Representations: Understanding Employees’ Individual Use Of Symbols,” examines, through interviews, workspace inventories and observations, employees’ tendency to personalize their workspaces with photos, memorabilia and other objects—even when rules prohibit it—and what this practice tells us about an individual’s self-expression, and work relationships.
According to the researchers, “…these objects symbolize who employees are and who they want to be. Through these symbolic self-representations, employees find common ground through shared non-work experiences, establish a common understanding of work roles, and share personal information about the self—all of which contribute to relationship development at work. Additionally, they focus attention on goals and establish a desired boundary between work and non-work both of which contribute to employees self-regulation.”
Byron, who received her PhD from Georgia State University, is a 2012-2014 Whitman fellow and an affiliated faculty with the Department of Psychology in the College of Arts and Sciences at Syracuse University. Laurence received his MA (2004) from Syracuse’s Maxwell School, and his MBA (2003) and PhD (2011) degrees from the Whitman School of Management.
Mazumdar research, examining star power and film success, to appear in Management Science
A research paper authored by Tridib Mazumdar, Howard R. Gendal professor of marketing at the Martin J. Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University, has been accepted for publication in the journal Management Science. Mazumdar’s co-authors are Angela Liu and Bo Li, assistant professor of marketing and associate professor of statistics, respectively, at the School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University, Beijing. Liu earned her PhD from the Whitman School in 2010.
The paper, titled, "Counterfactual Decomposition of Movie Star Effects with Star Selection," examines the effects casting has on the financial success of a film. Specifically, the study asks, what would a film’s outcome be if an unknown actor/actress had the lead role, given that individual possessed the same influence on the film’s production characteristics (e.g., script, budget, distribution, genre, etc.) of a well-known actor/actress, or vice versa?
According to the researchers, “The counterfactual analysis shows that the presence of a star does ensure wider release of the movie. However, the movie’s box office revenue is determined almost entirely by the movie characteristics, and stars have no direct residual effect on revenue. The stars’ effect on revenue is therefore indirect, and it comes from the wider release of the movie and the stars’ judicial choices of movie characteristics.”
In addition to his research and teaching, Mazumdar is also director of the Earl V. Snyder Innovation Management Center, dedicated to the study and understanding of innovation management and providing Whitman students with the opportunity to delve into the diverse fields of business, law, engineering, and industrial design through an interdisciplinary curriculum. The innovation management program at the Whitman School was established in 1981, with the dedication of the Snyder Center occurring in 1993 through a generous endowment from the estate of Earl and Josephine Snyder.
Two Whitman faculty to join Journal of Management editorial board
Two faculty members in the Martin J. Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University have accepted invitations to serve on the editorial board of the Journal of Management (JOM). Catherine Maritan, associate professor of management, has been named Senior Associate Editor, second to the Editor-in-Chief. She will be in charge of the strategy, organizational theory, and entrepreneurship sections, with the help of a team of associate editors. Natarajan Balasubramanian, associate professor of management, will be joining the editorial board. Both posts will become effective on July 1, 2014.
Maritan studies strategy processes and her research focuses on how firms build and use capabilities. In addition to the Journal of Management, She serves on the editorial board of the Strategic Management Journal. Her work has been published in leading outlets such as the Academy of Management Journal and Organization Science, as well as the Journal of Management and Strategic Management Journal. Maritan received her PhD in strategic management from the Krannert School of Management at Purdue University.
Balasubramanian’s research interests are in competitive analysis, organizational learning, and innovation. His research has been published in Management Science, Journal of Industrial Economics, Review of Economics and Statistics, and Strategic Management Journal. He is recipient of the prestigious Kauffman Junior Faculty Fellowship in Entrepreneurship Research. Balasubramanian earned his PhD from the Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles.
According to its website, the peer-reviewed, bi-monthly JOM is “committed to publishing scholarly empirical and theoretical research articles that have a high impact on the management field as a whole.” JOM content covers topics such as business strategy and policy, entrepreneurship, human resource management, organizational behavior, organizational theory, and research methods.
Assistant Professor Lihong Liang's research on full value reporting models to appear in Accounting Review
A research paper co-authored by Lihong Liang, assistant professor of accounting at the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University, and Edward Reidl, associate professor of accounting at Boston University, has been accepted for publication in the May 2014 issue of The Accounting Review.
The paper, “The Effect of Fair Value versus Historical Cost Reporting Model on Analyst Forecast Accuracy,” examines how the reporting model for a firm’s operating assets affects analyst forecast accuracy.
“We contrast UK and US investment property firms having real estate as their primary operating asset, exploiting that UK (US) firms report these assets at fair value (historical cost). We assess the accuracy of a balance sheet-based forecast (net asset value, or NAV) and an income statement-based forecast (earnings-per-share, or EPS),” explains Liang.
The authors predict and find higher NAV forecast accuracy for UK relative to US firms and lower EPS forecast accuracy for UK firms when reporting under the full fair value model of IFRS. Overall, they conclude, the results indicate that the fair value reporting model enhances analysts’ ability to forecast the balance sheet, but the full fair value model reduces their ability to forecast net income.
Read the full paper here.
McKelvie, Haynie research examines habitual entrepreneurship and addiction
Research by Alex McKelvie, associate professor of entrepreneurship at the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University, and J. Michael Haynie, Whitman’s Barnes Professor of Entrepreneurship, has been accepted for publication by the Journal of Business Venturing. The paper, titled “Habitual entrepreneurs: Possible cases of addiction to entrepreneurship?” examines the underlying psychological processes that may motivate habitual entrepreneurs to engage in entrepreneurship repeatedly. April J. Spivack is a co-author.
According to the authors, habitual entrepreneurs are entrepreneurs that launch multiple start-ups throughout their careers. Drawing from psychology literature on behavioral addictions, such as workaholism and internet use, McKelvie, Haynie and Spivack develop a framework that defines the symptomatology of “behavioral addiction to entrepreneurship.” Through case studies on two habitual entrepreneurs, they demonstrate how psychological, emotional and physiological aspects of the entrepreneurial experience can create “a behavioral addiction.” Their work, the authors contend, is one of the first to explore the psychological origins of habitual entrepreneurship and possible “dark side” of entrepreneurship outcomes.
Niederhoff research paper accepted for publication in Production and Operations Management
Research by Julie Niederhoff, assistant professor of supply chain management at the Whitman School of Management, and her co-author, Xiaole “Sherri” Wu, an assistant professor in the Department of Management Science at Fudan University, has been accepted for publication in the journal Production and Operations Management.
In the paper, titled "Fairness in Selling to the Newsvendor," the authors use a mathematical model to consider how objectives, other than profit maximization, influence the trade efficiency in a two-party supply chain with uncertain demand. Specifically, the authors contend, when the supplier or buyer of a good is concerned about the fairness of profits for the other party and themselves—for example, in Fair Trade agreements—the system develops prices and order quantities that are often more (but sometimes less) efficient (higher volumes and higher total profits) than would be predicted if all parties were strictly maximizing expected profits. The authors conclude that fairness concerns are most influential in a supply chain with high demand risk.
Production and Operations Management is published by the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS), an international professional organization representing the interests of POM professionals from around the world.