The beginning of the new millennium has been characterized by increased outsourcing and off-shoring of IT work. One outcome of this spurge has been massive layoffs of IT workers, with different companies following different approaches to downsizing IT workers. There is very limited empirical research examining layoff approaches accompanying IT outsourcing decisions and resultant organizational ...

Telstra and the Telecom Corporation of New Zealand (TCNZ) are examined against the backdrop of deregulation, corporatisation and privatisation of telcommunications companies (TelCos) world-wide. This changing context has seen TelCos face new opportunities and threats amid changed product markets. The deregulation of the New Zealand and Australian telecommunications markets has been accompanied ...

In mobile hydraulic systems such as commercial vehicles, hydraulic fluids are splashed and agitated in the reservoirs. To overcome air entrainment in oils, the overall dimensions should enclose a sufficient volume of oil to permit air bubbles to escape passively during the resident time of the fluid in the reservoir. However, in view point of environmental compatibility, energy saving, cost sav...

M layoffs in the 1980s and 1990s spawned a renewed interest in the effects of unemployment not seen since the Depression. Consistent with this focus, however, laid-off managers weren’t studied much after they had obtained new jobs. Reemployment signaled that a new, if somewhat different, equilibrium in employees’ careers had been restored. More recently, though, greater attention is being paid ...

We experimentally test how acceptance thresholds react to the decision of the proposer in a three party ultimatum game to exclude one of two responders with veto power from the game. We elicit responder acceptance thresholds in case the proposer decides to exclude one of them, what increases the available pie, and in case he doesn’t exclude him despite strong monetary incentives. We find that o...

We propose a new theory for downsizing, based on strategic reasons, rather than technological ones. A crisis may lead to a decrease in the willingness to cooperate in an organization, and therefore to a bad equilibrium. A consensual downsizing episode may signal credibly that survivors are willing to cooperate, and thus, it may be optimal and efficiency-enhancing, as the empirical evidence sugg...

Both media coverage and economic research suggest that there has been an increase in corporate restructuring and layoffs at healthy companies. This paper studies the restructuring and downsizing process at a financial services firm and its effects on the firm’s workers, both before and after these layoffs. I show that there were no major changes in pay or turnover leading up to the layoffs. The...