Executive Appearance

• June 13th, 2024
• in Uncategorized

Like it or not, it is generally agreed that appearance does matter. Conventionally attractive people tend to fare a little better in business and in life in general. For instance, it has been observed that good looking people tend to enjoy benefits that are less available to average looking people, like more prestigious work, higher pay, and more professional respect and influence. Still, researchers are continuing to discover how and where appearance matters in business, and perhaps most importantly, whether it should matter at all. Does it merely reflect a possibly outdated bias like the “macho leader” one, or does personal appearance actually predict important outcomes, like executive performance?

When Everyone Loses Their Jobs, Do Women Fare Worse Than Men?

• May 2nd, 2024
• in Uncategorized

When a firm is acquired, roughly 90 percent of managers are commonly laid off, propelling many of them—men and women—into the job market. What happens to female senior managers when firms are acquired? Do they land comparable positions to their male counterparts?

Often, unfortunately, no, according to a recently published paper authored by experts in The University of Alabama’s Culverhouse College of Business.

Discipline Employees for Wasting Time Online? Not So Fast

• April 1st, 2024
• in Uncategorized

Whether it is checking social media, browsing the news, shopping, or keeping track of sports scores, almost everyone occasionally uses the internet at work for things that are, well, not exactly work. In fact, researchers estimate that employees spend around 1-2 hours per workday cyberloafing, or engaging in non-work-related internet use. And most employers would like to recover that lost productivity. But how?

A Demo Does It

• February 27th, 2024
• in Uncategorized

An associate shows customers how to cook a rosemary chicken dinner in your local grocery store. Your favorite TikTok influencer demonstrates a new planner system to optimize his schedule. A Costco employee shows how a new form of cleaner can get grease out of anything. If you look around, you’ll find product demonstrations almost everywhere products are sold, and they fall into two broad categories: process demonstrations, where the entire process of using a product is shown step-by-step, and outcome demonstrations, which showcase the end result.

How Does the Introduction of Income Tax Affect State Fiscal Growth?

• February 19th, 2024
• in Uncategorized

Individual income tax is an important way for states to generate revenue and encourage a thriving market economy, but little research has been done on how the introduction of the tax affects a state’s bottom line. Culverhouse’s Dr. Traviss Cassidy, with collaborators Mark Dincecco (University of Michigan) and Ugo Antonio Troiano (UC Riverside), tackles these issues in “The Introduction of the Income Tax, Fiscal Capacity, and Migration: Evidence from U.S. States,” which was published this month in American Economic Journal: Economic Policy.

About Face: Do Facial Characteristics Affect the Careers of Male and Female Audit Partners?

• December 18th, 2023
• in Uncategorized

Like it or not, we all do it: We judge others, in part, by their appearance. Research shows, for instance, that people associate competence with some facial features, and competent-looking people get more votes, land more prestigious jobs, and climb higher in military careers. Gender stereotypes can also interact with appearance to influence our perceptions of individuals’ underlying personality traits.

Which Firms Benefit from Government Spending Shocks?

• December 14th, 2023
• in Uncategorized

When the government takes action that results in increased spending, and an increased or decreased demand for products or services, it is called a “spending shock” or a “demand shock.” Ideally, firms should be prepared to benefit from shocks in government spending. But are some more prepared than others?

How Does Competition Interact with Addictive Social Media Platforms and Their Users?

• December 11th, 2023
• in Uncategorized

“If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product.” This quote, attributed to former Google ethicist Tristan Harris, sums up the goal of most social media platforms: capture user attention and keep it for as long as possible. Platforms like Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram capture user data and attention and sell it to advertisers who hope to profit from that attention. But attention, like most resources, is a limited commodity, so platforms must compete for it. They can do this by improving the quality of their service and hopefully attracting new users or by turning to tactics that retain user attention but decrease service quality, like intrusive notification systems or a newsfeed full of low-quality content.

How Can Distressed Firms Recover?

• December 8th, 2023
• in Uncategorized

The early 2000s recession hit 3D Systems Corporation hard. Prior to 2000, the company, a leader in the emerging 3D printing industry, was financially stable, but starting in 2001, the firm began to slide into financial distress. Like many companies, 3D Systems initially tried cutting costs, reducing its workforce by 10% in 2001, then closing numerous facilities and reducing its workforce by an additional 20% in 2002. But none of these changes were enough to turn the firm’s fortunes around.

On the Board

• December 4th, 2023
• in Uncategorized

There was a time — not so long ago — when the composition of most corporate boards did not reflect that of society at large. Recently, though, corporate boards now have greater representation of women. General social movements aligned with improving diversity, equity, and inclusivity play a part in this ongoing evolution, but a powerful influencing force has also come from the industry itself.