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The inclusion of the Expected Return into the rules governing the insurance regulation in Spain may be considered as an important step to improve the transparency of the insurance system. The implementation of the Expected Return will allow to carry out the comparison, in terms of profitability, between insurance products offered by different companies. One of the objectives of this paper is to propose the methodology that should be followed for the calculation of the Expected Return, so that this indicator fulfills its main purpose: to compare different insurance products. The second contribution of this paper will allow to analyze the impact that the change in the premium value has on the Expected Return, so that it can become a new element to be considered by insurance companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present paper we analyze the reasons behind the high success rate in the football clubs insolvency proceedings. The Spanish insolvency scenario has shown elevated fail rates (higher than 90%), evidencing notable weaknesses. Conversely, football clubs have successfully overcome their legal insolvency situations in the great majority of cases, and the results of our paper prove that (i) a financial structure less concentrated in secured credits (particularly secured financial institutions) than the rest of firms, and (ii) the systematic support given by public administrations (voting in favor of their proposals) have provided such outcome. Additionally, this occurs in a context in which public administrations have shown their reticence to give support to the rest of insolvent firms, while others (football clubs) receive it even though they present poorer management indicators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the case of La Fageda, a business based in La Garrotxa (Girona, Spain). La Fageda produces yogurts and dairy products; within the sector in Catalonia it is ranked as the third company in market share and the first in growth, with outstanding rates of profitability. La Fageda's singularity is that it employs and provides integral assistance to a significant number of people who are mentally handicapped or have severe mental disorders. The paper presents the origins of La Fageda, its values, the business model and the management of the company. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to design integrated product-service offerings and implement servitization processes, manufacturers need practical and tangible methodologies. Service design has been suggested as a way to facilitate such processes. This paper assesses the results gathered from an experiment of the implementation of service design in six Basque manufacturers already undergoing servitization processes. Data was collected by means of participatory observation and semi-structured interviews. The findings suggest that service design allows manufacturers to go beyond product-oriented mindsets and to design integrated product-service value propositions through focusing on the experience offered to customers. Moreover, it concludes that service design can be applied without needing to fully transition towards services as a core offer. Nonetheless, manufacturers participating in this experiment highlighted the need to consider business competencies in service design in order to properly assess and manage all the change elements inherent to servitization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the staffing policies of some leading consulting firms in Spain are analyzed to identify the factors that characterize them, as well as similarities and differences among them. The case study method is used for this analysis, and three case studies are considered: Accenture, IBM and Company Z. The results suggest that the professional partnership model and the managed professional business model are still relevant but are insufficient in explaining the various policies. Five factors are identified in addition to major trends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are a growing number of social enterprises in Spain. Like any other organization, they must be managed efficiently. However, few studies have analyzed the direction of this type of business and, to a lesser extent, how they manage their human resources. This paper focuses on how Spanish social enterprises manage their human resources by using a case study methodology. The results confirm that social companies do follow human resources practices but, due to the strong social component that moves and attracts workers to contribute to their missions, these practices differ from those made by non social enterprises. Therefore, it is necessary to prevent the escape of talent from social companies by applying ethical and social responsible human resources practices, and by managing volunteers in accordance with their social characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complex and international nature of tourism contributes to make it one of the industries most exposed to diverse critical situations. With tourism being an activity with relevant impact on the development of economy, identifying the types of crises that affect the sector emerges as a key issue for hotel management. In this paper, the analysis of the information provided by a panel of experts reveal that not only are economic crises, but the tourism industry is facing multiple types of risks and adverse situations. From the results of the study, we propose a management agenda that will contribute to control and even minimize the negative impact of potential and actual risk situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies dynamic capabilities approach to the study of family businesses. We introduce the term ‘dynamic familiness' to show the capability of family firms to create, extend, or modify their unique bundle of resources coming from the interaction between the family, the individuals and the firm. Our aim is to give empirical evidence about the process of generation and reconfiguration of the resources in the family firm. This process will allow the firm to evolutionary adapt and survive through the generations. To achieve this objective, we conduct a case study in Grupo Yllera, a representative firm of Spanish family firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assortment is one of the most important tools for retailers differentiating themselves from competitors, attracting customers into the store and increasing their sales. This paper analyzes the relationship between assortment size – in terms of number of Stock Keeping Units – and category sales level. In order to do this, a panel database containing information about assortment size and sales per week between 2008 and 2012 for all hypermarkets and supermarkets operating in Spain is used. Our results confirm a positive and significant relationship between both aspects; nevertheless, the intensity of such result depends on the frequency and penetration of the category under study [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes if SME perceive auditing as a useful service for their businesses. With a survey of 400 Spanish business managers, specific advantages are identified which can be grouped together based on several relevant factors related to the businesses' stance on some evaluating agents, their internal management and their value and image in the eyes of third parties. Furthermore, the findings suggest small businesses, those who voluntarily audit themselves and those which are non-family businesses, are the ones that value auditing the most. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus of this paper is to analyze the effect of the type of creditors, and specially, the conflict between bank creditors and commercial ones, in the resolution of the bankruptcy. The results for a group of Spanish unlisted firms are: 1) the different priority given to them by law in the recovery of their credits implies that creditors have different preferences regarding the bankruptcy resolution; and 2) the conflict between both types of creditors reduces the probability of reorganization in bankrupt firm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the impact on the Spanish banking system of the European Commission's proposal for a new Directive on Deposit Guarantee Schemes (DGS). To do this, we examine the risk profile of Spanish banks according to the parameters defined by the European Directive over the period 2007-2010. Then we compare the current contributions to the DGS fund with those expected in the proposed system. We conclude that Spanish commercial and saving banks would have been more damaged than credit cooperatives with the implementation of the proposed rules. We also find that most banks increase their contributions to the DGS fund, suggesting a cyclical behavior of the new model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the whole role of both board of directors and ownership structure on the effectiveness of executive compensation design in Spanish listed firms. Using a principal-principal agency framework and based on panel data methodology analysis in the period 2004-2011, results show that high level of ownership concentration influence negatively in the executive compensation alignment, having an adverse effect on minority shareholders' interests. Moreover, evidences show that type of controlling shareholder determines supervisory board effectiveness, which only exert an effective monitoring over executive compensation - increasing variable pay and diminishing fixed salary-, when majority shareholder has not linked to management of the company. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the level of consciousness that Spanish organizations have on their value system. The Executive Committee, as representatives of the organization, should get the values of their workers were coincident with the values of their organization or at least not incompatible between them. For that reason it's necessary that the organization uses strategies, which allow it to join the values of its members and its own values to get Shared Values. Through the investigation, it is observed a strong coherence between organizational and member's values, so it's checked the existence of Shared Values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Knowing how financial managers assess capital budgeting allocations is a relevant issue beyond the mere desire to know what others do and how they do it. In this paper, we report some of the findings from a survey conducted in 2011 among 140 financial managers of Spanish companies. The main conclusion from the study is the existing divorce between theory and practice in investment project valuation. However, when analyzing this split in depth using certain essential value sources, such as future growth opportunities, the divorce might emerge as more apparent than real. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate reputation is a key intangible asset for organizations, especially in intensive-staff services, because it allows creating and sustaining competitive advantages. As managers are essential in the creation and communication of reputation, the aim of this paper is to establish a model about reputation perceived by them. Thus, Human Resources, Ethics and Costumer Loyalty, Media Reputation, Good Functioning, Respect and Credibility, and Environmental Responsibility are identified as specific dimensions that affect to the reputation perceived by managers of service companies, such as accounting audit firms that operate in Spain. This will facilitate the strategic management of reputation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantifying capital requirements for operational risk under the Basel Accords remains an open issue in banking practice. In this paper, the impact upon the economic capital of two critical elements when applying advanced approaches (AMA) in the modelling of operational risk, namely, the threshold, and the loss distribution of severity, is analyzed by using a loss database of a Spanish savings bank. This study demonstrates the importance of finding a methodological way to render the various operational risk profiles of financial entities comparable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to describe the factors that explain the electronic service quality in the case of the postal operators sector and how this affects customer satisfaction. In an increasingly competitive environment, postal operators, such as the Post Office Company in Spain, need to know the determinants of the success of their online distribution channels. Using data from 415 answers of Correos.es website clients and a confirmatory factor analysis, the dimensions of the quality of electronic services in this context and its effect on online satisfaction were determined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to analyse the influence that bid premium has on target shareholders' decision about selling in a tender offer. Neither empirical evidence nor theoretical models conclusively show that the higher the bid premium is, the higher the probability of bid success will be. In the Spanish market, we are not able to achieve conclusive results either since this influence depends on several variables such as the existence of previous sales agreement between some of the target shareholders and the bidder. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to show the influence of certified environmental management systems in the transition from control to pollution prevention. Taking as a reference point the environmental innovation, a number of environmental control and prevention oriented practices are analyzed providing empirical evidence of their implementation over the firms in the Spanish metal industry. Our results show a significant decrease in the implementation of preventive innovations among not certified firms which stresses the importance of the certification when carrying out this kind of environmental innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The implementation of quality systems provides internal and external benefits. This paper examines the relationship between the quality certification from the Institute for Spanish Tourism Quality in the performance and size of the hotel chains operating in Spain. This study shows that certification has a positive effect on the results and the size of the hotel chain is not a relevant factor to be certified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to approach to the reality of the environmental marketing in the Spanish industry, identifying, on the one hand, the most salient green practices in this sector and, on the other hand, the profiles of companies more prone to adopt them. Findings suggest that, in general terms, more socially visible organizations are more interested in environmental marketing practices. In addition, it is also observed that the implementation degree of environmental modifications in internal processes related to logistics and product design is superior to market directed actions, mainly oriented to promote and communicate the organization's environmental behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industrias Lácteas Asturianas, S.A. (ILAS) is the leading Spanish multinational in the dairy sector. It has productive subsidiaries in Mexico, United States, France, Poland, and China. This paper summarizes the distinctive features of its growth path, especially highlighting those related to its international expansion. The analysis of its business model, aimed at extracting the full potential of its raw material, and its discriminatory internationalization strategy, shed new light about how, even in traditional sectors, firms can develop a sustainable growth strategy based on classic competitive advantages like operative efficiency, the early adoption of technologies and relational capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main proposal of the paper is to analyze the human resources management practices adopted by some Spanish SMEs in order to promote and develop corporate entrepreneurship. A case study method is used to explore the corporate entrepreneurship activities developed by three SMEs. The main results show the importance of establishing good relationships among companys' members, creating an appropriate working environment. Also, the relevance of promoting risk attitudes and the participation of employees in corporate entrepreneurship activities is highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the strong expansion experienced by the phenomenon of international management standards. After a conceptual exposition on metastandards, carried out in order to clarify the confusion that still prevails on them, their international impact is then analyzed, stressing its particular impact in Spain. The paper also summarizes the different academic perspectives from which this phenomenon has been analysed. Finally, some considerations on the future evolution of this kind of standards are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper shows Spanish companies' position on work-life balance, considering two industries: food & drinks and information technology. The offer of work-life benefits is not very extended, and its use by workers is still lower. The positive and negative consequences of the benefits and the existence of institutional pressures on employers to achieve work-life balance are also considered. The sector the organization is in is relevant, and IT companies are more involved with work-life balance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first adoption of the new Spanish GAAP has not been identical for all companies. In each of the three key elements of the transition: date, valuation and disclosure, the Spanish regulator has included some choices for the transition that may affect the content and quality of the transitional financial information. In this paper we analyse the impact of the new Spanish GAAP adoption in terms of main accounting figures and ratios. Our results show that the impact has been significant for most of the figures and some of the ratios and therefore do not support the transition data choice as it damages comparability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyzes the differences between Spanish and Portuguese large companies regarding the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and electronic integration with supply chain members. These differences are established in terms of the capacity of generating superior firm performance. The results show differences between both groups and confirm that Spanish firms should pursue better electronic integration with supply chain members, for instance, through the development of ICT that facilitate collaboration with suppliers and customers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyzes how, using integration strategy, the relationships in a supply chain can be helpful for their members' logistics, marketing and even corporative performance. With the "Arcs of Integration" we study the influence of the extension and direction of this integration (upstream or downstream) in a sample of 99 companies belonging to an industrial district. Evidence shows clearly that the widest Arc gets better results. All this induces us to suggest a context of future research that allows us to widen our knowledge of these relationships, as well as a series of administrative implications to help business leaders not to see the relationships of the supply chain as something dangerous. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses collaboration with suppliers in the process of new product development. It contains a description of the benefits and challenges this collaboration poses and shows the experience of Spanish industry regarding such practice. From this experience, one may conclude that collaborating with suppliers in the development of new products leads to shorter and more efficient innovative processes and to better products, but one can also observe that Spanish firms are still in the learning stage. As a result, lessons learned are presented as a guide to managers in improving collaboration with suppliers in the innovation process. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between human resource flexibility and innovativeness, with the moderating effect of environmental dynamism on some aspects of flexibility. The research population is the Spanish automotive industry and the analysed sample includes 123 first-tier automotive suppliers. The results of our survey indicate that internal flexibility (capacity to modify the assets and skills of employees and the redistribution of annual working time) is positively related to innovativeness, whereas the influence of external flexibility (capacity to modify the number of employees or the amount of working hours through the hiring and layoff of employees) depends on the type of contingent employees: short-term hires, temporary help agencies, or consulting firms and R&D centres. The firm's level of environmental dynamism moderates the relationship between some aspects of flexibility and innovativeness: firms in high-dynamic environments can benefit more from some internal and external aspects of human resource flexibility than firms in low-dynamic environments. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyzes the relation between debt maturity structure and default risk. We use data on over 47,189 non-financial Spanish firms during the period 1995-2006. The results show that firms rated as low risk have more long-term debt. However, maturity is a non-monotonic function of risk ratings, with low risk firms and high risk firms having short-term debt and intermediate risk firms having long-term debt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The establishment of mergers and acquisitions and cooperative agreements within the European Union increased during the last century. Nevertheless, the new century seems to show a change in the trends. Therefore, the objective of this work is to analyse the characteristics and evolution of these growth operations in recent years (2000-2007). The different data presented in the paper have shown a growing economic integration process through cooperative strategies such as mergers, acquisitions and alliances. Spanish firms have actively taken part in this process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditionally, both competitor identification and the analysis of inter-firm rivalry have been approached from an industry perspective. After that, researchers or analysts have calculated aggregate indexes (such as CR or Herfindahl) that synthesize its structure. However, the availability of detailed information has allowed researchers to design new proposals that capture the interdependences arising among firms more precisely. In this paper, we use one of such proposals in order to describe the competitive situation in the Spanish banking sector. Specifically, we use one of the dimensions introduced by Chen (1996), market commonality, in order to identify the main rivals of every bank, savings bank or credit unions that operate in our country. Within this context, we pay special attention to the identification of the most important rivals for Banco Santander. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article summarizes the evolution of Banco Santander from its constitution in 1857 to 2007, when the institution celebrates its 150 anniversary. The paper shows the transformation of the bank y how it has gone through the complete geographical scale: from a local credit society to a regional bank and then to national status until it has reached its present position as one of the largest banks of the international financial system. Santander has grown as a consequence of the expansion of its activities in Spain, Europe and America and also through acquisitions and mergers. The performance of Santander has been possible thanks to the progress and internationalization of the Spanish economy. The explanation for the success of Santander has been due to the quality of its human resources, its solid financial strategy and the leadership of its management, in particular the leadership of the now president in office, who has been able to put Santander among the top ten in the world ranking of financial institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Information Systems Outsourcing is a growing phenomenon in many businesses nowadays, which has been characterised, in general, with an insufficient level of detail and analysis. For this reason the main aim of this piece of work is to deepen into every aspects which define the outsourcing contract. We will do this by showing the results of a survey carried out in the biggest Spanish firms, and we will suggest the future which is glimpsed in relation with outsourcing in the firms subjected to study. In the paper also it is presented a longitudinal analysis, which shows the evolution in the last years of many variables which define the outsourcing relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, the environment is very changeable, so firms have to base their competitive advantages on intangible resources, and one of them human resources. As a result of this, training is receiving special attention on the part of the firms and, nowadays, many firms attach great importance to this practice within human resources management. The training must be planned to address the lack of skills of employees and the training plan must answer "who, when, where and how". In the present paper, we will analyze, in a qualitative and quantitative way, how the above mentioned training process is developed within the firms. With this purpose in mind we have used a data base of 572 companies from Castilla-La Mancha with at least 50 employees, from which we obtained 118 valid questionnaires (20,6%). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is propose a Learning Organization Model based in a knowledge-organizational learning circuit and supported by facilitators that impulse the conversion of the individual into organizational knowledge. This Model is applied to the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collaboration between firms and universities is a phenomenon of increasing importance for the creation and transfer of innovations and that is necessary for the economic development of the countries. In practice, several obstacles arise that make more difficult the management of this kind of relationships. To know and to identify them is critical in order to improve the success of the cooperation process. In this paper the problems that arise in the cooperative relationships firm-university in Spain are analysed and some measures for make lesser the negative effects of these problems are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The increasing specialization in the automotive sector has fostered purchase strategies and logistics as key processes for the sustainability of competitive advantage. The paper describes the main traits of the so called "lean supply chain management", examines its level of implementation in Spain based on several case studies, and analyzes what its main challenges are considering the central forces that are currently shaping the economic environment. In particular, we suggest that the logistic function of vehicle brand owners will not only have to face a growing distance between their production plants and their suppliers, but also a greater cooperation given the balanced bargaining power that the emergence of mega-suppliers is going to provoke. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The achievement of competitiveness advantages by companies is something vital for their survival and success. With this paper we try to know which factors explain the competitive success of SMEs, using a sample of 1.201 Spanish enterprises that develop their activity in the industrial sector. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

What was the Stock Market response to the international expansion of Spanish firms? In this paper we answer this question analyzing the abnormal returns generated by 191 Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) made by 56 Spanish firms listed in the Madrid Stock Exchange between 1990 and 2003. Our data show, on average, a positive valuation of FDIs, although some of them have generated negative abnormal returns. Thus, the stock market does not react in the same way to every kind of FDI. As could be expected, how, who, where and when the FDI is made really matters. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]