A long-term personnel crisis, especially among nursing staff, has been tormenting the Czech healthcare sector despite the fact that average salaries are continuously increasing. Therefore, the financial remuneration factor is not decisive for employee retention. There are a number of other factors influencing the turnover rate, such as job satisfaction and the role of clarity although this paper deals with the influence of value preferences. The aim of the study was to map the value preferences of employees in two departments of a selected healthcare facility. Technical staff members work for the first department while the other department involved medical staff. The comparison also focused on the values that were attributed by the employees to the organisation. Furthermore, the extent of the value setting by managers reflected in their management style and how it affects the frustration of their subordinates was investigated. The data needed to evaluate the above-mentioned objectives was obtained through a questionnaire based on The Portrait Value Questionnaire. The data obtained was converted into comparable values and further evaluated through the calculation of mean values and correlation analysis. It was found in selected workplaces of the given organisation that the individual value settings of employees and their perception of organisational values do not match. Furthermore, the frustration experienced by staff in a given workplace is related to the management style of their superiors, which is affected by their value preferences. By identifying the value setting of employees and its alignment with the organisation, it is possible to better understand the internal environment of the organisation in connection with the effort to retain employees and with regard to their further motivation and achieving alignment with the values of the organisation.
The aim of this article is to test the possibility of a more efficient allocation of resources using market tools when proposing the government budget.The tool is the distribution of ownership rights when designing individual chapters of the budget at the specific stage of the government budget finalisation.The assumption is that the exchange of ownership rights between the individual chapters would lead to a more efficient allocation of resources than mere negotiation.The precondition is the correct setting for such negotiation.For this reason, the article uses an economic experiment in which three budget chapters of expenditure (industry, education, transport) can exchange ownership rights with allocated funds for the following areas: salary expenditure, investment, current expenditure.The design of the experiment is based on a review of relevant studies and literature; illustrative data used in the experiment correspond to the current reality.The article shows these innovative possibilities based on the conducted experiments where the roles were divided between the group of participants representing the individual ministries while the needs and possibilities of the ministries to exchange resources were defined within a set framework of the experiment rules and using the government budget of the Czech Republic for 2020 as the example.The article also implies the possible applications of this method.This method is generally applicable under the proper method design.
The 21st-century business environment requires permanent crisis management.Nowadays, managers seek to deal with a potential crisis effectively, with minimum losses or to avert the potential crisis in the best case.It can be noted that crisis managers must react proactively.Crisis management (CM) can be generally characterised as sets of approaches, measures and methods used in situations where managerial skills are no longer sufficient.The goal is obvious: minimise the impact of the crisis or avoid a potential crisis.The purpose of this paper is a literature review of crisis management approaches and, based on its summarisation, to propose a conceptual model respecting the proactive features and variables of the crisis management process.The paper highlights various definitions of CM approaches by various academic researchers and some empirical studies.A total of 98 literature sources have been reviewed for the research contribution.Particular attention is given to proactive models, which were described by many authors.All these models and approaches are analysed.The paper`s findings discuss crisis management process features and proactive aspects in a proposed Proactive Crisis Management Process (PCMP) model.
Bernard Bolzano was not merely a mathematician of the European format. He was also a critical social thinker whose work has distinct economic dimensions. This is why he rightly appears in the overviews of the beginnings of Czech economic thought. He began writing his work “About the Best State” 210 years ago, which made him the most famous Czech utopian. The half-forgotten Bolzano legacy, which is still alive and ahead of its time in many respects, recalls this text.
Family firms form a considerable global economic pillar and have a long tradition.Due to their restricted ownership structure and extended value structure, they deal with specific managerial challenges.In comparison with their generally owned competitors, family firms tend to be more stable, accountable and trustable.On the other hand, they have to combine private and business life, deal with succession issues and the relative closeness of the top management while resolving nonstandard governance mechanisms.The main objective of this paper is to propose how to create a dynamic model that can further propose viable strategies for the long-term sustainability of family businesses that maximise the stakeholders` utility.To be able to understand the internal dynamics of family businesses, as well as to fully incorporate the changing external environment, an underlying systemic model is required.It is proposed to incorporate several gradually evolving and mutually interlinked stages and to formalise knowledge acquired from the present literature extended with available data.The initial modelling stage, the mind mapping, summarises the key terminology and outlines the basic structure.These findings are subsequently refined through system and causal loop diagrams.The latter allows the formulation, discussion and generalisation of behavioural hypotheses related to the researched sustainability phenomenon.It was found that standard techniques and strategic planning tools do not fully support all the abovementioned aspects of family businesses.Thus, these specific features, reflecting various aspects of "familiness" were modelled and incorporated into a general framework for strategic planning and management.The proposed paper deals with specific internal matters of family-owned firms.It suggests and justifies a transparent model for their implementation, thus eliminating the major bottlenecks.With this knowledge, the addressed companies can sustainably develop their businesses and keep the quality of their private life on a desirable level.
Public transport is one of the driving forces of economic development; therefore, development and sustainability are required.In most cases, public transport operation is only possible with the help of public budgets, which in turn results in pressure from customers regarding efficiency.This article deals with the issue of public transport, especially in the Czech Republic, its sustainability and overall development.After an evaluation of the current situation for one specific case and possible future development, the author describes the basic survey conducted among passengers and outlines the possibilities for further development.The author made his basic observations and polled people who commute to work every day.In this case, the author attempts to show some basic connections and context.
The complex views of insolvency proceedings are unique, poorly known, interdisciplinary and multidimensional, even though there is a broad spectrum of different BM (Bankruptcy Models). Therefore, it is often prohibitively difficult to make forecasts using numerical quantifiers and traditional statistical methods. The least information-intensive trend values are used: positive, increasing, zero, constant, negative, decreasing. The solution of a trend model is a set of scenarios where X is the set of variables quantified by the trends. All possible transitions among the scenarios are generated. An oriented transitional graph has a set of scenarios as nodes and the transitions as arcs. An oriented path describes any possible future and past time behaviour of the bankruptcy system under study. The graph represents the complete list of forecasts based on trends. An eight-dimensional model serves as a case study. On the transitional graph of the case study model, decision tree heuristics are used for calculating the probabilities of the terminal scenarios and possible payoffs.
Generally speaking, financial accounting textbooks are in harmony on the explanation of accounts payable and accrued liabilities/expenses.However, the same thing cannot be said for accounts payable turnover and days in accounts payable ratios.Different financial accounting textbooks and academic papers have different explanations for the accounts payable turnover ratio.The extant literature on the ratio is mainly comprised of two groups of authors.The first group relates the ratio to purchases and the second group relates the ratio to cost of goods sold (COGS).Purchases, in a purely theoretical sense, relate to periodic inventory method, whereas the perpetual inventory method relates purchases with inventory (being debit) and accounts payable (being credit).The second major group who explain the ratio by using the COGS figure ignore what is included in COGS.It should not include depreciation, amortisation, payroll and interest expenses to be meaningful for the purposes of the calculation of the ratio.In practice, manufacturing companies do not attempt to calculate these ratios due to the difficulty of obtaining the figures.These ratios can only be truly calculated from within the company if need be.Their accounting departments will be able to calculate the ratio correctly since they can reach the data.Any financial analyst not being able to reach a detailed breakdown of the expenses of the companies whose shares are being traded in stock exchanges will not able to calculate these ratios.
The globalisation of markets leads to increased competition and the commodification of products. Research has led to growing customer interest in the Country of Origin (COO) when buying grocery. The COO is one of the crucial aspects of buying decisions and can provide a competitive advantage to local producers when differentiating from foreign rivals on the Czech market. However, there are labels where the COO have different conditions for branding. The aim of the article is to analyse COO labels and the quality referring to Czech origin in selected domestic grocery. The COO conditions serve as an evaluation criterion for labels. A descriptive and comparative analysis is used to achieve the goal, with each label examining the conditions for branding in relation to the COO of products. The source of information of the labels was the methodologies, regulations, the bulletin, website and rules for branding. In the case of inadequate information on the COO conditions, the data was acquired by interview or e-mail. The result of the analyses is the comparison of the COO and quality labels in terms of the product origin criterion. The final table summarises the results of the analyses and provides a preview of the situation of the labels on the Czech market. The results indicate that a number of labels refer to the COO by graphic design and the term. However, the COO of the product is not a primary criterion for branding. As the results show, the situation in the Czech market may be unclear. Primarily, labels do not have to state the COO or to be a quality identifier. Labels of the COO and quality are often purpose-designed by government, and profit or non-profit entities to highlight product parameters.
The current historically unparalleled global debt crisis and the resulting momentous valuation anomalies notably affecting the stock and bond markets (the historically low-interest rate level) are making it increasingly difficult for both institutional and private asset managers to generate an actual yield above the inflation rate. The problems with building wealth, and hence with pensions plans, first began at the turn of the millennium when the burst of the largest stock market bubble of all time firmly put the price distortions of assets into the public eye. This milestone also marked the beginning of a secular bust phase, which has been on a real gradual downtrend and despite nominal price increases is still ongoing today. However, this problem only becomes visible upon real evaluation, in ounces of gold. Contrary to the ubiquitous nominal view in uncovered paper currencies, only this real view, valued in ounces of gold, protects both private and institutional investors from an illusion of wealth.
In coping with organizational changes in the current turbulent environment, focus is primarily placed on structural, "hard" factors, while socio-dynamic processes, which are related to them, are somewhat overlooked. Organizational identity represents the output of processes of staff identification with the organization. We focus on four types of organizational identity orientation: team, working groups, individual and especially hybrid. The goal of this paper is to detect whether the presumed heritage of identity of the socialist organization - in the form of hybrid orientation - persists in the period of transition, and how this orientation relates to selected characteristics of organizations today. Our study is based on the questionnaire survey among 219 organizations and shows that hybrid orientation of identity is still present either directly or can be hidden behind the form of working groups. Results of multiple ordinal regression analysis demonstrate that hybrid orientation of identity prevails in organizations with weak organizational culture that can provide an environment for the manipulative enforcement of individual interests. Our study is an attempt to understand how differences in organizational design may be associated with the arrangement of social relations and be reflected in the form of organizational identity orientations. A better understanding of these processes can improve managerial decision-making in situations when the change of external conditions raises the change of internal settings.
The current competitive environment is characterised by increasing uncertainty and discontinuity and the brewing industry, which is the subject of the article, is no exception. The primary objective of enterprises is to ensure competitiveness based on a sustainable competitive advantage. The choice and implementation of an appropriate strategy is an important step to sustainable success. The aim of this article is to verify the methodology regarding three basic themes of the dissertation: socio-culture environment, strategy and competitiveness. Two breweries of various sizes operating in Czech brewing were the main research sample - a small and medium-sized brewery. Mixed research methods were applied, a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. The questionnaire was conducted with consumers to analyse the external environment. Other primary data was collected at selected breweries through semi-structured interviews and field research, followed by a search of secondary data - brewery documents including the annual accounts. Pilot research has verified that the methods chosen are suitable for determining the strategy used by the analysed breweries. The next step in the long-term horizon is to verify the link between strategy and economic performance/competitiveness.
Past literature suggests that firms that bear the name of the owners, also known as eponymous firms, have superior profitability. The goal of this paper is to test the differences in the financial performance indicators between eponymous and other Czech firms. In a sample of 17,833 privately held firms operating in the Czech Republic, owned by Czech individuals or families and having complete financial data for 2014-2017, we find that eponymous firms have a significantly higher return on assets. However, no difference in return on equity has been found. We also show that eponymous firms have lower asset turnover and labour productivity, use less debt financing and have greater liquidity. In this sense, their financial characteristics are close to those of family businesses. Overall, eponymous firms are younger than other firms, but there are no significant differences in the size of the firms. The results suggest that firms named after the founder are more likely to perform well.
Current research is primarily focused on the wage issue in the Czech Republic in relation to the size of the enterprise. This paper examines the development of wage rates in companies classified by the number of employees from the 2008 economic crisis onwards. Since the analysis and estimation of current trends in wage differentiation based exclusively on average and median wages are insufficient, moving from level characteristics to the entire frequency distribution appears justifiable. Wage distribution models based on three-parameter lognormal curves and broken down by the number of company employees were constructed to trace wage developments from the onset of the recession; the starting points of the curves represent the minimum wage in the respective year. The remaining two parameters were estimated utilising the maximum likelihood method. Having applied the curves, the proportions of employees with wages not exceeding a certain threshold were calculated. With the gross monthly wage dependence on the company size having been verified via one-way analysis of variance, the research has confirmed that large foreign firms provide the highest possible paying jobs. The average wage difference between the very large and the smallest organizations was calculated to reach almost 15,500 CZK; average wages in the latter firms representing only 55% of those earned in the former companies. As for the median wage, the difference amounts to almost 14,000 CZK. It has also been proven that an estimated 91.40% of employees in the smallest firms do not achieve the average wage, whereas in large and very large companies this share is estimated at 47.10% and 51.56%, respectively.
Turkey has had another year of high inflation and high devaluation in its economic history. This has had negative consequences on growth and the future prospects of the country. This paper analyses the consequences of high inflation and the devaluation rates on financial statements. Inflation and devaluation create difficulties for both local companies and foreign subsidiaries in terms of financial reporting. A model company's transactions have been used to show the effects of inflation and devaluation on financial statements. The application of different IAS based reporting methods will create discrepancies for companies and especially foreign subsidiaries will be the ones most affected. Those who apply IAS 29 will have less loss and pay local taxes compared to companies who apply IAS 21 based reporting where no taxes are paid due to the considerable amount of losses. On the other hand, local companies not applying any of these rules will pay the highest amount of taxes, since the government did not request the restatement of financials based on IAS 29. The unclear rules create discrepancies on financial reporting and unbalanced competition. This paper purports that IAS 29 application will lead the financial statements to be presented fairly both for local and foreign subsidiaries in Turkey for the year of 2018.
Personal competencies are significant predictors of employee outcome. Nowadays, due to the rapid development of technologies and increased automation level, competency requirements have changed. Therefore, experts develop and make regular updates in the general competencies and in the specific competency models for each industry. In 2018, the European Commission developed the Council Recommendation on Key Competencies for Lifelong Learning, which defines the core competencies necessary to improve performance, to sustain current standards of living and to adapt to market changes. Competency models are particularly significant in order to produce innovations where the educational level and knowledge and the skills and attitude of employees are essential.The purpose of the research is to define the basic concepts of actual competency models and to determine the advantages of their development. This research is a literature review for building a literature background for the next stage of the investigation, which will be empirical research. The outputs of this research are four hypotheses on the influence of the practical application of competency models, including the use of competency models in the development and implementation of training programmes as a positive impact on learners' results and attitude. Use of general competency models does not ensure the implementation of fully-fledged competency-based training programmes in a specific area.The literature review has identified that the major advantages of the development and use of competency models are improved performance and evaluation system optimisation. It is essential for each industry to identify its own competency requirements although there are still specific industries in which competency models have not yet been fully developed. It is concluded that most of the research evidence on competencies is, nevertheless, related to medium and large sized companies and industrial plants. Different approaches are required to analyse and develop competency models depending on the company size.
Incentives are one of the core practices of strategic human resource management and their effect on motivation and performance has been studied extensively. Particular attention is devoted to pay-for-performance (PFP) incentives while research on the effect of PFP incentives on performance has produced contradictory results. More importantly, incentives are not an isolated process; the effect of incentives goes beyond individual or organisational performance because they affect an entire organisation. Although incentives are included in most organisational design frameworks, the effect of incentives on other organisational design components has been neglected. The study uses the organisational design framework to focus on neglected relations between incentives and other organisational design components. The purpose of the study is to explore what are the organisational design components and how they are influenced by PFP incentives. A case study research design was used. The data was collected in a small company in which the incentive system was changed to PFP incentives as a part of substantial changes in the organisational design. Data was collected through interviews with employees, supported by internal documentation and observation. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. In the case, the PFP incentives led to higher performance although the PFP incentives restricted the new exploratory strategy and harmed cooperation. The effect of the PFP incentives on exploration and cooperation was slow, and hardly visible, predominantly as a result of unintentionally deviated attention.The study points out that focusing solely on performance when designing incentive systems may be myopic because PFP incentives may have a detrimental effect on other organisational design components. Based on the results, the paper provides a set of suggestions to consider when implementing PFP incentives.
Product quality is a crucial issue for manufacturing companies, so it is essential to take note of any emerging product defects. In contrast to the use of traditional methods, the "modern" constantly evolving data mining methods are now being more frequently used. The main objective of this paper is to detect the potential cause or the area of the production process where the majority of product defects arise. The dataset from the semiconductor manufacturing process has been used for this purpose. First, it was necessary to address dataset quality. Significant multicollinearity was found in the data and to detect and delete the collinear variables, correlations and variance inflation factors have been used. The MICE-CART method has been used for the imputation because the original dataset contained more than 5% of random missing values. In further analysis, the K-means clustering method has been used to separate the failed products from the flawless ones. Following this, the hierarchical clustering method has been used for the failed product to create groups of product defects with similar properties. For the optimal number of clusters, the determination of the BIC method has been used. Five clusters of products have been made although only three can be classed as important for further analysis. These groups of products should be directly subjected to the analysis in the production process, which can assist in identifying the source of scarcity.
This paper discusses the current Czech and European legal framework applicable to the adjustment to the taxable amount with respect to claims partially cancelled due to the insolvency of the customer resolved by reorganisation.The partial cancellation, according to the authors, serves as grounds to adjust a taxable amount under the EU VAT Directive.The supplier is entitled to issue a corrective invoice and claim a refund of a proportion of the VAT paid with respect to the delivery of goods or services to an insolvent debtor.However, such practice is not yet followed by the Czech tax authorities who do not allow for a reduction of a taxable amount in reorganisation and only allow such reductions in the case of bankruptcy liquidation.The paper argues that this approach is not compatible with European law.Moreover, such a different treatment of VAT payers in bankruptcy liquidation (resulting in higher satisfaction of VAT taxpayers as creditors) puts reorganisation at a considerable disadvantage and is contrary to the basic principles of insolvency law.Finally, the paper argues that the corresponding claim of the tax authority resulting from the VAT base adjustment constitutes a standard pre-insolvency claim and should not be preferred in the insolvency proceedings under Czech law.
This paper deals with the experience of third pillar reform in the Czech Republic, executed in 2013. The core of our study is formed by a comparative analysis of newly introduced supplementary pension savings and its substitute products (investment funds, life insurance) from two main aspects: product features and distribution features. The outcomes are supported by empirical sales and population penetration of the surveyed products. The results indicate that even a pension product with a very attractive product design, such as supplementary pension savings, will be hampered by its substitutes as long as its distribution features are unattractive. This is an important lesson, particularly for the discussed European solution, the pan-European portable pension product (PEPP).
