Inside
this
issue:
M
arking yet another major m i l e s t o n e i n i t s d e v e l o p m e n t , t h e H K U S T Business School recently achieved full accreditation by the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD). Together with the accreditation awarded by A A C S B - t h e I n t e r n a t i o n a l Association for Management Education in 1999, the School now has become one of a very few institutions in the world to be accredited by both of these two major, internationally recognized quality assurance processes for business schools.In fact, the HKUST Business School is the first Asian school to be accredited by EFMD since the F o u n d a t i o n i n t r o d u c e d i t s accrediting mechanism, the European Quality Improvement System (EQUIS) in 1997. To date, a t o t a l o f 3 7 m a n a g e m e n t education institutions have been accredited. They are mostly E u r o p e a n s c h o o l s s u c h a s
he School announced the launch of the Professional Cer tificate in eCommerce Online Program in September. The program is offered in collaboration with Edport.com Limited (Edport), a subsidiary of Affirm Score Limited. This is the first time that online courses of this nature are available to people in both Hong Kong and the region.
The program comprises four courses, including Foundations of eCommerce, eCommerce Economics and Strategy, eCommerce Marketing and Business-to-Business (B2B) eCommerce. According to the developer of the courses, Theodore Clark, Associate Professor of Information and Systems Management,
“The Wall” game...page 2 Agreement sealed...page 7 Student on winning spree...page 8
DUAL ACCREDITATION IN TWO YEARS
Copenhagen Business School (Denmark), INSEAD (France), IMD-International Institute for M a n a g e m e n t D e v e l o p m e n t (Switzerland), Cranfield School of M a n a g e m e n t a n d L o n d o n Business School (both in UK).
Dean Yuk-Shee Chan of the HKUST Business School was delighted with the recognition of quality bestowed on the School by EFMD. “For the School, this is a great honor. Like the AACSB
accreditation that we received last year, EFMD’s EQUIS accreditation is based on objective criteria and a stringent evaluation process by experts in the field. This recognition also marks a major breakthrough in the development of the quality a n d s t a t u s o f m a n a g e m e n t education in Hong Kong and Asia as a whole,” he said.
The scope of the EFMD’s EQUIS accreditation covers all activities conducted by a business
school, including all of its degree programs, executive education offerings and research projects. The EQUIS process entails three main stages. The initial stage requires a candidate school to submit basic information and the EQUIS director to conduct a one-day visit on site to verify eligibility of the school. The second stage involves the compilation of a self-evaluation report by the school and a site visit by a peer review team from EFMD. At the final stage, the EFMD Accreditation Awarding Body reviews the case and makes the final decision, taking into consideration the recommendations made by the peer review team.
In the case of the HKUST Business School, the peer review team comprised senior academics and a local cor porate repre-sentative, namely, Professors Gordon Shenton, EQUIS Director, Christian Delporte, Director Inter national Affairs, Institut d’Administration et de Gestion,
LAUNCH OF PROFESSIONAL CERTIFICATE IN
E-COMMERCE ONLINE PROGRAM
the courses are based on the “Active Learning” philosophy which emphasizes participation and real-time discussion. There is a high level of interaction allowing knowledge sharing between the tutor and students all over the world.
Dean Yuk-Shee Chan said, “we are pleased to be able to collaborate with Edport to launch these courses, which allow busy executives to study conveniently and easily,” Dean Chan said.
“With the rapid development of eCommerce in Asia, there is a keen demand from both business and IT executives in the region for new knowledge and information in the field. The combined strengths
Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium, Chris Greensted, Dean, Plymouth Business School, UK, and Stuar t Leckie, Chairman, Woodrow Milliman China Ltd.
The European Foundation for M a n a g e m e n t D e v e l o p m e n t (EFMD), based in Brussels, is Europe’s forum for information, research, networking and dialogue on innovation and best practices in management development. It has 390 member organizations in over 40 countries. Among the members are leading business schools and executive develop-ment centers, companies, public services and training agencies, m a n a g e m e n t c e n t e r s a n d institutions, consultancies, and individual members. It is the spokesman for management development in Europe. EFMD website: www.efmd.be
Dean Yuk-Shee Chan (right) presents a souvenir to Professor Gordon Shenton on the completion of the peer review team’s visit on the HKUST campus.
T
(cont’d on page 7)E-LIBRARY WINS
INTERNATIONAL
A
n e l e c t r o n i c l i b r a r y (eLibrary) developed by a team of researchers led by Kar Yan Tam, Professor of Information and Systems Management, was one of the top winners of the Stockholm Challenge Award 2000.The award is a coveted IT award administered by the city government of Stockholm in Sweden and by the European Commission.
The Stockholm Challenge lauded the eLibrary a structural
innovation in the development of distance education. The key features of it include a common user interface that allows easy a c c e s s t o l i b r a r y s e r v i c e s regardless of users’ information literacy levels, digitization of Chinese texts and a full-function Chinese search engine. The system’s sophisticated handling o f C h i n e s e t e x t p r o v i d e s comprehensive support for a solid bilingual operating environment for the users. (cont’d on page 2)
his year’s full-time MBA graduates are already hard at work. The placement statistics are remarkable both in terms of salaries and the speed in landing a job. At the end of September, only three months after their last exam, virtually all (24 out of 25) of the class have received job offers.
The offers have been made from multinational companies such as ExxonMobil, GE Capital, Goldman Sachs, Lombard Investment and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. The GE Capital job is an international position offered directly from the firm’s Stamford office in the US. The HKUST graduate is the only successful candidate from a Hong Kong business school among the 20 new recruits selected by the firm through a global recruitment process.
Some graduating students have received offers from technology companies such as 2cube. com, Autofreeways.com, OgilvyOne Worldwide and Web Connection. A few others will venture into start-ups yet to be named.
The average annual salaries offered by the multinationals are HK$450,000. Some of the HKUST graduating MBA full-time students were offered annual salaries from HK$500,000 to HK$700,000, comparable to salaries offered to graduates from top US business schools.
Assistant MBA Placement Director Doris Chan said this year’s job offers attained by graduates of the program sent a positive signal to the other multinationals. “We are pleased that the qualities of our students are being recognized. This year’s successful recruitment of local talent should encourage more multinational companies to focus on HKUST MBAs,” she said.
T
he new full-time MBA class this year showcases an impressive increase in the number of international students. Among the 28 new students, 12 (some 43%) are from outside of Hong Kong and t h e C h i n e s e M a i n l a n d . P l a c e s represented include France, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand.According to Program Director Steve DeKrey, the increase is in line with the School’s objective. “We have been focusing
on attracting more foreign students to make the program more diversified and dynamic. We plan to achieve an even split between Hong Kong and international students in our full-time MBA class,” he explained.
When asked about the reasons behind the growing interest in the program from the international community, DeKrey attributed the phenomenon to the lure of the China market, as well as the stellar reputation the School has established over the years. “Many students from abroad use
MBA PROGRAM SEES SURGING INTERESTS FROM ABROAD
Students of the MBA 2000 incoming class participate in a team building game called “The Wall”, The game requires the participants to support each other with the ultimate goal of the entire team being on the top of a wall within a designated limit of time.
EXCEPTIONAL YEAR OF FULL-TIME
MBA PLACEMENT
the MBA degree as a springboard to launch into the job market in Asia. The reputation of the university and the quality of faculty, the curriculum, and the placement service of the program become very important when it comes to which program to choose.” He cited the Financial Times’ ranking coup and the AACSB and EQUIS accreditation that the School attained recently as testimonial to its quality and international standing.
Karine Fabre was a lawyer when she enrolled in the full-time program. Grown up in France, Fabre was very interested to develop her career in Hong Kong. “I came to Hong Kong with my husband five years ago and have been working in a law firm for almost four years. When I was charged with the responsibility of managing the renewals department for my firm, I realized that it was about time to upgrade myself if I wanted to go further.” Fabre was very excited that she has made the right choice. “The program here is truly international. With a diverse group of faculty and
Karine Fabre, front row first from left, and her classmates during the residential program.
Over the past two years, the project has generated widespread interest among peer institutions from all over the world. It has become a model for other universities, engaged in both distance learning and conventional on-campus instruction, to follow.
Tam is delighted that the eLibrary project received international acclaim and recognition. “The award is a boost to IT education and the advancement of Hong Kong. It proves that Hong Kong is capable of developing and applying advanced technology for the betterment of society.”
The Stockholm Challenge offers IT pioneers from the private, public, academic and non-profit sectors from around the world a unique opportunity to showcase projects of excellence. In
the past two years, the award program attracted entries from 700 IT projects from more than 250 cities and 60 countries. This year, the Challenge received 612 entries from Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, and North America, w h i c h w e r e d i v i d e d i n t o s e v e n categories. Evaluation was based upon four criteria: innovation, user need, sustainability, and transferability. The eLibrary was one of the three joint winners in the “Education” category which included some 200 entries.
The victorious eLibrary was a HK$40 million project commissioned by the Open University of Hong Kong. The system was launched in 1998 to provide web-based librar y ser vices to the distance learners, tutors and staff of the Open University.
E-LIBRARY WINS INTERNATIONAL
(cont’d from page 1)
students, it is a very good opportunity to learn the essence of global business.”
The new class started with an intensive residential program at the end of August. This 5-day experiential learning program is par t of the core course “Managerial Problem Solving”. Associate Program Director Chris Tsang said the residential week enables new students to build closer bonds among themselves and to improve their teamwork and leadership skills through active par ticipation in group exercises.
Total Enrollment 28
Men 54%
Women 46%
Average Age at Entry 28
Age Range 24-36
% of Non-local 43%
Average Years of Full-time Work 6 Work Experience Range 2-10
Full-time MBA Student Profile 2000
PROMOTION
Dean Yuk-Shee ChanFROM THE DEAN
G
reetings at the start of another new school year! While the past summer was a recess for our students, we were busy as usual here at the School. We are delighted to report in this Newsletter the various developments over the summer such as the EQUIS accreditation, executive education offerings and research achievements. Inaddition, I am very pleased to report in more detail in this column the excellent admission results of our MBA and undergraduate programs.
Our MBA programs (both full- and part-time) garnered more records this year. Overall, we enrolled 150 new students, a 16 percent increase over last year. With a record 75 percent yield ratio, the part-time program enrolled 122 new students -- the largest part-time MBA class in the School's history. The most gratifying news is that in spite of the nearly 25 percent increase in size, the profile of the new class is every bit as strong as that of last year in terms of maturity and work experience.
While the number of students in the full-time MBA category remains at 28, the same as last year, the new class has a substantially stronger international profile with students from seven countries in addition to those from Hong Kong and the Chinese Mainland, namely, France, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand. The new full-time class also set a record in work experience, with an average of six years of on-the-job experience.
Equally pleasing are the undergraduate admission results. According to figures published by the local Joint University Programs Admission System (JUPAS), the HKUST business programs were the most popular choice among secondary school graduates this year with one in ten selecting our programs as one of their Band A (first preference) choices. In terms of academic scores, over 20 percent of the students in the School's newly admitted class have attained results classified as in the highest level by the School, with the rest in the middle to high categories.
These admission results signify a strong endorsement of the School's programs. In addition to program content and classroom teaching, the School believes that early exposure to the business environment is important in developing students into successful business executives. To this end, the School has proposed collaborative partnerships with major corporations to provide students with internship and work-study opportunities as well as financial support for their participation in international exchange and other enrichment programs. A number of new initiatives are in the pipeline and I expect to share with you more details of them in the next issue.
HKUST Business School
Dean: Yuk-Shee Chan
Associate Deans: K.C. Chan, Steve DeKrey, Kar Yan Tam Newsletter Editors: Elaine Chu, May Hung
Sub-editor: Virginia Unkefer
Contact us: [email protected], fax: (852) 2358 1467 Website: http://www.bm.ust.hk
© 2000 by the School of Business and Management, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. All rights reserved.
P
rofessor Jiing-Lih Larry Farh has been named the Head of the Department of Management of Organizations with effect from 1 July. Professor Anne Tsui, who served as the founding head of the department, will return to full-time research and teaching.Farh has been Professor of Management of Organizations since 1997. He received his PhD from Indiana University in 1983, with a specialization in Organizational Behavior and Personnel. Prior to joining the University as Senior Lecturer in 1993, Farh served on the faculty of the Louisiana State University for nine years. Prof. Farh is one of the founders of the department and has been the deputy head of the department since 1995.
Announcing the appointment, Dean Yuk-Shee Chan welcomed Prof. Farh to his new role and also thanked Prof. Tsui for her six years of dedicated service in leading the department.
LARRY FARH APPOINTED HEAD OF
MANAGEMENT OF ORGANIZATIONS
C
ongratulations to the six faculty members on their recent promotion.Effective 1 July 2000, Kalok Chan, Jeongwen Chiang and Inchi Hu were promoted to Professors of Finance, Marketing and Information and Systems Management respectively; Chul Won Park became Associate Professor of Accounting; Theodore Clark and Shaohui Zheng were made Associate Professors of Information and Systems Management.
Kalok Chan came to HKUST in 1995 as Visiting Associate Professor. He was Associate Professor of Finance at Arizona State University when he joined HKUST as Associate Professor in 1998. His research interests focus on the dynamics of asset prices; market micro-structure; and international financial markets.
Jeongwen Chiang had been on visiting terms with HKUST from 1996-97 before he joined the School in 1997 as Associate Professor. He was recruited from Washington University, where he was Assistant Professor from 1992-1997. His research interests focus on measuring promotional effects on consumer choice; shopping basket studies; new product development; and customer satisfaction research.
Inchi Hu was a member of the School’s
FACULTY PROMOTION
faculty since 1994 as an Associate Professor. Prior to that, he was Assistant Professor at University of Pennsylvania from 1986-93. His research interests are sequential analysis; stochastic control; stochastic process; and statistical inference.
Chul Won Park joined HKUST in 1994 as Assistant Professor. He had been working for San Tong & Co. (Peat, Marwick, & Michell) before joining academia. His research interests are earnings management; CEO performance evaluation; analysts forecasts; and equity valuation.
Theodore Clark was with McKinsey & Co. (1985-90) and International Business Machines (1982-84) before he joined HKUST as Assistant Professor in 1994. His research interests include electronic commerce; IT strategy; telecommunications policy and strategy; EDI; inter-organizational systems; and process redesign.
Shaohui Zheng came to HKUST in 1994 as Assistant Professor. He previously taught at Columbia University as Adjunct Professor (1997) and Shandong Institute of Technology and Mining (1987-89) as Lecturer. His research interests are quality control; supply chain management; queuing systems; and Markov decision programming.
Larry Farh
Kalok Chan Jeongwen Chiang Inchi Hu
Chul Won Park
WHY SOME FDIS DO BETTER THAN THE OTHERS?
F
oreign direct investment (FDI) is an important activity that helps to integrate the world economy and improve efficiency. Some ventures are for med to utilize complementary talents and resources from different places to produce competitive products for the world market, while others are used as an effective strategy of market entry. But these ventures can end up with very different outcomes. Some succeed, some fail. Among the successful ventures, some perform better than the others. Why is there a difference and what accounts for the different performance?The search for answers to this question has generated a sizable literature that has focused on a wide array of variables. But because there are so many potential explanatory variables, results thus far are mixed.
China has consistently been a target of study because it is a major recipient of inward FDI. According to figures released by the United Nations in 1999, China was the second largest recipient of FDI in the world in the period from 1993 to 1997, only after the United States. By the end of 1999, there were over 341,000 foreign invested enterprises (FIE) in China, with cumulative realized FDI reaching US$307.5 billion and the contracted amount reaching US$613.5 billion.
Two HKUST economists, Professors Leonard Cheng and Changqi Wu, believe that to identify properly the determinants of the performance of FIEs in China, it is important to select variables from a unified theoretical framework based on the economic literature on organization and management control, transaction costs, and market structure. Government policies are added to reflect the economic environment within which firms operate. A total of eight factors are thus identified (see Table 1).
An FIE’s performance is measured both in terms of the firm’s long-term prospects and its shor t-term profitability. Here, long-term prospect is defined as the firm’s long-term and non-financial performance as perceived by its managers while short-term profitability refers to total profits divided by total sales in the year before Cheng and Wu conducted their study. The relationship
between the FIE’s performance and the eight explanatory variables shown in Table 1 is the subject of the study.
THE SURVEY
The data Cheng and Wu used came from a survey of FIEs located in Guangdong and Hainan provinces with the assistance of researchers from three universities in Guangdong and a research institute in Hainan.
Altogether, 350 questionnaires were successfully collected. Among them, 201 were from equity joint ventures (foreign investors owning a certain percentage of the equity), 62 were from contractual joint ventures (foreign investors’ benefits and obligations were explicitly spelled out in contractual arrangements) and the rest were from wholly foreign-owned enterprises. The majority of foreign investors was from Hong Kong, followed by investors from the US. The year of venture establishment ranged from 1979 to 1996, with the majority of companies first registering between 1990 and 1994, a pattern that resembles that of the general population of FIEs in China.
RESULTS
Quantitative economic research methods were used by Cheng and Wu to analyze the data collected from the survey. The analysis shows that some factors have a stronger correlation with the performance of the surveyed FIEs than the others. The most obvious are the history of the FIEs and the firms’ exploitation of China’s comparative advantages.
According to the researchers, the coefficients of the natural log of duration of operation are positive and statistically significant in all cases, meaning that the longer an FIE has been in operation, the better is its performance measured both by its long-term prospects and short-term profitability. As for the exploitation of comparative advantages, the researchers found that labor-intensive industries like electronic assembly tend to perform better than capital-intensive industries like the electrical equipment and products sector and land-intensive industries such as agricultural/food industries.
Some factors are found to have a certain impact on
the performance of the FIEs. The contribution of cash by foreign parent companies has a significantly positive impact on current profitability but not on long-term prospects. Foreign management improves long-term prospects, but not current p r o f i t a b i l i t y. E x p e r i e n c e a s measured by the number of FIEs ow n e d by t h e fo r e i g n p a r e n t c o m p a n i e s h a s a s i g n i f i c a n t contribution to long-term prospects but not to short-term profitability. FIEs with relatively more export sales were found to perform worse than FIEs that sold more to the domestic market.
To the researchers’ surprise, the survey found that FIEs from Hong Kong did not perform better than FIEs from other countries and that those l o c a t e d i n t h e S E Z s a c t u a l l y performed significantly worse than those located outside the zones.
The finding about FIE with Hong Kong origin is described by the researchers as a contradiction to the c o m m o n l y h e l d b e l i e f t h a t geographical proximity and cultural similarity between Guangdong and Hong Kong give Hong Kong investors substantial competitive advantages. It is also inconsistent with Hong Kong’s dominant role as a supplier o f F D I t o C h i n a . A p o s s i b l e
explanation that they offered is that, in the survey, “Hong Kong” as a variable was positively linked with export intensity and contribution of equipment by the foreign parents, neither of which contributed positively to an FIE’s performance. A second possible explanation is “transfer pricing”, i.e., the joint ventures pay above-market prices to their foreign parent companies for imported inputs and as a result depress the formers’ profits. A third possible explanation is that many of the so-called Hong Kong investors were indeed Chinese firms that set up subsidiaries in Hong Kong in order to acquire the status of “foreign investors”. Fur ther study in this area is recommended by the researchers to provide a clearer answer.
The result about FIEs located in the SEZs, while unexpected, is regarded by the researchers as reminiscent of findings of other researchers that FIEs located in Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin performed better than those located in the SEZs. The explanation could be that the non-SEZ cities in Guangdong such as Guangzhou and its vicinity not only had cheaper land and labor than the SEZs, but also were more aggressive in accommodating the demands of foreign investors.
Changqi Wu is Assistant Professor of Economics at HKUST Business School; email: fnchqiwu@ ust.hk Leonard Cheng is Professor and Head of Economics at HKUST Business School; email: leonard@ ust.hk
RESEARCH
Original research “Determinants of the Performance of Foreign Invested Enterprises in China” by Leonard Cheng and Changqi Wu
TABLE 1 – Eight Factors Affecting FIE Performance
Organization and Management Control • Contribution of cash, management skills or technology by the foreign parent relative to the Chinese parent
• The foreign partner’s relative control over the enterprise Transaction Costs • The origin of foreign investors
• History of the FIE
• Number of FIEs in China owned by the same foreign parent Market Structure • Proportion of export sales
• Exploitation of China’s comparative advantages
Government Policies • Government-designated location (Special Economic Zones (SEZs) versus others)
G
lobalization has led many people to become more sensitive to cultural diversity. Most of us know that different things have different meanings to people in different places. This is especially important to marketers who push products across the boundaries of continents. They have to be sensitive to a lot of things and the use of color, which plays an influential role in marketing, is one of the obvious concerns.For many years, anecdotal evidence and some cross-cultural studies have suggested that different colors should be used in culturally diverse places because of the difference in meaning that colors carry. But more recent research has zeroed in on an important aspect -- the biological structures underlying color vision -- that are common to mankind. Some researchers argue that because of this commonality, humans may also share the same color preferences.
Findings from a recent research by three prominent researchers in the field, namely Amitava Chattopadhyay (Associate Professor of Marketing, University of British Columbia), Gerald Gorn (Professor of Marketing, HKUST) and Peter Darke (Assistant Professor of Mar keting, University of British Columbia), have provided evidence in support of this theory. The best-liked color across cultures according to their research is blue.
WHY BLUE?
An explanation of this preference first has to start with how colors are identified by our brains. The researchers pointed out three dimensions of a color: hue, which is the pigment of it (red, blue, yellow, etc), chroma, which is the saturation of it (highly saturated colors have a greater proportion of the pigment in them, making them rich and deep), and value, which refers to the degree of whiteness or blackness of a color (low value colors have a “blackish” quality to them as if the color black was mixed into the pigment, high value colors look as if the color white was mixed into them, making high value colors pastel-like in appearance). Hue is where the focus lies in the quest for common colors.
Simply put, hues are a continuum of light impacting our eyes (either directly from a light source or reflected off a surface of an object). Light transmitted at different wavelengths is received and interpreted by
EAST, WEST, BLUE IS BEST
the brain as different hues. Previous research findings have suggested that humans prefer shorter wavelength hues such as blue.
There are also suggestions that blue is preferred because it is a dominant color in our environment; the sky is blue, as are large bodies of water, from the sky’s reflectance, therefore making it the most universally salient color.
EXPERIMENTS
The Chattopadhyay, Gorn and Darke sur vey compr ised four studies. The preference of blue as a color of choice was confirmed in their first study involving 892 university students from five countries: Canada, Por tugal, China, India and Pakistan. The students were asked to write d ow n t h e i r favo r i t e c o l o r. G e n d e r information was also obtained except in the group of Portugese subjects, which had a total of 26 students. Results show that there i s fa r gr e a t e r h o m o g e n e i t y i n h u e preference across countries and gender than what has been commonly believed.
The second study deals with the other two dimensions of color, namely, chroma and value. Data were collected from Hong Ko n g a n d C a n a d a b e c a u s e o f t h e significant cultural differences that exist in those two places. Participants in the study were also university students. They were shown different versions of a print ad for a fictitious brand of paint (Figure1). The chroma (saturation of the pigment) and value (degree of whiteness
or blackness) of the graphic color in each version were modified professionally. A total of 266 sets of data (about half from Hong Kong and half from Canada) were analyzed.
Results from the test show an overwhelming p r e f e r e n c e f o r h i g h e r chroma (more saturated) colors than lower chroma colors. Subjects from the two places also prefer higher value (more whitish) colors than lower value colors.
Professor Gerald Gorn suggested this preference is also to do with human physiological responses. “Higher chroma colors are richer, more intense and
more likely to stand out. There is also evidence in other research that the more saturated a color, the greater the retinal activity, making the color more exciting,” he said. As for the preference towards whiteness, Professor Gorn said that previous psycho-physiological research has shown that white light is calming, therefore the more white a color is, the more relaxing it is to the person who looks at it. While the first and second studies generalize for consumers’ preference at the receiving end, study three, which looked at color choices for promotional materials made by managers in ad agencies, completes the picture by examining the preference made at the giving end.
Again, this study used subjects from Hong Kong and Canada. It focused on choice of color by managers in advertising agencies. It showed that actual color choices made, in a variety of marketing situations, by those managers reflected consumer preferences for blue hues and high chroma. Regarding value: Canadian managers chose higher value colors, mirroring consumer preferences while Hong Kong managers’ choices did not show a preference for either higher or lower value colors.
DOES CULTURE MATTER?
While few cultural differences in color preference were found from studies one through three, there is no need to throw all beliefs and anecdotal evidence regarding
Gerald Gorn is Professor of Marketing at HKUST; email: mkgorn@ ust.hk. Original research “Roses are Red and Violets are Blue – Everywhere?
Cultural Universals and Differences in Color Preferences among Consumers and Marketing Managers” by Amitava Chattopadhyay, Gerald Gorn and Peter R. Darke
cultural difference in hue preference out of the window. Study f o u r o f t h e Chattopadhyay, Gorn and Darke research showed that cultural differences in hue p r e f e r e n c e d o emerge when there a r e c l e a r s o c i a l n o r m s ( s u c h a s festival traditions)
prescribing appropriate color usage that is culturally specific.
The study included 92 students from two ethnic groups, namely Asian and non-Asian. They were asked to choose the color they most preferred as wrapping paper for a gift for a friend for three occasions: a birthday (non-culturally specific), St. Patrick’s Day (festival with a clear norm known internationally for the choice of green), (Lunar) New Year (clear preference for red among Asians).
Results show that for birthdays, blue was the most preferred hue for gift paper across the board. When (Lunar) New Year was specified as the occasion for the gift, red was the most preferred hue by Asians. As for gift wrapping paper on St. Patrick’s Day, color preferences for Asians and non-Asians were the same with green as the most common choice.
“In a way, conventional wisdom regarding consumer color preference in different cultures is still valid to a certain extent, but it may more reflect natural human desire to do the right thing rather than the colors people really like,” said Professor Gorn. “Insofar as many of us are devoting our efforts to understand how people from different cultural backgrounds are different, findings in this research also remind us of a very important fact, that mankind is after all one species and we may be more similar than we are different.”
The findings of the research suggest that there is a far greater opportunity for standardization in the usage of color globally. This is of particular importance to marketers. With the advent of the Internet, people around the world are increasingly exposed to homogenous mar keting influences such as the same business websites. The discovery of this common hue (blue) will go a long way in the increasing trend of standardized marketing initiatives across countries.
”Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly,” said Professor Anne Tsui, Founding Director of the Hang Lung Center for Organizational Research (Hang Lung Center) at the Welcoming Dinner of the Second Chinese Management Scholar Research Workshop on 19 July. She made this statement to reiterate the importance of an open mind and not being bound by existing knowledge, to a group of 43 scholars from 30 major universities of the Mainland who were about to embark on a week-long program packed with lectures and group work on research methods.
The workshop, held on the HKUST campus, is an annual event organized under the auspices of the Hang Lung Center. This year, the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) was invited as a co-organizer. The purpose of the workshop was to introduce modern research methods and techniques to Mainland scholars.
Dean Yuk-Shee Chan was pleased that the feedback from the 33 participants of the first workshop held last year was so positive that this time the number of Mainland scholars was increased to 43. “We are seeing this initiative developing into a major annual event to be marked on our Mainland counterparts’ diaries. The result of that will be a continuous exchange and sharing of information and experience that is important for the advancement of our knowledge about Chinese business management,” he said.
Throughout the week, participants attended lectures by professors from HKUST, CUHK, HK University, City University of HK and National Taiwan University, performed experiments in laboratories, and conducted sample research projects by applying what they learned from the workshop. In addition, they met with three of Hang Lung Center’s advisors, Herman Hu, Executive Director, Ryoden Holdings, David Pong, Managing Director, Shiu Wing Steel and Michael Tien, Chairman, G2000 (Apparel) during the Welcoming Dinner. Professor Otto Lin, Vice-President for Research and Development, HKUST attended the Graduation on 26 July. He congratulated the participants on their successful completion of the workshop and praised them for their active involvement in promoting the advancement of research methods used in Chinese management research.
Professor Larry Farh, Head of Management of Organizations and the Center’s Co-Director said the workshop has achieved its goals. “The idea of the workshop is to throw as much information as possible at the participants but the underlying focus really is to promote more dialogues and exchanges of views. Therefore the whole event was
purposely set with an informal tone. Participants were encouraged to adopt an open attitude and see things from new angles. It worked out very well and I believe what they learned from the workshop will form a solid platform from which they can take off in their academic pursuits,” he said.
CHINESE MANAGEMENT SCHOLAR RESEARCH
WORKSHOP
PACIS 2000
The Four th Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems (PACIS) was held on the HKUST campus from 1-3 June. A biannual event organized by the Department of Information and Systems Management (ISMT), PACIS is a prominent regional forum for researchers, practitioners and policy makers to share the latest k n ow l e d g e a b o u t a n d d eve l o p m e n t s i n information systems and technologies.
The theme of PACIS 2000 was “Electronic Commerce and Web-based Infor mation Systems”, a topic that has attracted growing interests among academics as evidenced by the
SUMMER CONFERENCES
Professor Otto Lin addresses the group at the Graduation Dinner.
Pictured in the front row with participants of the workshop are Professors Anne Tsui (center), Larry Farh (fourth from right), and Katherine Xin (fourth from left). Conference Chair Prof. Kar-Yan Tam, chats with
keynote speakers Chung-Kai Sin (left) and Alan Siu (center) during a break between sessions.
Prof. Gary Biddle, Head of Accounting Department, introduces the speakers (pictured below) at the panel discussion.
The 2000 HKUST Summer Symposium on Accounting Research was held from 19-22 June. Each year, the Symposium brings to HKUST leading scholars from the US, Europe and Asia to examine a current research topic. This year’s theme was “Corporate Governance and Control,” a n i s s u e o f v i t a l i m p o r t a n c e t o t h e competitiveness of Hong Kong and Asia in the new global economy.
The first two days featured talks covering the empirical and analytical dimensions of corporate governance by Professor Jerry Zimmerman from the University of Rochester and Professor Rick Antle, Associate Dean of the Yale School of Management. Both are leading researchers in the field. The third day and the morning of the fourth featured discussion of ten cutting-edge research studies presented by leading scholars from top business schools including Berkeley, Carnegie-Mellon, Columbia, Duke, Lancaster, Oregon, UCLA, Vanderbilt, Washington, and HKUST. As confirmed by these studies, good corporate governance is a key contributing factor to company performance, value creation and economic growth.
The culminating event of the Symposium was
overwhelming response from both speakers and attendees. Conference Chair and Professor of ISMT, Kar Yan Tam, was pleased that the conference had generated widespread attention. “The conference has become a significant event in the information systems calendar. It provides an excellent venue for participants to exchange ideas and leading-edge work, and it lays the ground work for constructive collaborations across borders,” said Professor Tam.
PACIS 2000 was structured into 32 regular sessions and one panel session with a doctoral consortium where 21 students from seven countries spent the first day interacting with renowned IS scholars. The conference featured four keynote presentations by Alan Siu, Deputy Secretary for Information Technology and Broadcasting of the Hong Kong SAR; the Hon. C. K. Sin, Legislative Councilor (representing the IT sector) of Hong Kong; Professor Michael Vitale, President of the Association for Information Systems; and Professor Allen Lee, Editor-in-Chief of MIS Quarterly.
The conference attracted more than 180 attendees.
a distinguished panel discussion spotlighting a “who’s who” of leading experts and activists in corporate governance in Asia, including Edward Chow (pictured below, second from left, moderator), Executive Chair man, China Infrastructure Group; Jamie Allen (third from left), Secretary General, Asian Corporate Governance Association; Charles Grieve (first from right), Director of Accounting Policy, Hong Kong Securities & Futures Commission; Hasung Jang (third from right), Professor of School of Business and Management, Korea University; Mike Scales (first from left), Corporation Secretary, Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation; and David Webb, Editor of Webb-site.com.
All agreed that the 2000 HKUST Summer Symposium on Accounting Research was a smashing success.
GRADUATE SEES HOPE AMID CHANGES
C
hanges may bring hopes rather than perils; the key is that one should face changes head-on and squarely with a positive attitude. This statement describes the experience of Andy Yuen (94 MBA) during his six years at Citibank, which two years ago merged with Travelers to form Citigroup, the world’s biggest financial-services firm. Yuen had been working in the equity derivatives division of Citibank for four years when the merger took place in 1998. “I joined Citibank right after I completed my MBA program at HKUST. At that time, the market was so vibrant that no one worried a bit about losing their jobs. That was so until the end of 1997 when the outburst of the financial crisis prompted a spate of lay-offs and people, including myself, began to understand their career might be in peril,” he said. Then came the news of the merger with Travelers, which, to most of the employees, implied job losses or at least impending changes. “My thinking at that time was that we all have to go through difficulties at some time in our careers. The most appropriate thing to do was to face it squarely and to do my best at work,” he said matter-of-factly.As it turned out, hard work coupled with a proven track record has stood Yuen in good stead. Around a year after the merger, he was designated to head up a new department to develop the warrant business for the bank in Hong Kong. “I feel like I’m running a new company in the sense that everything had to start from scratch. I have been working hard to keep things rolling. It’s tough, but it’s also very satisfying to see your effort pan out,” Yuen said.
H
azelene Lam’s job as an equity salesperson at Merrill Lynch has never been shor t on challenges. Market fluctuations aside, Lam has to tackle many other daunting problems everyday. One challenge is actually what most of us wrestle with day in and day out -information overflow.Lam joined Merrill Lynch after graduating from HKUST with a BBA degree in finance three years ago. “Simply put, my work is to propose investment strategy to our institutional clients. To do that, I have to rake through research done by our analysts and bone up on market news collected from different sources, then come up with my own analysis and recom-mendations. Even if I never took time away to eat and sleep, I could never get through the ocean of information, let alone the highly demanding analysis work that comes after it,” she
EFFECTIVE TIME MANAGEMENT
BRINGS SUCCESS
said.
In fact, the job requires more than that. “Relationship building is one of the linchpins for success in this industry. Investing time in clients is inevitable,” said Lam.
When asked how to deal with such a tall order, Lam has a simple a n d t w o - w o r d a n s w e r : t i m e management. “Multi-tasking and being selective is very important. This requires a very quick mind and a good sense of judgement too,” s h e e x p l a i n e d . C e r t a i n l y , t h e formula for a successful equity expert could go on and on. Such qualities as maturity, an outgoing personality, being trustworthy, having strong communication and language skills, and of course, financial smarts are of the essence. “Above all, you have to love the job or you would never have the energy to keep you going.”
ALUMNI NEWS
Dean Yuk-Shee Chan (right) and Steve Yan, Managing Director of Edport shake hands after signing the agreement at the launch ceremony.
of the HKUST Business School in eCommerce research and teaching and Edport in eLearning technologies, made possible the development of these high quality web-based eCommerce courses tailored for the needs of the Asian business and IT executives,” he said.
Edport’s managing director Steve Yan said the key benefit of these online courses is that they allow participants to learn anytime and anywhere at their own pace and needs. The innovative and user-friendly features of these courses are designed with the aim of balancing the needs of busy executives to acquire new knowledge within tight constraint of time.
“The online Professional Certificate courses will be launched in Hong Kong initially, followed by the Greater China region later this year, and then extended to other regions in the world next year to meet the demand for “just-in-time” learning by working professionals and corporations,” he said.
The cost for each course of the
NEW NAME FOR
AN ENHANCED
DIPLOMA PROGRAM
he School's highly popular Graduate Diploma in Management (GDM) program has been renamed the Executive Diploma in Management (EDM) program.
Under the new name, the EDM program combines former GDM program modules with several new modules including Entrepreneurship, and Leadership & Management of Change. A series of luncheon talks on key economic issues are added this year to keep participants up to date on the changing global business environment.
Professor Gar y Biddle, EDM Academic Director said, "EDM has the advantage and flexibility to react quickly to changes in the business environment. By making available some of the best elements in the School's world-class degree programs to the business community, the program presents a high-quality management education program to working executives in an efficient and effective format."
The EDM program for year 2000-01 is scheduled to start in November 2000 and expected to finish by mid-June 2001. For inquiries please contact the EDM Office by email: execprog@ust. hk. Website: www.bm.ust.hk/execprog
EXECUTIVE EDUCATION
T
LAUNCH OF PROFESSIONAL CERTIFICATE IN
E-COMMERCE ONLINE PROGRAM
program is HK$3,800. Participants who successfully complete all four courses will be granted a Professional Certificate in eCommerce (Online) by the HKUST Business School.
(cont’d from page 1)
For registration or inquiries, please visit the School’s website (www.bm.ust. hk/exed) or Edport.com (www.edport. com).
M
BA Year-Two student Regina Wong, together with 7 other team members, were the top winners in the IBM Gen-I Challenge 2000 Program, an eBusiness competition open to all local university students. The winners each received HK$8,000 cash prize and were invited to participate in the “IBM eBusiness Project” as interns for a 6-week period.The program ran from June to July and was divided into three phases. First, applicants had to submit a write-up on their internet business aspiration. Finalists were short-listed to participate in the second phase - the “Net Generation IQ-EQ Challenge”, which included a one-day company visit and pre-camp briefing on eBusiness trends and IBM’s technologies enabling business and a two-day-one-night camp to take par t in an eBusiness design
HANDS-ON LEARNING FOR GEN-I CHALLENGE WINNERS
S
ome 100 sixth formers from 21 local secondary schools attending the School’s Summer Study Program were reminded of the importance of life-long learning by Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, Director of Education, and guest speaker at the Program’s gala dinner, who likened learning to charging a battery.“ Tw o d e c a d e s a g o t h e “battery” people had after earning their first degree was probably powerful enough for career development over a long time, but with the advances in technology nowadays and the globalization of the world economy, one must keep recharging this battery with n e w k n o w l e d g e t o s t a y competitive,” he said.
The gala dinner was one of the activities punctuating the five-day Summer Study Program (31 July-4 August) that featured lectures and seminars by HKUST business professors. In addition, the par ticipants visited two local
STUDENTS
Chinese language newspaper operations, discussed issues with students at Singapore’s Nanyang Technology University via a video-conferencing link, and took part in laborator y exper iments and various specially designed sports and team-building games.
T h e P r o g r a m w a s c o -o r g a n i z e d b y t h e S c h -o -o l ’s E c o n o m i c s a n d F i n a n c e Depar tments. While the main focus was on these two subjects, the lectures and seminars were broadened to include other business-related topics such as the Internet and eCommerce.
The overall arrangement of t h e P r o g r a m s a w a c t i v e par ticipation from across the School. The organizing committee comprised six undergraduate s t u d e n t s r e p r e s e n t i n g t h e Business Students’ Union (BSU), Economics Students’ Society and Finance Students’ Society, and Karen Liu, Assistant to the Dean and Leonna Tong, Executive O f f i c e r o f t h e E c o n o m i c s D e p a r t m e n t . Professors Francis Lui of Economics and W i l s o n To n g o f F i n a n c e ( a l s o Associate Director of the Undergraduate Programs) were the committee’s advisors. F r o m t h e d r aw i n g b o a r d t o
actual implementation, the camp required eight months of hard work from this team of organizers. During the course of the Program, some 30 more HKUST business students were involved as team l e a d e r s a n d l o g i s t i c s coordinators.
Feedback from participants was more than encouraging. Anthony Pang of La Salle College said he was most impressed with HKUST’s state-of-the-art facilities. Pe n n y Ye u n g o f S t . Pa u l ’s Secondary School said she had heard a lot about the School’s achievements before she came but the Program allowed her to see for herself the various elements, including facilities, professors and s t u d e n t s , t h a t m a d e t h e s e achievements possible. Yeung’s schoolmate Helen Chow said she most liked the interactive teaching style of the professors who were involved with the lectures and seminars.
All in all, the participants felt they were able to learn more about H K U S T a n d b u s i n e s s a d m i n i s t r a t i o n a s a h i g h e r education subject. They also agreed that this “glimpse” of u n i v e r s i t y l i fe w a s a ve r y i n t e r e s t i n g e x p e r i e n c e f o r them.
Joanne Wong, Academic S e c r e t a r y o f B S U a n d t h e organizing committee of the Program, said it had been a lot of work but it was all worth it. “It was
SUMMER CAMP PARTICIPANTS TOLD TO “KEEP CHARGING YOUR BATTERIES”
competition. In the end, the winning team would receive thorough training on IBM eBusiness products and solution and take par t in a placement project.
“It was a valuable learning experience. We talked to many people who came from different backgrounds and were actually mavens in the industry. Having to present to these people really forced us to fine-tune our business plan and honed our presentation skills. In addition, the chance to work for the sponsoring company also provided me a special opportunity to get hands-on experience in eBusiness,” said Whands-ong.
Wong was also in the champion team in another inter-university competition, Advertising Competition Express, held earlier this year. The team comprised three MBA and one MSc students of the School.
2nd row far left: Dennis Yue, Advisory Sales Specialist, IBM China/HK 2nd row 2nd from right: Regina Wong far right: Tong Tai, General Manager, IBM China/HK.
Activities...
a very value-adding experience. I think my fellow students will agree with me that in the end not only the par ticipating secondar y students were able to learn from
Group photo
time...
Learning time...
the Program, but we as organizers a l s o h a d o u r b a t t e r i e s ( o f knowledge and skill) charged through our involvement with the event,” she said.
Guest speaker of the program Matthew Cheung, Director of Education (right) receives a souvenir from Dean Yuk-Shee Chan.
