What determines the performance of overseas operations of multinational enterprises has been an important topic of research. This study aims at providing further evidence on the influence of entry mode and firm specific factors on the performance of Japanese-affiliated manufacturing investments in Europe. The empirical results are based on a sample of 98 companies for the period between 1994 and 1997. The main hypothesis is that firms with high firm-specific advantages and entering through greenfield investment perform better. Taking into consideration the full sample over the four years combined, results suggest that the success of theses companies depend on the size and number of employees of the investing company. As expected, the number of subsidiaries of the parent firm affects the pertformance of the subsidiary. Furthermore, entry mode and R & D intensity a re shown to have a non-significant relationship with performance.

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The purpose of this article was to express the relationships between situationsin workplace and two types of organizational commitment: affective and utilitarian commitment. Although prior research addressed relationships among those variables (Buchanan, 1976; Aldag & Brief, 1978; Rhodes & Steers, 1981 etc.), little research has done that expressed what types of situation make people who work in that situation more committed to the organization. This paper tried to analyze the relationships between situation in the workplace (i. e., leadership, organizational climate and intention for credo) and organizational commitment in detail by a questionnaire survey. Questionnaires were distributed to 1, 148 employees who work in Coop Kobe, which is one of the largest cooperate association. Results of this survey supported the findings of prior research partially: 1) situations in the workplace effect affective commitment rather than utilitarian commitment, 2) feeling freely but not feeling alone in workplace and taking care but not pressing leadership make employees' commitment strong, and 3) the stronger the workplace embodies organizational identity, employees who work in that workplace commit more to the organization.

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It is argued that white-collar workers are committed more heavily to their professions than to their employment organizations. This study classifies types of commitments among white-collar workers as ‘professional’, ‘organizational’ and ‘dual’ commitment. Based on samples of 180 white-collar workers, the research found that:(1) Specialty of the job and career development have an impact on job performance, however organizational, professional and dual commitment have no impact on job performance.(2) Extrinsic satisfaction factors (payment, management policy, career path progress) influence the turnover intention, causing it to decline. Organizational and dual commitment similarly influence the decline in turnover intention, but professional commitment has no impact on the turnover intention.

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This study provides the information of reliability and implications of narrative essay tests for measuring achievement motive as a part of employee selection processes. To develop the key achievement motive explicit and concrete rating criterion, the TAT scoring method was applied to data (n=100) of essay tests gathered from seven raters. Three raters were chosen from entry level workers and the other four were professional writers of verbal testing items, forming two contrast groups. The reliability of the achievement motive ratings was calculated for each group by the interrater reliability approach, resulting that there was no significant difference between the groups. Coefficients of each group's achievement motive, general mental ability and personality traits were calculated, suggesting the possibility that the achievement motive ratings thus derived from essay tests implies individuality.

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Case method is a teaching method with a special emphasis on discussion among participants in class. Comparing to lecture method, case method focuses more on self-learning among participants, which is realized by teacher's discussion leadership. This paper describes some ideas and skills teachers need when they lead discussion classes. Also, it explains the value and philosophy case method has in its base.

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This paper reviews the way that an enterprise with fifty employees practiced the programs for human resource developments, investigating the drastic change of its operation systems twice in fifteen years to stay competitive over times. In the case of this enterprise, the top management showed the long-term futurevision (around ten years) soon after recognizing the change of business environments. He asked all employees to adapt to the vision and recruited the human resource necessary for the new environment. The HR plan had changed drastically every fifteen years with a minor revision in each year. Before introducing the new plan, every employee is allowed to take preparation of two to three years, spending for participating in training programs and adjusting themselves behaviorally and psychologically to the plan. For those who failed to make smooth transition, the reallocation trials in the enterprise and the assistance programs for outside job hunting were provided in order to fulfill individual objectives obtained in semi-annual interviews. It is concluded that an adequate use of the change programs for human resource development enabled the enterprise to change its operation systems drastically twice in fifteen years.

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