This study examines the impacts of placing cause advertisements at different stages of a consumer?s online decision journey. Cause related marketing (CRM) is defined as a commercial activity in which a brand is advertised with a cause to increase the effectiveness of marketing by inducing consumer altruism, reducing skepticism and increasing satisfaction with purchase. Extant literature on CRM advertising has focused mostly on TV/print campaigns (Mohr and Chiagouris, 2005). The increasing interest in online cause advertising, driven by the growth in e-commerce, makes our research both important and timely (Meeker and Wu, 2019).nExisting research suggests that consumer needs and expectations differ along the decision journey. Towards the beginning, consumers feel skepticism and desire control over the process; towards the payment stage, consumers feel elevation about their purchase and a greater need for trust (Batra and Keller, 2016; Powers, et al, 2012). Given this difference, it becomes imperative to identify customer mindset at each stage of online decision journey and develop effective marketing communications tailored to a customer?s stage in decision journey. With this aim, through laboratory and field studies, this study examines the impact of placement of cause advertisements at different stages of consumer?s online decision journey on the brand and the associated cause. Utilizing insights from persuasion knowledge model and social exchange theory, we show that the placement of CRM advertisements at the beginning and end of consumers? online decision journey has a differential impact on consumer behavior. We identify the underlying mechanism for this effect and show that consumer skepticism towards the CRM advertisement and felt elevation mediate this relationship. We find that advertisement characteristics such as trust in CRM advertisement, perceived control in cause advertisement and product characteristic namely product involvement moderate this relationship.nThis dissertation contributes to the literature on online CRM strategies and answers the call for research on the consumer decision journey (Batra and Keller, 2016). It is one of the first studies that juxtaposes CRM ad characteristics with features of consumers? online decision journey. This research can help marketers successfully formulate online CRM strategies for the brand and the cause.

Competition is an important, yet relatively unstudied, subject in the hub location literature. Through this thesis, we attempt to bridge this gap by studying the hub location problem under competition in the airline industry.nThe first essay discusses the hub location problem of a new airline, hereafter called the entrant, that wants to set up its hub & spoke network in order to maximize its share in a competitive market. Customers choose among competing airlines on the basis of utility provided by them, which depends on like price, travel time, and attractiveness of the airlines. The problem is modelled as a non-linear integer program, which is intractable for off-the-shelf commercial solvers. Hence, we propose four alternate solution approaches based on: i. Kelley?s cutting plane method; ii. mixed integer second order conic program based reformation; iii. Kelley?s cutting plane method within Lagrangian relaxation; and iv. second order conic program within Lagrangian relaxation. Our computational experiments based on benchmark datasets show the Kelley?s cutting plane within Lagrangian relaxation to perform the best, which is able to solve all the problem instances of upto 50 nodes within 10 minutes of CPU time.nThe second essay discusses the design of a more realistic hub & spoke network. We propose the hub location problem for the entrant in two alternate network settings: multiple allocation and single allocation. This further increases the computational challenge in solving an already difficult problem. We address this computational challenge by proposing three alternate solution approaches based on: I. mixed integer second order conic program based reformulation; ii. Kelley?s cutting plane method; and iii. Kelley?s cutting plane method within Lagrangian relaxation. Our computational experiments based on benchmark datasets show the Kelley?s cutting plane within Lagrangian relaxation to perform the best, which is able to solve all the problem instances of upto 50 nodes within 120 and 10 minutes of CPU time for single and multiple allocation setting, respectively.nThe third essay extends the entrant?s model to incorporate uncertainty in demand, for which we are interested in finding a solution that is robust to any changes in the demand. We model the uncertainty in demand using an ellipsoidal uncertainty set. This introduces additional non-linearities in the problem, and makes the problem computationally even more challenging to solve. We address this challenge by first proposing mixed integer second order conic program based reformulation of the problem. To solve the resulting formulation, we propose two alternate solution approaches. The first one is a cutting-plane method based on three types of lifted polymatroid cuts, while the second one is based on Lagrangian relaxation. Our computational experiments based on benchmark datasets demonstrate the superiority of the first method, which is on average 33% and 41% faster than the second approach for single and multiple allocation, respectively.nPapers arising from this thesis are at various stages of publication. The first paper, based on essay 1, is accepted for publication in European Journal of Operational Research (Click here). The second paper, based on essay 2, is under the first round of review in Transportation Research Part B: Methodological. The third paper, based on essay 3, has been submitted to Transportation Science.

The design of large-scale essional development (PD) programmes for teachers in the public schooling system faces two challenges. The first is identifying a suitable malleable construct which influences student performance, for designing interventions. Given the positive impact of teacher self-efficacy beliefs on student achievement, improving a teacher?s teaching self-efficacy beliefs is a desirable goal for a PD programme. Second, in a large resource-constrained public system, cost-effective reach is important. PD programs that have used technology judiciously for this purpose have shown promise, but the related research has reported mixed results, thus warranting further investigation.nAn online PD programme for Class 6-8 teachers in the public schooling system in Gujarat, aimed at improving teaching self-efficacy, provided the empirical context to study the effective use of technology in teacher training. A two-group randomized control trial was implemented to examine the effects of PD programme on self-efficacy beliefs. The PD design was in accordance with Desimone?s (2009) five core features PD programme viz. content focus, active learning, coherence, duration and collective participation. The study analyses survey responses of 19135 teachers and the classroom observations of 710 classrooms.nThe teachers who attended the online PD reported a positive change in subject-specific self-efficacy beliefs. Mixture modelling of participant activities found four latent iles based on latent ile analysis of pageview logs of 7037 participants, and six latent classes based on latent class analysis of responses to off-platform activity questionnaire of 7794 respondents. The variation in off-platform activities was significantly associated with the change in self-efficacy beliefs of the participants. The different latent online iles were mostly associated with variation in change of subject-specific self-efficacy beliefs. The comparison of classroom observation of participant teachers with non-participating teachers found no significant difference in teacher?s classroom actions (i.e. teacher activities & use of materials). But found significant difference in teacher?s use of textbooks (i.e. reading materials) in science classrooms. Finally, the teacher?s self-efficacy beliefs before training were found to be significantly associated with classroom activities, but the association of prior classroom activities to post-training self-efficacy beliefs was limited. The study provides insights on the "what works?" and "for whom?" questions in the context of large-scale PD for teachers.

Holistic student development is an important objective of higher education. It requires students to move from a conventional assumptions-based mode of understanding to a critical, systemic thinking that enables the development of an ability to accommodate multiple perspectives and discern among them. Self-authorship theory, derived from the constructivist developmental tradition of student development, suggests that holistic student development is achieved when students gain cognitive maturity, develop an integrated identity and achieve relational maturity. It is a journey from relying on external sources of meaning making to relying primarily on internally generated meaning making. This journey is facilitated by many ?developmentally effective experiences? (DEEs) that are part of the lives of young adults in their twenties as they undergo higher education. They include values exploration, making sense of past personal experience, relationships with others, and decisions about the future and thinking about how to get there.nLike the individuals who experience them, DEEs are embedded in the campus environment and must be studied within their context. This study examines DEEs in the context of a graduate school of business in India and their role in the development of self-authorship among students. The study is located in the interpretivist tradition of qualitative research and uses symbolic interactionism as an analytical perspective. The data are drawn from semi-structured interviews with selected alumni of the business school. The study describes the meaning-making roles that allowed students to develop a strong internal voice which was an essential part of their developmental journey. The DEEs identified and the associated meaning-making roles are an integral part of the socialization on campus. The core elements and processes of socialization are an important part of student self-authorship development. The elements of the context that support the students as they experience DEEs are also examined.nThis study contributes to the growing literature on self-authorship development in new cultural contexts, and in graduate essional education. It supports the argument for designing developmentally effective socialization experiences as part of the larger quest for holistic development of students in higher education.

We present two essays on behavioural finance in this dissertation. The first essay examines the influence of price-path, particularly the ?non-straight? price-path, on several aspects of investor behaviour. We compute empirical proxies for price-path based on behavioural decision-making frameworks, Cumulative Prospect Theory, and Salience Theory, and demonstrate that price-path significantly impacts disposition bias with trader-level data. We find that a price path that is likely to signal a favourable (unfavourable) price movement in the future reduces (increases) disposition bias among traders. The significant influence of price path on disposition bias is mainly due to the change in the propensity for gain realization. The findings suggest that beliefs about future price movement, as could be extrapolated from the experienced price path, significantly influence the trading decisions as reflected in the level of disposition bias.nIn the second essay, we examine the influence of the endogenous reference points on the selling decisions of investors in financial markets. The realized outcome and the counterfactual maximum are known to shape the reference formation of the decision-makers. Therefore, we investigate whether endogenous stock-specific reference points, ?realized-return?, and ?peak-return? of the previous round of investment in a stock significantly influence the selling propensity when they repurchase the same stock, using trader-level data of stock investments. We find that the selling propensity rises significantly when the return in the repurchase round is close to the ?realized-return? and the ?peak-return? of the previous round. The results imply that the past stock-specific experience significantly influences reference formation. Furthermore, the influence of the reference points is greater for traders with a relatively short holding period. The influence of endogenous reference points also declines with the time between the consecutive rounds of investment in the same stock. Since traders are known to exhibit the recency effect, the findings suggest that traders attach lower decision weights to the stock-specific endogenous reference points with time. The stock-specific reference points have a greater impact on the decisions of traders holding concentrated portfolios than diversified portfolios, likely due to the lower division of attention when traders hold fewer stocks. The findings suggest that endogenous reference points shaped by context specific memory have a significant influence on the trading decisions of market participants.

The dissertation empirically examines the effects of the characteristics of Chief Executive Officers (CEO) on entrepreneurial orientation (EO) of firms with the help of three essays. EO is the strategic posture of firms crucial for the renewal of competitive advantage and sustainable firm performance. The examination of EO from the perspective of CEO characteristics as its antecedents is still at an initial stage. Extending the growing trend in understanding how CEO characteristics may impact their firm?s EO, the dissertation contributes to the research literature on the antecedents of EO incorporating theoretical and managerial implications under various contingent effects.nIn the first essay, through an extensive literature review, we discuss the antecedents of EO of firms. Our findings suggest that the theoretical understanding of the development and antecedents of EO are still at an initial stage. We propose to utilize the approach of microfoundation inquiry, extend the exiting literature through sub-categorization of microfoundation factors, and understand the future research areas. We also identify two specific CEO characteristics such as CEO non-duality and CEO?s temporal orientation to examine in the subsequent essays.nExtending upper echelon theory and agency theory, the second essay examines that CEO nonduality- separation of CEO and board chair positions-positively influences entrepreneurial rientation of firms under the contingent effects of CEO?s experience, frequency of board meetings, and board independence, and contributes to the existing literature at the intersection of corporate governance and entrepreneurship using a sample of Indian firms during 2007-2016.nExtending upper echelon theory and temporal perspectives, the third essay examines the effects of CEO?s temporal orientation on EO of firms, and find U-shaped relationship under the contingent effects of environmental munificence, complexity, and dynamism, using a sample of Indian firms during 2007-2016.nOverall, the dissertation contributes to the ongoing scholarly literature on the effects of CEO characteristics on EO of firms, and helps to understand the phenomena under various contingent factors.

The objective of this thesis is to study employment relations in the Indian IT industry. Drawing from Foucauldian scholarship on governmentality in organizational studies, employment relations are understood as practices of governing employee subjectivities. More specifically, the thesis focusses on the problematization of employment relations, self-formation or self-fashioning practices, and counter conduct to investigate how particular kinds of relations with oneself and one's work are produced, normalized and/or contested.nThe study employed a qualitative multi-method research strategy. Data was generated through semi-structured interviews, industry and union documents/videos, and selected news media articles. The interview participants, totally 71 in number, included IT engineers, managers, HR, ex-IT employees, and union members. The analysis involved a constant back and forth between data and theory. Three narratives of subjectivation were produced through this process. First, is the employers' narrative of employability, understood as the discourse of skilling. Within this narrative, following a neoliberal employment model, employees are held responsible for their own employment and career growth through continuous skilling/reskilling. It is framed as a matter of developing the right 'mindset' or 'attitude'. Second is the employees' narrative of becoming neoliberal/enterprising subjects. This process of subjective becoming is fraught with contradictions, which makes inhabiting entrepreneurial subject position an elusive (im)possibility. The (im)possibility emerges from the contradictory demands and pressures imposed by enterprise discourse and its adverse effects on employees? wellbeing. These experiences are further structured through gender, age and migration discourses. The third is IT union members' narrative of rights and unionism, which positions employees as rights-bearing citizen subjects, who need to unionize to collectively contest and challenge the unfair terms of employment in the industry. In the face of neoliberalism?s forestalling of collective resistance, unionism was articulated as the only appropriate way of gaining a viable (collective) subjecthood.nThe thesis makes both theoretical as well as empirical contributions to the governmentality studies as well as critical management scholarship on the interrelationships among power, agency and resistance in employee subjectivation processes.

In forwarding the agenda of Universal Health Coverage (UHC), developing countries, including India, have adopted Publicly Funded Health Insurance Schemes (PFHIs) to serve their impoverished population. When PFHIs are implemented through Public-Private-Partnerships (PPP), they are advocated as a cost-effective solution to address the rising inequalities in healthcare access and poor quality of care in the public health system. India launched a PPP based National PFHI scheme (Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana) in the year 2008 and has recently expanded it as Pradhan Mantri- Jan Aarogya Yojana (PM-JAY), while there exists limited evidence on the effectiveness of PFHIs in achieving health system goals related to equity in access, demand for health services, and quality of care. This dissertation attempts to address this research gap.nUsing data from the two rounds of NSS (60th and 71st), and adopting the Concentration Index (C.I.) methodology, the first study finds that though there exists pro-rich inequity in inpatient service use it has reduced post-PFHI implementation (2004 C.I.: 0.158; 2014 C.I. 0.112). Inter-state analysis identifies three critical factors for reducing inequalities in healthcare access, effective targeting (greater coverage of poorest proportion), equitable distribution of health centers, and removing socio-economic access barriers.nIn the second study, the effect of PFHI coverage on the demand for a surgery (hysterectomy) is estimated using Propensity Score Matching (PSM) method. PFHI coverage increases (by about 16%) the probability of undergoing a surgery (hysterectomy). Further, the study finds that patients admitted in a private hospital and with PFHI coverage have significantly higher (21%) probability of undergoing any surgery.nData collected through exit-interviews with patients is analyzed using Multi-group Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to compare the perceptions of service quality and service satisfaction. Significantly lower perceived service quality (Difference: 0.20 units; p-value: <.01) along with reported administrative delays, longer waiting times, and longer length of stay among PFHI beneficiaries is suggestive of biased care.

International assignments form the backbone of global human resource management. These assignments have been elemental for various business strategies, control, coordination, knowledge transfer, and the development of leadership competencies. Global staffing has risen by 25% over the last decade and has the potential to grow to 50% in the next decade (Owens et al., 2010). While there is an increase in the number of global assignments, the number of failures in these assignments remains a pressing concern for academicians and practitioners. According to recent research, about 40% of global deployments fail, leading to huge losses amounting to $311,000 (approx.) a year (MacLachlan, 2018).nThe outcomes and objectives of the global assignments have rarely been studied from both the organization's and assignee's purview, leading to an unbalanced approach towards success. Also, literature has inherently discussed success metrics in the context of traditional corporate expatriate assignments. Subsidiary performance (Chang, Gong & Peng, 2012), expatriate adjustment (Kraimer, Wayne & Jawaroski, 2001), and cultural effectiveness (Lee & Sukoco, 2010) have been the primary parameters for the measurement of success of traditional expatriate assignments. Global staffing has evolved in terms of scope, tenure, and exposure, making it imperative to develop clarity about the success metrics (Andresen et al., 2014). Hence, this calls for an examination of the perceptual differences in the success metrics between the organization and assignees. There is also a need to extend this intervention across diverse types of assignments.

Pay-for-performance (PFP) is a financial incentive component of employee compensation that is contingent on performance. It is rewarded to the employee in recognition of the past performance and also acts an incentive for future performance. While PFP is a widely prevalent compensation practice, it also runs the risk of becoming counterproductive. Hence, it is important to determine when is PFP effective and how to enhance the effectiveness of PFP.nThe aim of this study is to investigate: 1) What is the impact of PFP on employee motivation, performance and well-being, and 2) How can organizations enhance the PFP effectiveness. To address these questions, we have broadened the criterion for PFP effectiveness to include the dual concerns of employee performance and well-being. Further, employee performance is addressed in a more comprehensive manner by the inclusion of the aspects of organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) and creativity, in addition to the traditional job performance aspect. To determine the impact of PFP on the employee level outcomes, we examine the role of PFP characteristics and their influence on employee perception of the PFP practice.nApplying self-determination theory (SDT), we propose that when an employee perceives that the PFP characteristics support the satisfaction of basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, there is a positive impact on their autonomous motivation, and, in turn, on performance and well-being.nThe study was conducted in a mid-sized engineering firm in the state of Gujarat (India) that specializes in design and manufacturing of plastic processing machines. The organization has 375 permanent employees consisting of managers (5%), engineers and executive staff (55%)and workers (40%), where workers are unionized.nThe data on employee pay was sourced directly from the organization, while the data on employee perceptions of PFP, motivation, performance and well-being were collected through the survey method. The surveys were conducted in three time-lagged phases separated by three months each. The data was analysed using structural equation modelling and regression analysis.nThe results suggest that PFP characteristics ? equity allocation, frequency, and recognition and feedback have a positive impact on the autonomous motivation of the employee, which, in turn has a positive impact on the outcomes of performance, OCB, creativity and subjective well-being. Contrary to the popular notion in management literature that PFP is a negative influence on motivation, this study tends to demonstrate that PFP may not always be detrimental for employee attitudes and behaviors.

I seek to understand the processes of organising that emerges and manifests as food-spaces, where class and gender are constructed and performed. Such spaces may be constituted as 'eating-out' spaces, work-spaces and social spaces by a variety of visible and less visible inhabitants. This study furthers this understanding through my participation in two food-space sites (restaurants). I have sought to explore how claims of authenticity around food and construction of food-spaces are performed and shaped by new understandings of work and eisure, and are, in turn, shaping them. I argue that these food-spaces emerge through the construction of new forms of work unfolding at spaces that are not conventionally constructed as work spaces, for example, restaurants and cafes. Through such a process of experience construction, eating and activities around eating are arranged closely connected with work and work-life. I have tried to see these performances as continuous processes of conceiving, perceiving and living the space, using Lefebvrian spatial triad. This approach helps unravel the socio-political processes through which some forms of work, along with the activities of production and consumption of food, are being constructed and claimed as ?new? forms and other forms are separated from these new forms and are being hidden. The latter operations impose invisibility on performers of such forms of work and their rhythms of everyday life connected with these forms.

Precarity, marked by uncertainty, instability and insecurity has become a significant feature of contemporary work and employment. This is particularly applicable to India, where 93% of the workforce (which includes those in the formal and informal sectors) is informal and engaged in precarious jobs, i.e., jobs marked by precarity. One such category is security guards working as contract workers, whose dignity appears severely challenged in the context of precarity. To understand this interface between precarity and dignity, data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with 29 client and supplier managers and 56 security guards of which 22 were unionized guards and union representatives, analyzed thematically and triangulated with the help of documents (contract agreements, court cases, media reports) and observations. The findings show that the major reason for security guards? dignity getting compromised emanates from client-supplier relationships. However, though all clients try to reduce the cost of security services by outsourcing, client-supplier relationships can shape how dignity is experienced. On the one hand, those clients who solely focus on cost reduction and depend on price-based competition between suppliers, open up possibilities for abuse and a drop in labour standards. On the other hand, client-supplier relationships focused on service quality, labour standards and organizational reputation, provide spaces to reclaim dignity. In the former, the dignity of security guards stands eroded due to insecurity of income, non-recognition of human needs and inferior treatment meted out to them by various stakeholders in client organizations, while the latter category provides spaces to reclaim some lost dignity. Further, this thesis argues how unionization enable guards to redefine their dignity at the collective level. However, the process of redefining dignity depends on union action and how the union navigates the constraints and challenges of union sustenance. The study extends workplace dignity literature by highlighting the impact of inter-organizational relations that increasingly determine contemporary employment conditions and work organization, while also contributing to the empirically unexplored role of unions in worker dignity.

In three independent but related essays, we examine diversity (heterogeneity) in strategic leadership to explore the interdependency among multiple levels of strategic leadership and analyze the role that strategic leaders play in helping firms attain the objectives of their strategic decisions.nIn essay 1, we examine the role of gender spillovers, to the levels of CEO, in the relationship between board gender diversity and firm performance. The empirical evidence on the business case for board gender diversity is equivocal. To offer clarity, we hypothesized that the appointment of female CEOs by gender-diverse boards acts as a mechanism through which women directors affect performance. We performed a meta-analysis of 73 independent samples to test the hypotheses. The results indicate that gender spillovers mediate the relationship between board gender diversity and firm performance.nIn essay 2, we address the equivocality of the empirical findings on the relationship between board diversity and firm performance. We hypothesize that different forms of board diversity will affect firm performance in distinct ways, and this relationship will be affected by CEO personal range. Evidence from the tests on a sample of large listed Indian firms shows that CEO personal range enhances the benefits of board functional diversity and social capital, whereas it aggravates the potential challenges posed by board gender diversity for firm performance. This work contributes to the emerging literature on diversity that recognizes its multifaceted nature?derived from multiple sources and operating at multiple levels?within strategic leadership.nIn essay 3, we study the outcomes of emerging economy firm (EMNE) internationalization and the role played by board diversity in attaining those outcomes. We hypothesize that the EMNE internationalization is non-linearly related to innovation performance, and this relationship is contingent on board diversity. We test these hypotheses on a sample of 21-year panel data of 244 Indian biopharmaceutical firms. The findings show that EMNE internationalization has an inverted U-shaped relationship with innovation performance. Furthermore, this relationship is moderated by board functional and gender diversity. This work contributes to the nascent literature that examines the outcomes of EMNE internationalization and the factors that influence them.

The use of electronic medical records (EMRs) in providing quality care for patients is spreading across countries including India. A systematic review of the literature reveals that EMR systems are designed as the database of medical records, and document health needs in biomedical terms. With potential implications for women?s health care, the biomedical framing of health discounts pre-existing sociocultural dispositions that inform meanings of health, illness, and healthcare practices. This thesis explores how women?s sexual and reproductive health needs are socially and culturally situated which potentially lead to variations in the use of EMR.nThe fieldwork comprised direct observations and conversations with eight obstetrics and gynecology doctors working in four kinds of hospitals and their teams and more than forty women who were consulting the doctors. Data collection spanned eight months and involved more than two weeks of on-site interactions with each doctor, which were analysed using grounded theory. While incorporating reflexivity and culture-centered approach to health for fieldwork and data analysis, the study emphasizes the nuances of researcher-researched relationship.nEMR systems are designed considering doctors with biomedical training as primary users. However, the study finds that patients also use EMRs for managing not only medical risks but also social risks. Beyond doctors? biomedical reasoning, the latter usage influences the use of EMR by doctors as they decide whether to record or not depending on their evaluation of the day-to-day appropriateness of the data in accordance with gender norms, familial responsibilities, folk knowledge, and stigmatization of certain health conditions in the immediate society. Yet, the biomedical design approach of EMR reduces the likelihood of fostering a dignified life for women. Hence, this thesis argues for a woman-centered design approach joining the conversations on patient-centric health IT designs within the domain of human-computer interaction (HCI). Accordingly, this work recommends design justice principles to explore opportunities for advancing health needs of women and to engage with research in HCI?s design-in-use paradigm. The findings are important in the contemporary context as the digitalization of health records is being encouraged by the Indian government and more intensely after the Covid-19 outbreak.

Counterproductive and deviant behavior at the workplace can take many forms from rudeness to bullying to abusive supervision to even violence. In the recent decade, there has been a lot of research on the antecedents and outcomes of these deviant workplace behaviors. The central concept of this study, workplace incivility, is understood as any low-intensity interpersonal behavior that is against the organizational norms for respect, with an ambiguous intent to harm the target. Workplace incivility as a theoretical construct was introduced twenty years back and most of the research thereon has focused on differentiating it from similar constructs as well as understanding its consequences on employee and organizational behavior. Common examples include demeaning someone, talking in unessional language, talking too loudly in a public place, gossiping, invading personal privacy, purposely ignoring someone, excessively interrupting a colleague during a meeting, etc. These deviant acts of behavior are quite ubiquitous in the global workplaces. On the surface it may seem that these innocuous acts of mistreatment can be disregarded as random acts of unpleasantness. However, over time, when such behaviors become the norm rather than the exception, they create a deeper problem for managers and organizations.nThe present study examines how Indian employees make sense of the concept of workplace incivility as well as their perceptions on the effectiveness of HR practices. The study used a mixed methods approach to understand the relationship between employee perceptions of effectiveness of HR practices of staffing, rewards, training, performance management, career development, and grievance resolution, and incidence of incivility in the workplace as well the effects on the normative, affective, and continuance forms of organizational commitment. The findings of the research have significant implications for researchers as well as HR practitioners. The study contributes in furthering the conceptual understanding of workplace incivility. The data collected through focussed group discussions as well as semi-structured interviews provides credence to the responses collected through surveys. The study also provides insights into critical measurement issues with the present incivility scale, cultural differences to uncivil behaviors with respect to India, as well as elicits further discussion on how appropriate implementation of HR practices can act as a deterrent for disrespectful, unessional, and rude behaviour in the workplace.

Although a rapidly growing economy, India faces many challenges on energy access and clean energy echoing some of the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations. Moreover, post-2020 climate actions outlined in India’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris agreement envision development along low-carbon emission pathways. With coal providing almost 3/4th of Indian electricity, achieving such targets will have wide-ranging implications for economic activity. My research uses a hybrid modelling architecture that combines the strengths of the AIM/Enduse bottom-up model of energy systems and the IMACLIM top-down economy-wide model to assess low-carbon growth. This hybrid architecture rests upon an original dataset that brings into consistency national accounting, energy balance and energy price data. Its macro-economic side also accounts for imperfections in the goods and labour markets that can raise obstacles to the transition. We analyse 6 scenarios ranging to mid-century: business-as-usual (BAU), 2oC, 2oC high growth, 2oC low growth, sustainable 2oC and 1.5oC. Our 2°C pathway proves compatible with economic growth close to 5.8% annual rate of BAU from 2012 to 2050, despite high investment costs. Scenario results show that low carbon high growth can be achieved with some trade-offs. Further mitigation efforts backing the 1.5oC scenario shows slightly higher annual GDP growth, thereby revealing potential synergies between deep environmental performance and higher economic growth possibilities. Moving away from fossil fuel-based energy systems would result in foreign exchange savings to the tune of $1 trillion from 2012 to 2050 for oil imports. The envisioned transition will require appropriate policies to manage e.g. the conflicting interests of entrenched players in conventional sectors like coal and oil, and the emerging players of the low-carbon economy. 3 As renewables play a critical role in low carbon pathways, we also analyse the relationship between financial support provided for wind power and annual wind power generation in 15 countries and 10 US states over 2006-2017. Our analysis indicates that support increases initially and then decreases beyond a point vis-a-vis the share of wind power to total power generated in a country. The inflection point exists for all countries but the value varies across countries. The relationships are statistically significant and provide compelling policy insights.

Recent years have witnessed an emergence of sharing economy, defined as an economic system in which assets or services are shared between private individuals. Ride-hailing has emerged as a key area of sharing based business models as cars are resources with high value and low utilization. Further, technological advances like Global Positioning System (GPS), and increasing penetration of Internet connected smartphones have reduced information search costs for coordinating market based transactions in ridehailing. These changes have led to evolution of ride-hailing from a traditional decentralized model in which taxis operated independently to organizations owning and managing the fleet to multi-sided platforms sourcing rides for matching supply and demand. Coordination is central to understand the shift from the decentralized model to the centralized model of ride-hailing. In the centralized model of ride-hailing, the ride-sourcing platforms centrally coordinate the operations of ride-hailing and unlock value through matching demand and supply. Quantifying the value of coordination provides a decision metric for the key stakeholders in ride-hailing. The value of coordination in ride-hailing platforms has not received due importance in the existing operations and supply chain literature, which focuses on the product-based firms organized as hierarchies while ridehailing platforms source rides as a service in a market-based organizational structure. Through this research, we quantify the value of coordination provided by the ride-hailing platforms to the primary stakeholders like drivers and customers. We evaluate the impact of change in the levels of demand and supply, situational contexts like spatial and temporal distribution of demand, characteristics of taxi drivers and customers, and network characteristics like topography on the value of coordination. We build an agent-based network model for our analysis with drivers and customers as agents operating on the road network with separate decision rules for matching for each ride-hailing model. Our analysis offers insights for the ride-sourcing platforms regarding market entry/exit decisions, operational decisions for an existing market, and to the drivers and customers on the efficacy of centralized ride-hailing in different contexts. An understanding of the value generated through the centralized ride-hailing can also be helpful for policymakers working in the area of urban mobility.

Uber, Ola, Didi, and Lyft are examples of successful e-hailing taxi platforms. In this thesis, we aim to develop decision models for such platforms. In the first essay, for an e-hailing taxi operation, we analyze the driver's profit maximizing reactive strategy (best evaluation criteria to either accept or refuse a ride request) in response to the ride request characteristics broadcasted by the platform and an associated driver penalty for refusing a ride request. We analyze six operating modes, which are a combination of three reactive strategies (no refusal, refusal based on proximity, and refusal based on profitability index), and two broadcast methods (no matching, and matching). Also, we consider three types of service region topology: straight line, square, and circle. We provide structural properties of operating modes that show the similarities and differences among the operating modes. We develop two models: an analytical model of a single taxi operation and an agent-based simulation model of multiple taxi operations. Using real data, we find that a driver who follows refusal based on proximity strategy can earn approximately 25% more than the baseline - no refusal strategy. We also find that the single taxi based analytical model is a good approximation of a more realistic problem. An e-hailing platform faces uncertainty from both the supply and demand side. Our second essay studies the platform's capacity decisions - the number of drivers to serve the demand - which affects all the stakeholders (platform, driver, and customer). An e-hailing driver is characterized by ride capacity, ride acceptance rate, driver incentive, and absenteeism rate. Platforms provide driver incentives to maintain a high ride acceptance rate. We study capacity decision models under different scenarios: a single supply source, a dual source of reliable and unreliable drivers, driver absenteeism, presence of supply constraints, and competition. We find that it is optimal to select taxi drivers exclusively from either unreliable or reliable drivers pool. The above finding holds even if the drivers exhibit absenteeism. However, when there are supply constraints imposed by regulators, the optimal capacity decision is to have a mix of unreliable and reliable drivers. We identify driver incentives as a more dominant lever for the platform as compared to ride acceptance rates and absenteeism rates. When two platforms engage in two-stage capacity-price competition for a random demand, we find the platforms are asymmetric in their capacity sizes at optimality.

This dissertation consists of three independent essays on electoral democracy and development. In the first essay, we examine whether political parties that are formed along ethnic identities target material benefits along ethnic lines. We examine this question in the context of two ethnic parties -Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) - in India. We use close election outcomes to generate quasi-random variation in party representation and find that while legislators from the low-caste BSP have a significant positive impact on the consumption of households belonging to the Scheduled Castes, legislators from the pro-Hindu upper-caste BJP do not have any significant impact on the consumption of either Muslims or Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. These results suggest that while ethnic parties mobilize voters along ascriptive identities, not all identity based targeting might manifest itself in the economic sphere. In the second essay, we examine the extent of electoral handouts in democratic elections in India by analysing changes in household consumption during election quarters. Using data from consumer expenditure surveys and staggered state elections in India over the period 1994 to 2012, we find that the poorest 20% of households are the primary targets of electoral handouts and that elections have a significant positive effect on the consumption of these households, in particular on their consumption of cereals, egg-fish-meat and alcohol. We also find that electoral competition does not have any significant impact on the relationship between election timing and consumption expenditure. In the third essay, we re-examine a key instrument, which is widely used in the extant literature to obtain causal estimates of the impact of politician identity on development outcomes. Conceptually, the instrument uses the occurrence of close elections to generate quasi-experimental election outcomes. However, due to the unavailability of data on development outcomes at the constituency level, in practice, the instrument is constructed by aggregating the outcomes of close elections to the administrative district level, which consists of multiple constituencies. We re-evaluate the validity of the instrument used empirically and show that the current practice in the literature of non-randomly setting i the instrument to zero, when it is not defined, renders it inappropriate for establishing causality.

We present three essays on financial intermediation in this dissertation. The first essay examines the credit risk choices of the public sector banks (PSBs) in India with novel data that identifies borrowers with their banks by ownership type. We determine the ownership type of the lender bank associated with every firm using a lender type prediction model. The analysis of the lending decisions suggests that the PSBs are more likely to lend to observably riskier firms relative to the private sector banks. The higher risk of the borrowers of the PSBs is more pronounced for small and medium-sized banks. The channels that contribute to the poor credit risk choices of the PSBs include lending to riskier firms in the service sector and firms that are impacted by the change of political regime. The essay contributes empirically to the understanding of lender moral hazard in state-owned banks. The second essay examines the impact of risk-sensitive Basel regulations on debt financing of firms around the world and investigates how firms cope with the impact through adjustments to their financing sources and capital investments. We find that the implementation of Basel II regulations is associated with reduced credit availability and higher cost of debt, particularly for lower-rated firms. Such firms mitigate the shortage in bank credit through increased reliance on accounts payables, lower payouts to shareholders, and reduction in their capital investments in the post-Basel II period. The findings of this essay substantially contribute to the understanding of the real effects of risk-sensitive bank capital regulations. In the final essay, we examine the role of pledge of shares as collateral for bank borrowings. We model the collateral choices of entrepreneurs and argue that it is optimal for the entrepreneur to issue debt securities with tangible collateral compared to collateral choices that include promoter pledge of shares. Further, we show empirically that firms would exercise the pledge of shares as the last option in the pecking order of collateral choices. Finally, we show that a regulatory change that substantially improved the creditor rights negatively impacts the propensity to pledge promoter ownership stake as collateral.