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In his dissertation ERIMs Ioannis Evangelidis notes that people generally neglect the importance they place on product attributes when making purchases, which may lead to sub-optimal purchases. Ioannis argues that this is a result of influences from the decision environment, specifically in relation to the options we are presented and the manner in which attributes are described. Moreover, Ioannis prescribes policy measures which can be taken to nudge desired or optimal behaviour.

ERIM’s Maria Rita Micheli focuses on Business Model Innovation (BMI) and confronts the lack of explicit understanding in how organizations combine external innovations with internal capabilities to innovate. As such, Maria Rita seeks to contribute to research along three dimensions: (1) through shedding light on the process of BMI, (2) by exploring the relevance of managers’ attention for BMI, and (3) by exploring the effectiveness of different BMI strategies.

ERIM’s Justinas Brazys examines market distortions created by the speed of information dissemination with special attention paid to high frequency traders who account for a substantial component of price volatility. Justinas demonstrates that pieces of news can have either positive or negative consequences for high-risk assets and that international economic data is disseminated far slower than domestic economic data, providing avenues which even slow traders can benefit from.

ERIM’s Erwin van Tuijl examines the upgrading, or process of learning and knowledge sourcing in generating value, of the Chinese automotive industry. Erwin examines this learning process in a series of case studies for different institutional arrangements, both formal and informal, and discusses several avenues for improvement (such as specialist co-location).

ERIM’s Jorien Pruijssers confronts the misconduct of auditors in the aftermath of the financial crisis in her upcoming dissertation. Jorien develops a novel perspective on auditor conduct by examining it from the organizational rather than regulatory perspective and further demonstrates that auditor integrity can be engendered via thoughtful organizational design and that auditor misconduct can be mitigated through use of similar tools.

ERIM Promoter Award for faculty member known to have supervised 25 Phd Graduates.

ERIM’s Saskia ter Ellen confronts the many dimensions of diversity and an over reliance on homogeneity throughout the dismal science in her upcoming dissertation. Contributing to a new field of research which seeks to create a more stylized, but representative, economic model, Saskia demonstrates that such diversity may imbue economic actors or persons with unstable and unconditional forecasting rules in the formation of expectations.

ERIM’s Ruben de Bliek investigates the place of trust in economics, especially in the face of classical economic assumptions held about the ‘homo economicus’. Ruben demonstrates four contexts in which the presence of trust is economically positive as opposed to oft-held classical assumptions.

ERIM's Aurelien Baillon balances economists reliance on hard numbers, such as GDP, and soft factors, such as executive confidence, in an attempt to bring attention to the further study required for the latter subjective factors. Aurelien discusses the role of subjective truths in economics today and explains that, though subjective, these truths can be examined in an objective manner.

ERIM's professor Lars Norden focuses on lending technologies such as relationship lending and trade credit that emerged to cope with key challenges in SME finance. He will raise the following questions: Do lending technologies work? Who benefits? Are there differences across countries? What do SMEs do when banks cut lending?