3/4/2009 4:32:00 AM By
E.J. Reedy
3/3/2009 11:13:00 AM By
E.J. Reedy
I just came across a recent paper from the World Bank which takes on the general issue of how someone wanting to look at assets might think about disentangling gender from such an examination. I thought this was a really interesting topic and something I know that many struggle with in studying business ownership and wealth creation. Many businesses are co-owned by spouses, and how does one disentagle the asset effects of this? I am not totally sure, but I like the fact that this paper tries to draw out lessons from some field work that might apply more broadly to others interested in this topic.
Ownership and control over assets such as land and housing provide direct and indirect benefits to individuals and households, including a secure place to live, the means of a livelihood, protection during emergencies, and collateral for credit that can be used for investment or consumption. Unfortunately, few studies - either at the micro or macro levels- examine the gender dimensions of asset ownership. This paper sets out a framework for researchers who are interested in collecting data on individual level asset ownership and analyzing the gender asset gap. It reviews best practices in existing surveys with respect to data collection on assets at both the household and individual levels, and shows how various questions on individually owned assets can be incorporated with a minimum of effort and cost into existing multi-topic household surveys, using examples of three Living Standard Measurement Study surveys: the 1998-99 Ghana survey, the 2000 Guatemala survey, and the 1997-98 Vietnam survey questionnaires. The analysis shows that it is feasible to add a minimal set of questions to enable calculation of the gender asset gap. Adding a series of extra questions will permit a more satisfactory and nuanced analysis of asset acquisition, use, disposition, and valuation - information that is critical for policies promoting gender equality, poverty reduction, and economic growth.
This is probably most applicable to those studying microfinance
2/23/2009 10:49:00 AM By
E.J. Reedy
As I talked about a couple of weeks ago, we are in the middle of reviewing the Kauffman Firm Survey questionnaire before going back to the field in late spring for the fifth round of survey work. Recently, we have reconsidered the need to ask a question about training that the businesses have received. In hindsight, we should have asked this from the beginning but we haven't. Now we are at the point where we need feedback about this specific question and the value it brings in being asked at this point in the overall process of this panel data collection process.
Training_question_022309.pdf (74.65 kb)
2/19/2009 11:21:00 AM By
E.J. Reedy
The International Consortium for Entrepreneurship (ICE) is a loose alliance of countries and organizations interested in doing cross-country coordinated research on entrepreneurship and innovation. One of the projects that ICE has identified for the year is to study the linkages between large and small firms in a richer way. This project is just getting scoped out and Chris Parsley from Industry Canada has taken the lead on developing the questionnaire and some of the proposed design. I find the questionnaires quite thurough and interesting. We would greatly appreciate feedback on the questionnaires or design. See more explanation from Chris below and the attached draft questionnaires.
I should emphasize that this is a draft and we are really hoping to get input from each of you so that the cases are all conducted with a common understanding of this project and what it is trying to achieve.
There were a number of perspectives expressed at the November meeting and I would venture to say that I have probably not captured all of them here.
The questionnaire is really two questionnaires: one for small firms and one for large firms. They are marked accordingly. Most of the questions are similar, but we have tried to capture small and large differences by posing specific questions to only one group.
The document is a mixture of objective questions and discussion questions. The idea is that we would send this “questionnaire” out ahead of time and schedule an interview to follow. The participants could then gather what objective data they need and would also have time to consider the discussion type questions. So I think it fairer to think of this as a protocol for interviews where we could explore in depth the nature of the strategic alliances between the large and small firms. Hence it is not a survey instrument in the usual sense but a tool designed to probe the subject in some detail recognizing that there will be differences between among specific cases.
Unit of analysis: One of the challenges in preparing this protocol is what we consider to be the unit of analysis. One possibility is the large firm, and the sum of its strategic alliances with small firms. A second possibility is a single alliance between a small firm and a large firm. In the latter case we would get more detail of specific arrangements, but we would have to interview both the large firm and the small firm and we would not know how general these practices are. Small firms are notoriously difficult to interview as they seem very time constrained. On the other hand, if the large firm is used as the unit of analysis we can gather more overall evidence and understand the large firm’s general strategy to alliances, but we will not have the small firm’s perspective, particularly on how it controls its IP. Since this project is about finding links between innovation and entrepreneurship it seems important to get the small firm perspective. To get around this problem the protocol has been constructed to examine both units of analysis. Some questions refer to the general pattern of alliances (section B for instance) and others (in sections C D E & F) ask both about all the small-large alliances in a firm and also about the particular alliance in question. This assumes therefore that we can interview the small firm. It may be the case that answers to every cell are not appropriate, but that has been anticipated.
Scope: At the meeting in November there seemed to be a consensus that we would be looking at strategic alliances between large and small firms that dealt with R&D and also learning. Joint ventures were excluded as were vendor-buyer agreements. Consequently we have tried to make this clear in the protocol. There was no agreement on which sectors to target, but it was noted that biotech and pharma could be fruitful sectors to explore. Depending on what input we receive it could be possible to coordinate among ICE members so that we get a good coverage of different sectors.
I would strongly encourage your feedback and we would be particularly appreciative of your comments regarding the following:
1) The approach outlined here
2) Ways to refine and improve the protocol.
3) Any suggestions as to possible cases in each of your countries
4) Any possible consultants (we anticipate a European consultant and a North American one - this is not the only possibility however. Again your thoughts would be appreciated. With more consultants it is even more critical that this protocol conveys a clear understanding of what we are after.)
5) Any other thoughts
Ideally we would like to have your input by February 27.
Linkages Questionnaire - small firms _3_.pdf (33.27 kb)
Linkages Questionnaire - large firms _3_.pdf (33.05 kb)
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Developing better data is part of Kauffman's long-term strategy for advancing better research and policy on entrepreneurship and innovation. Data Maven is place you can connect with new data developments, provide us feedback on possible new projects, and contribute to the community seeking to improve entrepreneurship and innovation measurement.
E.J. Reedy is a manager in Research and Policy at the Kauffman Foundation. Learn more ...
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