A Stochastically Optimized Two-Echelon Supply Chain Model: An Entropy Approach for Operational Risk Assessment.

Minimizing a company's operational risk by optimizing the performance of the manufacturing and distribution supply chain is a complex task that involves multiple elements, each with their own supply line constraints. Traditional approaches to optimization often assume determinism as the underlying principle. However, this paper, adopting an entropy approach, emphasizes the significance of subjective and objective uncertainty in achieving optimized decisions by incorporating stochastic fluctuations into the supply chain structure. Stochasticity, representing randomness, quantifies the level of uncertainty or risk involved. In this study, we focus on a processing production plant as a model for a chain of operations and supply chain actions. We consider the stochastically varying production and transportation costs from the site to the plant, as well as from the plant to the customer base. Through stochastic optimization, we demonstrate that the plant producer can benefit from improved financial outcomes by setting higher sale prices while simultaneously lowering optimized production costs. This can be accomplished by selectively choosing producers whose production cost probability density function follows a Pareto distribution. Notably, a lower Pareto exponent yields better supply chain cost optimization predictions. Alternatively, a Gaussian stochastic fluctuation may be proposed as a more suitable choice when trading off optimization and simplicity. Although this may result in slightly less optimal performance, it offers advantages in terms of ease of implementation and computational efficiency.

ESGs and Customer Choice: Some Empirical Evidence.

The goal of this paper is to determine whether a company's performance on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) indicators influences customer choice, and if so, which ones are the most important, as well as whether the COVID-19 pandemic had an effect on changing this hierarchy. Additionally, it intends to investigate the influence of regional and demographic factors on its formation. To achieve this goal, primary data were gathered in Greece via a questionnaire survey. According to the findings, a company's performance on ESGs influences consumer choice, with an emphasis on environmental and social indicators. It was also demonstrated that a company's social indicator performance is relevant to both urban and suburban customers. Customers in urban areas place a higher value on a company's performance in governance indicators than those in suburban areas, who place a higher value on a company's performance in environmental indicators. Finally, no significant COVID-19 effect was evidenced on the findings, although the emphasis on "social indicators" was further reinforced, probably due to the increase in social awareness of citizens during the pandemic.

Changing the organizational culture to transform the economy: The case of Greece.

Introduction: Organizational culture determines the ability of companies to adapt, transform, and innovate, thereby directly affecting their profitability and competitiveness. However, the same applies to the public sector since, now more than ever, it has to be agile in order to shield its society and economy against modern challenges (such as COVID-19, climate change, and digitalization). This article uses the case of Greece as an example to present the need for change in organizational culture to unlock its development and growth potential through transformation, adaptation, and innovation. To support our argument, we combine the findings of the international literature regarding the relationship between organizational culture and the aforementioned elements, as well as empirical evidence from Greece. Methods: In particular, we assess organizational culture pertaining to the major sector reforms that took place in Greece, as a result of the recent economic and financial crisis, by presenting and evaluating comparative empirical findings on the characteristics of the prevailing and desired future organizational culture. Results and discussion: Examining and comparing the results of previous studies in Greece that used the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI) questionnaire survey in both private (such as banking and telecoms) and public sectors (such as social security, public revenues authority, and hospitals), two interesting results arise: (i) there is a clear distinction between the public sector and the private sector, with the former being mainly characterized by "hierarchy culture," while the latter by "market culture" and (ii) in both sectors and all industries/services, the desire to prevail in future organizational culture is the "clan culture." These findings are of immense importance as organizational culture issues play a key role in formulating future strategic plans, enabling the development of key sectors of the Greek economy and enhancing effective governance and social services. Concisely, our results draw useful conclusions for policy implications and academics, implying that there is an emergent need for organizational transformation in both private and public sectors in Greece, which can be achieved through new innovative methods of organization and operation, creating a new more agile, adaptive, and innovative culture.