Deborah B. Kim, Edward D. White, Jonathan D. Ritschel and Chad A. Millette
Within earned value management, the cost performance index (CPI) and the critical ratio (CR) are used to generate the estimates at completion (EACs). According to the research in…
Abstract
Purpose
Within earned value management, the cost performance index (CPI) and the critical ratio (CR) are used to generate the estimates at completion (EACs). According to the research in the 1990s, estimating the final contract’s cost at completion (CAC) using EACCR is a quicker predictor of the actual final cost versus using EACCPI. This paper aims to investigate whether this trend stills holds for modern department of defense contracts.
Design/methodology/approach
Accessing the Cost Assessment Data Enterprise (CADE) database, 451 contracts consisting of 863 contract line item numbers (CLINs) were initially retrieved and analyzed in three stages. The first replicated the work conducted in 1990s. The second stage entailed calculating 95 per cent confidence intervals and hypothesis tests regarding percentage accuracy of EACs for a contract’s final CAC. Lastly, regression analysis was conducted to characterize major, moderate and minor influencers on EAC reliability.
Findings
For modern contracts, EACCR aligns more with EACCPI and no longer demonstrates early accuracy of a contract’s final CAC. Contract percentage completion strongly reduced the per cent error of estimating CAC, while cost-plus-fixed-fee contracts and those with no work breakdown structure greater than Level 2 negatively affected accuracy.
Social implications
To militate against optimism of early assessment of a contract's true cost.
Originality/value
This paper provides empirical evidence that EACCR behaves more like EACCPI with respect to modern contracts, suggesting that today’s contracts have relatively high SPI. Therefore, caution is warranted for program managers when estimating the CAC from contract initiation up to and slightly beyond the mid-point of completion.
Details
Keywords
Senthilkumaran Piramanaygam, Kuan-Huei Lee, Rajasekharan Pillai K and Saurabh Kumar Dixit
Ubiquitous penetration of the internet fuelled by the interactive nature of digital media has created a new genre of entrepreneurs who leverage social media to propel their…
Abstract
Purpose
Ubiquitous penetration of the internet fuelled by the interactive nature of digital media has created a new genre of entrepreneurs who leverage social media to propel their businesses. This study aims to explore the transformation of one such digital entrepreneurial cohort: Food YouTubers (YTs), who have metamorphosed from being mere content creators to entrepreneurs in the context of an emerging economy.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors invoke a qualitative interpretive phenomenological approach to unravel the entrepreneurial transition process. A combination of personal interviews and open-ended surveys is used to collect relevant data from 14 digital entrepreneurs. The transcripts are analysed to extract meaningful codes and themes.
Findings
The study shows that these entrepreneurs’ innovativeness and readiness to meet the real-time demands of their customers made their ventures a runaway success. This is the first study to target food YTs in India, an emerging economy. While the study is exploratory in nature, it provides basic insights into the transition of a novel group of influencers into entrepreneurs.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of its kind to analyse the transition of YouTube influencers into entrepreneurs in emerging economies, as it relies more on entrepreneurial activities for their economic and social well-being.