title
stringlengths 6
301
| keywords
listlengths 0
23
| messages
listlengths 2
2
|
|---|---|---|
Women's participations in economic and NGO activities in Bangladesh: An empirical study on the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey (BDHS)
|
[
"Women",
"Economic sociology",
"Labour market",
"Gender"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The economic contribution of women and their involvement with the third sector are subjects of interest in contemporary literature particularly in the social sciences (see, e.g. Amin et al., 1998; Waring, 2003; Kabeer, 2005; Pitt et al., 2006; Bose et al., 2009; Rahman and Wright, 2012; Rahman and Khan, 2013; Bradshaw et al., 2013; Verick, 2014). Bangladesh is a developing country with a majority Muslim population and women's participation in labour force activities has not been an easy one particularly due to socio-cultural reasons. It is often in discussion as to how Bangladesh has been so successful in utilising its female population in economic activities where Islam as a religion is still play vital role in shaping people's life. On the other hand, Bangladesh is also well known as a country with huge success in the growth and development of NGO sectors and a vast majority of workforce are females. Women are generally targeted to give jobs in garments and NGO sectors and loans are being granted for small business purposes. Over the last two decades, micro-credit programmes have proved very popular in Bangladesh and have provided a focal point for discussions about the reduction of poverty. Government alongside with NGOs have come forward to involve women in labour force activities through micro-credit programme. However, little is known on the dynamics of women's participation in labour market and NGO sectors. Moreover, it is worthwhile to study the degree to which economic crisis has impacted on the labour market in Bangladesh. Considering all these points, the study aims to identify key determinants of the women's participation and NGO activities particularly in microcredit related activities in Bangladesh.\nResearch methods: The data\nDependent variables: Women's occupations are considered to examine the pattern of their economic engagement by their socio-economic and demographic backgrounds. There is a long list of occupational categories in the BDHS survey which are reduced to a small number of categories as follows: non-employed; professional; business (small and large business); semi-skilled labour (home-based manufacturing; factory worker, blue collar services; semi-skilled labourer); farmer/poultry worker (land owner; farmer; agriculture worker; fisherman; poultry and cattle raising); unskilled labour (rickshaw driver, brick breaking, road building construction work; domestic servant); and others (student; retired; other). Then two dichotomous dependent variables were considered to study women's participation in economic activities: women's participation in employment during the last 12 months or so (either employed or non-employed); and women's involvement in NGOs activities as being actively involved or not involved at all.\nIndependent variables: From the large set of variables we selected those we felt to be relevant namely, age of the women, marital status, number of living children, urbanisation, geographical regions, educational status of respondents and their partners, asset quintiles and involvement in NGOs. Definition and measurement of the variables are illustrated in Table II. The variables were selected based on existing literature and theories (Becker, 1965; Hossain et al., 2004; Bose et al., 2009) on women's participation in economic activities.\nResults and discussions: Descriptive analysis\nConclusions: This study examined the economic activities of women in Bangladesh on the basis of the macro-level data on women's participation in the labour force, continuity of their employment and participation in NGO activities. A set of socio-economic and demographic characteristics of women was used including the age of the women, their marital status, number of living children, place of residence, geographical region, education and wealth index in order to examine the effects on women's economic activities in Bangladesh. First, we attempted to understand the types of women's occupations in Bangladesh; second, we mapped women's continuity of employment, and finally, identified the key determinants of women's involvement in NGO activities as well as economic activities in Bangladesh. This study indicates that female labour force participation has been gradually increasing in Bangladesh but the rate is not an encouraging one when compared to participation of male counterparts. This indicates that a big gender gap still exists in labour market participation. Moreover, variation in economic participation is also found to be significant for age cohorts. It is suggested that policy-makers should take the finding seriously in order to balance equal participation by age and sex in labour market. The study has revealed that among those employed a vast majority of women are performing economic activities in farming, agriculture and poultry industries particularly in the homesteads. Women in Bangladesh have a long tradition of involvement in this sector and may well prefer to keep engaging in it because of socio-cultural norms. It is likely to be continued unless other sectors are developed in Bangladesh particularly in rural setting. In such a case, micro-credit may play an important role in income generation, alleviating poverty through entrepreneurship and more importantly encouraging people to involve in various types of economic activities (Rahman and Khan, 2013; Chowdhury et al., 2016).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine key factors affecting the economic involvement of women in Bangladesh and women's involvement with non-governmental organisations (NGOs) particularly in microcredit operating in that country.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study uses nationally representative data set. Quantitative analysis was utilised to explore data contained in the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Surveys 2007 and 2011.\nFindings: The findings indicate that age, marital status, number of children living in the household, place of residence, geographical location, education, partner's education and the wealth index are important factors in enabling women's involvement in economic activities. In other words, the key findings emerged from the study are first, the low level of women's economic activities in Bangladesh with a majority involved in farming, agriculture and poultry; second, those women involved in the labour market generally tended to come from poor backgrounds, have very little education, live in the Northwest geographical region and have a large family living in the same house; and finally, age, currently married, having a higher number of children, living in rural areas, from the Northwest region with almost no education and belonging to the poor wealth index quintile are found to be associated more with NGO activities in Bangladesh.\nSocial implications: The findings indicate there are potential barriers that are preventing Bangladeshi women from engaging in the labour market that could reinforce the case for reshaping the government's labour policies. The study reveals that the recent economic crisis has no significant impact on the women labour force participation as well their involvement in NGO activities in Bangladesh. It is generally understood that enhancing women's economic participation and NGO activities has a positive impact at family, community and country levels. The study concludes that investing in women, particularly in creating employment opportunities including NGO sectors can help the country as a safeguard even during the economic crisis. It is anticipated that the findings will help policy-makers in enhancing female labour force participation as well as encouraging them to engage in NGO activities in Bangladesh.\nOriginality/value: The research paper is original in terms of conceptual framework, research design and statistical analysis.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The history of the modernisation construct: Tracing the contribution of business and economic historians
|
[
"Business history",
"Sociology",
"Modernisation"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: The modernisation construct emerged during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when prominent thinkers, such as Adam Smith, Antoine de Condorcet and Henry Maine, used historical and economic data to present their understanding of changes in communities and/or countries from reviews of religion, labour and economics (Inglehart and Baker, 2000; Inglehart and Welzel, 2005). In the twentieth century, scholars such as Max Weber and Talcott Parsons built upon these foundations defining modernisation as an evolving:\nEarly conceptualisations of modernisation: Early conceptualisations of modernisation can be traced back to the eighteenth century, when scholars attempted to differentiate the ancient and medieval eras from the modern era (Thornton, 2005). This differentiation between the traditional way of doing things and modern way reflected the emergence of the innovative social order. Specifically, Bernstein (2004); Lal (1998) and Landes (1998) argued regular economic growth in the eighteenth century, which outpaced the needs of the expanded population and created a favourable situation for the rise of capitalism primarily in the urban centres of late-medieval Western Europe. In confluence with the ascension of the Age of Enlightenment, technological innovations contributed particularly to this rise by enabling the expansion of human power over nature. Moreover, technological and economic advancement was credited for helping individuals recognise new opportunities for freedom to assure new roles that allowed them to escape their constrained opportunities within traditional society. Smith (1776) promoted this view when he developed the doctrine of capitalism positing that technological innovations engendered a revolutionary power to advance human progress and related cultural changes. Shortly thereafter, French philosopher Antoine de Condorcet (1795) similarly presented substantive notice to peers arguing not only that economic development was linked to advancements in technology but also that such progress imposed changes on individual morals, thus culturally changing society. Importantly, de Condorcet claimed that human progress would be continual, because technological advancement would emerge as society attempted to better control the environment.\nProponents of modernisation: Following the Second World War, the breakdown of European colonial empires and subsequent emergence of the Cold War, the topic of modernisation experienced a resurged interest, primarily by American social scientists. Scholars of this era framed modernisation as useful lens to construct theory and make prediction models through systematic description. In this lens, scholars highlighted that:\nThe critics of modernisation: Despite the massing of proponents of modernisation, critics of the conceptual framework emerged within social science to overwhelm and discredit it as early as the 1970s (O'Donnell, 1973). The research culture among historians suggested that liberal scholars pressured other scholars to view the bureaucracy associated with organisations and institutions as privileging the upper class and leading to the rise of dictators and/or authoritarian leaders in third-world countries. As a result, social history scholars favoured reviews of external happenings and their influence on communities over the internal workings of organisations and institutions because of this ideological shift. With reference to third-world countries, critics of modernisation suggested that underdeveloped societies did not need to accept and practice modern values to be developed (Eisenstadt, 1977). Instead, third-world countries, under the emerging dependency and world systems theories (Cardoso and Faletto, 1979; Marsh, 2014), were promoted by social historians and sociologists to offer alternative solutions to the puzzle of development.\nRevival of interest in modernisation in late twentieth century: In the 1980s and early part of the 1990s, economic and business historians continued to lead the shift towards examining specific modern institutions through modernisation. For instance, Starr (1982) examined the growth of medicine as a modern legitimate profession and concluded that its institutionalisation coincided with the interaction and/or synergy between internal advancements or maturities within wider social changes. In The Social Transformation of American Medicine, winner of a 1984 Pulitzer Prize, Starr emphasised on the impact of specific historical actors who made discoveries and challenged the field. His work highlighted the relevance of modernisation by describing how evolving structures emanating from human agency advanced the medical profession and helped it gain greater access and power within various markets, organisations and governmental agencies. Fricke (1982) studied the modernisation of small businesses in the USA prior to and after the establishment of the New Deal, a domestic programme established between 1933 and 1938 in the USA to reform and assist relief and recovery efforts during the Great Depression. Looking at the McCreary Tire & Rubber Company, Fricke highlighted that although four large tire companies (i.e. USA Rubber, Goodrich, Goodyear and Firestone) dominated the sales market, small companies such as McCreary were able to survive the Great Depression through efforts to adopt modern accounting, inventory control and financing practices stimulated by the New Deal.\nTwenty-first-century business history scholarship on modernisation: Although it has been curiously overlooked, modernisation-focused scholarship in the twenty-first century has been established amongst historical researchers in business and economic fields. A keyword search of modernisation in the Journal of Management History, Business History and Management & Organisational History and in Business Source Complete database produced over 30 published articles from 2000 to 2016 in a variety of history journals (e.g. Accounting, Business & Financial History, Australian Economic History Review, Business History Review, Economic History Review, European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Explorations in Economic History, Financial History Review, Journal of Economic History, Labor History and Labour History Review). Additional searches using the archival engines provided by the various websites of the 2016 Financial Times top 50 journals delivered an additional set of articles from publications such as the Academy of Management Journal, Human Relations; MIS Quarterly, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Business Ethics and Organisational Studies. The total number of papers reviewed from these search processes totalled 45 and undoubtedly show that modernisation has been a significantly addressed topic by business disciplines (Table I).\nConclusion: Although our review captures how modernisation has been conceptualised across disciplines, we have also addressed how the construct has been studied and described in the contributions of business and economic scholars. Collectively, the works of these scholars indicate that modernisation is a research lens used to link documented realities about progress. The modernisation lens uses stages or comparison to articulate the transition, from traditional to a technological and industrial economy and possibly from authoritarian leaders and political structures to participant or stakeholder/shareholder-oriented systems. Further, modernisation is posited as involving technical development, complexity, specialisation and rationality for the safety, security and enhanced living of society. This view of modernisation also involves not only secularism and formal organisation but also job specialisation and accompanies the creation of new occupations coupled with evolving technologies and consumer preferences. In this view, modernisation is associated with capitalist social processes, which highlights how products and services were produced for individual or shared consumption. Moreover, society compels continuous service and product improvements, suggesting that modernisation, although not cleanly linear, is a real phenomenon.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to trace and/or historicise modernisation as a conceptual framework from the antecedents to present times. It also highlights the recent and past attention provided to modernisation by business and economic history scholars to recognise their contribution.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper is a literature review which offers a sample of debate from foundational scholars regarding the concept of modernisation emanating from sociologists, historians and business scholars. To present an analysis of the recent activity from business scholars on modernisation from highly recognizable journals and draw conclusions about the conceptual framework regarding its future as a framing device, the authors used search functions in the Business Source Complete database and specific journal search engines.\nFindings: A keyword search of modernisation produced 45 published articles from 2000 to 2016 in business-related history and Financial Times top 50 journals. The foremost recognizable aspect of modernisation, as a construct presented here, demonstrates the concept that aims to illustrate a basic and/or universal pattern of the social processes that primarily affect development (e.g. cultural, economic, organisational, ecological, technological, etc.). Moreover, the authors demonstrate that economic and business scholars helped identify and explain different types of modernisation, reinforce or connect specific characteristics to modernisation, develop modernisation as an index capable of measurement and provide evidence of modernisation as a rhetorical strategy.\nOriginality/value: Little to no previous studies on modernisation emphasised on the contribution of business and economic historians; instead, they focused on the contributions of sociologists and social historians. Business and management historians served as an important voice in the development of modernisation as a conceptual frame. They highlighted the opportunities that are available to position modernisation as a useful tool to predict the future of traditional and advanced organisations.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Determinants of celebrity-owned brands leveraging price premium
|
[
"Willingness to pay",
"Celebrity-owned brands",
"Premium pricing"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The rapidly rising enthusiasm for celebrity-owned brands (COBs) in developing economies in recent years has encouraged many celebrities to start their own product lines. The portfolio includes apparels, wineries, vineyards, hotels, restaurants, and many more. In addition, celebrities have become extensively involved in numerous brand endorsements. Celebrity endorsement has been widely studied in marketing and advertisement literature (Chung et al., 2013; Erdogan and Baker, 2000), but the impact leveraged by the celebrity-brand association as an \"owner\" on various facets of consumer behaviour has received limited academic attention. The scope of this study is limited only to COBs. The first objective was to conceptualize the COB model, followed by exploration and empirical testing of the measures acting as determinants of a buyer's intention to pay price premium only for the COB. The distinct conceptualization of both celebrity-brand associations eliminates the possibility of inaccurate empirical testing of two closely related but different constructs, thereby ensuring advancement in theoretical and empirical testing to be eventually considered as academic contribution (Meredith, 1993).\nConceptualizing COBs: The term celebrity is from the Latin term celebrem/celebritas/celebre and derived from the verb meaning \"to celebrate\" and the noun describing one who is well known/famous, from the French celebre (Drake and Miah, 2010). Initially, the term referred to a ritual or ceremony, but around the fourteenth century it began to signify the notion of being famous. By the mid-nineteenth century, it indicated a person of fame, becoming the descriptive noun of a celebrity. Rojek (2001) defined celebrity as the accumulation of attention capital which could represent individuals, social groups, and social events. At the individual level, they have been classified into three categories - ascribed, achieved, and attributed celebrities (Rojek, 2001). The scope of this study is limited to achieved celebrities. This category refers to those who are positioned because of their acknowledged talent and achievements in any specific domain (Rojek, 2001).\nLiterature review and hypothesis development: Ownership influence (OI)\nResearch methodology: The academic literature offers a variety of methods to measure the WTP (Breidert et al., 2006). Aligning the research objective of this study with the various options available, the stated preferential technique of direct customer surveys was selected. The customer surveys were conducted through self-administered questionnaires.\nData analysis and results: The second research objective of this study involved deriving factors capable of influencing buyers' WTP price premium for COBs. It entailed the need to reduce the list of variables through empirical testing and arrive at determinants which firmly impelled the buyers' WTP price premium for COB. The data reduction was best achieved through exploratory factor analysis (EFA). To further confirm the factors, the results (factors) were analysed through CFA. The hypotheses were ultimately tested using binary logistic regression.\nDiscussion: The results revealed that for the overall sample, the factors SE, IM, PPI, OI, DV, and unique BP were significant at p<0.01. The binary logistic regression for the full sample was fitted as follows:(1)\nConclusion and contribution: The study offers two theoretical contributions. First, it views celebrity-brand association from a different lens by conceptualizing COB. Second, it proposes a theoretical link between the buyer's WTP price premium and COB. There has been extensive literature highlighting the role of celebrity endorsements in influencing buyers' purchase decisions; however, this study takes a new initial step by proposing the influence that the celebrity as an \"owner\" has on the buyers' WTP price premium for the brands owned by them. Following Whetten (1989), we structured our contribution into three sections: what (what are the factors influencing buyers' WTP price premium for COB), how (how are various factors related), and why (why are they related).\nLimitations: The study has several limitations. One of the prime limitations of this study relates to sampling technique with concerns about selection bias and gatekeeper bias. The other limitation revolves around data analysis. In this study, the results of each group were not compared with each other. For more insightful inferences, these groups may be compared to generalize the claim. Last but not the least, the study inherits the variables from CEB literature to draw the factor structure for COB.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the celebrity-brand association from a different perspective.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study uses exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and binary logistic regression.\nFindings: This study conceptualizes celebrity-owned brands (COBs). It statistically validates the complimentary and synergistic effects of six inter-related but distinct factors that are likely to influence a buyer's willingness to pay price premium for COBs.\nOriginality/value: This study makes a novel attempt by analysing the celebrity-brand relationship from a different perspective. The paper deviates from the traditional and widely researched linkage of a celebrity with a brand through endorsement.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Study effect of natural extracts on the antioxidant activity in pork balls
|
[
"Lipid oxidation",
"Antioxidant",
"Natural antioxidant",
"Natural extract"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Deterioration of food quality occurs during processing and storage mainly because of the presence of oxygen and oxidative processes, ignoring the deterioration via microorganism activity (Niciforovic et al., 2010). Lipids are widely distributed in both the intra- and extracellular space of meat as triacylglycerides, phospholipids, and sterols. However, lipids are chemically unstable and, thus, easily lead to oxidation reaction (Falowo et al., 2014). For meat products, the oxidative deterioration of lipids is one of the most important problems in the meat industry because lipid oxidation causes undesirable rancid flavor notes, discoloration, formation of toxic compounds, short shelf life, higher drip losses, and poor nutrients (Contini et al., 2014; Falowo et al., 2014). Oxidative reactions also generate reactive oxygen species which are linked to carcinogenesis, inflammation, aging, and cardiovascular disorders (Niciforovic et al., 2010; Roby et al., 2013).\n2. Literature review: Oxidation is one of the most important degradation reactions in foodstuffs, which seriously limits their preservation. Fat content of food products, even those with less than 1 percent lipids, is affected by degradation reactions, mainly chemical oxidation (Nerin et al., 2008; Atanassova et al., 2011). As a consequence of the lipid deterioration process, hydroperoxides are formed (primary oxidation) which are unstable and decompose relatively quickly into aldehydes, ketones, alcohols, acids, esters, or hydrocarbons (secondary oxidation). These secondary oxidative products are responsible for changes in color, texture, odor, and flavor in food (McClements and Decker, 2000).\n3. Method: Materials\n4. Results: Investigate antioxidant activity in the fruit extract-added pork ball during storage.\n5. Discussion: Investigate antioxidant activity in the fruit extract-added pork ball during storage\n6. Limitations and future research directions: The conclusion of this study implied that the mango extract had higher antioxidant activity and higher efficiency to retard lipid oxidation in a pork ball than the santol and rambutan extracts during ten-day storage and the suitable concentration to delay lipid oxidation in the pork ball was 0.20% (v/w) for all fruit extracts. The application of fruit extracts should be investigated for their efficiency in more food variations and their factors that affect the stability of antioxidant properties during preparation, processing, or storage at various conditions. Moreover, the study to identify the group of antioxidants in mango, santol, and rambutan extracts including their chemical properties and their effect on the lipid oxidation should be explored more.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the potential of fruit waste materials from fruit industry as sources of powerful natural antioxidants.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The peels of mango, rambutan, and santol were extracted and analyzed for their antioxidant activity. Pork ball samples were prepared and treated with different natural extracts at various concentrations, namely 0.05, 0.10, 0.15, and 0.20% (v/w), compared with the control (no natural extract), and then stored at 4degC. The samples were investigated at the zeroth, third, fifth, eighth and tenth day to find out the antioxidant activity of the total phenolic content and lipid oxidation including the evaluation of the change of rancid flavor and color during storage. All statistical results were analyzed by RCBD using SPSS at p0.05.\nFindings: During storage, the amount of phenolic compound in a pork ball by adding fruit extracts at various concentrations slightly decreased, while the lipid oxidation slightly increased. Mango extract showed the best efficiency to delay lipid oxidation in the pork ball for ten days followed by santol extract and rambutan extract. For sensory evaluation, the pork ball with fruit extract at various concentrations showed the lower rancidity development than control, and mango extract at 0.20% (v/w) showed the best delaying rancidity during ten-day storage. Thus, mango peel extract at 0.20% (v/w) showed the highest effectiveness of antioxidant activity against lipid oxidation in pork ball.\nOriginality/value: This study was continued from the previous research which investigated the best extraction condition for by-products of mango, rambutan, and santol. From that study, the authors found that the crude extracts need further research on their antioxidant property in foods. The research findings have provided information regarding the interesting new natural antioxidant that can be applied into lipid-containing foods to delay the rancidity and extend the shelf life.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Dimensions of wine region equity and their impact on consumer preferences
|
[
"Brand equity",
"Lifestyles",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Quality",
"Wines",
"Value analysis"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nIntroduction: In the last two decades, the origin of a product as a potential source of market value has received considerable attention from both marketing researchers and practitioners (Peterson and Jolibert, 1995). Marketing researchers concluded that consumers employ information about the origin of a product to infer its quality (Verlegh and Steenkamp, 1999), marketers established trademark-like brands and legal regulations were created protecting the seemingly valuable link between origin and quality. As a result, protected and controlled designations of origin are commonly used and promoted in the wine industry and other industries around the globe (Thienes, 1995). Yet, recent research evidence suggests that the value consumers associate with specific origins may go far beyond and possibly even exclude quality and may in fact be grounded in other dimensions such as emotional associations (Von Alvensleben, 2000). Details of what is actually protected and promoted to the consumers, therefore, remain largely unknown.A related stream of research established dimensions of brand equity for consumer goods. Both, theoretical and empirical literature on brand benefits suggests that, besides quality, dimensions such as price, social acceptance, emotional, environmental, and humane value impact on consumer perceptions and preferences (Woodruff, 1997). Most recently, striking similarities were found between how consumers utilize brands and places of origin (Papadopoulos and Heslop, 2002), leading to an integration of origin and brand equity research as expressed in the concept of country/place branding.The current study advances this integrative approach by examining dimensions of wine region equity. Employing a consumer sample, it extends past research on origin effects, brand equity and wine marketing, and establishes links to consumer preferences and lifestyle.\nTheoretical background and development of hypotheses: Origin effects\nMethod: Subjects and design\nResults: Dimensions of wine region equity and consumer preferences\nManagerial implications: This study examined the relationships between consumer (origin) preferences, benefits sought in wine and lifestyle. A number of significant linkages could be identified supporting managerial decisions on the design of regional umbrella brands, target segment selection and marketing communications.Five dimensions of wine region equity could be identified as drivers of consumer preferences. Insight into the importance of respective dimensions allows marketers to design place-based umbrella brands by selecting and communicating functional, price, social, emotional and environmental benefits. The knowledge of consumer segments that favor a particular wine origin supports the selection of appropriate target markets and provides a basis for marketing-controlling activities, that is, monitoring of selected segments on a regular basis. Information on how segments respond to a range of competing origins is essential for positioning insight and activities. It allows researchers to identify wine origins that compete against each other from a consumer perspective and it enables managers to evaluate the competitive position of their region, considering uniqueness and superiority. Knowing the benefits sought by specific segments of the market provides further information on which consumer groups to target with a given umbrella brand design. In addition, it provides managers with the information necessary for successfully tailoring place-based brands to market segments by communicating the particular benefits that consumers within a segment seek. Insight into segment characteristics in terms of lifestyle supports managerial decisions on the selection, combination, and design of communications media. Appropriate media can be identified that reach a particular audience, such as people watching television, going to the movies, or listening to the radio. Additionally, the lifestyle activities enjoyed by a target audience can be included in the message, appeal and executional cues. When individuals are to be targeted who enjoy going to restaurants, typical consumers should be shown in exactly this situation when wine origin benefits are being communicated through commercials or advertisements. Tying all the information together on the relationships between origin preferences, wine benefits sought by consumers and consumer lifestyle provides marketers with a powerful tool for effectively addressing and persuading consumers.Future research in the wine area should focus on applying the concept at different scales, for example by comparing equity dimensions for smaller origins such as wine appellations. Another promising avenue could be to examine differences in the relationship between equity dimensions for different wines (e.g. red/ white or by varietal). After all, some grape varieties (e.g. Veltliner, Autrichien) and wine styles (Bordeaux) have received their names from the place where they originated or their name is closely associated with a place (Riesling, Gewurztraminer: Germany) and educated consumers may perceive respective links to be more valuable. Finally, future extensions of the concept could investigate possible additions to the number of dimensions examined in this study. Health benefits associated with wine seem to have particular value. In short, concepts and measures need to be refined and developed in order to better understand and exploit the origin of wine as a source of market value.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of the study is to identify dimensions of wine equity in terms of benefits sought by consumers in wine.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This study examines dimensions of wine region equity, measured in terms of benefits sought by consumers in wine. A survey was conducted in several US states to identify drivers of preferences and to determine relationships that may exist between those drivers, preferences for wine from a number of origins, and consumer lifestyles.\nFindings: - The findings suggest that wine region equity originates in six consumer motivational factors. Quality, price, social acceptance, emotional, environmental value, and humane value were found to be strong and significant predictors of consumer preferences for wine from three US states (California, Oregon, Washington) and six countries (Australia, Chile, France, Italy, New Zealand, Spain). Linking those dimensions of region equity to consumer lifestyle, demographic and behavioral variables allows for tailoring marketing communications strategies closely to markets.\nOriginality/value: - Practical applications of this study extend beyond the wine industry and include generalizations for the identification of markets and market segments that react more favorably to specific origins, the identification of equity dimensions to be included in regional umbrella brands, and the identification of lifestyle-based persuasive communication means and executional cues for specifically targeting selected audiences.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A model for managing the transition to a global engineering network spanning industrialized and emerging economies
|
[
"Virtual work",
"Team working",
"Distributive control",
"Product development",
"Emerging markets"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: It is a common practice in many industries today to carry out product development, from concept to first prototype, using geographically distributed teams. This is particularly the case with large corporations that develop complex products or large systems where all the necessary competencies may not be available at one location. A number of definitions of these so-called virtual teams are listed in Powell et al. (2004). Snow et al. (1992) describe an organizational form called \"network organization\" that is a cluster of business units coordinated by market mechanisms. The term global engineering network (GEN) is used to describe an organizational form that falls between that of a virtual team and a network organization. It corresponds closely to the multinational work teams of Earley and Gibson (2002). In contrast to a virtual team, the relationship between the partners in case of GEN is longer term and may span the operation of many virtual teams. Furthermore, the team membership is from different organizations where each organization has separate business targets but brings a specific competitive advantage to the table. Thus, technical as well as business, commercial and legal aspects must be actively and simultaneously considered when setting up the collaboration. In contrast to a network organization, middle-management planners have a critical role to play in GEN; the set-up of the network is not left purely to market forces.We focus our attention on a particular type of GEN, one where the membership is a combination of resources from countries with advanced industrial economies, e.g. the western countries, and those from emerging economies such as China and India. We refer to the former as industrialized countries (ICs) and the latter as emerging countries (ECs). The ECs offer three main advantages:1. Fast growing domestic market. Local and regional demands create opportunities for setting up manufacturing in ECs. As a result, migrating product development and engineering to ECs in order to incorporate local know-how also becomes an attractive prospect.2. Availability of workforce. Depending on the domain and discipline the availability of sufficient numbers of highly skilled and competent technical resources is a big advantage. This is especially the case for mature technical disciplines where the output from the universities has been declining in the ICs.3. Low labor cost. Highly competitive wages and low cost compared to ICs make engineering in ECs profitable and a competitive necessity. However, cost can be a temporary advantage and cannot be the sole basis of a long-term strategy for distributing the engineering effort.Thus, it is only natural for global engineering and manufacturing firms to utilize opportunities created in ECs as is being done by many of them as part of their \"cost migration\" strategies (Vestring et al., 2005). An additional advantage of such a global network is that of flexibility (Stock et al., 1999), changeability (Dekkers and van Luttervelt, 2006) or agility (Lee and Lau, 1999). This is needed to quickly respond to windows of market opportunity around the world. In fact, Parker (1999) cites speed as one of the prime motivations for collaborative development efforts with suppliers.\nLiterature review - distributed development: The challenges faced by virtual teams have been extensively researched and an excellent review is provided in Powell et al. (2004). They also point out the lack of published research on global, long-term virtual teams - the kind that we discuss in this paper. The extent of use of global virtual teams is reported by McDonough et al. (2001). The principal rationale for the use of such teams is stated to be the need to understand the customers in new, emerging and fast growing markets. The desire to leverage scattered expertise is the next stated objective by the companies employing such teams. The presence of behavioral and managerial challenges for such teams is also identified. When the team is distributed over time zones with large chunks of non-overlapping working hours the complexity of management and coordination increases even more, as discussed by Mar-Yohana (2001). Specifically, he discusses issues of leading global project teams. Vinaja (2003) stresses the multi-cultural issues in virtual teams and cultural factors that impact leading such teams and the influence on the nature and strength of collaboration. Additional challenges arise when the team is composed of individuals from different organizations - within the same company or from different companies, e.g. suppliers. The difficulties of melding together teams comprising members from different profit centers within the same company, as was the case with the teams we studied, should not be underestimated. An extensive study of so-called multinational work teams, including a theoretical model incorporating their key features, is presented in Earley and Gibson (2002). The integration of suppliers in new product development or engineering has also been deeply studied and there exist best practices on how to go about doing this. Two main sets of aspects, relationship structuring and asset sharing, are pointed out in Ragatz et al. (1997). Bevan (1989) proposed the concept of \"co-makership\" implying a strongly collaborative and strategic relationship with suppliers, and showed how it enhanced competitiveness.The problems of geographic distribution and how they can be overcome using information technology is reported with examples in Boutellier et al. (1997), Reddy et al. (1993), and Nowak et al. (2002). Most virtual team literature, particularly related to product development, has dwelt on team sizes of less than ten persons. The teams we studied were always larger and typically of the order of 15-40 persons spread across 3-5 locations, countries, and organizations. The organization of work in such teams poses a higher level of management challenge. However, such situations are not uncommon in large product development projects that involve suppliers. This has certainly been the case in aerospace and automotive industries. In these industries it has long been the practice to partition the overall development effort and to parcel out well defined development tasks with clear deadlines. Thus, there exists a body of knowledge in practice of how to set up such teams and how to select the organizational partners, i.e. suppliers, to participate in the development (Ragatz et al., 1997). Similar experience exists in software development driven by the off-shoring trend of the last decade. However, we believe that the challenge of executing engineering activities in a network is much greater than in the case of software due to the difficulty of transferring and sharing implicit knowledge and the importance of domain know-how.In addition to the complexity factors mentioned earlier other significant ones have arisen in recent times, namely, when work is spread across locations with widely differing wage spectrums and approach to intellectual property (IP) protection. This, in particular, is an issue today as many companies are trying to reduce their cost of development by conducting some of it in ECs. This does not appear to have been addressed in existing literature though with some exceptions. Grabowski et al. (2001) discuss experience from joint European-Chinese developments where the principal need was to locate, understand and protect the know-how existing at different locations. The latter should not be an issue when the GEN primarily comprises members from one global organization though it is in case of IC-EC networks due to the insecurity faced by certain members of the network concerning their jobs. What has also not received attention is the challenges encountered in the process of transition from localized to distributed development particularly when the new locations added are from ECs. We cover these issues in our paper.\nChallenges facing GENs: The operational challenges facing GENs have been reported in the context of virtual teams in the literature cited earlier. Jonsson et al. (2001) categorize these challenges as geographical (time and distance separation hindering communication), cultural (work habits, differences in language proficiency leading to misunderstanding, etc.) and organizational. Our view of the challenges is shown in Figure 1. The problems of distance, time, structure and culture have been extensively covered in the virtual team literature. However, in case of GENs comprising IC and EC entities, the problems thrown up by economic factors and strategy are special.One of the issues faced in GEN as well as in sourcing networks in ECs is the concern about protection of IP. When dealing with advanced engineering and design activities there is a concern of the loss of this know-how outside the core firm. There exist clear guidelines and practices on how to deal with this when dealing with suppliers. However, no such guidelines exist for internal engineering networks even though the dangers may be just as large. While there is little grounding in fact there is a strong perception among engineers in the ICs that their counterparts in ECs will easily defect, along with the know-how, to competition in the EC markets. As discussed by Dietz et al. (2005), it is possible to take clear strategic and operational measures to overcome these problems rather than relying on legal measures with a questionable record of success.A second issue, peculiar to GENs comprising members from ICs and ECs is the perceived threat to the IC location member of the loss of work to the EC locations in the medium to long-term. This is particularly critical and a major business risk in the start-up phase of such a network. The members in ICs perceiving poor long-term career prospects may start leaving the organization thus resulting in a crucial loss of competency. Such risks have been reported by Bloch and Jans (2005) in the context of software off-shoring where a high rate of turnover at the onshore location threatened the transfer of knowledge to the EC location. This can doubly hurt because the transfer of high-end technical work, where competence is developed over many years, is a gradual process. The mitigation of this risk through clear communication and a sound and transparent strategy for long-term work allocation is discussed later.\nThe GEN transition model: The previous section highlighted the problems faced in the operation of GENs and also described a significant business risk during the launch phase and the transition phase of GEN. Once a strategic decision has been made to move from a localized development effort to GEN - a global, virtual, multi-cultural, multi-organizational team - the transition process has to be managed in a balanced way. We propose a model, shown in Figure 2, to guide this process. The model comprises three foundational elements and three transformational processes.Existing teams in ICs undergo a transition from insecurity, often manifesting itself as objection and passive resistance to EC team participation, to accepting EC colleagues, and finally reaching peak performance in the collaborative environment. The strategy here is to follow basic principles of change management - clear communication of objectives and rationale, address the insecurity and fears, and motivation and coaching combined with championing. The teams in ECs need to be developed from novice to expertise level (in terms of domain specific engineering work). This competence build-up needs to be achieved from simplified engineering to complex jobs. Standard engineering solutions and processes help manage this transition. The management challenge in this transition phase is to bridge the two sets of teams, in IC and EC, and meld them towards common goals. During the transition phase, both sets of teams transform from understanding to collaborating as if familiar colleagues at one location are working together. Here, clear work structure and robust project management have to be employed in conjunction with the transformation processes at the IC and EC locations.The GEN transition model shares some commonalities with the model for supplier integration presented in Petersen et al. (2003) if we treat the various development locations as individual suppliers. The transition model takes into account the following aspects of the supplier integration model, in particular, via the team building transformation element:* increased knowledge of the supplier is more likely to result in greater information sharing and involvement of the supplier in the product development process;* sharing of technological information increases levels of supplier involvement and improves outcomes;* supplier involvement leads to higher achievement of team goals; and* problems associated with of technological uncertainty can be mitigated by greater information sharing and supplier participation.The transition model complements the conceptual framework for multinational teams described in Earley and Gibson (2002). They describe individual and group elements linked through specific processes that are inherent in teamwork. Further, they describe certain catalyst elements, namely, social structure and work structure, which provide the impetus for the processes and support them.Model development approach\nGEN transition cases: The model proposed earlier is supported by three cases where we were involved in the transition to GEN over the last three years. The cases are described next, their scope is shown in Figure 3 and their characteristics are summarized in Table I.Case 1 - manufacturing automation systems business\nConcluding remarks: In this paper, we have briefly discussed issues that have been dealt with in research concerning the operation of global, multicultural, multi-organizational, virtual teams. Such teams are becoming the norm for most manufacturing companies when it comes to new product development or project-driven engineering activities. While many companies have such teams in operation many are still in the process of making such a transition. There is a strong trend towards using resources from ECs. The rationale for this is usually the non-availability of sufficient competent resources at one location or the necessity to reduce development and engineering costs. We have focused specifically on GEN that has membership from IC and EC locations as these are increasingly common today and we believe these poses additional challenges as compared to GEN with only IC membership. Further, we have emphasized the challenges of making the transition to GEN as it is fraught with business risks. The challenges of IC and EC membership and the difficulties encountered during the transition phase have not been explicitly covered in existing literature.We have proposed a model for managing the transition that has certain foundational elements and that is based on the execution of three location-dependent transformation processes, namely, change management, team building and competence building. The transition process, which can take a few months, when managed properly and explicitly with appointed owners for the three transformations can lead to significant benefits due to tapping of a new pool of technically competent resources and increased first-hand knowledge of customer behavior in the new markets.We have mentioned earlier the lack of literature addressing issues faced in transition to a GEN. An additional aspect that needs further research is the mechanisms for and the obstacles to the reconfiguration of GENs. Once again, most literature that focuses on the operation of global teams, with some exceptions such as Dekkers and van Luttervelt (2006), assumes a steady state operation. However, these teams are likely to go through frequent changes in terms of individuals as well as organizations. The criteria for successful management of such reconfiguration, sharing many commonalities with the GEN transition process that we discuss in this paper, needs further research. This need is higher in case of engineering as opposed to manufacturing as the process and need for know-how and knowledge transfer is more challenging.We believe the elements of the transition model that we have presented establish the necessary conditions to facilitate a trouble-free transition to a GEN. However, further research will be necessary to determine if the conditions established by these elements are also sufficient to facilitate a trouble-free transition. If not, the model may need further enhancement.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Product development in most industries is often done today in a global engineering network (GEN). More recently, there has been a clear shift to using development resources from the so-called \"emerging countries\" (ECs) that have growing domestic market, highly skilled workforce, and low labor cost base. The integration of resources from ECs, whether from the company's own businesses there or from external suppliers, poses a new challenge for collaborative work in a GEN. This paper aims to describe these challenges. Further, the process of transition to the use of resources from ECs is fraught with business risks. Further, seeks to discuss these risks and how they can be mitigated and to propose a model, derived from practice, to manage the transition process. The model comprises a set of foundation elements and location-dependent transformation processes.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Product development teams in three businesses were studied - an automotive supplier, a manufacturer of made-to-order electrical equipment and a developer of automation software - over three years. These businesses were in the process of relocating some development activities to ECs. Two of the teams were assisted in this transition and the third observed and the model presented is an outcome of this involvement.\nFindings: - Successfully starting a global development team strategy requires clarity and transparency of strategy, good communication, proper organization of effort and focus on product and process standardization. Further, a set of change management processes needs to be launched at participating locations for competence build-up and team building.\nPractical implications: - This model can be used by organizations setting up such EC-IC teams to avoid the possibility of failure of such critical collaborative efforts.\nOriginality/value: - There is considerable literature on distributed product development and virtual teams. The coverage includes management challenges, technology enablers and organizational and multi-cultural challenges. However, the specific challenge of teams comprising membership from advanced and ECs is not covered. Further, while the literature deals with the operation of such teams it does not cover the sensitive transition or start-up phase. This paper deals with this issue.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The value of sharing planning information in supply chains
|
[
"Supply chain",
"Supply chain management",
"Information sharing",
"Value",
"Point-of-sales",
"Forecast",
"Simulation",
"Distribution",
"Network"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Sharing only order-based demand information between supply chain partners gives a delayed and distorted picture of customers\nLiterature review: The concept of information sharing\nMethodology and research design: This analysis is based on a simulation study. The use of simulation in supply chain analysis is a rather obvious choice since discrete event simulation models can handle stochastic behaviour throughout the supply chain and thus phenomena dependent on uncertainties in operations can be evaluated (Persson and Olhager, 2002). A simulation approach is also necessary for studying cases with a mix of a few large customers with information sharing and several small customers without information sharing.\nAnalysis and discussion: The data in Tables IV-VI present the results in the case when customer order quantities correspond to five days\nConclusions: Table VII summarises the findings regarding the value of information sharing with medium to high customer order frequency and two-tier supply chains with relatively short lead times.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The development of information technology has made it possible for companies to get access to information about their customers\nDesign/methodology/approach: A simulation study based on randomly generated demand data with a compound Poisson type of distribution is conducted.\nFindings: The results show that the value of information sharing in operative inventory control varies widely depending on the type of information shared, and depending on whether the demand is stationary or not. Significantly higher value is achieved if the most appropriate types of information sharing are used, while other types of information sharing rather contribute to decreased value. Sharing stock-on-hand information is valuable with stationary demand. Customer forecast and planned order information are valuable with non-stationary demand. The value of information sharing increases when having fewer customers, and when the order quantities are large. Sharing point-of-sales data is not valuable, regardless of the demand type.\nResearch limitations/implications: The use of simulation methodology is a limitation, because the study has to be limited to a specific model design, and because it is not based on primary empirical data. The study is especially limited to dyadic relationships in supply chains, and to distribution networks with a rather limited number of customers.\nPractical implications: Guidance is given about what type of information should be appropriate to share when different types of demand patterns and distribution networks, and how order batch sizes and lead times affect the value of information sharing when using re-order point (R,Q) methods.\nOriginality/value: Very limited research providing specific assessments of potential inventory control consequences when sharing planning information in various contexts has been found in the literature. The findings and conclusions also question some previous research on information sharing.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The role of coordination in avoiding project delays in an engineer-to-order supply chain
|
[
"Coordination",
"Complex projects",
"Concurrent project development",
"Interface engineering-production",
"Shipbuilding industry"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In engineer-to-order (ETO) supply chains, companies are responsible for performing different activities during a project, such as: design, engineering, procurement, logistics, manufacturing, assembling and commissioning (Hicks et al., 2000; McGovern et al., 1999). In such companies, the product differentiation occurs at the design stage (Hoekstra and Romme, 1992). This means that each product is designed to satisfy specific needs which vary from one customer to another. ETO companies are mainly dedicated to produce capital goods (Hicks et al., 2001). Shipbuilding, heavy equipment, offshore oil and gas, and construction are typical examples of sectors which operate as ETO supply chains (Gosling and Naim, 2009). Such type of supply chain typically serves niche markets, which have none or few competitors, and customers, who may accept to pay a higher price for a product that perfectly fits their needs (Stavrulaki and Davis, 2010). ETO companies do not have a stock of finished products to immediately satisfy a specific customer need (Bertrand and Muntslag, 1993). Consequently, the customer is exposed to the total product lead time (Amaro et al., 1999; McGovern et al., 1999; Bertrand and Muntslag, 1993).\n2. Background: 2.1. ETO supply chain: characteristics and challenges\n3. Research method: 3.1. Overview\n4. Case study: 4.1. Overview of the shipbuilding project\n5. Analysis and discussion: 5.1. Analysis of problems delaying the project\n6. Conclusion: The literature has shown that improving delivery in ETO supply chains is dependent on reducing lead times and increasing the reliability of estimates (i.e. Hicks et al., 2001; McGovern et al., 1999; Gosling and Naim, 2009). In this paper, we examined the root cause of delays from a coordination perspective. The main research question was \"how can coordination affect the lead time in an ETO supply chain?\" To answer this research question, three aims has been posed. The first aim was to identify the main problems causing project delay. Through a detailed analysis of data from shipbuilding project a number of problems have been identified (conf. Table III). Such problems highlighted the lack of coordination between two companies, a ship designer and a shipyard responsible for performing engineering and production activities, respectively.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: ETO supply chains produce high-value products on a project basis. The occurrence of delays is a major problem that impacts the performance of a company and its supply chain. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the cause of delays and to understand the role of coordination to mitigate them.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An in-depth case study was conducted to identify problems that delay a project and to examine such problems from a systemic perspective. Based on data from interviews, group meetings, field observations and documentation, a pattern is proposed to explain the relation between coordination and lead time.\nFindings: Conceptually, to reduce the project lead time a higher level of concurrency is necessary. However, more concurrency increases the interdependencies between activities, something which demands more coordination effort. Since the coordination mechanisms applied are not appropriate to cope with the increasing coordination effort, a number of problems appear causing reworks and delays which increase the lead time.\nResearch limitations/implications: The main limitation is that the authors are not able to distinguish which particular project characteristic influences the adoption of a specific coordination mechanism. Further research is required to examine the effect of various coordination mechanisms across a higher number of projects.\nPractical implications: Practitioners can benefit from discussions in this study to comprehend how coordination can improve the delivery performance in ETO supply chains.\nOriginality/value: This study contributes to a better understanding of coordination in ETO supply chains by making sense of problems that delay the project. Matching the coordination mechanisms with the required coordination effort, which is based on the project characteristics, is a way to avoid delays and reduce the lead time.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Inflation and income inequality in developed and developing countries
|
[
"Inflation",
"Income inequality",
"Kuznets hypothesis",
"Panel cointegration",
"B22",
"B23",
"C22",
"C23",
"E52",
"O11",
"O23"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: A key open question in analyzing policy responses to income inequality is why economic growth would decrease income inequality in developed countries (DCs) but increase income inequality in developing countries (LDCs)? What is the nature of the relationship between income inequality and economic growth, and other related macroeconomic variables? Kuznets (1955) shows how income inequality would increase until a critical threshold level of income is attained, and after reaching the threshold income inequality begins to decrease. Kuznets (1955) predicts that as economies develop and the level of income increases, income inequality will first rise, then reaches a maximum and then falls after a specific critical threshold development stage and income level. Kuznets's (1955) claim is based on both cross-country (a panel of countries including USA, England and Germany) and time series data. Kuznets proposed the idea of the \"inverted U-shaped hypothesis\" of income inequality (Kuznets, 1955, 1963), which is consistent with the Lewis dual economy model (Lewis, 1954). On the other hand, inflation is considered to be as a purely monetary phenomenon that influences a country's income inequality level in different ways. Since David Hume (1711-1776), it has long been believed that wages lag inflation (Mayer, 1980). Therefore, one mechanism through which inflation can increase income inequality is by shifting income away from wage earners toward profits (Laidler and Parkin, 1975; Fischer and Modigliani, 1978).\n2. Literature review: Recent research studies present mixed findings on the inequality-inflation relationship both in theoretical and empirical literature. This section of this paper briefly reviews the theoretical and empirical literature to highlight the hole in the literature and explore possible needs for analysis to address the inconsistency in results.\n3. Data and method: 3.1 Data\n4. Empirical results: This section discusses time series analysis and reports the empirical results on the relationship between inflation and income inequality for DCs and LDCs.\n5. Conclusion: In this paper, the association between inflation and income inequality was examined in both the DC and LDC groups. Using a panel of 24 developed and 66 developing countries followed over 25 years, we studied the non-stationarity and cointegration properties of the variables related to income inequality, inflation, economic development, and a set of control variables. The results of panel cointegration test suggested by Kao indicate that there is a long-run equilibrium relationship between inflation and income inequality across countries.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate both linear and/or nonlinear effects of inflation on income inequality and to test the Kuznets hypothesis using panel data of 24 developed countries (DCs) and 66 developing countries (LDCs) observed over the period of 1990-2014.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper explores the short- and long-run Granger causality relationship between inflation and income inequality using the Toda and Yamamoto (1995) procedure and a Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) approach. The existence of a nonlinear relationship between inflation and income inequality is confirmed implying as inflation rises income inequality decreases. Income inequality then reaches a minimum and then starts rising again. The findings of this paper show the existence of Kuznets \"U-shaped\" hypothesis between income inequality and real GDP per capita in DCs group, and the existence of Kuznets' inverted \"U-shaped\" hypothesis for LDCs group.\nFindings: The results indicate that there is no bi-directional Granger causality between inflation and income inequality in the short-run, but, there is bi-directional Granger causality in the long-run for both the DCs and LDCs group. The results help us to assess the effectiveness of monetary policy in reducing income inequality in both the DCs and LDCs group. As a policy implication, monetary policy is often aimed at controlling the annual rate of inflation in the long-run with a short-run focus on reducing output gaps and creating employment. However, managing inflation may have implications for income inequality.\nOriginality/value: This is original research paper which analyzes the \"U-shaped\" and inverted \"U-shaped\" paths of income inequality and real GDP per capita for large sample of two group countries including developed and developing countries, respectively. Also, this paper analyzes the nonlinear relationship between inflation and income inequality in two groups. Furthermore, this paper investigates the short- and long-run relationship between variables. The results are important for policy makers.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Entrepreneurial perceptions and bias of SME exporting opportunities for manufacturing exporters: A UK study
|
[
"SME",
"Entrepreneurship",
"Manufacturing",
"Exporting",
"Resources",
"Motivators"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Due to the nature of today's marketplace, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are increasingly facing similar international problems as larger firms. For many SMEs, especially those operating in high-technology and manufacturing sectors, it is no longer possible to engage in the marketplace without taking into account the risks and opportunities presented by foreign and/or global competition. The study focuses on the new emerging area of international entrepreneurship and its theoretical basis within internationalization research. International entrepreneurship places more importance on entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs (and their characteristics), widely considered as the main variable in SME export research due to the decisions they face in a globalized environment (Oviatt and McDougall, 2005).\nLiterature review: The difference between must and want determines which category of motivators should in theory affect the firm and which should not; these motivators are situational (i.e. act at one point in time) and generally consist of variables (reactive and proactive, home and host) such as unsolicited orders, unique products, size, excess capacity, and common market membership (Driscoll, 1995; Kuada and Sorensen, 2000). The 32 motivators examined by the study and shown in Table I are some of the most significant and most recurring motivators from the literature (Driscoll, 1995; Leonidou et al., 2007; Stouraitis et al., 2017). They are subdivided into the firm level, external, and managerial level. The nature of the stimulus also determines the firm's internationalization direction (Leonidou and Katsikeas, 1996) and hence its survival and success, e.g. ill-prepared or weakly stimulated firms will be more likely to struggle. According to Leonidou et al. (2007), motivators can be separated into proactive/reactive and internal/external; internal being those that derive from within the firm and external from the environment. The 32 variables selected, as seen in Table I, are recurring in the literature (Driscoll, 1995; Kuada and Sorensen, 2000; Leonidou et al., 2007) and either deemed of very high and high impact by Leonidou et al. (2007) or are clearly host country-specific. In addition, host country-specific lower impact motivators may complement other higher impact motivators or affect the firm in other ways not related to internationalization which makes our focus on them more significant.\nResearch question: Based on the above models, a resource-based perspective on internationalization is currently emerging as a useful tool to explain export strategy. The resource-based view (RBV), developed within the field of strategic management, has roots in Edith Penrose's (1959) work, characterizing firms as a collection of heterogeneous or firm-specific resources (Foss et al., 1995).\nMethodology: Participants\nResults: In order to investigate whether our principle components could be used as possible predictors of export decision, we used a binomial logistic regression with the components as the IVs and export decisions is the latest entry mode as the DV. Our model was not significant, which is evidence to suggest that the stimuli do not impact export decisions. In order to reveal the latent variables that reflect various attitudes toward exporting, principle component analysis (PCA) using varimax rotation was used to explore relationships between the questionnaire items. Our tests show that Bartlett's test of sphericity was significant, kh2(1081)=2044, and the Kayser Meyer-Olkin measure was 0.6, providing enough evidence to support that our data are suited for PCA. The accepted measure of spread (eigenvalues) for a component is usually anything above 1.0; however, the scree plot (see Figure 1) plateaus at five components. According to Stevens (2002), for a sample size of 100 people, we can accept component loadings >|0.5|, which can be seen in Table III. The items lead us to believe that the components correspond to the reactive, the external, the research, the marketing, and the technology dimensions and are presented below. We present these findings with caution; however, as our sample size of 103 was rather small (Figure 2).\nDiscussion: The results depicted in the dimensions show that the manager's decision may be biased toward association or led by specific correlations between variables prompting him/her to answer in a specific manner questions on one motivator, or react differently, according to his/her reaction to similar motivators in the same dimension with different weight in the manager's mind. For example, the external dimension includes all internationalization motivators that deal with the external environment (political, legal, economic) such as legal restrictions in the host and home countries and political and economic stability in the host and home countries. It is interesting to see how SME managers view these motivators as being interconnected as, for example, political stability and economic stability both would be equally significant to the manager yet the weight placed on each may be imbalanced. The same can be said of the research dimension, focusing on R&D, servicing products, and knowledge of foreign markets.\nConclusion: As Banerjee and Duflo (2011) state, careful consideration and understanding of the motivations and constraints of everyone can lead to better designed policies and institutions more likely to attain their goals. It has been shown that managerial attitudes toward motivators for internationalization are mildly affected by bias toward specific factors and can be divided into five specific dimensions. Bilkey and Tesar (1977) and Tan et al. (2007) state that managers' decision to export (and internationalize) is mainly affected by their perceptions of foreign countries (i.e. speaking languages, studying abroad) and their perception of the value of internationalizing and exporting. The higher the risk apprehended by the company the higher the managers' perception of the value of international expansion. Internationalization may be seen as strategic renewal as firms without a competitive advantage may be able, through management, to see international opportunities but may require social capital and a change of strategy to access them (Prashantham, 2008). As McDougall et al. (2003) state, international new ventures are more aggressive than domestic ones and rely on marketing and entrepreneurial orientation to survive in international markets. As Banerjee and Duflo (2011) state in their review of entrepreneurship in developing countries, awareness decreases with income and resources as the environment (banking, loans, political situation, etc.) becomes more and more insecure and forces the entrepreneur to save less, plan less, and focus on the present creating a vicious cycle for strategy\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Success in export ventures has been linked to managerial capabilities. The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of exporting motivators on managerial perceptions of UK manufacturing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by investigating the links between export motivators and decision bias (i.e. predictable behavior).\nDesign/methodology/approach: Based on the Uppsala and resource-based view perspectives (using a sample of the UK's independent manufacturing SMEs and utilizing a survey, correlation analysis, and factor analysis), this study finds and describes the effect of the most recurrent motivators and clusters of motivators from the literature on the SMEs' decision to export by investigating the dimensions (research, external, reactive).\nFindings: This study finds that export motivators can be separated into specific dimensions leading to potential selection bias. In addition, the importance of size, knowledge of foreign markets, and unsolicited orders show an association with the perceptions of motivator stimuli toward specific dimensions (research, external, reactive).\nPractical implications: Government policy and SME export strategy need to understand managerial perceptions and bias better in order to allocate resources efficiently toward stimulating exporting.\nOriginality/value: The literature and empirical work on the topic have been fragmented and conflicting focusing on specific motivators but not necessarily explaining the selection or origin of motivators even less on SMEs. Dimensions have not been taken into account as clusters of motivators.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Design of an environmental information system for monitoring water and air quality in urban areas
|
[
"Pollution control",
"Geographic information systems",
"India"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The population of big cities in India has been growing rapidly, which increases the pollution level by causing a burden on the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB), which is responsible for providing local services. This increase of pollution brings out many problems, some of which are the increases in the level of water and air pollution. The north-western state of Gujarat, being a highly industrialized state, is a case in point. The systems for treatment and water disposal of this state are highly challenged as it has no effective systems for treatment of disposal of waste water. The aim of this research is to address and visualize the pollution problem corridors using geographical information system (GIS) analysis tools. The studies are carried out mainly at Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC), ROLTA headquarters and Asian Institute of Medicine, Science and Technology.Figure 1(a) shows the location map of Gujarat and Figure 1(b) shows the growth centers and industrial estate of Gujarat (courtesy of Maps of India).\n2. Research objectives: The aim of this research is to verify how GIS analysis can be used to visualize pollution control and add additional information to them. Over the recent 20/30 years GIS and simulation software have improved considerably. Through the wonderful combination of GIS data and simulation programs, the door to spatial modeling has been widely opened (Aydim and Yomralioglu, 2001; Baz et al., 2002; Baz, 1999; Celik and Yomralioglu, 2002; Gahegan and Flack, 1996; Grimshaw, 1994). When used in a GIS environment, simulation models can create various landscape scenarios and visualize them in 2D or 3D format (Hehl-Lange and Schmid, 2000; Janowsky et al., 2001; Neteller and Mitasova, 2002). They can enable us to \"see\" corridors, barriers and bottlenecks in a future or present landscape. By simplifying reality, these models can assist the identification of the crucial parameters of the fragmentation process (Kotzinos and Prastacos, 2001; Zolloweg, 1994). They can also help to identify gaps in our knowledge regarding different pollutants and to address questions that are otherwise difficult to study empirically. The identification and visualization of environmental changes in pollution control increment is a major step in planning the defragmentation of landscapes and the establishment of fully functional corridors. The major task of this project was to build a modern document storage and retrieval system, which allows quick access to the document of interest by using a search and find engine.\n3. Methodology: The methodology for this research is divided in to several multi-tasks, which are described below.3.1. Task 1 - review of the existing information system at GPCB\n4. Results and discussions: A document management system that contains scanned images of key documents stored in a structured indexed database has been developed. The electronic navigator that is a part of this advanced document management system provides organizing, sorting, querying and retrieving of key documents. Further, a computerized laboratory information system on discharge and ambient air quality monitoring, namely, air, water and hazardous conducted by GPCB as well as self-reporting monitoring data provided by the industrial units were developed. Front-end application programs were developed in Visual Basic using Oracle as the back-end database to integrate the laboratory data and the existing data in the FoxPro into the Oracle database.In addition to this, detailed procedures were developed that were to be followed by the head, regional, and zonal offices to ensure efficient updating of the information. An integrated GIS Database of industries, CETPs and TSDFs that allows the GPCB to access, use and query the database according to pre-defined specifications were developed. Developed forms will allow GPCB to create a new entry at any point of time more efficiently and effectively. Further GPCB can locate a particular industrial unit, CETP, TSDF or monitoring station in terms of geographic location in space.Figure 6 shows a portion of the GIS map developed for GPCB and Figure 7 shows CETP and TSDF location points along the entire state of Gujarat.Finally, a complete information system has been developed pertaining to all the industry and non-industry related features in a map. The digital map created allows the GPCB to retrieve information for all the industry-related features including the CETPs and TSDFs with their particular location in the map and carry out GIS analysis like querying, Buffer zone, spatial analysis, overlay, etc.Figure 8 shows the GIDC estate information system.After the development of a complete information system, a GIS database for the environmental monitoring station was developed that helps to develop a complete solution pertaining to the GIS database, involving creation of pollutant contours, querying and visualizing the query output in spatial (in the map) and non-spatial form (database of the query output features) and reports related to each one of these queries in Word, Excel or Access format.Figure 9 shows air quality monitoring stations of the area of interest. Figure 10 shows a pollutant contour (dissolved oxygen) diagram of the area of interest. Figure 11 shows the query output of the GIS database and Figure 12 shows sample report generated from the GIS databaseAt the end, a consent application (MIS) procedure has been laid out that contains automated procedures in place to improve the productivity of its mandated functions related to the regulations of air emission and waste water discharge as well as ambient quality monitoring. GPCB sends routinely letters to industries informing them compliance status based on updated regulatory information.\n5. Conclusion: The potential of GIS for development of a powerful database for environmental modeling has been discussed. Advances in information technology have urged organizations to renew their processing system. Organizations not following this vital development will struggle to maintain their services and gradually face with more problems. All organizations as well as municipalities require complete, correct and up-to-date data to provide high quality services. After obtaining such data from inner and outer resources, they must be processed to produce required type of information. Since using a well-established information system will provide many benefits, many attempts have been made to establish spatial information systems for private and government organizations in India. Unfortunately, most of them resulted with no success. The state of Gujarat could successfully implement the various measures of environmental pollution controls. Utilization of air and water quality utility can provide the community to address both water quality issues and ambient air quality. Design and implementation of effective measures can result in the following:* improved water quality;* reduction of pollutants loadings in downstream receiving waters;* reduction in water treatment costs; and* reduction of ambient air quality.The future undertakings of the project can extend in illustrating agro-environmental aspects of the whole state of Gujarat. The combination of the environmental data with an automated interpretation procedure is especially suited for the documentation of dynamic processes in long-term environmental projects. This study can also be extended for the development of an ecological database.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Over the past 50 years India has been experiencing rapid population growth, causing the migration of a large part of the population to the cities looking for livelihood. This resulted in massive increments of population in the cities that has led to the increase of pollution. Gujarat, being a highly industrialized state, is a case in point. The systems for treatment and water disposal of this state are highly challenged. The north-western state of Gujarat has no effective systems for treatment or disposal of waste water. The purpose of this article is to address this problem, introducing a geographic information system (GIS) approach to record the characterization, analyze the needs and generate a conceptual GIS database in the state.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This paper outlines the background, suggested methodology for the development of a GIS database pollution dependent control of water pollution in the state of Gujarat in India. The present research is to install a document management system that has been developed in providing organizing chart, sorting, querying and retrieving of key data. A computerized laboratory information system on monitoring of quality of ambient air has been developed.\nFindings: - An integrated GIS database has been generated involving creation of pollutant contours, querying and visualizing the query output in spatial and non-spatial form.\nOriginality/value: - The authors have created a complete geo-spatial database for the environmental monitoring for the whole state of Gujarat. They have dealt with nearly 36,000 different files from different sources and put them together to create the database. A computerized laboratory information system on monitoring of quality of ambient air has been developed. Front-end application programs have been developed in Visual Basic and the back-end database to integrate the laboratory data and the existing data in oracle database.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
OpenText builds a high-performance culture for the long-term: Workshops on sales and customer service teach teams how to work under pressure
|
[
"Customer service",
"Information technology",
"Teamwork",
"Growth",
"Competitive advantage"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Information-technology firms used to focus on providing their workforce with \"hard\" skills enabling them to operate their IT systems more effectively. But forward-thinking technology companies now recognize that investment in the \"soft\" skills of leadership and sales management can give them the edge by creating high-performing teams that excel under pressure.\nKey role of one-page maps: The training combines one-page maps with structured coaching. The maps show:* the terrain on which a task needs to be executed;* the main obstacle or hazards that lie in the way; and* the most direct route to a successful outcome.Maps allow users to \"see\" where they are now, where they want to be, and how to get there. The performance maps can be shared by members of a team. Over time, they become internalized so that users no longer need to refer to the physical object to know what action or decision to take. Gazing offers ten reasons why it believes maps are particularly effective:1. Maps chart the territory. Improved performance under pressure depends on learning new mental skills. But for most people, the psychological aspects of a task may seem hard to grasp. Maps demystify this unfamiliar territory by showing what is there - the main features, obstacles and hazards - so that users know exactly where they are and what to expect.2. Maps are descriptive rather than interpretative. The job of a map is to show the territory, not to tell which path or route to take. It provides valuable information, but it leaves the user to interpret it, and to decide how to act upon it. Used correctly, maps promote flexibility and choice rather than a rigid or dogmatic approach.3. Maps are inherently practical. Most people know how to use maps. Users work out where they are, where they want to get to, what the best route is... and then they get going. But maps are practical in another sense, too. Psychological research shows that humans have a natural tendency to arrange complex information spatially inside their heads; to create their own mental maps. So the Gazing approach can be claimed to tap into the way people's brains actually work.4. Maps are highly memorable. Maps present a simple summary of what can be a huge amount of information. More than that, they present it in a form that the human brain finds easy to recall. It is a widely understood psychological principle that most people remember pictures or visual diagrams many times more effectively than the written word. In fact, once people are truly familiar with a map, they no longer need to look at it; they carry it around inside their heads and can \"refer\" to it whenever they need to.5. Maps are especially useful at times of uncertainty. People do not have to use a map if they are clear about where they are going. Maps become useful when people are uncertain and need some guidance. At these times, maps are priceless, giving back immediate control to the user. Behavior becomes focused, directed and full of intent.6. Maps highlight hazards. Good maps represent the world as it really is, including the hazards, obstacles and areas to avoid. They are therefore just as valuable for showing people where they should not go, as where they should.7. Maps encourage adaptability. People may plan their route in advance, but very often they need to check the map in mid-journey, to make sure that they are still heading in the right direction. If not, the map helps people to make the necessary adjustments. This ability to adapt and adjust while carrying out a task is a defining feature of high performance.8. Maps are universal tools. Every culture on the planet uses maps. They are one of the most practical tools known to mankind; people of all ages understand what they are for and can learn to use them.9. Maps promote accountability. If a map accurately represents the world people live in, it will retain its usefulness indefinitely. Details may need to be refined or clarified, but the essential structure is of enduring value. This helps to promote accountability, because if someone has an accurate map and ends up in the wrong place, it is that person's responsibility.10. Maps allow discoveries to be made. A good map does not just help people to find their way from A to B. If there is enough depth to the information it contains, it can also be an invaluable aid to exploring new territory. Gazing maps of the mind under pressure offer users insights into their own mental processes, enabling them to build on strengths and address weaknesses, in pursuit of new and better ways of performing tasks.\nConsistent performance framework: Sam Robinson, director of field enablement at OpenText, commented: \"Creating a high-performing work environment that is customer driven will keep us ahead of the game and ensure that our people are focused and motivated. Working with Gazing will ensure that we have a complete and consistent performance framework in place, driven by the leaders in the business.\"\"This is all about equipping our team to improve the customer experience. We are confident that, with closer customer engagement, sales forecasting will become more accurate by up to 20 percent. We know the result of this will drive revenue, but in the meantime our people will become more effectively skilled and the customer will get a better experience, too.\"The training has three key components:1. developing the right mindset, through mental preparation to create resilience;2. acquiring the correct skill set to feel \"in control\"; and3. learning a framework to perform effectively in the real world.\"OpenText has recently seen dramatic growth,\" explained Martin Fairn, Gazing Performance Systems chief executive. \"It already has a number of training and coaching processes in place but wanted to bring these together under a unifying platform to help to improve sales capacity and gain focus on the execution of a global sales-enablement direction. The work we are doing with the company's senior management down will focus on equipping them with the maps, tools and skill sets to create a high-performing environment of their own. A consistent approach rolled out across the business will enable the OpenText sales teams to reach its goals.\"The program starts at OpenText's European executive level, with leadership sessions for the senior-management team, covering marketing, operations and regional vice-presidents. Workshops will then be delivered for the 14-strong sales-director team, followed by its 100 sales managers.The program will be delivered locally across OpenText's European operations, including France, Germany, Spain, Austria and Switzerland, in local languages via a network of local Gazing partners. OpenText initially plans to make this a European best practice, but may later consider extending it to its global sales teams.\nNew approach to managing pressure: Sam Robinson continued: \"When you are creating a high-performance environment, it is the responsibility of the leaders to drive it and the managers to deliver it.\"\"Gazing's approach maps directly on to that and creates a practical framework that people can act upon when back in work. The fact that Gazing's approach will integrate into our current customer-relationship-management system will ensure that people can easily adopt their new insights; as a result, their approach to managing pressure will become the new way we do business at OpenText.\"The final component of Gazing's work will be to deliver \"train the trainer\" sessions, so that these skills become transferable to the core leadership team and can be reinforced through continual coaching and reviews.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Describes how OpenText, an international enterprise-software company, wanted to align its expanding European business under a common framework, following a period of rapid growth, and so chose more than 100 employees to go through workshops focused on sales and customer service.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Explains the reasons for the workshops, the form they will take and the results they aim to achieve.\nFindings: - Details how the workshops combine one-page maps with structured coaching. Reveals that the maps allow users to \"see\" where they are now, where they want to be, and how to get there.\nPractical implications: - Highlights the key components of the workshops: developing the right mindset, through mental preparation, to create resilience; acquiring the correct skill set to feel \"in control\"; and learning a framework to perform effectively in the real world.\nSocial implications: - Describes the acquisition of skills in managing pressure that will be useful in employees' personal as well as professional lives.\nOriginality/value: - Details a novel approach to the acquisition of customer-service skills.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Corporate governance and firm performance in developing countries: evidence from India
|
[
"Corporate governance",
"Board of directors",
"Firm performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The relationship between corporate governance and firm performance has been a widely debated and well-researched topic in the developed countries context. However, in the past few years, this issue has also been discussed in the context of emerging countries, such as India, in light of the recent corporate collapses and scams[1]. The corporate collapses resulting from a weak system of corporate governance highlighted the need to improve and reform the governance structure. Firms' governance plays an important role in the probability of accounting frauds and firms which have a weak governance structure being more prone to accounting frauds (Berkman et al., 2009). The failure in preventing these scams has fuelled many debates on the effectiveness of current corporate governance rules, principles, structures and mechanisms (Sun et al., 2011).\n2. Review of literature: Much of the standard related literature examines the interrelation between firm performance and some subset of several measurements of corporate governance, such as insider-outsider ownership, board composition, board size, executive compensation and board tasks (Jensen, 1993; Yermack, 1996; Dalton et al., 1999; Coles and Hesterly, 2000; Elsayed, 2007; Bhagat and Bolton, 2002). Some studies instead of focusing on individual measures of corporate governance use a composite measure. For instance, Gompers et al. (2003) and Core et al. (2006) construct a governance index (G-index). In this section, we review the related literature, and as research on this issue is quite voluminous, we mainly cover issues of measures of corporate governance and their linkage with firm performance. Later, we also provide a review of findings of Indian studies.\n3. Research design and methodology: This section provides a discussion on data sources, selection of firms and construction of the empirical model for estimating the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance as well as the estimation issues.\n4. Empirical results and discussion: In this section, we present the estimation results of the impact of corporate governance variables on firm performance measures. At the first stage, we report results for the impact of each corporate governance variable separately on the indicators of firm performance. Subsequently, in the second stage, the impact of all corporate governance variables, along with control variables, is tested on different measures of firm performance.\n5. Conclusion and implications: The present study serves as a pointer to the corporate governance and firm performance relationship for Indian manufacturing industry. Results of the study document that the relationship between corporate governance and performance is not very strong in India. This is maybe because the guidelines and regulations are not followed by companies very strictly in the initial years of the sample period. Our main findings in this study are: first, the results show that board size is negatively related to ROA. Second, the board meetings are found to be positively associated with firm performance, though the association is slightly weak. Third, ROE, profitability and stock returns are not found to be related to corporate governance indicators of firm. Also, CEO duality is not found to be related to any performance measure; thus, it does not seem to be a crucial determinant of firm performance.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This study aims to examine the impact of corporate governance on firm performance for a large representative sample.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This empirical analysis focuses on a large number of companies covering 20 important industries of the Indian manufacturing sector for the period 2001-2010. Several alternative specifications and estimation techniques are used for analysis purposes, including system generalized methods of moments, which effectively overcomes the problem of endogeneity and simultaneity bias.\nFindings: On one side, the findings indicate that larger boards are associated with a greater depth of intellectual knowledge, which in turn helps in improving decision-making and enhancing the performance. On the other side, the results indicate that return on equity and profitability is not related to corporate governance indicators. The results also suggest that CEO duality is not related to any firm performance measures for the sample firms.\nPractical implications: The outcomes of the analyses advocated that companies that comply with good corporate governance practices can expect to achieve higher accounting and market performance. It implies that good corporate governance practices lead to reduced agency costs. Hence, it is concluded that firms of the developing world can possibly enhance their performance by implementing good corporate governance practices.\nOriginality/value: Departing from the conventional system of the prior studies and instead of focusing on a single measure framework, a range of measures of corporate governance and firm's performance variables are used. Also, several alternative specifications and estimation techniques are used for analysis purposes. Furthermore, the sample also covers a large sample of manufacturing firms.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A logic-based framework for collection/item metadata relationships
|
[
"Semantics",
"Cataloguing",
"Metadata",
"Digital libraries",
"Linked data",
"Collections",
"Information modelling"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Digital libraries, repositories and aggregation systems frequently hold collective entities that are composed of individual objects. Examples include a collection of photographs, an archival group of records, or a complex data set consisting of data generated by a single scientific instrument. While these collective entities may not be explicitly referred to as collections in all cases, they have a compositional structure that introduces two distinct levels of description - the collection level and the item level. Metadata describing these collective entities and their constituents may be attached to the collection, the items or to both.\n2. Background and related work: Collections have frequently been analyzed in terms of their role in the provision of information services, and as the introduction of digital objects and resources reshaped those services, there was an effort to define and examine collections. Lee (2000) focused attention on the role of collections as information seeking environments and pointed to the conflation of the notions of collection membership with notions of ownership and physicality. Assumptions about the nature of collections in archival practice have been similarly challenged by the introduction of digital objects and environments; in particular, assumptions that some collections arise naturally from other phenomena (Currall et al., 2004), and that collections arising from deliberate selection require different treatment in terms of description or arrangement from \"organic\" collections (Yeo, 2012). More system-oriented views have viewed collections as lists of query results (Lagoze and Fielding, 1998) or sets of digital objects (Goncalves et al., 2008).\n3. Formalizing collection/item metadata relationships: This section presents conceptual analyses necessary for a logic-based framework of CIMR. These analyses use first order logic to represent metadata records, collections and collection membership. This representation method connects directly to semantics for RDF and other logic-based representation languages, and forms the basis of the framework of metadata relationships between collections and items that follows.\n4. Framework of collection/item metadata propagation rules: In this framework, propagation rules for collection and item metadata are grouped into categories according to their logical form. Propagation rules are inference rules, expressed as universally quantified material conditionals, where properties of one individual a entail conclusions about another individual b in virtue of a relationship R those individuals bear to each other (Brachman et al., 1991). A collection/item propagation rule is one where the supporting relationship is the isGatheredInto relationship that stands between an item and a collection of which the item is a member, and has the general logical form of a universally quantified conditional with a conjunctive antecedent. The specific logical forms that make up the framework are determined by the direction of reasoning, the type of quantification at the item level, and the relationships between the attributes and values involved in a rule. The identification of the correct rule to express a relationship between collection-level and item-level metadata is a challenging prospect, and the framework can assist in the identification of rules by allowing the generation of rules on the basis of available attributes. A framework of categories for collection/item propagation rules was first proposed in Wickett et al. (2010) and is developed further in Wickett (2012).\n5. Discussion: The framework of CIMR presented in the previous section has a number of potential applications, such as improving the specification of metadata vocabularies, enhancing the performance of retrieval systems, supporting the creation and validation of metadata at both levels of description.\n6. Conclusion: Logic-based reasoning has the potential to enhance the usability, completeness and validity of metadata in a variety of domains. The method of formalizing metadata described above represents significant progress in the application of techniques knowledge representation to problems of metadata creation and management, providing a flexible technique for encoding colloquial metadata as a set of statements in first-order logic. The framework of rules for CIMR has a range of potential applications for the enhancement or metadata systems and vocabularies.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present a framework for the articulation of relationships between collection-level and item-level metadata as logical inference rules. The framework is intended to allow the systematic generation of relevant propagation rules and to enable the assessment of those rules for particular contexts and the translation of rules into algorithmic processes.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The framework was developed using first order predicate logic. Relationships between collection-level and item-level description are expressed as propagation rules - inference rules where the properties of one entity entail conclusions about another entity in virtue of a particular relationship those individuals bear to each other. Propagation rules for reasoning between the collection and item level are grouped together in the framework according to their logical form as determined by the nature of the propagation action and the attributes involved in the rule.\nFindings: The primary findings are the analysis of relationships between collection-level and item-level metadata, and the framework of categories of propagation rules. In order to fully develop the framework, the paper includes an analysis of colloquial metadata records and the collection membership relation that provides a general method for the translation of metadata records into formal knowledge representation languages.\nOriginality/value: The method for formalizing metadata records described in the paper represents significant progress in the application of knowledge representation techniques to problems of metadata creation and management, providing a flexible technique for encoding colloquial metadata as a set of statements in first-order logic. The framework of rules for collection/item metadata relationships has a range of potential applications for the enhancement or metadata systems and vocabularies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The impact of territory of origin on product authenticity perceptions: An empirical analysis in China
|
[
"China",
"Perceived authenticity",
"Familiarity",
"Congruence",
"Self-brand connection",
"Territory of origin"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The influence of place of origin is well documented in the marketing literature which tends to concentrate on country of origin (COO) effects (Basfirinci, 2013; Roth and Diamantopoulos, 2009), despite their seemingly diminishing relevance, or even negative impacts, in modern markets (Basfirinci, 2013; Hamin et al., 2014; Samiee, 2011). In particular, the prevalence of hybrid and multi-national products has prompted consumers to seek regional or local products rather than standardised, homogenised products with uncertain origins (Elaydi and McLaughlin, 2012; Ger, 1999; Seidenfuss et al., 2013). Some firms have responded to these demands by promoting products according to their territory of origin (TOO) in reference to \"the holistic combination in an environment of soil, climate, topography, and the 'soul' of the producer\" (Iversen and Hem, 2008, p. 615). For example, Armour-Lux, a clothing brand from France's Brittany region, increased its sales by more than 30 per cent after labelling its products \"100 per cent Made in Bretagne\" (instead of \"Made in France\"). It also relocated its headquarters from Paris to Bretagne to highlight its territorial distinctiveness (Jaxel-Truer, 2012). Moreover, its products sell internationally, including in Asian markets, indicating that increasing demand and interest in local products is not exclusive to Western countries (Ger, 1999).\nLiterature review: TOO\nMethod: We use an experimental method and a partial least square (PLS) approach to test the chain of effects, from TOO to perceived authenticity and to consumers' self-brand connections, as well as the moderating effects of familiarity with the TOO and perceived congruence between the product category and the TOO.\nConclusion and discussion: Doubts about the importance of COO information have prompted marketers to call for alternative approaches, and TOO represents a criterion that might enhance product evaluations. We confirm this suggestion by demonstrating that TOO associations result in brand authenticity perceptions. Consumers adopt a meaning transfer process to evaluate a product's authenticity and transfer TOO meanings, such as tradition, culture and uniqueness, to the product. In addition, they incorporate the meanings associated with the brand's authenticity into their self-concepts and form a connection with the brand. Our findings empirically establish relationships that have been suggested in prior literature with an experimental approach; they also isolate the unique character and impact of a TOO strategy, compared with a COO version. We identify two moderators of the relationship between TOO and perceived authenticity (familiarity with the TOO and congruence between the product category and the TOO), which resonate with findings from the COO literature and confirm their importance in the meaning transfer process. Finally, results indicate that TOO offers a promising strategy for building consumer-brand connections.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the importance of territory of origin (TOO) associations for consumers' perception of product authenticity and empirically tests the chain of effects, from TOO associations to perceived authenticity, and to consumers' self-brand connections.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An experimental method and a partial least square approach were adopted. Hypotheses were tested on data collected across 665 Chinese consumers.\nFindings: Results demonstrate that TOO exerts a positive impact on perceived product authenticity, which in turn leads to stronger consumers' self-brand connections. In addition, compared with country of origin (COO) information, TOO has a unique positive impact on perceived authenticity and a direct positive effect on consumers' self-brand connections. Also, the positive impact of TOO on perceived authenticity is enhanced through consumers' familiarity with the TOO and through congruence between the product category and the TOO.\nResearch limitations/implications: One possible outcome of TOO (perceived authenticity) and one product category (lavender soap) were considered in this study.\nOriginality/value: Given the diminishing relevance of COO associations, this study demonstrates that TOO is an appealing alternative strategy for strengthening brand equity.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Strong structuration and carbon accounting: A position-practice perspective of policy development at the macro, industry and organizational levels
|
[
"Trust",
"Power",
"Carbon accounting",
"Position-practices"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In an attempt to promote action on climate change, the then Commonwealth Government of Australia introduced the Clean Energy Act in 2011, resulting in the introduction of a fixed carbon price from 2012 to 2015. However, a new government was elected in 2013 and repealed the Act in 2014, resulting in the withdrawal of the scheme. Prior to this, a carbon reporting system was introduced whilst state governments, as well as industry organizations, had facilitated the development of voluntary frameworks. This is consistent with the observation that carbon accounting is contested[1] (Ascui and Lovell, 2011, 2012; Bebbington and Larrinaga, 2014), and therefore characterized by \"emerging tensions between different communities over the limits and boundaries of professional expertise\" (Ascui and Lovell, 2012, p. 48). Bowen and Wittneben (2011) believe that understanding these tensions can help to illuminate the resulting key challenges.\n2. Strong structuration: a position-practice perspective at three levels of ontology: We begin this section by outlining strong ST. Given that it was developed based upon structuration theory (ST), we provide an initial overview of ST before summarizing the development of strong ST in Sections 2.1 and 2.2. We then provide an overview in Section 2.3 of how the ontological concept of positon-practice relations can be applied on a sliding scale of the three abstract levels of ontology (Stones, 2005; Coad et al., 2015) with reference to carbon accounting, which is then used to analyse the case study and therefore research question.\n3. Research method: In order to answer our central research question:\n4. A position-practice perspective on the development of carbon accounting frameworks: This section analyses the results of the case study in response to the research question of:\n5. Discussion and conclusion: This paper has provided an overview of strong ST and then illustrated how its position-practice perspective can be utilized at the three abstract-concrete levels of ontology in order to answer the research question through a case study of the development of carbon accounting frameworks at the policy, industry, and organizational levels within Australia.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to utilize the three abstract-concrete levels of ontology of strong structuration theory (strong ST) to examine how, and to what extent, was the development of carbon accounting frameworks at the policy, industry, and organizational levels enabled by external structures as conditions of action, that is, what was the nature of active agency within a field of position-practice relations that led to the development of these frameworks.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A case study was undertaken drawing upon interviews that were undertaken between 2008 and 2011 at the industry and organizational levels as well as documentary evidence relating to carbon accounting policy development at the macro, or policy level.\nFindings: The parliamentary committee hearings into the development of the carbon price legislation represented fields of position-practice relationships which highlighted the interplay of the internal structures, capabilities and the roles of both power and trust of the agent(s)-in-focus. A meso-level analysis of the Victorian water industry highlighted how it was able to mediate the exercise of power by the macro level through the early adoption of carbon accounting frameworks. At the ontic or micro level of the individual water business, the development of a greenhouse strategy was also the outcome of position-practice relationships which highlighted the interplay of the internal structures and dispositions of the agent(s)-in-focus. The position-practice relationships at both the industry and organizational level were characterized by both soft power and trust.\nResearch limitations/implications: Future research could investigate how the withdrawal of the carbon pricing mechanism in Australia has affected the development of carbon accounting practices whilst overseas research could examine the extent to which carbon accounting frameworks were the outcome of position-practice relationships.\nPractical implications: Given the global significance of carbon accounting, this paper provides an overview as to how the early adoption of voluntary carbon accounting practices resulted in a reduction in carbon emissions within the water industry and therefore limited its liability for the carbon price.\nOriginality/value: This paper illustrates how the strong ST ontological concept of position-practices can be utilized at the macro, meso, and ontic levels and how these relationships mediated the impact of the carbon price upon both the water industry and the individual water business.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The value of seeking strategic direction in ensuring a future pattern of "realistic" growth potential
|
[
"Search engines",
"Strategic management",
"Business development",
"Integration"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Technology and media companies tend to register high levels of initial growth at market launch. This impacts upon market expectations as analysts seek further intensive growth. Thus, such companies become prisoners of their own success - challenged to meet growth targets that are often not sustainable over the medium and longer term. Limiting \"single\" revenue streams can further exacerbate this issue of sustainable high growth.\nFoundations and vulnerability: Google's website content is provided free to users. Approximately 95 per cent of the company's revenue is generated from advertising. During 2002-2005 there had been overall phenomenal growth (Table I); however, year-on-year growth has been in decline. A comparison of Google's market capitalization in relation to a selection of other companies is given in Table II.When a search is undertaken a series of advertisements (or sponsored links) appear on the right-hand side of the page. These links are triggered by the search key words. The benefit for the advertiser is that it is pay-per-click. However, can advertising alone provide the necessary revenue growth for Google's future? The indication is that the company has already realised its gains through optimizing its revenue through advertising (Financial Times, 2006).However, many companies are using the pay-per-click approach. While they may not be Google's size they have the opportunity to acquire some of the revenue perhaps destined for Google(tm)?\nCreating a strategic direction for realistic growth: Companies must fulfil a real strategic direction. The points illustrated (Figure 1) are interrelated and signal an approach (with flexibility) to assist in business development.Internal-external analysis\nMatching: Ansoff's growth matrix\nHow can Google(tm) achieve sustainable long-term growth?: Google(tm) has significantly diversified its in-house product range with the launch of, amongst others, Google Base. Virtually all products link back to providing a platform for advertising.If current growth is so dependent on advertising, can growth be leveraged through major acquisitions? It is crucial though, as indicated earlier, to judge the right time. In 1999 Yahoo! had a market capitalisation of US$115 billion and the opportunity to acquire eBay(tm). Today eBay's market capitalisation is more than Yahoo!'s (see Table II). A possible lost opportunity for Yahoo!? However, Google does not have significant experience of acquisitions (Google, 2004). It could be argued that Google(tm) is \"building\" its knowledge base through a series of astute acquisitions of technology-focused start-ups.It could equally be argued that these provide a better cultural and strategic fit. For example, in January 2006 Google(tm) acquired dMarc Broadcasting, Inc. Using an automated advertising platform, dMarc can connect advertisers directly to radio stations. This simplifies the sales process, scheduling, delivery and reporting of radio advertising, thus enabling advertisers to efficiently purchase and track their campaigns. Google's intentions appear to be integrating the dMarc technology into their online advertising platform, thus creating a new radio advertising distribution channel. The acquisition has cost Google a reported US$102 million with further contingent cash payments (maximum of US$1.136 billion over the next three years) dependent upon met product integration, net revenue and advertising inventory targets (Google, 2006).Clearly any acquisition has to be appropriate for the future of Google(tm). Of course, these acquisitions may not all be US-based. Both China and India provide opportunities for growth. This is a point that has not been overlooked by Google's competitors. The market can no longer be considered as contained by national boundaries. Google(tm), much like News Corporation before it, may seek acquisitions and strategic alliances globally.\nLessons for other companies: The companies considered within this paper are, or have been, major players within their particular industries. However, there are lessons for medium-sized enterprises.*Understand the core competency drivers and seek to leverage them for sustainable competitive advantage. As Proctor (1997) suggests, \"the achievement of a transformational strategic intent will almost inevitably demand competences which may first appear far beyond the capabilities of the relevant firms - thus risks\". But these can be leveraged to the benefit of the business.*If revenue is derived from one stream of activity, seek to optimize its potential. Concurrently seek ways of developing new streams to generate growth over the medium and longer terms.*Critically evaluate both internal and external environments. The resultant information can be used to determine product and market development.*Growth may be sustained through acquisition and resultant integration. However, there must be a strategic fit to optimize the value of the acquisition over the longer term. Equally, market forces may determine the need for divestment with a re-focussing of the business to achieve growth potential.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - By using the internet search engine Google(tm) as the primary example, this article illustrates: (1) that some high-growth expectations are unsustainable over the short and medium term; and (2) that dependency on single revenue streams may provide growth over the short term, but may not be sustainable over the medium and longer terms, and may be a high-risk scenario. An approach is presented that companies can undertake to critically evaluate current and future positions and consider such options as acquisition and integration as a means of building future growth potential.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Secondary research based on the analysis of published data.\nFindings: - Dependency on one revenue stream within a volatile market can impact upon growth expectations. Hyper-growth expectations may be unsustainable, indeed unrealistic, over the medium term. Such growth expectations may be detrimental to the company. Companies who can spread the risk through acquisition and integration through strategic fit may have greater longer-term growth potential, notwithstanding market and environmental dynamics.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Future opportunities for research could include, among other areas, how Google(tm) and similar online companies could use currently free products to generate revenues.\nPractical implications: - Companies need to consider the volatility of the marketplace. Dependency on one revenue stream could be a high-risk scenario, especially in relation to sustainable high growth expectations. Companies also need to consider various strategic options for sustainable longer-term growth, and continually critically review both internal and external environments, as well as product ranges and revenue streams. Companies should take action to sustain growth, whether that is through new market development, acquisition or even divestment.\nOriginality/value: - While being flexible companies need to consider a realistic strategic direction for the business. Companies also need to consider realistic growth rates as compared to hyper-growth expectations that are unlikely to be sustainable over the medium and longer term.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Teenage sexual health needs: asking the consumers
|
[
"Sex education",
"Health services",
"Sexual health",
"Consumers"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Chlamydia is now the most common sexually transmitted disease in the UK and is most common in women aged less than 20 years. It is estimated that 60-80 per cent of genital chlamydial infections are asymptomatic (Hicks et al., 1999) resulting in infections remaining untreated and subsequent reproductive problems. This study took place in 2002/2003 during rising rates of sexually transmitted infection (STI) (Public Health Laboratory Service, 2001). A chlamydia screening pilot for England (Department of Health, 2002) showed rates of 13.8 per cent for those aged under 16 years and 10.5 per cent for those aged 16-19. Local opportunistic testing of young people seeking contraceptive advice produced chlamydial infection rates of around 20 per cent, with one location at 50 per cent.A British Medical Association (2002) report suggested possible explanations for current high STI rates. Though there is increased transmission, there is also greater professional and public awareness, improved access to GUM services, and improvements in diagnostic sensitivity. The report suggests that contributory factors may be inadequate sex education and the absence of recent high profile safer sex campaigns.Approximately 26 per cent of girls and 30 per cent of boys have had sexual intercourse before the age of 16 (Wellings et al., 2001). A previous local study (Jones et al., 1997) reported that STI education was non-existent in some schools and very poor in others, concluding that sex education, information and service provision requires a holistic approach.Curricula designed to help teenagers deal with social and peer pressure have had some success in tackling risk-taking behaviour (Kirby, 1992) and it is advisable to consider teenage views when planning sex education (Mellanby et al., 1996; Scott and Thompson, 1992). Adolescents think that sex education should be more positive and that sexual health clinics should be advertised in locations frequented by teenagers (DiCenso et al., 2002).Research on teenage sexual health has tended to focus on pregnancy rather than STI, but findings can be relevant to both, for example, abstinence programmes showed an increase in pregnancies in partners of male participants (DiCenso et al., 2002). Such programmes may discourage males from carrying condoms while sexual intercourse continues at the original rates, so may also to lead to a rise in STI. Sex education programmes usually improve knowledge (Song et al., 2000) but there is little evidence of change in behaviour (DiCenso et al., 2002).Success is associated with broader interventions at a younger age, for example, disadvantaged children receiving pre-school day-care are less likely to have teenage pregnancies (Zoritch et al., 1998), suggesting that sexual behaviour is likely to be based on self-efficacy engendered at an early age. Lessons from substance misuse programmes may also be relevant, where a combination of teaching social resistance and general life skills has been shown to be effective (Botvin et al., 1995). However, a recent Health Development Agency (2004) report on STI prevention has stated that there is insufficient evidence to support or discount the efficacy of community development/empowerment in this context.In 2000 a Sexual Health Strategy for Wales (National Assembly for Wales, 2000) recommended effective sex education, including information on STI, combined with good access to sexual health services. In England the Department of Health has given a commitment to improve sexual health and relationship education in school and to increase access to young person friendly services (DOH, 2004).\nAim of this study: The aim of this study was to examine sexual knowledge, attitudes, practice and access to services and to re-visit topics examined in our previous study (Jones et al., 1997) which resulted in improved services for young people. Since, at least the 1980s and probably before (Davis, 1989) sex education has been criticised by some expert teachers, doctors and by teenagers for failing to keep pace with societal norms and for being too late, and too general. This study set out to examine whether, in the opinion of teenagers, this situation had improved.\nMethod: Year ten pupils (aged 14-15 years) in three schools took part in this study. A mixed comprehensive involved in the 1997 study was included and other schools were single sex comprehensives in an area of high chlamydia prevalence. Sampling was theoretically driven with schools asked to select pupils based on their maturity, and willingness to take part. Parents of the selected pupils were sent a letter explaining the study and giving a researcher's telephone number for queries. Parents were invited to contact the school if they did not wish their child to take part.Separate gender groups were held, as experience indicated that this promoted greater openness. Two meetings were convened for each group, led by an experienced young facilitator plus an observer. Focus groups were semi-structured and based around questions which are used as sub headings in reporting results.Data were analysed based on a \"grounded theory\" approach, with theories developed inductively from the process of collecting and analysing data. Theories that are produced are, therefore, grounded in the data and the real experience of participants (Glaser and Strauss, 1967). The constant comparison technique was also used, involving reading all of the transcripts to gain an overall \"feel\" for the data (Atkinson, 1999). Categories were generally researcher led (based on the questions asked) and were interrogated until they reached theoretical saturation in the light of the study's aims.\nResults: Groups comprised between six and nine participants and interviews lasted approximately one hour. In all 16 girls and 16 boys took part. The following abbreviations denote the speaker when direct quotes are used: C = Cardiff, V = Vale, B = boys, G = girls. Each participant is allocated a person number with sessions numbered one and two. Thus, CG1.4 would denote Cardiff girls first session, person four. Results are grouped under the core category (question) to which they most closely relate.What do you think of school sex education?\nDiscussion: The main limitation of this study was that teachers selected participants based on their maturity and willingness to take part, which may have resulted in failure to include those in greatest need of sexual health services. This possibility was confirmed in focus group discussions where some participants indicated that more intelligent and better behaved pupils had been selected.Though both local studies examined pupil opinion only, there was a high degree of intra and inter group consistency, leading the researchers to believe that they had been given fairly accurate information. Current results resembled those of previous local research, finding that sex education came too late and was inadequate (Jones et al., 1997). Although more \"teenage friendly\" services had been put in place following the first study, those who took part in the current study were largely unaware of their existence, demonstrating the necessity of collaboration between teachers and service providers. Teachers who are uncomfortable with sex education usually do it poorly, aggravated by inappropriate methods and materials, highlighting the need for expert input. Teenagers have insufficient information and this may apply disproportionately to those of lower ability.Regarding peer delivery, greater empathy and making the information seem more relevant needs to be balanced against potential lack of respect for people of a similar age. Some difficulties could be overcome by using a scheme such as APAUSE, devised by Exeter University (2003) (www.exeter.ac.uk). Such schemes are popular with participants and can increase knowledge, but there is little evidence of effectiveness in changing rates of unprotected sex. A study of pupil led sex education in England (RIPPLE) reported that by age 16 fewer girls in the peer led group reported intercourse or unintended pregnancies than those in the control arm, though the difference was borderline (Stephenson et al., 2004).It is believed that, due to strong friendships, girls find it easier to have in depth discussions and Hey (1997) suggests that friendships are a \"defining female characteristic\". In the current study social networks were important for gaining understanding by discussing information obtained from the media, and from school. Teacher embarrassment was seen as an important factor in the information different groups received. When teaching about condom use had occurred the connection with protection against STI was not conveyed adequately. Discussions gave no indication that teenagers were relying on emergency contraception as a substitute for using condoms, so it is unlikely that wider availability of this method has played a significant part in the spread of infection.The situation regarding the Cardiff school's local clinic may have deteriorated since the previous study, when a number of pupils had either used the clinic or knew someone who had, whereas during the current research none were clinic users and knowledge was limited. Staff changes both in the school and the clinic may have contributed to this.Preference expressed during our earlier study (Jones et al., 1997) for a centrally located young people's clinic led to one being provided, but the Cardiff group was unaware of its existence. (However, the clinic is heavily used by young people.) There was a different problem in the Vale, where pupils were aware of the local clinic but were forbidden to leave the school at opening times, though a number had ignored school restrictions. Better co-operation between schools and service providers is essential if access is to be improved.The greater confidence that an organised clinic visit might confer is likely to place additional demands on existing STI services. Asymptomatic people can wait several weeks for a first appointment, which may result in non-attendance or further transmission during the waiting period. Furthermore, those who are tested need to be aware of the implications. A qualitative study investigating the psychosocial impact on women of a diagnosis of chlamydia found that most held stereotypical views of people with STI (Duncan et al., 2001) resulting in anxiety and fears about disclosure to partners. The researchers suggested that information should normalise and destigmatise chlamydial infection.Opportunistic urine testing (as opposed to other methods) was acceptable in the current study and this is supported by recent research (Moens et al., 2003), which found that a cervical swab was unacceptable to younger women. Lothian Health Board in Scotland has introduced postal urine testing and this could be useful in coping with rising demand and reluctance to attend a clinic.Embarrassment, lack of confidence and worries about the legal status of those below the age of consent were all factors that might prevent teenagers from accessing sexual health services. If transmission of STI among this population is to be controlled effectively, education is an important factor. Unless teenagers are given information about services, they are unlikely to be accessed by those most at risk. Magazines have been criticised by health professionals for giving partial or inaccurate information but this source may not be inferior to the very little sex education that seems to be available in school. Out of date videos failed to get the message across and it seems likely that the video which pupils criticised as \"old fashioned\" in 1996/1997 (Jones et al., 1997) is still in being shown! The belief that behaviour would change if knowledge improved is, however, questionable. Numerous examples of teen sexual health interventions demonstrate improvements in knowledge but no change in behaviour measured by outcomes such as pregnancy rates (DiCenso et al., 2002).The function of condoms in preventing STI seems to be a difficult message to communicate to teenagers. Researchers in London schools (Magnusson et al., 2002) found that after an intervention to improve sexual health knowledge, some remained unaware that condoms were the only form of contraception that could prevent STI. Lack of protection may be reinforced by prevalent beliefs about female responsibility for contraception.A recent Health Development Agency review (Ellis et al., 2003) of HIV prevention identified lack of skill with condoms and poor negotiating skills as important factors in sexual behaviour. A demonstration of condom use on a model is of some help, but to gain confidence, boys will need samples to try at home.In this study embarrassment was an important factor in sex education, accessing condoms and during negotiations with partners. Teenagers are likely to be less embarrassed about access if they are taken to visit a clinic and less embarrassed about negotiating if they are confident about condom use. The widely held belief that sex is better without a condom needs to be balanced against the risk of STI, and many teenagers have insufficient information to make an informed choice.Conflicts between adult strictures to abstain and male peer pressure to be experienced may make it more difficult to discuss how a sexual relationship should proceed. Some divergence exists between adult and teenage perceptions on the source and nature of pressure. The perception that adult pressure for abstinence is counter-productive is confirmed by previous research (DiCenso et al., 2002). Adult attitudes may also contribute to delay in help seeking if a sexual health problem arises.Prevalent beliefs about male and female sexuality can result in pressure to conceal or exaggerate sexual experience, fuelled by masculine characteristics of sexual objectification, banter and behaviour (Mac an Ghaill, 1994). An attitude of invulnerability was prevalent, especially concerning STI and insufficient information to understand the risks is likely to be a contributory factor.There should be more openness applied to STI, which still seems to be a taboo subject for some schools. Teenagers are expressing a need for a trustworthy and confidential source of practical information and most teachers have little training in the field of sexual health. If this important subject is to be taught effectively, it may be necessary to bring in expert advisors.\nConclusions: The dominant themes of sex education being variable, too little and too late, are similar to the evidence of young people to the House of Commons Select Committee on Sexual Health (Adler, 2003). Though users' opinions had been taken into account in planning services in the study area, the fact that participants in one school were unaware of what was available highlights the need for continuous collaboration on information provision between service providers and education authorities. This is also true of the situation of the single sex schools, where an appropriate service was available but not at times when pupils were free to leave the school grounds. The conclusion must be that, if these schools are representative of the UK, there is still some way to go before teenagers are equipped to protect themselves against unintended pregnancy and STI.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - In response to rising prevalence of sexually transmitted infection (STI) among teenagers, this study was designed to examine teenage perceptions of sex education, access to services, and attitudes relevant to STI.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A focus group study was conducted in three schools to discuss the sexual health needs of teenagers. Four single sex groups of 14-15 year olds (two male and two female) comprising six to nine participants met for two one-hour sessions. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed by two researchers.\nFindings: - Sex education was reported to vary considerably in quality and content both between and within schools. Participants felt that this was due to some teachers being embarrassed, resulting in didactic delivery and lack of discussion. Most participants had received very little information about STI, including how it could be avoided or what to do if infection was suspected. Many felt that it would be useful to have an organised visit to a sexual health/contraceptive clinic as part of the curriculum and that it would also be helpful if clinic staff contributed to their sex education.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Teachers selected participants based on their maturity and willingness to take part, which may have resulted in failure to include those in greatest need of sexual health services.\nPractical implications: - Teenagers need more comprehensive sex education at an earlier age, delivered by individuals who are expert in the subject and comfortable in its delivery. Information alone is not enough but should be linked to accessible user-friendly services for contraception and general sexual health.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides information on teenage sexual health needs in general and to the field of STI in particular.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Price endings: magic and math
|
[
"Prices",
"Pricing policy",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Mathematical modelling"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The link between price presentation and value communication is complex. This study illustrates that price numerals can impact choices. Three specific research questions motivated this study to understand the link between price and value:1. When comparative prices are presented to consumers, do consumers process the price holistically or process each digit as a stimulus?2. Do consumers \"round\" prices?3. Do price endings such as 9 or 0 have specific effects on purchase intentions?A review of the literature indicated that researchers have focused on 9- or 0-ending prices and not on all other potential numbers. Although there is a debate on whether 9- or 99-ending prices started with the introduction of cash registers or with retailers understanding that customers routinely truncate numerals (see Huston and Kamdar, 1996; Gendall et al., 1997), the practice of price endings with a specific digit is practised around the world. Early research reported by Ginzberg (1936) involved an experiment by a large mail-order house that compared the sales and profit outcome in two groups of items, one using the just-below prices and the other one using 0-ending or rounded prices. Ginzberg (1936) reported that the resulting profit for some products was not acceptable to the retailer, and similar work was reported recently by Anderson and Simester (2003).Some researchers addressed this prevalent practice from the perspective of consumer behaviour and argued that there are two effects contributing to the use of certain price endings:1. level effects; and2. image effects.Most of such research focuses on how people process the price information (e.g. from left to right) and seems to provide some answers to the practice (e.g. Coulter, 2001). Meanwhile, these researchers raised some other interesting concepts and theories to explain their findings. For example, \"0\" is the easiest number to remember and thus creates a positive image as well as being a reference point for other price endings, such as \"9\", which may be perceived much lower than expected (e.g. Schindler and Kirby, 1997).This paper uses a discrete choice modeling method to understand the effects of all different price endings (from 0 to 9) on the choice behavior. Specifically, we want to address the following issues:* Do consumers process the price holistically or process each digit as a stimulus?* Do consumers \"truncate\" prices (level effect)?* Do price digits interfere with each other?* Do consumers \"round\" prices?* Do certain price endings (e.g. odd/even or \"9\" and \"0\") have specific effects (image effect)?\nLiterature review: The literature concerning price endings may be classified into four major categories. There were ten studies (see Ginzberg, 1936; Georgoff, 1972; Blattberg and Wisniewski, 1987; Carmin and Norkus, 1990; Diller and Brielmaier, 1995; Schindler and Kibarian, 1996; Stiving and Winer, 1997; Bartsch and Paton, 1999; Anderson and Simester, 2003; Allen and Dare, 2004) that investigated the effect of specific endings on sales In addition, five studies (see Gendall et al., 1997; Wedel and Leeflang, 1998; Gendall et al., 1998; Coulter, 2001; Bizer and Petty, 2002) investigated the effect of price endings on purchase intention. Moreover, nine recent studies (see Lambert, 1975; Schindler and Warren, 1988; Schindler and Wiman, 1989; Estelami, 1999; Schindler and Kibarian, 2001; Guido and Peluso, 2004; Schindler and Chandrashekaran, 2004; Gueguen and Legoherel, 2004; Thomas and Morwitz, 2005) have examined effect price endings as well as numerical processing on memory of price. Finally, seven studies (see Twedt, 1965; Kreul, 1982; Huston and Kamdar, 1996; Schindler and Kirby, 1997; Naipaul and Parsa, 2001; Schindler, 2001; Suri et al., 2004) documented that prices are likely to end with 0, 5 or 9 in the marketplace. Moreover, the majority of studies have relied on between subjects design.Higher-than-expected demand\nHypotheses: The central focus of this paper is to demonstrate empirically that consumers process price numbers with limited attention to specific digits, which results in differential weighting of numerals that form a price. A special form of differential weighting is the rounding of numerals.The literature suggests that odd and even prices are processed differently. Finally, prices that end in 9 or 0 may also be processed differently. Specific hypotheses arising from these ideas are summarized below.According to the traditional economic theory, consumers process price holistically. As a result, a higher price would result in a lower likelihood of a product being selected. In other words, price as a whole number may have a negative influence on consumer choices.To infer whether consumers may process the digits in the price as separate stimuli, we need to separate the price into two parts: the dimes (or tens of dollars) and the pennies (ones of dollars). For example, 59C/ may be processed in two separate parts, namely 5 for the dime and 9 for the penny. If consumers process price digits differently, then the digits of the price may have different weights on inferred consumer preferences. The idea of differential weighting is consistent with left-to-right processing of numerals as well as the level effect (see Coulter, 2001; Stiving and Winer, 1997). Thus, our null hypothesis would suggest that:H1. The effect of dimes and pennies on respondents' choices would differ by a scaling factor only.\nMethodology: In order to test our hypotheses, the prices of tomato soup and backpacks were varied.These product categories were selected because our research subjects - university students - typically purchase them. Moreover, the products cover a price variation that is natural to these categories. A personal visit to local retail stores indicated that tomato soup prices ranged from $0.40 to $0.99 and the prices for backpacks were between $30 and $60. In both product categories, prices were presented as two-digit numbers; soup prices were presented in cents and backpack prices in dollars. Finally, only one brand in each product category was included in the current study in order to have a better control of the effects of price endings. The products chosen had a variety of attributes that differentiated one from another within the same brand. For example, Campbell's tomato soup was available in several flavours (plain, tomato with rice, tomato with noodle, tomato with basil and oregano), and Mountain Equipment Coop's backpack comes with different advertised features (sling pack, multiple exterior pockets, detachable waist pack, and multiple-usage). All four products of each brand were selected for the study.Sample and questionnaire description\nResults: A summary of estimates and associated statistics is provided in Tables I and II. Although these tables only summarize sequential inclusion of variables, a number of other models involving backward selection were also estimated. To save space, these models are not summarized in the manuscript.Both product estimates suggested that one would reject all six null hypotheses (with two exceptions: 9-ending in the soup model and rounding of numbers in the backpack model). If one considered a model with alternative specific constants as the base model, then additions of various price-ending effects would provide marginal improvements in fit statistics. Although the estimated models are statistically significant, they only account for 5.5 and 16.3 percent of variation. This is a clear indication that a great deal of variation exists within respondents that is not captured in the models summarized in Tables I and II.Interpretation of estimates\nFuture research and limitations: First, this study is based on two-digit prices without decimal numbers. Future research should consider using prices with more than two digits and the decimal numbers. As price length increases, people may be more likely to use less effort to process the price information. Our knowledge about how multiple digits are processed is limited. Second, this study captures \"on-line\" cognitive processing, which means that price stimuli are directly compared at the point of purchase (Coulter, 2001). However, it was not possible to explore \"off-line\" cognitive processing, where price digits are encoded and represented in memory. Future research should investigate the possible memory mechanisms used to process the price information. Third, it was possible to test the rounding effect in this study; however, it was not possible to test the effect of truncation in the processing of digits. This is partly because in two-digit numbers, the zero variable is equivalent to truncation. With multiple digits, the possibility of truncation could be better studied. Fourth, the literature review suggests that the price image effect could potentially act as a mediator to choice. With the current research, it did not appear feasible to test such mediation. Finally, one may explain the observed effects in this study as a result of reference prices. Future research may investigate the role of reference price and price endings on consumer choices and memory.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to improve understanding of the effects of price endings on consumers' choice behavior. The research study described here was driven by three central questions. First, do consumers process a price holistically or process each digit as a stimulus? Second, do consumers \"round\" prices? Third, do price endings such as 9 or 0 have specific effects on purchase intentions?\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The study is based on a discrete choice experiment where consumers responded to two-digit prices. Tomato soup and backpacks were the two product categories selected for the study. A total of 188 university students who had purchased these products completed an online survey indicating their choices for one of the four alternative products, with an option of not purchasing anything. Tomato soup prices were varied from 40 cents to 99 cents (every potential price ending was included) and backpack prices varied from $30 to $59 (no pennies). Each respondent made 20 choices for each product and the resulting database was used to construct the nested logit models.\nFindings: - Estimated models suggest that consumers do not process price holistically. In other words, respondents processed prices by splitting numbers into two parts. Furthermore, the use of truncation and the effects of \"odd/even\" and \"0\" appeared to be statistically significant for both canned soup and backpack products. Although there was rounding of prices for the soup category, there was no statistically significant support for that in the backpack category. Finally, the effect of a 9-ending was statistically significant for the backpack category but not for the soup category.\nPractical implications: - The findings suggest that consumers may not process prices holistically. This, in turn, means that price endings are likely to influence consumer price sensitivity and both retailer and manufacturer profits.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first paper that examines price endings for all numbers from 0 to 9. In addition, the use of a discrete choice modeling method to infer individual choice behaviour in this context is new and innovative.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Preparing for natural hazards: the role of community trust
|
[
"Hazards",
"Disaster management",
"Natural disasters",
"Risk intelligence",
"Communication processes"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In societies susceptible to experiencing adverse impacts from, for example, volcanic, wildfire, and seismic activity, the management of the associated risk is afforded a high priority. A key component of risk management is encouraging the adoption of protective measures (e.g. storing food and water, household emergency planning) to reduce the risk of injury and damage and facilitate people's capacity to cope with hazard consequences (Paton et al., 2003, 2006). Despite the efforts of emergency planners, based on the assumption that providing people with information about hazards will motivate the adoption of protective actions, people living in communities at risk from natural hazards continue to demonstrate poor knowledge of risk mitigation procedures and a reticence to adopt protective measures (Paton et al., 2000).One reason for this has been the failure to accommodate the fact that it is not information per se that determines action, but how people interpret it in the context of experiences, beliefs and expectations that develop in and are sustained by the community and societal contexts in which they live (Marris et al., 1998; Rippl, 2002). An important, but oft neglected, issue in this regard is the relationship between the community and the source (rather than the content) of information and advice on disaster preparedness. Because of the complexity and uncertainty associated with natural hazards, information on mitigation measures typically comes from the societal mechanisms established for this purpose. That is, from civic emergency management agencies.The greater the uncertainty they face, the more people attribute weight to their trust beliefs about a source of information (Johnson-George and Swap, 1982; Sjoberg, 1999). Trust influences perception of other's motives, their competence and the credibility of the information they provide (Earle, 2004; Kee and Knox, 1970). As such, it would be expected to play a prominent role in mediating relationships concerned with acquiring information about, understanding, and taking action to mitigate infrequently-occurring natural hazard consequences. While considerable attention has been directed to the content of risk communication, the role of people's perceptions of agencies that provide the information has been less extensively researched. This paper examines how trust in the civic agencies that provide risk communication influences hazard preparedness.When dealing with natural hazard issues, people rely on sources (e.g. emergency planners) with whom they have a general relationship (e.g. their being officers of local councils or other civic agencies) that extends beyond natural hazard issues. Hence, the quality of trust developed in general contexts (e.g. in relation to people's experience of council/civic services, their dealings with council officers) may influence trusting in the context of risk communication about infrequent natural hazard events. The specific relationship between trust in civic emergency planners and the quality of risk communication has not been systematically examined. The relationship between trust and hazard mitigation is examined using a model developed by Kee and Knox (1970) and Mayer et al. (1995) that views trust as a process influenced by situational (familiarity, information availability) and structural (e.g. community competence) factors.Two predictions of this model are examined. The first considers how situational factors (familiarity, information) influence the relative importance of trust as a predictor of the effectiveness of risk communication. This is examined with regard to its role in predicting the adoption of protective measures. The second examines the proposed relationship between community characteristics and levels of social trust. The importance of the latter derives from recognition that people's perception of risk is influenced by social context (Earle, 2004; Poortinga and Pidgeon, 2004). It is proposed that trust will be influenced by community characteristics that influence people's capacity to confront the uncertainty associated with complex, infrequently-occurring natural hazards. The paper commences with an analysis of situational factors.\nStudy one: situational factors: With respect to whether trust influences people's decision making, two aspects of the situation have been identified as being important (Mayer et al., 1995; Siegrist and Cvetkovich, 2000). The first concerns familiarity with a situation. The second involves the availability of information.The importance of social trust, according to this view, is inversely related to familiarity with the hazard, and the availability of information about the hazard. As frequency and experience increase, the more information will be directly available to the person or accessible from within their community, negating the need to acquire and evaluate information from other sources. Consequently, it is only in unfamiliar situations, in which reliance upon external expert sources is greater, that trust in the source of information becomes a component in decision making about mitigation. While this relationship has been found for several technological hazards (Siegrist and Cvetkovich, 2000), its applicability to infrequently-occurring natural hazards has not been examined. This issue is explored here by comparing responses from populations exposed to bushfire, volcanic and earthquake hazards. The communities differ with regard to their relative familiarity (based on frequency of exposure) with each hazard.Procedure\nStudy two: identifying the predictors of trust: The model (Kee and Knox, 1970; Mayer et al., 1995) predicts that levels of social trust will be predicted by community characteristics that reflect the capacity of community members to acquire and use information to confront the uncertainty they face. This prediction was tested using data from the low familiarity/low information volcanic scenario.Procedure\nConclusion: The analyses presented here support the utility of the proposed model as a means of understanding how social trust influences risk communication about natural hazards. The postulated role of situational and structural factors was supported, as was a role for trust in civic institutions in people's decision making regarding adoption of protective measures (see Figure 1: based on a volcanic scenario).Trust is contingent on situational cue (familiarity/information) availability. However, any conclusions regarding the relative contributions of familiarity and information availability remain tentative as this stage. Familiarity was assessed here on the basis of the frequency of hazard occurrence and information-availability by the level of community discourse about hazard issues, but their relative contributions could not be examined separately. They are inextricably linked to levels of experience. The qualitative analysis tends to favour information-availability as the driver. For example, bushfire residents described information sharing (rather than hazard experience per se) as an important determinant of the development of a culture of preparing within the community. While differentiation may be feasible with more prevalent technological hazards, it is unlikely that levels of familiarity for most natural hazards would be able to emulate those of their technological counterparts. The analyses also highlighted the need to view relationships between emergency management functions and the community as reciprocal (examined here using the construct of empowerment) rather than prescriptive.When dealing with infrequent natural hazards, information will be evaluated in terms of people's generalized beliefs regarding trust in the social institutions providing information. Risk communication is not just about providing information. The social construction of risk and its management must be considered, and future research should encompass both the information made available and the community and societal contexts within which it is disseminated. Currently, risk communication programs in the areas studied do not create contexts conducive to either encouraging discourse about natural hazards or facilitating citizens' active involvement in developing and implementing sustained mitigation practices.These findings reiterate the need for risk communication to be based on community engagement principles (Paton et al., 2005) and encourage discussion of hazard issues within established community forums (e.g. religious groups, social action groups) in ways that empower community members to identify the implications of hazard activity for them and facilitate their ability to confront those issues (Paton, 2006; Paton and Bishop, 1996). When emergency management agencies engage community members about hazards, levels of trust, satisfaction with communication, risk acceptance, willingness to take responsibility for their own safety, and collective commitment to confront hazard consequences will increase.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper seeks to examine how perception of the relationship between people and sources of information influence hazard preparedness and how trust in civic emergency planning agencies responsible for risk communication influences preparedness decisions. It aims to hypothesize that: familiarity with and information about hazards predicts the relative importance of trust; and that levels of trust are influenced by community characteristics.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A cross-sectional analysis of the relationship between trust and hazard preparedness was conducted. Hypotheses were tested using data on bushfire, volcanic and earthquake hazards. Data were analysed using multiple regression analyses.\nFindings: - The first hypothesis, that situational factors predict the relative importance of trust, was supported. Partial support was forthcoming for the second hypothesis. Collective problem solving and empowerment predicted levels of trust.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The findings demonstrated the utility of this multi-level model for the analysis of risk communication and need to accommodate societal-level variables in future risk communication research. The source of information plays a role in risk communication that is independent of the information per se.\nPractical implications: - The relationship between people and civic agencies and the information provided must be accommodated in planning risk communication. The analysis provides an evidence-based framework for the development of risk communication strategies based on community engagement principles.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first time this multi-level model has been applied to natural hazards and contributes to understanding the contingent nature of the risk communication process.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Technology strategy and sustainability of business: Empirical experiences from Chinese cases
|
[
"China",
"Core competence",
"Technology strategy",
"Technology management and innovation",
"Business sustainability"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: China's success of the market economy with Chinese characteristics has drawn the world's attention. The ever increasing Chinese economy, which has surpassed Japan to become now the second largest economy in the world (Barboza, 2010; OECD, 2003), has made China the economic engine of the world economy. In the current financing crisis and the economic downturn, the Chinese economy has, to some extent, been affected seriously but in a relatively controlled way. The evidence is that the banking sector and large state-owned enterprises remain strong and play a pivotal role in the economy. China's legacy has become popular not only through demonstrating its economic power, but also the \"country-specific advantages\", \"soft capacity\", \"the hidden dragons\", which can be interpreted as Chinese management (Zeng and Williamson, 2003; Adams et al., 2006; Rugman and Li, 2007).\n2 Theoretical aspects of technology and technology strategy: 2.1 What is technology?\n3 Design and implementation of technology strategy: Technology, like marketing, financial and human resources, is pervasively important in any organization. Management of technology is a basic business function. Burgelman et al. (2009) argue that technology strategy is in the position and has to answer the following questions:\n4 Industrial sustainability of business: Sustainability refers to sustainable development that meets the need of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. In 1995, the formation of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) marked the ever first collective efforts towards a business or industry response to sustainability with a presence of 160 international companies from over 30 countries (Paramanatham et al., 2004). The UK's sustainable development strategy (The UK Government, 1999) outlines four objectives in defining \"sustainability\":\n5 Research design and methodology: Creswell (2007) argues that qualitative research is sometimes called interpretive research, which is in contrast to a quantitative approach. The goal of qualitative research is to comprehend the complex world of human experience and behaviour from the point of view of those involved in the situation of interest (Krauss, 2005). This implies that the investigator is expected not to have a priori, well-defined conceptualization of the phenomenon but rather this conceptualization emerges from the interaction between the investigator and the participants (Krauss, 2005).\n6 Case studies analysis and discussions: The five companies have been carefully studied, which are summarized in Table I. This section presents the critical analysis of the cases in the following strategic themes.\n7 Conclusion and policy implication: The burst of the financial bubble has led people to re-consider the sustainability of business. This paper has linked together the concept of technology strategy and sustainability of business in the post-recession. It has achieved the objectives by identifying the major activities of management of technology in the Chinese vanguard companies and examining the strategic relation between technology strategy and sustainability of business. More generally, this study has sought to characterize the process of technology management in Chinese firms and the features of China's technology strategy - 3-I patterns - imitation, improvement and innovation. In other words, it has established the concept of China's technology strategy from technology transfer to technology innovation.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper sets out to review the literature of technology strategy, competitive advantage and sustainability of international business, in particular, the contribution that the enactment of technology strategy can make toward the effective implementation of business sustainability in the post-recession. It examines what kind of role technology strategy plays in Chinese business and how business sustainability could be leveraged through the implementation of appropriate technology strategy. This paper attempts to address various crucial issues in the establishment of a proper technology strategy for the sustainability of the business in the global market place based upon case study of five vanguard Chinese companies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This exploratory study primarily adapts a qualitative multiple-case-study method which attempts to understand how Chinese firms perceive the role of technology strategy in their business, to capture the practical terms and concepts underpinning technology strategy and sustainability, and to allow us to have an analysis of the relationship between technology strategy and sustainability of business. Finally, ten propositions concerning \"technology strategy and sustainability of business\" are to be developed and verified along the theoretical development of the paper and examination of five cases. The nature of the study results that the paper applies qualitative method with a multiple-case-study approach, including Geely, Haier, TCL, Huawei and Lenovo.\nFindings: This paper addresses the crucial issues - management of technology as basic function in international business and the close relationship between technology strategy and business sustainability. It showcases the Chinese business paradigm from \"imitation to innovation\" of how Chinese hi-tech firms built their core competence. This study provides fresh insights for multinational companies in creating competitive advantage through designing an appropriate technology strategy.\nOriginality/value: Theoretically this research fills the gap of an area of technology management which has been rarely touched. This will have strong implication not only to Chinese companies but also non-Chinese multinational companies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The generation game: Concepts of Baby-Boomer, Gen X and Gen Y can create more heat than light
|
[
"Work-life balance",
"Young people",
"Flexible working"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Fixed Graphic\nThe generational approach: a useful but limited starting point: I conducted a qualitative study on young adults in Britain, born between 1975 and 1982. I explored how the young adults conceptualized the notion of work-life balance at a point of transition in their lives, just as they were about to leave university and enter full-time paid employment.\nThe need to go beyond the generational approach: In a critical review of generational differences in work values, in which work-life balance tends to crop up as a key work value among Gen X and Gen Y. Parry and Urwin (2011, p. 79) argued that while this is a \"popular practitioner idea [...] the academic empirical evidence for generational differences in work values is, at best, mixed\".\nThe life-course approach as an alternative: Therefore instead of drawing on a generational approach to make sense of my data on young adults, I turned to a life-course approach. Life-course research \"studies people's individual lives (their trajectories and experiences) within a framework of reference to structural contexts and social change, paying explicit attention to the powerful connection between individual lives and the historical and socio-economic context in which lives unfold\" (Chatrakul Na Ayudhya et al., 2014). The approach acknowledges the distinction between generations and birth cohorts and the young adults in my study belonged to a particular birth cohort at the time of the study. The concept of transitions is key in a life-course approach. In particular it was the transition from being university students to full-time workers in Britain that helped to contextualize the participants' talk of work-life balance at that point in time.\nConclusion: Studies that have looked for generational differences in work values are useful in highlighting the issue of diversity in the work-life balance needs of workers of different age groups. In part, they have enabled researchers like me to conduct work-life balance studies with people who are not yet working parents.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Explores the limited value of concepts such as Baby-Boomer, Generation X (Gen X) and Generation Y (Gen Y) and advances the view that life course is more valuable.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Examines how young adults in Britain, born between 1975 and 1982, conceptualized the notion of work-life balance as they were about to leave university and enter full-time paid employment.\nFindings: Reveals that the notion of individual choice strongly underpins young adults' conceptualization of work-life balance and expectations of work-life balance support; while young British and Asian adults largely considered it to be a matter of individual choice, there were variations in their preferences for how to prioritize their impending employment and personal lives; and four emerging patterns of work-life balance orientation preferences were found - balancer, careerist, career-sacrificer and integrator.\nPractical implications: Provides support for the argument that the work-life balance perceptions of young adults who would belong to the so-called Gen Y cannot be generalized and simplified as being either work-centric or life-centric. The picture is a lot more complex given the diversity within this group of young adults.\nSocial implications: Highlights how, instead of looking for generational differences (or age-related differences) which can be divisive, it is more useful to look at the issue of multi-generations in a broader way.\nOriginality/value: By using a life-course approach instead of a generational approach, is able to take into account how past transitions have shaped the way work-life balance was discussed by the young adults and how anticipated future transitions were expected by the young adults to change their needs and therefore expectations of employer and government support.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Eye health in New Zealand: A study of public knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to eye health and disease
|
[
"Eyes",
"Public health",
"New Zealand"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Awareness and knowledge of the importance of eye health is a critical prerequisite for motivating eye care behaviours and access to care (Baker and Murdoch, 2008; Muller et al., 2007). Eye health is an important public health concern because visual impairment can negatively impact the public healthcare burden (Chang et al., 1991; Saaddine et al., 2003), independent living, quality of life, mental health, and accident rates, as well as increasing the need for community services, family support, and earlier institutional care (Ivers et al., 1998; Ivers et al., 2003; McCarthy et al., 2002; Mukamel et al., 1999; Masud and Morris, 2001). Moreover, increasing public awareness of eye health in NZ is critical as approximately 20 per cent of patients experience blindness that is preventable (Hilary and Inglis, 2009). For example, approximately 68,000 New Zealanders over the age of 40 currently have glaucoma - half of whom do not know they have the disease (MOH (Ministry of Health), 2003; Altangerel et al., 2009). In addition, associated sight-threatening diseases such as diabetes, which causes diabetic retinopathy, are more prevalent in Maori and Pacific Island populations, as well as lower income and elderly, who have less access to regular quality health care (Taylor, 1997; Thomson and Paterson, 1998; Higginbotham et al., 2004; Varma et al., 2004; Taylor et al., 2004; Barnett et al., 2006; Nsiah-Kumi et al., 2009).\nMethodology: We used a mixed-method approach to investigate the research question to increase the rigor and relevance of the study (Jick, 1979; Nutbeam, 1998; Bowling, 2002). To develop and complete an overview of public knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to eye health and disease amongst New Zealanders, we benchmarked international studies (e.g. American Eye-Q(tm) Quiz, AOA Public Image Survey) (Nutbeam, 1998; Edlow, 2005; Edlow and Markus, 2008), interviewed optometrists and allied professionals, and conducted a focus group to develop and validate a twenty-two (22) question survey. The study was then beta tested with twenty prospective respondents to assess the format, logic and convenience of the questionnaire. Finally, we also included an open-ended question \"Is there anything you would like to say about eye care in New Zealand?\" which 135 or 26.6 per cent of participants responded. These responses were coded into key themes to provide greater insight into our survey data.We distributed the survey online (e.g. community health groups, minority community clinics, newspaper websites) and at public locations (e.g. public libraries) across multiple cities to obtain a representative sample by age, gender, and ethnicity. Persons eligible for the study were adults living in NZ who were 18 years or older. We collected a total of 507 responses (95 per cent confidence level, +-5 per cent margin of error) in the June-July 2009 study period.\nResults and discussion: The demographics of the participants were broadly representative of the NZ population. By ethnicity, participants were: European/Pakeha (77.7 per cent), Maori (10.8 per cent), Pacific Islander (1.6 per cent), Chinese (6.0 per cent), and Indian (3.8 per cent). Participants by age were: under 35 years old (42.4 per cent), 35-44 years of age (19.9 per cent), 45-54 years of age (22.5 per cent), 55-64 (9.5 per cent), and over 65 years of age (5.7 per cent). Although similar to ethnicity demographics in other surveys of public health awareness (Bauman et al. 2003), this reflects a slight under-representation of Maori and Pacific Islanders, as well as those over 55 years of age compared with the general population; and a marginal over-representation of Asian respondents. Similarly, the survey represents a higher number of female respondents at 69.5 per cent (males 30.5 per cent), which reflects a higher proportion of female caregivers. 58 per cent of participants were parents/guardians who answered three additional questions about eye health for their children.The results of this survey may be broadly segmented into the following three areas: awareness of eye health, access to care, and vulnerable persons.Awareness of eye health\nConclusions: The objective of this study was to assess public knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to eye health and disease in NZ. A secondary objective was to assess eye health for vulnerable persons such as children, elderly, and indigenous communities of Maori and Pacific Islanders. A key conclusion from this study is that awareness about the importance of eye health is high in NZ, although knowledge about associated diseases (e.g. macular degeneration) is low: this is particularly important given the risk and cost of preventable vision impairment. This suggests that health promotion and campaigns might focus on informing the public about specific diseases, particularly benchmarking successful overseas results in targeting specific diseases such as glaucoma (Baker and Murdoch, 2008).Comparatively, over 30 per cent of respondents are unaware that a comprehensive eye exam can detect chronic and systemic diseases, which is comparable to international studies (e.g. 38 per cent in NZ compared with 32 per cent in the USA) (American Optometric Association (AOA), 2008; Frederikson and Jacobs, 2008). Given the high rate of diabetes and preventable blindness, this indicates that increased and sustained public awareness campaigns to encourage eye-safe behaviours and habits would be beneficial. In particular, an Australian study showed that television messages regarding eye care were particularly effective in raising awareness (Muller et al. 2007). Of concern, 62 per cent of \"non-users\" (i.e. respondents who do not wear glasses or contact lenses) reported \"never\" to the question of how often they access eye care from a provider. This contrasts with 15 per cent of non-users in a comparative American survey who reported as \"never\" accessing eye care (AOA, 2008). Owing to potential for a general lack of engagement, a population-wide campaign targeting a broad population, as well as those with messages about specific diseases or targeting specific populations, could be beneficial.Relative to the overall NZ population, this survey also suggests that Maori and Pacific Islanders have similar rates of eyeglass and contact lens use. However, adults in these groups access eye care providers (e.g. optometrists) less frequently than other ethnic groups. Of note, Pacific Islanders were under-represented in this sample relative to the general population. These results do however suggest that activities targeting Maori and Pacific Islanders, in the same way that other studies have targeted the over 50 year olds, through specific messages and relevant publications, may be fruitful (Muller et al., 2007). NZ examples in public health include campaigns such as the national Push Play campaign promoting physical activity that similarly targeted a broad audience, with tailored messages for specific audiences. The He Oranga Poutama program targeting Maori people was implemented under the broader umbrella of the national Push Play campaign (Bauman et al. 2003). Similarly, a cervical screening campaign in NZ launched in 2007 contained both a universal message for all woman, but delivered a particular focus on Maori and Pacific Island woman due to their lower rates of screening (National Screening Unit, 2010).In terms of limitations and extensions, it should be noted that this study is a point estimate. Thus, performing a longitudinal analysis to verify findings and identify changing trends may strengthen study results. We would also like to explore other barriers to accessing eye care such as socioeconomic indicators, such as education and income. Also, while this is a cross-sectional survey there is a potential for selection bias among respondents, especially as it was a voluntary survey. Importantly, the data needs to be viewed with the limitation of sampling methods, which reflects a higher participation rate among younger Europeans, perhaps a function of higher internet and public libraries use where data was gathered. In addition, while Maori and Pacific Islanders were pooled for analysis and additional studies are required to address issues specific to the Pacific population.In sum, this consumer survey of eye health in NZ, which assessed awareness and access to eye care, provides a foundation for those involved in the provision of eye care health services. It is also a first step to further exploring key issues and identifying patterns for consumer, provider, and public health debate, as well as establishes a baseline for public health campaigns.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This study seeks to measure the public knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to eye health and disease in New Zealand (NZ).\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A 22-item survey of 507 adults in NZ was conducted. The survey was developed using interviews and focus groups, as well as comparisons with other benchmark international studies.\nFindings: - Overall awareness about the importance of eye health is high in NZ, although knowledge about associated diseases (e.g. macular degeneration) is low - this is particularly important, given the risk and cost of preventable vision impairment.\nOriginality/value: - This consumer survey of eye health in NZ, which assessed awareness and access to eye care, provides a foundation for those involved in the provision of eye care health. It is also a first step to further exploring key issues and identifying longitudinal patterns for consumer, provider, and public health dialogue, as well as a baseline for public health campaigns.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Modelling the readiness factors for agility in healthcare organization: a TISM approach
|
[
"Agility",
"Organizational agility",
"TISM",
"Readiness",
"Agility in hospital"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Nowadays, healthcare sector faces challenges like increase in competition, technological innovation, changing market environment and customer demands (Tseng and Lin, 2011). Social and demographic changes, quick medical technological growths, specialized interests, changes in public insist for care and new theories about healthcare management and organization would affect existing hospitals. There has been an increase in the amount of spending for healthcare due to a longer life expectation, need for increased standard of living by developing countries, capacity to pay for eminent medical treatments and technological advances that help to cure diseases with better services (Demirkan, 2013). These features create an apparently unstable environment that inclines to become increasingly multifaceted and unpredictable with time (Basole and Rouse, 2008; Tolf et al., 2015). This critical situation can be handled by modifying the priorities and developing new strategies, with relatively contemporary model and methods (Sharifi and Zhang, 1999). The idea of adapting to unpredictable changes lends to the evaluation of flexibility, and it is referred to as the concept called \"agility\" (Ganguly et al., 2009).\n2. Literature review: The concept of agility was first introduced by researchers of the Iacocca Institute (1991). After the first introduction, it has been receiving an increasing attention by both researchers and industrial communities (Bottani, 2009). Goldman et al. (1995) defined that \"Agility is the ability to thrive in a competitive environment of continuous and unanticipated change and to respond quickly to rapidly changing, fragmenting global markets that are served by networked competitors with routine access to a worldwide production system and are driven by demand for high-quality, high-performance, low cost, customer-configured products and services.\" Likewise, Christopher (2000) defined agility as \"the ability of an organization to respond rapidly to changes in demand both in terms of volume and variety.\" According to Dove (2001), agility is \"the ability of an organization to thrive in a continuously changing, unpredictable business environment.\" Hooper et al. (2001) defined agility as \"the ability of an enterprise to develop and exploit its inter- and intra-organizational capabilities.\" Prince and Kay (2003) stated it as the \"ability to respond to sudden changes and meet widely varied customer requirements in terms of price, specification, quality, quantity, and delivery.\" Mathiyakalan et al. (2005) defined it as \"The ability of an organization to detect changes (which can be opportunities or threats or a combination of them) in its business environment and hence providing focused and rapid responses to its customers and stakeholders by reconfiguring its resources, processes and strategies.\"\n3. Methodology: 3.1 Sampling design and data collection\n4. Results and discussions: 4.1 Interpretation of TISM digraph\n5. Implications of the study: The necessity of agility in service sector, especially in healthcare, is emerging and gaining attention among researchers as well as practitioners also. Many studies utilized agility in effective ways for betterment of agility. This study focused on identification of readiness factors to implement agility in a well-organized way. The readiness is an initial stage in change process that helps in the identification of essential factors of effective implementation of agility in healthcare organization. The continuous monitoring of environmental scanning would help to predict and manage changes quickly in healthcare organization. The implications involved to acquire knowledge of agility, theoretical as well as practical/ managerial perspective.\n6. Conclusion: This study has identified readiness factors by using TISM approach to implement agility in healthcare organization. The key factors identified are environmental scanning, organizational leadership, resource availability, cost effectiveness, innovativeness and training and development. The main key factor like environmental scanning would have much influence on other factors. These key factors would help the management in monitoring continuously the changes in fields like technology, political, legal, climate and economic. The resource availability of organization would decide the funding for each requirement of change process. The MICMAC analysis helps to know the importance level of each factor, which divides the resources in required proportion for each requirement of change process. Innovativeness helps to develop a variety of service which is a unique quality to provide better service for their customers. The cost effectiveness would help managers to study each change process, comparing expense and outcome in monetary terms for measuring the benefits. The environmental scanning and resource availability will influence other factors more for modification process in terms of agility. New training methods are adopted to train the employees to act quickly in unpredictable situations. Managers need to perform multiple tasks due to continuous change and modification in external environment. Team building among employees would help the management to create trust, cooperation and better understanding of employee's opinions towards agility. The management should have openness with its employees to get the suggestions, opinions and new ideas that are useful for the betterment of the organization. Strategies are formulated to execute agility for improving the quality and variety of service provided to retain the customers. Agility is implemented in healthcare organization to reduce cost, to offer quick service for current demands and to maintain competitive advantage.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze the interactions among different readiness factors for implementing agility in healthcare organization. Total interpretive structural modeling (TISM) based readiness framework for agility has been developed to understand the mutual interactions among the factors and to identify the driving and dependence power of these factors.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The identification of factors is done by TISM approach used for analyzing the mutual interactions between factors. Cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification analysis is utilized to find the driving and dependent factors of agile readiness in healthcare.\nFindings: This paper identifies 12 factors of readiness for change in literature review, which is followed by an expert interview to understand the interconnection of factors and to study interrelationships of factors. The study suggests that factors like environmental scanning, resource availability, innovativeness, cost effectiveness, organizational leadership, training and development are important for implementing/improving the readiness of agility in healthcare organizations.\nResearch limitations/implications: This research focuses mainly on readiness factors for agility in healthcare sector.\nPractical implications: Top management must stress on readiness factors that have a strong driving power for efficient implementation of agility in healthcare. This study helps the managers to take quick decisions, and continuous monitoring of readiness factors would be more beneficial to improve the quality of service, which makes the organization more agile.\nOriginality/value: In this research, TISM-based readiness for agile framework structural model has been proposed for healthcare organizations, which is a new effort for implementation of agility in healthcare.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Real estate advertising campaigns in the context of natural hazards: Evidence from the Wenchuan earthquake
|
[
"Advertising",
"Public relations",
"Risk perception",
"Real estate",
"Wenchuan earthquake"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: An earthquake usually causes a temporary real estate marketing crisis because of the negative consequences affecting the products (e.g. buildings). Therefore, it is of great interest to marketing practitioners in real estate businesses to develop marketing strategies to manage the negative effects of disasters on their businesses. Advertising is usually regarded as the main pattern of corporate marketing communications (Ho et al., 2016). There is no doubt that the information offered by real estate advertising may change in response to an earthquake, but advertising during a disaster results in consumer disgust if the advertising is mismanaged (Kinnick, 2003). It is necessary to explore the effective management of advertising communications after an earthquake.\n2. Theoretical analysis: This section proposes a theoretical framework used to explain how an earthquake influences real estate advertising (Figure 1). An earthquake may influence homebuyers' perceptions toward a corporate image and a product's attributes. Changes in homebuyers' perceptions influence their purchase intentions or behaviors, which, in turn, influence the demand for housing. As a result, an earthquake may indirectly contribute to a temporary market crisis for some real estate corporations. To forestall a likely market crisis, developers must adjust marketing strategies to fit the homebuyers' varying purchase intentions or demands. From the perspective of marketing crisis management, advertising has long been the preferred tool, which is usually used to influence consumers' feelings, perceptions, and attitudes toward a crisis and a company, as well as its products and services (Atkinson, 2014).\n3. The case of the Wenchuan earthquake in China: The deadliest and strongest earthquake to hit China since the 1976 Tangshan earthquake, the Wenchuan earthquake occurred at 2:28 p.m. on May 12, 2008, with a moment magnitude of 7.9 (Deng et al., 2015). The epicenter was located 90 kilometers northwest of Chengdu, which is Sichuan Province's capital city of about 10m residents (Deng et al., 2015). The earthquake caused severe damage to the city and was felt across most of mainland China. The official report by the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs stated that 69,227 people had died, 17,923 had gone missing and 374,643 people had been injured[1]. There is no doubt that this disaster was a sad experience for the Chinese people and had caused great psychological trauma. May 12 was designated as the \"National Day for Disaster Prevention and Reduction\" by the State Council.\n4. Method: This study evaluated advertising messages related to the Wenchuan earthquake by employing the content analysis method. The sample of ads was derived from two newspapers, Chengdu Economic Daily and West China City Daily, which are the two major regional business newspapers in Sichuan Province and usually feature an abundance of commercial ads. All real estate ads were collected from every daily issue of both newspapers from March 11 to November 10, 2008. Advertising messages displayed before the earthquake were used to compare with those after the earthquake. The sample period after the earthquake was half a year, which can provide a relatively long observation period to explore change features of advertising message. In addition, the deadline was November 10, 2008 because advertising message related to the earthquake turned to be very rare after that. Finally, 4,150 ads were collected: 1,277 ads displayed before the Wenchuan earthquake and 2,873 ads afterward.\n5. Analysis and discussion: 5.1 Changes in the numbers of ads before and after the earthquake\n6. Conclusions: This study analyzed how real estate advertising is used in response to a disaster event, such as the Wenchuan earthquake. First, a theoretical analysis based on theories of public relations and earthquake risk perceptions was conducted to explore the mechanism of the earthquake's impact on real estate advertising, then 15 types of advertising messages related to the earthquake were identified. On the basis of the likely variations in post-disaster advertising messages, the content analysis approach was used to evaluate the message changes in the post-quake advertising. The results revealed 12 types of advertising messages alluding to the earthquake. Of these types, five were used to manage public relations and seven were used to reduce or compensate for buyers' earthquake risk perceptions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine how advertising is used by real estate companies as an instrument for managing the adverse effects of a catastrophe.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Through a theoretical analysis, types of post-disaster advertising messages were identified. On the basis of the likely variations in post-disaster advertising, a content analysis was conducted of a sample of 4,150 property print advertisements to identify advertising messages related to the earthquake. Finally, the message changes in these earthquake-related advertisements were evaluated and compared with the dimension of time to explore the development of advertising strategies.\nFindings: The authors found that 12 types of advertising messages were used by developers in response to the Wenchuan earthquake. The initial advertising strategy was mainly to manage public relations, then the strategy was to reduce or compensate for the increased earthquake risk perceptions of buyers.\nPractical implications: The findings provide valuable references for helping enterprises adopt effective advertising messages and strategies to reduce the negative effects of disasters.\nOriginality/value: There are only a few studies on advertising campaigns, especially in the real estate industry, that have been conducted in the wake of catastrophes. This study sought to expand upon the scarce findings in this particular field.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Testing a dynamic model of the impact of psychological capital on work engagement and job performance
|
[
"Work engagement",
"Psychological capital",
"Job performance",
"Latent change model",
"Mediational model"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Psychological Capital (PsyCap) or simply PsyCap, represents an individual's state of development of the combined positive psychological resources of hope, efficacy, resilience and optimism (Luthans, Avolio, Avey and Norman, 2007; Luthans, Youssef and Avolio, 2007). Whereas previous research clearly demonstrates PsyCap predicts desired work outcomes, with but very few exceptions (e.g. see Peterson et al., 2011), the studies have utilized a static approach and have not answered the call for dynamic, longitudinal analysis (see Avey et al., 2008). Yet, a basic tenet of PsyCap is its dynamic nature and malleability: PsyCap is by definition a \"developmental state,\" open to change and has been shown to be developed through targeted training interventions (Luthans et al., 2010; Luthans, Avey and Patera, 2008; Luthans, Norman, Avolio and Avey, 2008). In addition, Newman et al. (2014) recent comprehensive review noted PsyCap research has mainly focused on the antecedents and outcomes (such as job performance), rather than on its mediators. To fill this need, in this study the potential mediating role of work engagement on the relation between PsyCap and job performance is tested.\nPsyCap: The construct of PsyCap was formulated by Luthans and colleagues (Luthans, 2002; Luthans, Avolio, Avey and Norman, 2007; Luthans, Youssef and Avolio, 2007) and describes the psychological status of an individual characterized by: having confidence (efficacy) to take on and put in the necessary effort to succeed at challenging tasks; making a positive attribution (optimism) about succeeding now and in the future; persevering toward goals and, when necessary, redirecting paths to goals (hope) in order to succeed; and when beset by problems and adversity, sustaining and bouncing back (resilience) to attain success (Luthans, Avolio, Avey and Norman, 2007; Luthans, Youssef and Avolio, 2007, p. 3).\nA dynamic perspective of PsyCap, work engagement and job performance: An important cornerstone of PsyCap construct is that the construct is malleable and state-like (Luthans, 2002; Luthans, Avolio, Avey and Norman, 2007; Luthans, Youssef and Avolio, 2007) thus it can be expected: to fluctuate over a relatively short period of time around a certain mean level value; but also to show significant changes over time (see Luthans et al., 2010; Peterson et al., 2011). In this regard, previous research has shown that PsyCap as a whole has higher rank-order stability (r about 0.50) than emotional states, but is not as stable as personality or self-evaluation traits (Luthans, Avolio, Avey and Norman, 2007; Luthans, Youssef and Avolio, 2007). Moreover, it has been shown to be developable, at mean-level, through targeted interventions (Luthans et al., 2010; Luthans, Avey and Patera, 2008; Luthans, Norman, Avolio and Avey, 2008). Moreover, a study by Peterson et al. (2011) found a small mean level change and a decreasing trajectory of PsyCap over a seven-months period, as a function of situational or contextual variables (such as support, feedback or organizational climate). Thus, in this study, we aim to further contribute to the understanding of the dynamic nature of PsyCap by investigating the extent of its rank-order and mean level stability over a one-year interval, and also the direction of this change (increase or decrease).\nRelationship between PsyCap and work engagement: The engaged employee is connected to the task and is personally present and fully active in his/her own role (Kahn, 1990). In particular, Schaufeli et al. (2002) stressed the importance of three dimensions of engagement - vigor (the willingness to invest energy and effort into the work), dedication (experiencing a sense of significance and pride) and absorption (a state of mind characterized by full concentration and immersion in the work). The JD-R model theorizes that personal resources (similar to PsyCap) have an intrinsic motivational potential able to lead to high work engagement (Lorente et al., 2014). In this regard, empirical studies demonstrated that personal resources protect individuals from demanding situations, and facilitate goals attainments and stimulate growth and development over short time periods (Ouweneel et al., 2012; Xanthopoulou et al., 2009b). Engaged employees are characterized by tenacity and persistence, and are driven by a solid belief in future success (Xanthopoulou et al., 2007, 2009a).\nRelationship between work engagement and job performance: Extensive research has demonstrated a significant relationship between work engagement and job performance. For example, work engagement has been correlated with a number of different objective, subjective and inter-subjective performance indicators, such as in-role performance (Halbesleben and Wheeler, 2008), sales volume (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009b), and innovativeness (Hakanen et al., 2008). The explanation that has been given is that job performance is effective when employees experience a positive and active motivational state of mind, characterized by the affection (dedication), energy (vigor) and cognitive inspiration (absorption) toward work. It is this particular psychological condition that motivates employees to work hard and perform well. Engaged employees approach their work proactively (Salanova and Schaufeli, 2008), are more dynamic (Bakker and Leiter, 2010), more responsive to new information and work harder (Bakker and Leiter, 2010).\nThe mediating role of work engagement: According to our dynamic model, PsyCap can be conceptualized as the expression of the psychological resources corresponding to the amount of potentialities (namely efficacy, optimism, hope and resilience) owned by the individual. Work engagement expresses a motivational component, and is represented by the investment of efforts and involvement that the individual dedicates to work. On the other hand, job performance represents the behavioral outcome, recognized and valued by the organization. It is through this motivational process (i.e. boosting work engagement) that potentialities (i.e. PsyCap and changes in PsyCap) are translated into productive organizational behaviors (i.e. effective and increased job performance). Thus, we formulated the following hypotheses:\nMethod: Sample\nResults: Relationships among variables and across waves\nDiscussion: During the past decade new emphasis has been placed on investigating, clarifying, and ultimately, understanding the relationship between employee positive states (such as PsyCap and work engagement), and job performance (Luthans, 2002; Newman et al., 2014). This study contributes to this better understanding by investigating the dynamic nature of such states along with job performance, and the mechanisms through which the positive psychological resources of PsyCap may lead to higher work engagement and in turn improved employee performance. In general, our results supported that the effect of PsyCap on performance may be indirect and channeled through work engagement.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Psychological Capital (PsyCap), consisting of hope, efficacy, resilience, and optimism, is a positive state associated with attitudes, behaviors and performance. The purpose of this paper is to investigate a dynamic mediational model posing work engagement as the mediator of the longitudinal relation between PsyCap and job performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data came from all white collar employees who responded to this study's variables (n=420) from a comprehensive data set drawn from a large communications service company over two consecutive years. Job performance was rated at the end of each year by the direct supervisor as part of the organizational appraisal system.\nFindings: Structural equation modeling analysis found that both absolute levels and increases in PsyCap predicted subsequent work engagement increases which in turn predicted job performance increases. Moreover, the mediating role of the changes in work engagement between previous PsyCap and performance change was confirmed over time.\nResearch limitations/implications: There is much to gain in conceptualizing the relations among PsyCap, work engagement and job performance as dynamic, rather than static. The results support the conservation of resources theory, in which employees are motivated to acquire, protect and foster their valued (psychological) resources to attain successful performance outcomes, in order to create a gain cycle of resources (Salanova et al., 2010). Moreover, it provide further empirical validation for the idea that processes, like work engagement, are sustained by personal resources, and that these latter exerts mostly an indirect effect on organizational behavior outcomes (Xanthopoulou et al., 2009b).\nPractical implications: These results are important from a practical point of view, because they point to the importance of training interventions aimed at developing and sustaining PsyCap as an important determinant of workers' motivation and behavior within the organization. Considerable literature offers practical insights and guidelines for developing PsyCap (Luthans et al., 2006, 2015; Luthans and Youssef-Morgan, 2017).\nOriginality/value: Despite the demonstrated state-like, dynamic nature of PsyCap, its relationship with performance has mainly been statically analyzed and the role of possible mediating mechanisms largely ignored. This study begins to fill this research gap by investigating the dynamic nature of PsyCap in relation to work engagement and job performance and whether over time engagement mediates the relationship between PsyCap and job performance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A comparative study of truck cycle time prediction methods in open-pit mining
|
[
"Production cycle",
"Simulation",
"Multiple regression analysis",
"Neural nets"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: There are a number of methods being used by the industry to predict load-haul cycle times in open-pit mining. The most commonly used approach is computer simulation using the so-called Monte-Carlo technique. This method aims to simulate by computer the step-by-step operations of the entire truck and loader fleet, including the randomness of the loader-truck cycle time, and the queuing of trucks at the loader and at the dump or elsewhere. However, the accuracy of the truck and loader cycle times generated by these simulations is questionable as evidenced by significant discrepancies between actual and predicted cycle times (Blackwell, 1999; Hardy, 2007). Computer programs such as truck and loader productivity and cost (TALPAC) and Caterpillar's fleet production and cost (FPC) analysis are currently used by mining engineers to estimate open-pit haulage truck requirements. A perceived shortcoming of software such as TALPAC is that it provides a best estimate based on manufacturers' equipment performance specifications and capabilities, such as rim-pull curves. This method incorporates performance assumptions that are optimistic, as equipment is subjected to wear and tear which reduces its operational efficiency (Hardy, 2007). Furthermore, no account is made for random events that occur over the course of a truck haul cycle. Queuing to load and unload, refuelling, operator breaks, and unloaded trucks giving way to loaded trucks on narrow sections of road or intersections are examples of events that will impact on a truck cycle time. Such events cannot be accounted for when a predicted cycle time is based on theoretical equipment capabilities.In this study, one of the analytical models developed is based on multiple regression (MR), where factors in the load/haul cycle considered potentially significant are the independent variables and the cycle time is the dependent variable. Edwards and Holt (2000) developed an MR model for hydraulic excavator cycle time with satisfactory results. Edwards and Griffiths (2000) and Tam et al. (2002) have subsequently shown that a neural network (NN) model for hydraulic excavator cycle times has a predictive performance that \"is superior to the MR models.\" However, this assertion may not be true in every case.The second analytical model developed for this project is based on NN technology. To this end the MATLAB(r) (MATrix LABoratory) software package developed by The Mathworks (Demuth et al., 2005) is utilised to create an NN that is the core of an artificial intelligence (AI) model. The same significant variables used in the MR models are used to train the AI model. NN have found application in mining; for example, Alehossein (2002) discusses an NN model for prediction of three Cartesian force components acting at and on the cutter-head of a rock cutting machine, Tam et al. (2002) developed an artificial NN model predict excavator performance, and Grayeli and Moosavi (2006) used artificial NN modelling to predict the load distribution in mining cable bolts.In this study, three methods of truck cycle time estimation are compared. These are:1. simulation using TALPAC;2. artificial NN; and3. multiple regression.The objective is to determine the best method among the three based on comparison with the actual cycle times for various truck haulage routes at a large open-pit gold mine in Western Australia. A secondary objective of this study is to investigate whether the predictive capabilities of the three methods used will increase from TALPAC to the MR model and from this model to the AI model as previously believed.The scope of this study is limited to predicting the truck travel time (loaded+empty) only; the reason being that these are the elements of truck cycle for which accurate data were available for modelling. However, a base set of 12 independent variables is used in both the regression and NN models (Table I).\nTALPAC Software: TALPAC is one of the most widely used truck and loader simulation packages in Australian mining, but most truck manufacturers have programs that calculate results using similar algorithms, for example, FPC by Caterpillar, Inc. For mine planning purposes, the aim of computer simulation is to determine the truck-loader fleet productivity expressed in bank cubic metres (BCM) per operating hour.The first step in running a TALPAC simulation is to define the load and haul equipment. Properties such as bucket/tray capacities, power ratings, and both capital and operating costs are defined for the load and haul units used by the operation. Also defined at this point are the expected spotting and loading times. The user is then able to assign a statistical spread to the times that will be used in the simulation based on the expected time.The intended haul route then is defined as a series of sections. Each section is allocated a length, grade, rolling resistance, and speed limitation. Indication is also made as to whether the truck is loaded or empty for that section of the route. Truck spotting and loading/dumping times also are included in the haul cycle as auto entries of zero distance. The duration of these sections of the cycle are drawn from the parameters defined for the loading and dumping units.Material properties and shift rosters are defined before the simulation is run for the extraction of the target BCM (or tonnes) of rock. A number of reports are generated by the simulation relating to productivity, tyre and fuel consumption, haul cycle, and cash flow. For this study, the haul cycle report is the key point of interest.\nArtificial NNs: Artificial NNs have been utilised for a variety of applications as the processing power of computers has improved since the late-1980s. The primary advantage of such networks is their ability to \"learn\" non-linear relationships between input variables and target output values. Artificial NNs are designed in such a way as to attempt to replicate biological NNs that are part of an animal's nervous system. The human brain does not use higher mathematics to solve problems; instead hundreds of billions of neurons interactively put their contributions (weights) together towards achieving the best and quickest possible outcome (Mehrotra et al., 1997). This concept has been used in the NN technique to predict the haulage cycle time from a combination of variables presented in Table I.A simplified representation of feed-forward NN functionality is shown in Figure 1, where R inputs are presented to a single neuron transfer function f. The elementary neuron has R inputs and with each input there is an associated weight w. Before using the NN for predictions, it is trained for a set of data to calculate the weights of each neuron-to-neuron connection. This happens by continuous readjustment of the weights through the redistribution of the feedback errors, which arise by comparing the calculated output with the actual. A single layer neuron network is similar to a multivariable linear regression model. The input to the transfer function f comprises the sum of the weighted inputs and bias and the output from transfer function gives the activation a of the neuron. Back propagation networks often use the hyperbolic tangent sigmoid (tansig), ft, or log sigmoid (logsig), fl transfer function as given in equation (1): Equation 1 Each input is multiplied by its individual weighting, w1,1 to w1,R, where the subscripts refer to (layer 1, input number). The bias, b, is applied to the sum of all weighted inputs before presentation to the neuron function. Mathematical details of the process of applying weights and biases in the training of the NN are discussed by Haykin (2008).\nMultiple linear regression: Multiple linear regression analysis is a statistical method of determining a formula with which to find the value of a dependent (unknown) variable by its relationship to a set of independent (known) variables. Each of the independent variables is assigned a weighting that reflects its impact on the value of the dependent variable. This weighting is referred to as the coefficient of the variable in question. The formula is developed based on a set of data where the values of both independent and dependant variables are known. Then the formula is applied to a set of known independent variables in an attempt to estimate the unknown dependent variable:* The general form of a linear regression model is shown in equation (2) (Neter et al., 1985): Equation 2 where:* there are (p-1) independent variables;* the Yi term represents each instance of the dependent variable;* the bk term represents each of the coefficient values from 0 to (p-1);* the Xik term represents each instance of all independent variables from 0 to (p-1); and* ei is a random error term with a mean value of 0.Assuming that the expected value of the random error term is zero, an expected value for the dependent variable is shown by equation (3) (Neter et al., 1985): Equation 3 It is not expected that all independent variables will have a purely linear influence on the cycle time. It has been shown, however, that a linear MR technique can be utilised by manipulating the data before commencing the regression (Chanda, 1989). In developing his model to estimate the probability of success in multiple seam room and pillar coal mining, Chanda (1989) used the linear form of each of the identified independent variables as well as cube root, square root, square, cubic, and logarithmic forms of each variable to take into account the non-linear interactions among the variables. A similar process is applied to the defined independent variables used in this project.It is recognised that not all defined independent variables will prove significant in determining the dependent variable. In such cases, forward stepwise regression is considered to be the preferential regression method (Draper and Smith, 1966). Stepwise regression is an iterative process where the correlation of each of the independent variables to the dependent variable is assessed, and the independent variable with the highest correlation is entered into the regression equation at each iteration. The process is ended when all variables are included in the equation or the correlation between the remaining independent variables and the dependent variable is considered insignificant.\nModelling applications: Truck cycle time data\nResults: Variation in the predicted cycle time between simulations for each route in TALPAC is limited. The most significant difference between minimum and maximum predicted times is a 1.4 per cent variation for the \"Chaffers to SW3\" haul route. Table II summarises the simulated times for relevant haul routes as determined by TALPAC. Mean times listed in Table II are used for comparison with regression and NN cycle time predictions.Artificial NN results\nComparison of results: Predicted cycle times for all simulation methods are shown in Figures 8-11. Predicted times in each graph are plotted against a line representing the mean actual cycle times for each dataset. Where predicted times were close to the actual cycle times, points were plotted in close proximity to this line.Generally speaking, predicted times for both the regression and NN models were significantly more accurate than the TALPAC predictions for all sets of data. There appears to be a limited variation between the times predicted by regression and NN models.In order to quantify variations between predicted and actual cycle times, a percentage error for each haul route was calculated using equation (5). Graphical representations of calculated errors are shown in Figures 12-15: Equation 5 Figures 12-15 show that both regression and NN models are more accurate than TALPAC in all cases. TALPAC simulation consistently is most accurate for the Chaffers to SW3 haul route through all datasets.\nConclusions: The results outlined above would appear to indicate that both NN and regression models based on actual mine data are superior in their predictive abilities to TALPAC simulations. TALPAC Software appears to have under predicted cycle times for shorter haul routes and over predicted times for the longer haul routes. There appears to be minimal quantifiable difference between predictions made by the regression and NN models.The data utilised for this project is limited to information made available from an operating mine only. Therefore, the models developed apply to this specific mine site and one has to be careful not to directly apply these models to other operations. However, the regression and NN models similar to those developed in this project easily can be developed for any open-pit operation providing that sufficient data is available. In such a case, input data could be refined to include variables considered significant by the operation itself.The quantity, and quality, of data recorded by open-cut mining operations is ever increasing, particularly with the implementation of computer-based monitoring systems. An opportunity exists for mines to utilise the collected data to predict load and haul cycle times more accurately. The benefits to be gained from increased accuracy include the potential to assist in mine planning, scheduling and budgeting decisions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to compare the predictive capability of three methods of truck cycle time estimation in open-pit mining: computer simulation, artificial neural networks (NNs), and multiple regressions (MRs). The aim is to determine the best method. The most common method currently used is computer simulation.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Truck cycle times at a large open pit mine are estimated using computer simulation, artificial NNs, and MRs. The estimated cycle times by each method are in turn compared to the actual cycle times recorded by a computerized mine monitoring system at the same mine. The errors associated with each method relative to the actual cycle times are documented and form the basis for comparing the three methods.\nFindings: - The paper clearly indicates that computer simulation methods used in predicting truck cycle times in open-pit mining underestimate and overestimate the results for short and long hauls, respectively. It appears that both NN and regression models are superior in their predictive abilities compared to computer simulations.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The cycle time prediction models developed apply to a specific mine site and one has to be careful not to directly apply these models to other operations.\nPractical implications: - The paper describes the implementation of regression and NN modelling. An opportunity exists for mines to utilise the large volumes of data generated to predict truck haulage cycle times more accurately and hence, improve the quality of mine planning.\nOriginality/value: - The paper addresses an area of need in the mining industry. Accurate prediction of cycle times is critical to mine planners as it impacts on production targets and hence, the budgets.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Do ageing economies save less? Evidence from OECD data
|
[
"Ageing",
"Longevity",
"Old‐age dependency",
"Savings",
"Elderly people",
"Ageing (biology)"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1 Introduction: Within a few decades, the demographic structures of most, if not all, economies will be vastly different from today. Advances in medical science will conceivably result in continual increases in life expectancy. The rise in longevity will see a greater proportion of people entering higher age brackets. This phenomenon, coupled with the trend of falling fertility rates, implies that demographic structures will tend towards the aged.Ageing can bring about substantial macroeconomic impacts. One of the channels through which demographic ageing can exert its influence is aggregate savings; this has been well established in the literature. However, the literature has hitherto focused on the effect of rising age dependency on savings, while largely ignoring that of extended life expectancy. This omission of life expectancy can have serious adverse consequences. Theoretically, the impacts of life expectancy on savings are opposite to those of an aged population structure; however, as life expectancy and age dependency are highly correlated, analysing the impact of one without due consideration of the other is likely to result in bias.The life-cycle hypothesis (LCH)[1] suggests that individuals save during their economically active years to finance their consumption during retirement. Accordingly, increases in the dependency ratio, be it youth or age dependency, will increase the number of non-savers relative to savers in the economy, thereby reducing private saving rates in aggregation. As national savings are largely made up of private savings, ceteris paribus, increases in dependency ratios are also expected to reduce national savings. Empirical validation of this was demonstrated in the seminal work of Leff (1969). Two main early criticisms of Leff's results centred on data quality (Goldberger, 1973) and the pooling of developing and developed countries in the same sample (Gupta, 1971; Ram, 1982). The latter point is relevant, in so far as Leff's results appear to be entirely driven by the developed countries in his sample. The more recent literature tends to support Leff's conclusions, e.g. see Edwards (1996), Masson et al. (1998), Loayza et al. (2000) and de Serres and Pelgrin (2003). However, it is still common practice to pool developed and developing countries in a same sample. In other words, despite more recent empirical validation of Leff's results, it appears the earlier criticisms have not been been sufficiently addressed.Previous work, however, has largely ignored the fact that population ageing is brought about not only by rising age dependency, but also by longer life expectancy. The link between life expectancy and savings was only brought to attention very recently by Li et al. (2007) and Kinugasa and Mason (2007). Longevity-driven ageing can have an opposite effect on aggregate saving rates as compared to dependency rate-driven ageing[2]. Increases in longevity can prompt working age adults to save more in preparation for a longer retirement. Even the elderly can be motivated to continue to save, or at least to run down their assets more slowly, as longevity brings about both higher uncertainty of future medical expenses and the risk of outliving one's assets (De Nardi et al., 2009). Furthermore, the retirement age may not stay constant as life expectancy increases. Ando et al. (1995), for example, find that the elderly in Japan have a high probability of maintaining employment, and tend not to dissave as much as theory predicts. Work by Ehrlich and Lui (1991), Lee et al. (2003a, b) and Sheshinski (2009) provide theoretical support for the positive impact of longevity on private savings. Bloom et al. (2003) and Kinugasa and Mason (2007) provide empirical evidence in reaffirming this theoretical proposition.Since higher age dependency and rising longevity exert opposite effects on private savings, the overall impact of ageing is therefore equivocal. This paper follows the very recent development in the literature by setting forth to investigate the joint effects of higher age dependency and rising longevity on savings. The empirical analysis of this paper is based on a panel dataset covering 22 OECD countries over 1961-2010.The contributions of this paper are threefold. First, our model jointly considers the effects of higher age dependency and greater life expectancy on savings, thus avoiding the potential bias present in previous studies that neglect one of these interrelated factors. Second, we explore non-linearity in the savings and ageing relationship, a feature that the previous literature has ignored. The consideration of non-linearity is motivated by the fact that the saving rate is bounded; as such, ignoring the non-linear terms may risk omitted variable bias. Third, given that both saving rate and demographic measures are all trending over time, identifying whether they share common stochastic trends (i.e. trend non-stationary but cointegrated) or driven by individual deterministic trends (i.e. trend stationary) is crucial in avoiding spurious regression results. However, previous studies that draw on panel data largely ignore this concern. In this paper, we carefully investigate the time series characteristics of our data and model them accordingly.Our findings are summarised as follows. The longevity effect on savings is rather robust in many different specifications for our 22 OECD country sample. In contrast, the effect of old-age dependency, which acts as the main measure of ageing in much of the literature, appears to have no discernible effect on savings once the country-specific time trends of savings are accounted for. It is also found that the coefficient estimates for the demographic variables become unstable when the analysis is extended to larger samples that are less homogeneous than the 22 OECD country sample.The rest of the paper is organised as follows. Section 2 lays out the empirical framework of the analysis. Section 3 presents the findings. The last section concludes the paper with discussion of the overall findings.\n2 Empirical specification: Data\n3 Results: Baseline specifications\n4 Discussion: While a general observation is the OECD is experiencing falling savings rates with increased aged dependency ratios in the last two to three decades, the results of this paper challenge the typical view that the oncoming ageing of their populations will necessarily drive the saving rates down further. This is because longevity appears to be a very important (and robust) determinant of savings and there is no reason to expect the growth of longevity to come to a halt in the near future. This suggests some scope for savings within the OECD to maintain (or not to fall as fast as what would have been suggested based solely on the old-aged dependency rate) as long as life expectancy continues to rise.It is conceivable that the response of savings to changes in old-aged dependency rate and longevity will differ across countries with different social security systems. The differences in the results between the OECD samples and the OECD plus non-OECD sample may well be hinting at the importance of institution and public policy setting. For instance, the generosity of pension systems in Europe is believed to discourage private savings, which currently stays well below 20 percent. In comparison, saving rates in China typically exceed 40 percent, partly attributing to its underdeveloped social security system. Furthermore, as pointed out by Blondal and Scarpetta (1998), retirement duration in much of the developed world has increased from a few years in the early twentieth-century to almost 30 years nowadays, while retirement ages stay stubbornly below 60. The implication here is that future research in this area needs to more explicitly account for differences in social security systems across countries.In terms of aiding the public policy debate, an often-brought up issue is that of propping up private savings in anticipation of ageing. This idea stems from the fact that saving rates in some developed countries have been steadily falling in the last 50 years, as already shown in Figure 1. While it is a legitimate public policy concern that private savings can fall further with ageing, limiting capital supply and retarding future living standards, the evidence revealed in the analysis challenges this notion. Based on this evidence, a public policy aimed at propping up private savings in anticipation of ageing could be redundant at best and counter-productive at worst if the policy has any adverse side effects. Nonetheless, we strongly advocate that population ageing should be recognized as a multi-faceted phenomenon. As such, analysis of the economic impacts of population ageing should consider various dimensions of the population ageing process, not just an increase in the old-aged dependency rate. Future research should be directed to further separating the economic effects of various elements of population ageing.It is also worth pointing out some general limitations of the paper. The first issue concerns endogeneity. It is well known that countries with higher income often have lower fertility rates and higher life expectancy. This suggests the possibility of some form of reverse causality from savings (which is a source of future income) to old-age dependency and life expectancy. Over a short window, say a year or two, this is not likely to be an issue since it takes time for savings to impact on living standards sufficiently to influence life expectancy and fertility rates. However, in specifying the window length, the concept of \"short\" is seldom clear. The five-year averages are taken based on the convention of the literature, as age dependency and life expectancy change very slowly. While assumed to be exogenous in the previous literature, it is never clear whether five years is a sufficiently short window to make such an assumption. Guidance from prior work will suggest it is safe to make such an assumption. Even if such an assumption does not hold, it is worth pointing out that finding an instrument to control for the endogeneity is never a straightforward issue. It is a well known result from the instrumental variables literature where the use of weak instruments is perhaps more pernicious compared to accepting a little bias from an OLS estimator. Therefore, it is not quite clear how to proceed in instrumenting for old-aged dependency and life expectancy even if one drops the conventional assumption of exogeneity of these variables. For this reason, it is perhaps advisable to use the current empirical specification.Lastly, we have considered life expectancy at birth and the fertility rate as well. Despite that, one should be cautioned that life expectancy at birth may only capture some aspects of longevity. For instance, reduction in under-five mortality rates and old-aged mortality rates will both result in an increase in life expectancy at birth, but their impacts on savings could be very different. As such, future research should be directed to further separating the economic effects of various elements of population ageing.\n5 Conclusion: Demographic changes, such as population ageing, have the potential to alter macroeconomic outcomes. However, the standard singular focus on age structure in the literature might risk oversimplifying the multifaceted phenomenon of population ageing. In particular, rising old-aged dependency tends to be accompanied by rising longevity. Yet, as the two factors are expected to have opposite effects on savings, the omission of one could lead to bias in estimation of the impact of the other on savings. The empirical evidence presented in this paper - in general - supports this proposition.For the 22 OECD countries examined in this paper, it is found that, once we have accounted for country heterogeneity using country fixed effects and country-specific time trends and global shocks using time fixed effects, old-aged dependency does not have any discernible effect on saving rate anymore, while life expectancy has significant positive effect. This implies that an ageing population does not necessarily save less, as is commonly asserted, when the longevity effect is sufficiently large.There is also evidence that demographic changes have non-linear effects on saving rates. This finding is consistent with the fact that, in reality, saving rates are bounded. While incorporating non-linearity can refine the estimation, it does not change the qualitative results of the linear model.The empirical findings of the paper highlight that the trend properties of the data require careful treatment. It is demonstrated that, at least for the smaller OECD sample used here, one might find a spurious relationship between old-aged dependency and saving rates when country-specific time trends are omitted.Lastly, there is a lack of coefficient stability across non-homogeneous country groups. The use of an enlarged OECD sample covering some emerging economies, or a mixed sample of both developed and developing countries, leads to both qualitative and quantitative changes in the findings. In particular, the results resemble those of the previous literature, in that old-aged dependency has a significant, negative effect on savings. This calls into question the practice of pooling countries at vastly different stages of development into the same panel data set - a strategy often used in the literature to boost the number of observations.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to re-examine the effect of population ageing on private saving, taking into account the fact that ageing is brought about by not only rising old-aged dependency but also expanding longevity.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The study uses panel data of 22 OECD countries from 1961 to 2010. Linear and non-linear panel regression methods are used. The study takes into account the time series characteristic of the data, such as the deterministic trend present in old-age dependency ratio.\nFindings: - Longevity consistently has a significant positive impact on savings, while old-aged dependency rate has no discernible impact once country-specific time trends in the data are accounted for. The general finding within the literature where old-age dependency exerts a negative impact on savings is sensitive to the manner in which the data is handled and/or the sample selected.\nOriginality/value: - First, the authors jointly consider rising old-aged dependency and expanding longevity on savings, thus avoiding potential omitted variable bias in previous studies. Second, they explore non-linearity in the savings-ageing relationship which was ignored previously. Third, they identify whether saving rate and demographic measures are sharing common stochastic trends or driven by individual deterministic trends to avoid spurious regression results.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Why do we buy luxury experiences? Measuring value perceptions of luxury hospitality services
|
[
"Hedonic value",
"Luxury hotel",
"Experiential value",
"Luxury restaurant",
"Luxury values",
"Restaurant attributes"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The luxury hospitality industry has experienced rapid growth in the past decade. According to the Smith Travel Research (STR) report, the luxury segment in the USA had the highest occupancy rate (72.3 per cent) in the fourth quarter of 2014. As a consequence of the segment's substantial growth, hospitality researchers are paying increased attention to the phenomenon of luxury consumption (Daun and Klinger, 2006; Han and Hyun, 2013; Haynes and Fryer, 2000; Hyun and Kim, 2014; Kim et al., 2001; Walls et al., 2011; Yang and Lau, 2016; Yang and Mattila, 2013, 2014; Yang et al., 2016). For example, Daun and Klinger (2006) examined how premium hotel brands address the challenge of building and sustaining their value proposition; Mohsin and Lockyer (2010) investigated service quality perception of luxury hotels in New Delhi, India. Yang and Mattila (2014) contrasted luxury services and luxury goods and examined the impact of consumers' need for status on their reactions to mass luxury. However, the notion of perceived luxury values has received scant attention. As suggested by Shukla and Purani (2012), luxury value perceptions are poorly understood and under-investigated. Accordingly, there is a lack of valid measurements for capturing consumers' value perceptions of luxury hotels and restaurants. Using luxury restaurants as an example of luxury hospitality services, the current study aims to identify measures that capture consumers' value perceptions in the context of luxury hospitality services.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 What is luxury?\n3. Luxury hospitality values framework: 3.1 Functional value\n4. Methods: A survey questionnaire was developed to test our proposed luxury hospitality value framework. To ensure that we had successfully modified the measurements wording of extant luxury goods value for luxury services (Shukla and Purani, 2012; Vigneron and Johnson, 2004; Wiedmann et al., 2009), we tested our scale on luxury restaurants as an example of luxury hospitality services in the current study.\n5. Results: 5.1 Confirmatory factor analysis\n6. Discussions and conclusion: 6.1 Conclusions\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The luxury segment of the hospitality industry has experienced substantial growth in the past decade. Unfortunately, the notion of perceived luxury values has received scant attention, and there is a lack of valid framework to capture consumers' value perceptions in the context of luxury hospitality services. Using luxury restaurant as an example of luxury hospitality services, this paper aims to establish the structure of luxury hospitality values and their measures and to investigate the relationship between luxury hospitality values and purchase intentions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A survey questionnaire was developed to test the proposed luxury value framework. Confirmatory factor analysis and hierarchical linear regression were used to test the hypotheses.\nFindings: Four luxury restaurant value dimensions including functional value, hedonic value, symbolic/expressive value and financial value were identified. The study results further reveal that a consumer's purchase intention is influenced primarily by hedonic value, followed by functional value and financial value. Interestingly, unlike in the context of luxury goods, the purchase of luxury restaurant services is not substantially influenced by symbolic/expressive value.\nPractical implications: Hospitality firms catering to the affluent might use the luxury value framework to better understand what drives their customers' purchase intentions, and use such knowledge to create new services or to improve current product offerings. In addition, luxury hospitality companies can use this luxury value framework to position their brands/products.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first that empirically tests a luxury value framework in the luxury hospitality context and investigates the relationship between luxury hospitality values and purchase intentions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Trade openness and economic development in the UAE: an asymmetric approach
|
[
"Trade openness",
"Asymmetric causality",
"Asymmetric impulses",
"GDP per capita",
"The UAE",
"E17",
"C32"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The economic performance of the UAE has been impressive especially during the last recent decades. The UAE is usually considered as a successful economic example. There are many reasons behind this impressive success. The political and economic stability of the country in a relatively volatile region combined with a good regulation system, which makes the rule of law to apply, can be mentioned as the main reasons. The government has also been active in implementing policies that can promote economic growth without too much reliance on the main source of income which is oil. Among these diversification policies, the main one has been trade liberalization and openness to the world market. In fact, the UAE can be considered as one of the most open societies in the world. According to the World Trade Organization (2012) the trade policy in the UAE is characterized by openness with small tariffs and very few non-tariff obstacles to trade. Based on these facts, the goal of this paper is to empirically investigate the impact of trade openness on the economic development in the UAE. New asymmetric methods are used for this purpose. We utilize the asymmetric impulse response functions and the asymmetric causality tests. These methods provide the possibility to investigate the impact of a reduction in the trade openness on the economic development compared to the impact of an increase in the trade openness on the economic development. This is an important issue because the size of the impact of a positive change can be different than the size of the impact of a negative change in the absolute terms. There are many reasons behind these potential asymmetric effects. One is that people tend to react more to negative news than the positive news by nature. This is likely to be the case even in situations in which the absolute size of the underlying change is of the same magnitude. However, the standard impulse response analyses and causality tests do not account for this potential asymmetric effect. Another reason for the existence of asymmetric effects is the fact that imperfect information prevails in many circumstances as is indicated by the seminal contributions of Akerlof (1970), Spence (1973) and Stiglitz (1974). Since asymmetric information exists then asymmetric impulses must also exist. In addition, there are natural constraints that can cause an asymmetric structure. For instance, there is no upper limit on the amount of a price increase. Though, there is a lower limit on the price decrease since in the reality the price has to be a positive value. Hence, a price increase has a different impact, in the absolute terms, than a similar price decrease in terms of magnitude. These facts mean that taking into account for potential asymmetry in the estimation of the impulse responses is a necessary approach that is usually neglected in the literature.\n2. The UAE trade policy: The UAE as an emerging economy has established itself as a regional strategic trade hub, known for its business friendly environment and a rapidly growing economy that has experienced significant expansion and diversification over the last 15 years. Fossil energy resources are abounded in the UAE since it has currently 10 percent of world's proven oil reserves and the world's fifth largest proven natural gas reserves. While oil production contributes significantly to generating income and government spending, diversification of the underlying economy remains the key governmental policy in achieving sustainable growth. In fact, the government is focussed intensively on encouraging the private and non-oil sectors to maintain and grow their roles in the economy. This diversification policy can be traced to the founding of the UAE, in 1971, with revenue from oil and gas exports invested into hydrocarbon and other energy related industries. The policy led to the growth of related aluminum and petrochemical industries and as the UAE moved forward, the pure dependency on oil and gas exports has significantly decreased.\n3. Literature review: This section provides a brief review of relevant literature on the relationship between trade openness and economic growth. This relationship has been a debated topic at both theoretical and empirical levels. At the theoretical level, the neoclassical growth models based on seminal contribution of Solow (1956) claims that there is no causal relationship between openness and economic growth. The underlying argument is that the economic growth of a country is an exogenous factor, which is determined by technological change or population growth rate and unaffected by country's openness to the international trade. Conversely, the endogenous \"new\" growth theories maintain that trade openness can enhance growth through expansion effect or technology transfer (Okuyan et al., 2012). Trade openness increases the access to imported inputs that are important for technological progress which is turn results in productive growth either through an expansion of market for outputs or inputs (Dowrick and Golley, 2004). The output-market expansion paved the way for domestic producers to utilize the economics of scale and specialization that leads to productivity growth. The input-market expansion benefits from the product-variety and quality model has been leading to technological transfer due to trading with research-intensive economies. Therefore, trade becomes a \"channel\" for transfer of technology. Studies of Grossman and Helpman (1991), Coe and Helpman (1995), Lawrence and Weinstein (1999) and Mazumdar provide the basis for this proposition. In contrast, Yanikkaya (2003) argues that restrictions on trade can decrease or increase the worldwide rate of growth[1].\n4. The data and methodology: In our empirical investigation trade openness is defined as the sum of exports plus imports divided by the GDP. Our measure of economic performance is the GDP per capita at the constant prices. The data set is on yearly basis and it covers the period 1986-2013. The source of the data are the FRED database, which is provided by the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis.\n5. The estimation results: The asymmetric generalized impulse response functions are presented in Figures 1-2. As it is evident from these figures, a permanent positive shock in the trade openness variable results in a positive response in the GDP per capita. However, a permanent negative shock in the trade openness does not result in any response in the GDP per capita. Furthermore, neither a positive permanent shock nor a permanent negative shock in the GDP per capita renders any significant response in the trade openness in a time horizon of ten periods.\n6. Conclusions: This paper provides a review of the trade policy in the UAE. It also investigates the dynamic interaction between trade openness and the GDP per capita in the UAE. To our best knowledge, this is the first attempt to investigate this issue within the context of the UAE. Unlike previously published papers on the topic, this paper utilizes the asymmetric impulse response functions and asymmetric causality tests. Allowing for asymmetric effects in the estimation of the empirical model accords better with reality compared to the symmetric approaches since it is widely agreed that economic agents usually react more to the negative shocks than the positive ones. In addition, the asymmetric approach is more informative in the sense that it can separate the potential impact of positive changes from the impact of negative changes. Our estimation results reveal that a positive shock in the trade openness impacts positively the economic performance. However, there seems to be no significant impact from a negative shock of the trade openness on the economic recession. We also find that the economic growth or recession does not impact the trade openness in the case of the UAE in any direction. These empirical conclusions are supported by the conducted asymmetric causality tests as well as the estimated asymmetric impulse response functions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to offer a review of the trade policy in the UAE. It also investigates the dynamic interaction between trade openness and GDP per capita in this emerging economy.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The asymmetric generalized impulse response functions and the asymmetric causality tests developed by Hatemi-J are used.\nFindings: The results from asymmetric generalized impulse response functions indicate that a positive permanent shock in the trade openness results in a significant positive response in the cumulative sum of the positive component of the GDP per capita. Such a response is not found for the negative shocks in the trade openness. Furthermore, neither a positive nor a negative shock in the GPD per capita results in any significant response in the trade openness. These empirical findings are also supported by the implemented asymmetric causality tests.\nOriginality/value: This is the first attempt that investigates the impact of trade openness on economic performance in the UAE. Unlike previous literature on the topic, this paper allows for asymmetric impacts in the empirical model.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
"Man, I shop like a woman!" The effects of gender and emotions on consumer shopping behaviour outcomes
|
[
"Gender",
"Emotions",
"Hedonic shopping",
"Recommendation and return intentions",
"Retail environment perception",
"Shopping satisfaction"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Previous research suggests that gender influences the way people shop (e.g. Buttle, 1992; Johnstone and Conroy, 2005; Otnes and McGrath, 2001). In general, women enjoy shopping more and have a higher involvement with retail environments than men (Johnstone and Conroy, 2005; Meyers-Levy and Sternthal, 1991; Polegato and Zaichkowsky, 1994). In addition, research suggests that women report more positive shopping behaviour outcomes than men - such as satisfaction, recommendation, return intentions, and hedonic shopping (Meyers-Levy and Sternthal, 1991; Mittal and Kamakura, 2001; Patterson, 2007; Yavas et al., 2004).\nGender and shopping behaviour: Definition\nEmotions in retail environments: Definition\nGender, emotions, and shopping behaviour outcomes: Gender and shopping behaviour outcomes\nRetail environment perception as an underlying mechanism: Retail environment elements influence consumers' shopping behaviour (e.g. Areni and Kim, 1994; Donovan and Rossiter, 1982; Hsu et al., 2010; Noad and Rogers, 2008). For instance, environmental evaluations are important in determining consumers' approach behaviour toward shops (Baker et al., 1992). In addition, retail environment elements can influence consumer's cognitive and affective processes (e.g. Fiore and Kim, 2007; Skandrani et al., 2011), creating a pleasant (Ballantine et al., 2010), an entertaining (Turley and Chebat, 2002), and a unique shopping experience (Borges et al., 2013; Burns and Neisner, 2006; Kent and Stone, 2007). Moreover, a pleasant retail environment positively affects customers' shopping behaviour outcomes (Aurier and de Lanauze, 2011; Baker et al., 1994; Walsh et al., 2011).\nOverview of the studies: Two studies examine the effects of gender and emotions on consumers' shopping behaviour. Study 1 is a field experiment that tests the effects of gender and emotions (positive vs neutral) on consumers' satisfaction, recommendation, and return intentions (H1a and H1b). Study 1 also tests the mediation hypothesis through retail environment perception (H2). Study 2 is a laboratory experiment that explores the effects of gender and emotions (positive, neutral, and negative) on hedonic shopping behaviour. Study 2 provides additional support for the hypotheses (H1a, H1b, and H1c).\nStudy 1: gender, emotions, and shopping behaviour (field experiment): Method\nStudy 2: gender, emotions, and hedonic shopping (laboratory experiment): Study 2 extends the previous study in four ways. First, Study 2 tests the impact of gender and emotions on hedonic shopping. In this study, consumers simulate a shopping task in a new supermarket and can choose products from a list of hedonic and utilitarian items. Second, the present study uses three emotional states (neutral, positive, and negative), also investigating the role of negative emotions on shopping behaviour outcomes. Third, this study controls consumers' previous emotional states in the analysis. In doing so, this study supports the idea that retail environment elements such as music can activate consumer emotions in the shop, despite consumers' previous emotional states. Finally, this study is conducted in a different retail setting (a supermarket), which is also neutral in terms of gender. In addition, the study is a laboratory experiment, which allows control of external variables that might be significant in a real retail environment, such as crowding effects (e.g. Machleit et al., 2000).\nGeneral discussion: The findings demonstrate how the interaction between gender and emotions affects shopping behaviour outcomes (shopping satisfaction, recommendation, return intentions, and hedonic shopping). In particular, these results indicate that, in a neutral emotion condition, women are more satisfied, and more likely to recommend the shop to others, to return to the shop, and to buy hedonic products than men. Conversely, when positive emotions are salient, these results show that women and men have similar levels of satisfaction, willingness to recommend the shop, return intentions, and hedonic shopping. The findings also show that retail environment perception mediates the effects of gender and emotions on shopping behaviour outcomes. Moreover, the results show that negative emotions affect the shopping experience more for women than for men.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Research suggests that women demonstrate higher levels of shopping satisfaction, recommendation, return intentions, and hedonic shopping than men. However, is it possible to reduce the effects of gender on shopping behaviour? The purpose of this paper is to explore how the interaction between gender and emotions affects consumers' shopping behaviour outcomes.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Two studies show the effects of gender and emotions on shopping behaviour outcomes. Study 1 is a field experiment that tests the effects of gender and emotions (positive vs neutral) on consumer satisfaction, recommendation, and return intentions. Study 2 is a laboratory experiment that explores the effects of gender and emotions (positive, neutral, and negative) on hedonic shopping.\nFindings: Results demonstrate that positive (vs neutral) emotions increase shopping behaviour outcomes for men, to reach the same level as for women. The findings also indicate that retail environment perception mediates the effects. Moreover, the results show that positive emotions increase levels of hedonic shopping for men and that negative emotions reduce levels of hedonic shopping for women.\nPractical implications: This paper helps retailers enhance shopping behaviour outcomes in retail environments. From a managerial perspective, the findings also provide insights on how to improve shopping behaviour outcomes for male consumers.\nOriginality/value: This paper shows how to reduce gender effects on consumer shopping behaviour outcomes by activating specific emotions in retail environments. This research also demonstrates the mediating role of retail environment perception.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
European registry for quality improvement in cataract surgery
|
[
"Quality improvement",
"Benchmarking",
"Clinical guidelines",
"Outcomes",
"Disease registry",
"Web-based expert system"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nBackground: In 2007, the European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (ESCRS) applied for an EU grant to create a European registry aimed at improving the quality of cataract and refractive surgery. There were many reasons behind this application: growing health tourism within the field, increasing patient complaints after refractive surgery in some countries, and a rapid technical development of the surgical procedures. The development of cataract surgery is on different levels in the European countries and there has been a wish from surgeons coming from developing countries to be able to compare themselves with surgeons from industrialised countries. As a society for professionals, the ESCRS also felt a responsibility to contribute to improved quality of care. The philosophy behind the project was to create a database for learning and quality improvement, not for supervision. The idea and design were based on experiences from the Swedish National Cataract Register (NCR), which started in 1992 (Behndig et al., 2011), and the European Cataract Outcome Study (ECOS), which started in 1995 and was funded by the ESCRS from 1998 (Lundstrom et al., 2001). In 2006, the ESCRS took the initiative to start a registry for refractive surgery outcomes: the Refractive Surgery Outcomes Information System (RSOIS). The purpose of this web-based system was to reflect outcomes of refractive surgery and improve quality of care for this procedure. The EU grant application was successful, and led to the creation of the European Registry of Quality Outcomes for Cataract and Refractive Surgery (EUREQUO) with two co-financers: the European Union under the Executive Agency for Health and Consumers, and the ESCRS. The ESCRS was the lead partner in the project, and eleven national societies participated as associated partners. EyeNet Sweden, a quality registry centre funded by the Swedish government, also became an associated partner in order to provide quality registry knowledge (Lundstrom, 2005).\nPurpose: The purpose of this report is to describe the establishment of a multinational quality database (EUREQUO) for learning and improvement, and to describe the ensuing achievements within cataract surgery after four years.\nQuality registries within health care: Establishment of quality registries\nMethods: Technical issues\nResults: The system was designed to allow both manual input of data via the web and mass import of aggregated data from existing electronic databases. Interfaces have so far been created for direct transfer of data from two national quality registries (the Swedish and the Dutch cataract registries) and seven large EMR systems. The web form for input of preoperative and surgical data for cataract surgery is shown in Figure 1, and examples of cataract surgery outcome graphs for benchmarking are shown in Figures 2 and 3.\nDiscussion: The initiative to create a European quality registry on outcomes of cataract and refractive surgery was well-received and well-supported by professionals working in the field, and few arguments were raised against the concept. The confidentiality of the database was probably an important facilitator. However, for many centres there was no allocation of working time for collecting data on outcomes, and so data collection was reduced to an unpaid spare-time activity. One possible way to avoid this time conflict could be to automatically transfer data from the mandatory medical record data to the quality registry database, particularly since it became evident soon after this project started that double entry of data by clinicians should be avoided. Project money was thus allocated to building interfaces between existing electronic data sets and the EUREQUO database. Most of the data entered into the EUREQUO database came via transfer from existing databases such as national registries and EMR systems. One prerequisite for this method is that the source database must contain all the variables that are mandatory in the EUREQUO system. Furthermore, these variables must be marked in the source database in order to be identified for export to another system. In some cases, the source systems have lacked single mandatory variables, which in the output reports have been treated as missing data and not included in the calculations. However, some existing EMR systems could not be connected to the EUREQUO database because too many important variables were either not included or not marked for export. One purpose of the EUREQUO project was to create evidence-based guidelines. The idea was to present guidelines based on \"real world\" data, which means including all cataract extractions irrespective of complicating co-morbidities in the eye or the experience of the surgeon. For benchmarking purposes, there are two possible ways to present the data; either including only the best cases with operations performed by experienced surgeons using the best available equipment, or including all surgeries performed by all surgeons. The EUREQUO guidelines use the latter alternative (Lundstrom et al., 2012), while conversely a recent publication offering standards for benchmarking in cataract surgery used the former, best-case scenario (Hahn et al., 2011). The board of the ESCRS has decided to continue funding the project for at least the next three years (2012-2014), which will guarantee sustainability of the database for the near future. When asking surgeons to participate in a quality registry, one issue is their differing levels of familiarity with information technology. Some surgeons are used to exporting outcome data to a regional or national registry from their EMR system, some have their own databases for outcome follow up, some use EMR with or without a database, and finally some still work with paper-based records. Joining an electronic quality database will therefore mean different things for different surgeons, depending on their present use of information technology. For the most technically advanced surgeons it will give them the possibility to compare their own data with others, but for the least technically advanced surgeons it will also give them access to an electronic quality system and the possibility to compare their own data over time. This means that the benefit of joining an international quality database will vary between clinics and surgeons. However, the possibility for a single surgeon to match their own outcomes with a large database will be a benefit for any surgeon. The backbone of the register is the continuous addition of data from national registers and several EMRs. For the individual clinics and surgeons, this means that their own data can always be compared to state-of-the-art epidemiological and surgical results. The Young Ophthalmologist Program - a specific part of the ESCRS for supporting new surgeons under training - has adopted to use the database for trainees and their benchmarking. The prerequisite for participation in a quality registry database for a surgical procedure is that every consecutive surgery case is reported, in order to create a true outcome picture based on daily practice rather than on selected best cases. The requirement for participation in the EUREQUO is that preoperative and surgical data must be reported for all cases during a year, and follow-up data for at least one month a year. During the follow-up month, all consecutive surgeries should be reported with their follow-up data. As an alternative, participation in a registry like the EUREQUO could be confined to a part of the year, but all consecutive cases should be reported during that period. Within modern cataract surgery, the number of operations performed is so high that in many countries it is not easy to keep track of all patients for follow-up. Both cataract and refractive surgery are high volume surgeries, and so from a statistical point of view, data from less than a whole year could be enough for useful analyses. The database is routinely checked for impossible values, and as mentioned above there are also built-in methods of ensuring plausible values. An audit including comparison of database values with medical records has not yet taken place; one is planned, but this is a resource-demanding exercise. Patient-reported outcome is not yet included in the system, though this is an important component of the quality outcome of cataract surgery. We plan in the near future to add a patient questionnaire to the registry, possibly by connecting a disability questionnaire such as the Catquest-9SF to the database, and measuring activity limitations in daily life before and after surgery (Lundstrom and Pesudovs, 2009). Another possibility would be to connect an item bank to the database for customising items to the patient (Pesudovs, 2010). This would make it possible to include patients with different abilities and different cultural backgrounds, and measure outcomes in a standardised and comparable way.\nConclusion: A European quality registry has been set up for cataract and refractive surgery. It incorporates the biggest web-based database in ophthalmology, linked to quality registries and electronic medical records from 16 European countries. The volume of data is very large, and the system will facilitate transfer of surgeries in the long term. The registry is intended for learning and clinical improvement, and evidence-based guidelines for cataract surgery have been formulated on the basis of the data included in it. The ESCRS has guaranteed the economic sustainability of the database even after the end of the financial contribution from the European Union.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: A project aimed at creating a multi-national database for cataract and refractive surgery was initiated in 2008. The database was intended for learning and clinical improvement, not supervision. The project was co-funded by the European Union, under the Executive Agency for Health and Consumers and the European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (ESCRS) and supported by 11 national societies for cataract and refractive surgery. The purpose of this article is to describe the setup of the database and the ensuing achievements within cataract surgery after four years.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A web-based system was created for input and output of data, with a software interface to two databases, one for cataract surgery and one for refractive surgery. Data can be put in either manually through web forms or by transfer of data from existing national registries or large electronic medical record systems. Output of reports from the system or export of one's own data is available on the web. The data are anonymous to all users, with the sole exception that reporting surgeons and clinics have access to their own data. The system does not include any patient identification.\nFindings: After four years, data from 16 countries have been entered into the system, including reports of more than 900,000 cataract extractions. The database has been used by individual clinics for benchmarking and clinical improvement work, and has also served as the basis for new clinical guidelines for cataract surgery. The ESCRS has guaranteed the sustainability of the database after the project period.\nOriginality/value: A European quality registry with data input from surgeons and clinics in 16 European countries has been established. Close to one million surgeries have been entered into the system during the first four years. Evidence-based guidelines have been published based on data in the registry. The system is used for benchmarking by both experienced surgeons and trainees.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Approaches to HRM in the Barbados hotel industry
|
[
"Human resource management",
"Hotels",
"Barbados",
"United Kingdom",
"Human resource strategies",
"Personnel administration"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: People are one of the greatest costs and also one of the main assets of contemporary organizations. The extent of a company's success in terms of its survival and competitive position is determined by, inter alia, workers' qualities, attitudes and behaviour in the workplace. The management of people has become a critical issue for the hotel industry in recent years, as more emphasis has been placed on quality. The hotel industry is necessarily labour intensive and this makes it particularly important that it develops effective human resource practices and policies to achieve competitive success (Pfeffer, 1998). Barbados is a small island where tourism accounts for as much as 70 per cent of foreign exchange earnings. Further, tourism employs 13 per cent of the island's labour force and in 2000 it contributed 11.3 per cent to the island's gross domestic product (International Labour Office, 2003). Barbados targets a high spending tourist from the very top of the market through to more modest hotel accommodation, which, nevertheless, represents a once in a lifetime vacation. Thus, the effective management of people in the hotel industry is important to the overall competitiveness of the whole country, which depends on the consistent delivery of excellent service.This paper seeks to understand the extent of the adoption of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices, the extent of the development of the personnel function and the existence of a formal HR strategy in the Barbados hotel industry by using Hoque's (2000) methodology. Following Hoque's (2000, p. 50) comparative study of United Kingdom (UK) hotels with manufacturing establishments, we will \"... look at the extent to which HRM practices have been adopted ... and test whether the usage of the practices asked about is any more widely reported ...\" in the Barbados hotel industry than in the UK hotel industry. The findings presented here are part of a larger study that used both quantitative and qualitative methods to explore the development of HRM in the Barbados hotel industry and also investigate the relationship between the adoption of HRM and performance in Barbados hotels. Findings based on the part of the study that looked at HRM and performance can be found in Alleyne et al. (2005) and Alleyne et al. (2006). This article concentrates solely on the development of HRM in Barbados.The structure of the paper is as follows. The first section discusses selected literature on HRM. The second section presents an introduction to Barbados and some of the key features of employment there. The third section discusses the research methodology used. The results are presented in the fourth section, and conclusions are drawn in the final section.\nSelected literature review on HRM: HRM concept\nManaging people in Barbados: The Barbados Workers' Union (BWU), the largest and oldest union in the country, is a general workers\" union, drawing its membership from organizations in the different sectors, including hotels, of the Barbadian economy. The total number of unionized workers (out of 135,500 employed) gives a union density of 36 per cent (International Labour Office, 2003, p. 9). Hotels and hotel based restaurants account for over 60 per cent of the work force of 13,000 in the sector and 40 per cent (3,500) is organized by the BWU, giving a union density of 27 per cent for the sector. This is a very different picture to that found in the UK where union density in the hotel and catering industry is only 4 per cent (Culley et. al., 1999).The Barbados Employers\" Confederation (BEC), comprising the employers, represents 72 enterprises in the hotel and tourism industry under an organization called The Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA) (International Labour Office, 2003). There is an industry-level collective agreement between the BHTA and the BWU, which ensures that the industry is well regulated. The agreement covers hours of work, basic pay, service charge, grievance and disciplinary procedures, to name a few. The Barbados Hospitality Institute (BHI) is a full service hospitality training facility, which provides certificate, diploma, and associate training in all aspects of the hospitality industry. Service quality is the aim of this training.This short introduction to Barbados shows that the employment context is very different to that found in the UK. The trade union presence in the hospitality industry and the use of industry-wide collective bargaining is far more widespread in Barbados than in the UK and this means that aspects of IR/PM will be part of the employment relations context as well as aspects of HRM.\nResearch methodology: A quantitative survey was used to examine the approaches to HRM in the Barbados hotel industry. Saunders et. al., (2003, p. 92) have pointed out that the quantitative survey \"is a popular and common strategy in business and management research,\" and surveys enable \"easy comparisons and appear to be authoritative.\" In this case, the aim was to make direct comparisons between human resource management practices in the UK and in Barbados. The survey is a useful tool for analyzing and assessing HR practice and the HR function in a systematic way and it has allowed us to gather similar data to that acquired by Hoque (1999a; 2000). The survey sought to look at the extent to which HRM practices had been adopted in the Barbados hotel industry, the existence of a formal HR strategies, and the extent of development of the HR function within the hotel industry. This article compares the findings in Barbados with Hoque's UK hotel sample.The survey population\nResults: Characteristics of the sample\nConclusion: These findings were unexpected, given that the UK is a mature Western economy, where Barbados is classified as a developing country. Overall, the results show that Barbados hotels seem well organized when compared to the UK sample of hotels. With respect to the usage of HRM practices, Barbados hotels scored higher than the UK hotels in the areas of recruitment and selection, training, job design, and communication and consultation. Indeed, Barbados hotels scored better on 13 out of the 21 HRM practices when compared with the UK hotels. It could be argued that the collective agreement has ensured that good terms and conditions are applied throughout Barbados and that the kind of practice associated with IR/PM has influenced the widespread adoption of good employment conditions.There were mixed results with respect to the existence of a formal HRM strategy. UK hotels were ranked higher in terms of the formal endorsement and actions in support of HR strategy by top management, the existence of a formal mission statement and the fact that the mission statement explicitly refers to HR issues. In contrast, Barbados hotels had a higher frequency with respect to HR policy deliberately integrated with business strategy (external fit) and HR practices deliberately integrated with each other (internal fit). This finding is still positive as the meshing of HR strategy and business strategy, as well as deliberately integrating HR practices may be a push for investing in HR practices that contribute to a high standard of service in the Barbados hotel industry.With respect to the extent of the development of the HR function, these results show that the HR specialists in the Barbados hotels are ahead of their UK counterparts in terms of formal qualifications in HR/personnel management and support staff present in the HR/personnel departments. It was also found that the Barbados HR specialists spent a lot less time on HR matters. This could be a result of a peaceful work environment, and a need for HR practitioners to be multi-skilled.Hoque's (2000) list of 21 HRM practices is a summation of best HRM practices. More evidence of this \"best practice\" is found in Barbados and it seems that this may be partly because of the stronger collective bargaining/union presence. Thus, contrary to expectation, it appears that many aspects of best HRM practice are encouraged in a collective as opposed to an individualized employee relations environment. The mixed messages on HR strategy and fit suggest that the \"best fit\" argument may be less important than the \"best practice\" argument. It could be argued that in a situation where \"best practice\" is adopted anyway, the need to develop sophisticated, custom-built strategy evaporates, especially in a tourism environment where there is a heavy emphasis on quality everywhere.These findings show how important it is to collect objective information about HR practices in different country contexts. It would be easy for HR managers to assume that practices in Barbados would be less advanced than those in the UK, or to assume that Western ideas about the management of people could be transferred easily to developing countries. These findings have shown that collective approaches to the management of people may be more appropriate in some country contexts, and that this can help establish a level of \"best practice\" that in many ways surpasses the level of investment found in more individualized country contexts such as the UK. The promotion and adoption of \"best practice\" may be the most effective approach for achieving competitive advantage across an entire, though small, country like Barbados, which depends so much on its people to deliver consistent levels of excellent service.Finally, readers should be continually aware of the fact that the UK data is about ten years old and as such the employee climate may have changed since then. Thus, future research needs to be done to obtain objective data on the shifts in the HR climate in the UK hotel industry over the last decade.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to measure the extent of the adoption of human resource management (HRM), the existence of a formal HR strategy, and the development of the HR function in the Barbados hotel industry compared with Hoque's sample of hotels in the UK.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A quantitative survey, covering 46 hotels out of a population of 75 hotels was conducted with the respondents being the hotel's management: a general manager, HR manager or line manager.\nFindings: - It was found that the adoption of human resource (HR) practices was more prevalent in Barbados hotels than in the UK sample. With respect to the existence of a formal HR strategy, the results were mixed. The results also show that in many respects the Barbados hotels are ahead of their UK counterparts in the development of the HR function.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The research focused on a small sample in a developing country. In addition, responses were obtained from top management rather than all levels of staff.\nPractical implications: - The findings about HR practices were based on management assertions. There is need for a follow-up with more tangible evidence.\nOriginality/value: - The paper highlights the importance of HR practices in a developing country. These findings were unexpected, given that the UK is a mature western economy, where Barbados is classified as a developing country. They may be explained by the better-developed formal systems for the management of employment relations at an industry-level in Barbados.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The effect of corporate governance on carbon emission disclosures: Evidence from Turkey
|
[
"Corporate governance",
"Board independence",
"Board diversity",
"Carbon Disclosure Project",
"Carbon emission disclosures",
"Sustainability committee"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Global warming and climate change have become increasingly growing problems that threaten the future of the world. Many stakeholder groups are urging action and proposing several solutions in association with those problems (Prado-Lorenzo et al., 2009). In particular, environmental groups are lobbying governments to establish regulations on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and calling entities to take proactive measures on carbon emission strategies (Reid and Toffel, 2009). Increasing attention on GHG emissions has also created an effect on GHG emissions-related disclosures. Therefore, developing proactive strategies for environmental issues and disclosing GHG emissions information have become crucial for entities to maintain their corporate image in response to the demand by stakeholders.\n2. Theoretical framework: One theory that is used widely to understand the determinants of environmental and social disclosures is the legitimacy theory, which proposes the concept of a \"social contract\" existing between organizations and society at large (Choi et al., 2013). Legitimacy theory suggests that environmental legitimacy is built based on the perception of an organization as environmentally responsible by relevant publics (Kuo and Chen, 2013). As a consequence of growing attention on environmental issues, the tendency of firms to engage in environmentally responsible practices increased. In this respect, firms convince stakeholders that their activities are in line with stakeholders' expectations with regard to carbon emissions to legitimize themselves and to keep the social contract (Yunus et al., 2016). One way of doing this is to disclose their carbon management practices via several channels such as annual reports, sustainability reports and websites.\n3. Literature review: 3.1 Background: Kyoto protocol and Carbon Disclosure Project\n4. Hypothesis: 4.1 Board size\n5. Measurement of variables: 5.1 Dependent variables\n6. Results and discussion: 6.1 Descriptive statistics\n7. Conclusion: Global warming and climate change have been the focus of increasing attention from researchers, governments, politicians, enterprises and civil society. The purpose of this research was to investigate the relationship between board characteristics and the extent of carbon disclosures by Turkish non-financial entities listed on BIST.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate whether corporate governance characteristics impact the voluntary disclosure of carbon emissions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This empirical research was carried out in two stages. Initially, the carbon disclosures data were sourced from the annual and stand-alone sustainability reports of Turkish non-financial companies listed on Borsa Istanbul during 2011-2015. Later, the corporate governance characteristics that influence carbon disclosures were examined using panel data regression models.\nFindings: The empirical findings of this study suggested that entities with a higher number of independent directors on their boards were more likely to respond to the Carbon Disclosure Project. In addition, board nationality diversity and the existence of a sustainability committee had a significant positive impact on the propensity to disclose carbon emissions and the extent of those disclosures.\nOriginality/value: This research provides empirical evidence of the determinants of carbon emission disclosures, which could be useful for organizations and regulatory bodies. Such an understanding is crucial to specify necessary policies that will provide emission reduction practices and policies for entities. This paper fills some of the gap in the literature by concentrating on the association between corporate governance characteristics and disclosures of a more specific environmental issue, being carbon emissions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Student part-time employment: characteristics and consequences
|
[
"Part‐time employment",
"Part‐time workers",
"Student experience",
"Stress",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: An increasingly prominent feature of the higher education sector in the UK is the rise in the number of students studying full-time, while working in part-time employment. This is not, however, a new phenomenon and part-time working has been a feature of the university experience for some time (Barron and Anastasiadou, 2009). This means that term-time working is now a common place aspect of the undergraduate student experience (Moreau and Leatherwood, 2006). It has been suggested, however, that perhaps the notion of the full-time student is increasingly one that is no longer applicable (Curtis and Shani, 2002). This situation has arisen in part as a consequence of changes in the manner in which higher education is funded by government. Central to these changes is the shift in the financial burden away from the state and towards the student (Metcalf, 2005). The aim of this paper is to examine the nature of students' part-time employment and to discuss the reported consequences of holding such employment during term time.Student part-time employment has been receiving an increased level of interest from academic researchers since the early 1990s. A growing body of literature has investigated this phenomenon, with a view to establishing the nature of that employment, and the possible consequences for individuals seeking to combine study and employment. The participation of university students in the labour market during their studies is not a new development, however, and in some countries such activity is the norm rather than the exception. Research carried out in other countries indicates that the prevalence of part-time student employment continues to grow. In Germany student employment is a well-established phenomenon (Winkler, 2009). While the Eurostudent Survey (HIS, 2005) found term-time employment rates of 20 per cent in Portugal, 30 per cent in Italy, 69 per cent in Ireland and 91 per cent in the Netherlands.Beyond Europe the statistics also indicate variations in the rate of employment across different countries. A large scale survey in Australia (n=34,752) found that 72.5 per cent of those who responded held a part-time job during term time (Long and Hayden, 2001). This figure marked an increase in student employment of more than 20 per cent since the survey was first commissioned in 1984. This growth in student part-time employment in Australia is supported by Salamonson and Andrew (2006) in a survey of 267 nursing students. They found that more than three quarters of the students held a part-time job during their studies, working on average for 14 hours per week. A smaller scale survey at a single university in New Zealand (n=83) reported that 81 per cent held a part-time job during term time (Manthei and Gilmore, 2005). Evidence from China indicates that some students are engaging in part-time employment during their studies. For example, Tam and Morrison (2005) found that 66.9 per cent of students held a part-time job in a survey conducted at a single institution (n=417). They also reported that over 80 per cent of the sample found that, overall, working while studying was beneficial to their academic work.However, this prevalence of employment amongst higher education students is not reflected in all countries. In a study of 466 undergraduates in Greece, where there is no established tradition of students being engaged in employment, it was found that the majority did not work during term time (Mihail and Karaliopoulou, 2005). What these studies do not indicate is whether reported levels of term-time employment are directly related per se to a funding system where students pay some form of fees, or whether they are a function of a particular cultural or societal system.In the UK the higher education sector has also witnessed a rise in the proportion of students holding a part-time job during term time. According to data from the Trades Union Congress (2006), between spring 1996 and spring 2006, the number of students reported as holding a job during term time rose by 54 per cent to 630,778. While the Student Living Report UNITE (2004) found that 39 per cent of students were working part time and 3 per cent were working full time during their studies.Perhaps the key change in the higher education sector has been in the way in which the sector is funded (see Greenaway and Haynes, 2003, for an overview of the main changes in the sector). In the UK policy changes meant that the maintenance grant for higher education students was replaced with a means-tested student loan, which is paid back once the individual is earning above a set threshold (Curtis, 2005). One consequence of this change in funding is that students are increasingly facing financial pressures (Schafer, 1996) as the cost of higher education has shifted increasingly from the state to the student (and students' families) (Metcalf, 2005). In the academic year 1999/2000, more than 74 per cent of eligible students took out a student loan (DfEE, 2000). This means UK university students are facing greater financial pressures than those in other European countries (EURYDICE, 1999) and that financial debt is an inevitable part of going to university (Carney et al., 2005). The most recent change to funding saw central government reducing the grant to higher education providers, in particular a substantial reduction in the amount paid to support teaching. To counter this universities in 2012 will be allowed to charge students up to PS6,000 per annum, and up to PS9,000 per annum if they meet published criteria for widening access.A note of caution is necessary, however, as the relationship between shifting the financial burden from the state to the student, and the increase in part-time student employment, is not a causal one and may be due to other factors (Metcalf, 2005). This is because levels of student employment are a function of the level of employment generally in the economy; the socio-demographic profile of students; the nature of the available financial support structure; and the amount of class contact time required by the course (Darmody and Smyth, 2008). This view is supported by Ryland et al. (1994) who argue that the relationship between students and their participation in the labour market is a complex one.Broadbridge and Swanson (2005) are critical of the existing student employment literature and they put forward three central weaknesses in this knowledge base. First, the majority of studies have failed to take into consideration the wider context in which changes in student employment have occurred. Second, previous empirical work has failed to investigate long-term changes in student participation in the labour market. Third, little consideration has been given to the impact of part-time employment on the overall quality of life experienced by students. A further weakness of existing studies is that so far they have failed to establish conclusively whether term-time employment is either a negative or a positive feature of the higher education sector. The contribution of this paper is in seeking to establish more clearly the consequences for individual students of attempting to combine full-time study with part-time employment. While some studies have reported benefits (time management, enhanced employability, improved social skills), there is a comparable number that reported negative outcomes (reduction in reading, missing time-tabled classes, tiredness). The overall aim of this paper is to build on the work of Ford and Bosworth (1995) and Moreau and Leatherwood (2006), to clarify the nature of the relationship between term-time employment and studying in higher education.\nMethod: Design and sample\nResults and discussion: Paid part-time employment during term time\nConclusion: This paper set out to investigate the nature and composition of student part-time employment amongst higher education students through reporting the results of an on-line survey undertaken in a UK university. The findings from the survey indicate that students continue to undertake part-time jobs during their studies and that they do so at a significant level. This adds further weight to the view that combining academic study with part-time employment continues to be a majority experience for students. A second key finding relates to the amount of time that individuals are spending in employment in comparison to time spent in the lecture room. Students at this institution are not only working significantly beyond the official UK government guidelines for part-time employment of a maximum of ten hours per week, some are also spending more hours per week in their chosen employment than in time-tabled university classes. These jobs are also concentrated within a relatively narrow range of industrial sectors, with most students being in jobs in retail. However, these findings need to be seen in the context of changes in the higher education sector.The survey also looked at the possible effects, on both academic study and student well-being, of this combination of employment and study. The ongoing discussion in the literature is somewhat divided over the benefits or otherwise of term-time employment. Some researchers have found that there are potential benefits from part-time employment such as enhanced future employability and a reduction in the need to seek financial assistance from other sources. Results here indicate that the possible benefits of working are significant and experienced in some instances by the majority rather than the minority. While those benefits, such as enhanced time-management and improved group working skills, are more vocational than academic they may contribute to enhanced employability. The negative effects of term-time working were less apparent in this study and related to factors not associated with studying such as a reduction in leisure time. This was a rather surprising finding given that several studies report time spent in employment as having a detrimental effect on academic scores. Although this does perhaps raise a more philosophical question as to what is the purpose of higher education and how might this view differ between individual students?As the UK higher education system continues to evolve in response to changes in government policy, with further adjustments to funding mechanisms, student part-time employment seems likely to remain on the agenda. At the time of writing it is unclear yet what the effects of the near tripling of tuition fees will be. It would seem likely, however, given previous substantive changes to funding, that part-time employment will continue to rise. However, existing studies have so far failed to establish conclusively whether term-time employment is either a negative or a positive feature of the higher education sector. There remains a lack of longitudinal studies that identify how individuals respond to maintaining this juggling act of academic commitments and employment commitments. It is possible that as a student becomes more used to the demands of university education, then the potential negative effects of simultaneously holding a part-time job may be reduced. On a more fundamental level there is a need to perhaps consider how institutions respond to dealing with full-time students for whom hours spent in the classroom take second place to hours spent in the work place. Institutions may need to consider examining existing models of delivery so that enhanced flexibility allows students to combine study and employment more effectively. Even more controversially perhaps the time is coming when the concept of the full-time student ceases to be applicable to a significant proportion of the undergraduate student population.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The aim of the paper is to examine the consequences of students engaging in part-time employment during their studies. It reports the results of a survey of part-time employment among university students. The research examined the possible consequences of combining part-time employment with full-time study, with particular reference to stress.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The research consisted of an institution-wide Web-based survey of full-time undergraduates within a post-1992 university in the UK.\nFindings: - The survey found that part-time employment, in common with many previous studies, is a majority experience for full-time undergraduates. It also found that some students were spending longer in their chosen employment than in time-tabled classes. A central finding was that unlike much previous research, it emerged here that students reported more positive than negative outcomes.\nPractical implications: - The data shows that students continue to engage in part-time employment at a significant level and for some studying is almost a secondary activity. This perhaps raises questions about the existing model of higher education delivery and the need for institutions to consider offering more support mechanisms for individual students.\nOriginality/value: - The paper is of value in seeking to clarify the nature of the consequences for students seeking to combine employment and studying. Furthermore the paper builds on our understanding of the continuing growth of student part-time employment.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The effects of business operation mode on market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness
|
[
"Market orientation",
"Innovation",
"Business performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In recent years, the management environment and customers preferences have become more dynamic and complex than ever before. Any corporation can hardly survive without going through certain changes. To deal with these circumstances, many corporations have introduced the idea of \"market orientation\", which is one of the most important trends. Researchers have carried out numerous empirical studies to examine the relationship between market orientation and business performance (Day, 1994; Han et al., 1998; Hult et al., 2004; Hurley and Hult, 1998; Kohli and Jaworski, 1990). It is argued that market orientation exists on a continuum characterized by the degree to which firms acquire, disseminate, and response to information gleaned from customers, channels, and competitors. Firms tend to perform better when they attempt to focus on market orientation with special emphasis on flexibility and faster response time (Baker and Sinkula, 1999; Hardley and Mavondo, 2000; Noble et al., 2002). Most of the previous studies agreed that there is a positive relationship between market orientation and business performance.However, creating a market orientation is only the first step. Slater and Narver (1994) argued that a market orientation only enhances performance when it is combined with a learning orientation. Without the ability to use and act upon information (applied learning), market orientation may not be positively related to performance. Geus (1998) further emphasized the importance of learning capability that the ability to learn faster than competitors might be the only sustainable competitive advantage. Baker and Sinkula (1999) proposed a synergistic effect of market orientation and learning orientation. They suggested that firms with lower learning capabilities might have an inflexible construction of market orientation. Baker and Sinkula (1999) viewed learning orientation as the qualitative engine behind market orientation. Learning-oriented firms not just acquire and disseminate information about markets or utilize market-based knowledge to look for new ways to serve customers but also continually investigate the dynamics of markets. Slater and Narver (1995) indicated that \"for a business to maximize its ability to learn about markets, creating a market orientation is only a start.\" Hardley and Mavondo (2000) contended that learning orientation has a significant and positive impact on customer orientation and competitor orientation. Thus, it is suggested that the levels of learning orientation will influence the relationship between market orientation and business performance.Farrell (2000) argued that learning orientation is a source of competitive advantage. Firms should facilitate organizational learning as the highest priority in management practice. However, what specific management practices and behaviors could facilitate a learning orientation and market orientation? Does a market orientation facilitate learning orientation? What learning strategies could enhance a market orientation? All these research questions are still remained unanswered and subject to further studies.Moreover, both market orientation and learning orientation require a sense of innovation. It is suggested that the success of marketing operations is based on a firm's capability to differentiate its products and marketing activities from the competitors. Lado and Maydeu-Olivares (2001) contended that innovation is one of the \"core value-creating capabilities.\" Han et al. (1998) suggested that market orientation have positive impact on organizational innovation. However, why is this so? Is it because market-oriented firms are capable of developing a learning environment? Is it because market-oriented firms are able to introduce more general innovation activities? Or is it because market-oriented firms try to achieve innovation through organizational learning? Previous literature does not seem to clarify these issues.Furthermore, according to Hurley and Hult (1998), the modes of business operation have great influences on learning orientation and innovativeness. The degree of openness and involvement in decision-making will facilitate managers' commitment to innovation. The degree of sharing information and resources will enhance the acceptance of new ideas and reduce turf, politics and status, which may hinder innovation in a firm. The degree of support and collaboration will reduce fear and encourage new ideas and risk taking in a firm. However, specifically, how do firms' business operation modes influence their market orientation, learning orientation, and innovativeness? What interaction effects among market orientation, learning orientation and business operation modes will impact on a firm's innovativeness and business performance? Previous studies concerning these issues are limited and subject to further validations.As a summary, previous studies have suggested that the construct of innovation needs to be introduced in the market orientation-learning orientation-business performance model. Market orientation requires innovative responses to different market condition. Firms with greater capacity to innovate will be more successful in responding to their environments and developing new capabilities that will lead to competitive advantages and superior performances (Hult et al., 2004; Hurley and Hult, 1998). However, it seems that researchers rarely discuss the interrelationships of a comprehensive model that contains market orientation, learning orientation, innovation, and business performance. In addition, previous studies seldom consider the role of business operation mode on learning, innovation and business performance. Therefore, the purposes of this study are as follows.1. An exploration of the interrelationships among the constructs of market orientation, learning orientation, and innovativeness.2. An examination of the impacts of market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness on business performance.3. An investigation of the impacts of business operation mode on market orientation, learning orientation, innovativeness and business performance.\nLiterature review: Market orientation\nResearch design and methodology: Research model\nResearch analysis and results: Characteristics of sample firms\nDiscussion and suggestion: This study focuses on the following two major issues of interest:1. the interrelationships among market orientation, learning orientation, and business innovativeness; and2. the impact of research constructs on business performance.H1-H3 proposed that there are positive relationships among market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness. The results indicate that each one of the constructs is significantly related to each other. H4-H6 proposed that market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness would significantly impact on business performance. The empirical analysis results supported these three hypotheses and the results further depict the direct and indirect influential path on business performance. H7-H9 proposed that firms will achieve higher levels of market orientation, learning orientation, innovativeness and business performance when they are operated under an appropriate business operation mode, which implies a participative, sharing and collaborative management style. The empirical results also highly support these hypotheses on most of the factors.The above results can be drawn into several managerial implications. First, the interrelationship between market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness has been recognized as major factors of business performance. The results of this study argue that both direct and indirect effects are important for business performance. It is suggested that managers need to synchronize their operation patterns in the consideration of market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness. It is only when there exists the contingency fit between these three research constructs can the firm perform better.Second, although previous literature is inconclusive on the influential routes of innovativeness on business performance, our study reveals that direct effects of innovation on performance are significantly larger than those of market orientation, learning orientation on performance. The study results also indicate that the indirect effects of market orientation and learning orientation through innovativeness are also significantly larger than the direct effects of innovation on performance.Third, business operation mode has played a very critical direct effect and moderating effects on a firm's innovativeness. The variance explained from the factors of business operation mode to innovativeness is significantly larger than those effects from market orientation and learning orientation. Therefore, it seems to suggest that firms need to concentrate their efforts on promoting innovativeness through various means including market orientation, learning orientation, and participative and supportive authority delegation. Without an appropriate business operation mode, the efforts to promote market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness may be diminished.The results of this study may provide several significant contributions to academicians and practitioners. Firms due to the accelerating growth of internet, business globalization, manufacturing integration, supply chain management and customer relation management have become the most popular management activities. To enhance efficiency and effectiveness of these activities, market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness are three of the most important factors to enhance business performance. The study results suggest that market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness should be integrated into the above management activities. Second, though the modes of business operations have shown to influence business performance, the contingency fit between business operation modes and other constructs have rarely been studied. The results of this study indicate that business operation mode is one of the most important factors for the creation of innovation and business performance.Although the research results are interesting, several limitations exist in this study. These limitations suggest areas and directions for future research. First, this study adopts the cross-sectional research design and examines firms at one point in time. As a result, directional relationships are not clear and must be inferred from logically thought. Owing to the constraints of time and data availability, a longitudinal research is not viable in this study. Second, this study identifies business operation mode as a crucial moderating factor for firms to create innovativeness. Some other factors may also have significant effects on innovation. Further efforts should be made to evaluate more contingency factors for innovativeness and business performance. Third, the study could have been evaluated the differences between manufacturing and service sector, but due to the limitation of sample size, this study could not analyze comparatively. It will be valuable for further studies to concentrate on comparison of innovativeness between manufacturing and service sector.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this study is to evaluate the interrelationships between market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness. The effects of business operation mode on learning orientation and innovativeness are also investigated.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A 65-item survey questionnaire was developed and 700 manufacturing and service firms in Taiwan were selected as the samples of this study. Mail survey was conducted and respondents were asked to express the opinions related to the effects of business operation modes on market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness of their firms.\nFindings: - The results conclude that: the emphasis of market orientation, including intelligence generation, intelligence dissemination, and responsiveness, is associated with the levels of learning orientation and organizational innovativeness; the emphasis of learning orientation is associated with the levels of business innovation; and a participate, power sharing, and collaborative business operation mode may enhance a firm to promote innovativeness and business performance.\nOriginality/value: - As the management environment has become more dynamic, the emphasis of market orientation, learning orientation and innovativeness are some of the important issues that executives need to follow. Since very limited studies have concentrated on above issues, the results of this study can provide important references to academicians and practitioners in the developing of business innovativeness.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Effective vibration-based condition monitoring (eVCM) of rotating machines
|
[
"Condition-based maintenance",
"EMaintenance",
"Data combination",
"Maintenance optimisation",
"Pattern classification",
"Rotating machines"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The rapid and continuous growth in the globalisation of most industrial operations has significantly shifted the paradigm of competitiveness away from monopoly and more towards perfect competition. The pressures exerted by this paradigm shift are immense, especially in the areas of waste elimination and the implementation of cost-effective strategies that can avert or significantly minimise critical plant downtimes. The fundamental objective of most organisations is the transformation of raw materials into finished products, which may be tangible or non-tangible. The effective achievement of this transformation process requires that the influence of crucial elements such as men, machines, methods, materials and money (i.e. the 5Ms) is well-managed. The burden of managing an industrial plant grossly rests on the shoulders of two key plant functions, namely production and maintenance. Traditionally, the production function is directly concerned with the generation of the finished goods from the various raw materials. This invariably implies that the production function is the custodian of all machines which is perhaps why production is arguably referred to as the main reason for the existence of most manufacturing organisations. However, owing to a highly dynamic operational environment (e.g. load and speed variations), virtually all industrial machines are susceptible to failures which lead to plant downtimes.\n2. The concept of eVCM and its alignment with eMaintenance: eMaintenance is a term that emerged within the last two decades and has been continuously associated with various maintenance literatures (Muller et al., 2008). According to Baldwin (2004), eMaintenance refers to the proper integration of all activities (i.e. maintenance strategy, maintenance plan, maintenance type and maintenance support) that would lead to the achievement of excellent maintenance, which is also illustrated by this simple relationship (Baldwin, 2004):\n3. Experimental investigation of the application of eVCM: In order to practically observe the applicability of eVCM, two identical rotating rigs with different foundation structures were used for a pilot study. On both rigs, measured vibration data were collected from four bearing locations under different conditions of health (e.g. relatively healthy (C1), misalignment (C2), bent shaft (C3), rubbing shaft (C4), bearing looseness (C5) and shaft with breathing crack (C6)) and at three distinct machine speeds (i.e. 1,200 rev/min, 1,800 rev/min and 2,400 rev/min). For further clarity, Figure 3 presents a matrix of all the data generated from all experimentally simulated scenarios of speeds and machine conditions on both rigs.\n4. eVCM faults classification parameters: On each of the experimental rigs, 20 distinct sets of vibration measurements were simultaneously obtained from each of the four bearing locations under C1 condition at three speeds. The same process was then repeated for each of the five fault conditions (i.e. C2, C3, C4, C5 and C6) thereby providing a total of 360 vibration measurements. This approach was aimed at imitating practical industrial CM of rotating machines whereby a typical CM analyst performs routine vibration measurements from two identical rotating machines installed at two different plant locations (as depicted by Figure 1) over a period of time (e.g. one measurement per week for 20 weeks), under changing operating (e.g. speed and loading) and health conditions. In order to generate the appropriate fault classification parameters that would effectively highlight the dynamic behaviours of the experimental rigs under the different conditions, each of the 360 measured time-domain vibration data were converted to the frequency domain using the well-known fast Fourier transformation (FFT) process. During the FFT process, the following signal processing parameters were applied:\n5. eVCM in practice: As briefly mentioned in the introductory section, the repair/replace times of critical and complex industrial assets such as rotating machines are often inflated by the amount of time spent by maintenance experts on trying to understand the root causes of failures. Hence, the development and implementation of simplified machine fault classification methods that would shorten diagnosis time is long overdue. Figure 10 shows how the eVCM algorithm effectively detected and classified all vibration data corresponding to each of the six experimentally simulated rotor-related faults into separate clusters. In addition to its ability to accurately detect and classify the machine conditions, eVCM possesses the capability to support maintenance decision making which is very useful for the concept of eMaintenance. To further illustrate this point, C2 (misalignment) cluster is the closest to C1 (healthy) cluster due to the following reasons:\n6. Conclusion: The notion of regarding the maintenance function as just another cost centre under the manufacturing department has drastically changed within the past few decades. These changes can be attributed to the continuous emergence and growth of concepts such as eMaintenance that clearly depict the different ways by which maintenance can contribute towards overall business effectiveness. However, the ability of eMaintenance to attain true excellence is often impeded by the dominance of current approaches to CM of critical industrial assets such as rotating machines. In this study, eVCM is proposed for simplifying machine faults detection and classification, especially identical multiple speeds rotating machines with foundation variations. eVCM also reduces CM sensor requirements as well as eliminates the complexity and data intensiveness associated with the current practice of performing separate analysis for individual machines at different speeds. Based on pilot experimental investigations, it is envisaged that eVCM possesses the attributes required for automatic and autonomous machine faults classification, which would be a valuable addition to the existing eMaintenance framework.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is mainly to highlight how a simplified and streamlined approach to the condition monitoring (CM) of industrial rotating machines through the application of frequency domain data combination can effectively enhance the eMaintenance framework.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper commences by providing an overview to the relevance of maintenance excellence within manufacturing industries, with particular emphasis on the roles that rotating machines CM of rotating machines plays. It then proceeds to provide details of the eMaintenance as well as its possible alignment with the introduced concept of effective vibration-based condition monitoring (eVCM) of rotating machines. The subsequent sections of the paper respectively deal with explanations of data combination approaches, experimental setups used to generate vibration data and the theory of eVCM.\nFindings: This paper investigates how a simplified vibration-based rotating machinery faults classification method based on frequency domain data combination can increase the feasibility and practicality of eMaintenance.\nResearch limitations/implications: The eVCM approach is based on classifying data acquired under several experimentally simulated conditions on two different machines using combined higher order signal processing parameters so as to reduce CM data requirements. Although the current study was solely based on the application of vibration data acquired from rotating machines, the knowledge exchange platform that currently dominates present day scientific research makes it very likely that the lessons learned from the development of eVCM concept can be easily transferred to other scientific domains that involve continuous CM such as medicine.\nPractical implications: The concept of eMaintenance as a cost-effective and smart means of increasing the autonomy of maintenance activities within industries is rapidly growing in maintenance-related literatures. As viable as the concept appears, the achievement of its optimum objectives and full deployment to the industry is still subjective due to the complexity and data intensiveness of conventional CM practices. In this paper, an eVCM approach is proposed so that rotating machine faults can be effectively detected and classified without the need for repetitive analysis of measured data.\nSocial implications: The main strength of eVCM lies in the fact that it permits the sharing of historical vibration data between identical rotating machines irrespective of their foundation structures and speed differences. Since eMaintenance is concerned with driving maintenance excellence, eVCM can potentially contribute towards its optimisation as it cost-effectively streamlines faults diagnosis. This therefore implies that the simplification of vibration-based CM of rotating machines positively impacts the society with regard to the possibility of reducing how much time is actually spent on the accurate detection and classification of faults.\nOriginality/value: Although the currently existing body of literature already contains studies that have attempted to show how the combination of measured vibration data from several industrial machines can be used to establish a universal vibration-based faults diagnosis benchmark for incorporation into eMaintenance framework, these studies are limited in the scope of faults, severity and rotational speeds considered. In the current study, the concept of multi-faults, multi-sensor, multi-speed and multi-rotating machine data combination approach using frequency domain data fusion and principal components analysis is presented so that faults diagnosis features for identical rotating machines with different foundations can be shared between industrial plants. Hence, the value of the current study particularly lies in the fact that it significantly highlights a new dimension through which the practical implementation and operation of eMaintenance can be realized using big data management and data combination approaches.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Fostering doctoral entrepreneurship education in Germany
|
[
"Entrepreneurialism",
"Education",
"Germany",
"Doctorates"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: In recent years, entrepreneurship education has grown in significance. The major focus of attention has been on how to teach pupils and students of different ages and educational levels about entrepreneurship in order to enhance their willingness to become entrepreneurs as well as to boost their chances of doing so successfully. Only few scholars have discussed doctoral education in entrepreneurship (e.g. Bygrave, 1994; Brush et al., 2003). Considering the increasing importance of the entrepreneurship field, the very low number of doctoral programs worldwide dedicated to entrepreneurship is surprising (Katz, 2006). After all, the development of entrepreneurship as an academic field demands well-trained researchers and teachers. The present paper aims at contributing to the literature by directing attention to postgraduate entrepreneurship education. The purpose is to present a good-practice case of establishing an innovative entrepreneurship doctoral program in a country suffering from a lack of entrepreneurship education and research.The paper makes the following contributions: Firstly, it increases our understanding of entrepreneurship education by focusing on doctoral education. Secondly, it provides a real-life case study and assessment of an innovative doctoral program, from which other entrepreneurship education initiatives can learn. Thirdly, it points out practical implications in terms of success factors and possible challenges that might be encountered when attempting to design postgraduate entrepreneurship programs.\nBackground and methodology: During the 1990s, Germany was hit by a competitiveness crisis, which led to the highest unemployment rates the country had experienced in 60 years. The related debate focused on the lack of entrepreneurial spirit and demanded a better infrastructure be provided to facilitate the start-up of new ventures. Since then, the government has embarked on a range of activities to foster entrepreneurship. Among others, in the late 1990s the \"EXIST\" initiative was launched to enhance entrepreneurship in higher education[1]. Despite these efforts, a deficit in entrepreneurship research and education was discernible at German universities (Schmude, 2001). Regarding research, entrepreneurship in Germany (nationally as well as in international comparison) was hardly empirically analyzed or theorized upon, as for a long time entrepreneurship had not been considered a separate field of studies. As for teaching, academics were hardly experienced in the field, resulting in a shortage of adequately trained professionals and young entrepreneurship scholars.This situation led a team of three professors from different academic institutions (two from business administration and one from molecular biology) to initiate the EXIST High Technology Entrepreneurship Postgraduate Program (HighTEPP), which aimed at addressing the challenges described above. The program was launched in cooperation with the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMB+F), which provided the funding, as well as both, a number of renowned established and start-up companies. The purpose of this paper is to present EXIST HighTEPP as a good-practice case of establishing a post-graduate entrepreneurship program in Germany and to outline success factors and possible challenges.Methodologically, this paper is based on a single-case study (Yin, 1989). Both authors were involved in the program in different roles. One was pivotal in designing and running the program, the other was recruited into it. The case study is based on program documentation, own personal accounts, as well as communication with other people involved in the program. Thus, the case draws heavily on the authors' personal experiences and reflections. A potential point of criticism is therefore a possible bias of the authors, which was addressed by including evaluation documents as well as input from former members of the program into the assessment. The personal involvement provides unique insights which would otherwise be difficult to obtain.The remainder of this paper is structured into three main parts: Firstly, the German EXIST initiative is presented as the context in which HighTEPP was initiated. Secondly, the postgraduate program itself is presented. The third part concludes the paper, highlighting the lessons that could be learned from the case.\nThe \"EXIST - university-based start-ups\" Initiative: In the late 1990s, the BMB+F estimated that approximately one third of the economic growth in Germany could be attributed to newly founded companies. Yet, it was assumed that many innovative ideas existed that were never exploited. This prompted the German government to engage more in fostering entrepreneurial activities. The initiated activities followed an approach that differed from earlier support and subsidizing programs. Previously, a centralized approach to facilitating the transfer of innovation between research institutions and practice had been favoured (e.g. by establishing nationally-funded research institutions). The new approach was much more decentralized and regionally embedded. Yet, it did not follow the strategy of supporting less developed regions by building up their infrastructure and subsidizing business activities in those regions. Instead, the new programs strongly focused on establishing regional centers of excellence, regardless of their location (see Dohse, 2000).The EXIST initiative was one of the German government's most comprehensive programs to support the transfer of innovation and technologies from research into practice and to increase the number of innovative start-up companies. Weigand and Audretsch (1999) had found that innovative and technology-oriented companies in Germany displayed above-average growth and could thus be expected to create a large numbers of jobs. Started in 1997, EXIST aimed at universities cooperating with regional partners from industry and research to develop projects to motivate, train, and support potential entrepreneurs from universities, polytechnics and research institutes (www.exist.de, 2001). The EXIST initiative was guided by four core principles:1. establishing a culture of entrepreneurship within education, research and administration of German higher education institutions;2. transferring research results into marketable products and services;3. developing the potential of business ideas and entrepreneurs within universities and research institutes; and4. increasing the number of newly founded innovative, technology-based start-up companies with the final aim to create and secure new jobs.Explicitly, this initiative sought to re-engage the publicly funded German universities into more competition[2]. In the absence of an entrepreneurial spirit many universities found it difficult to recognize the need for entrepreneurship education and research. Therefore, the EXIST initiative was started as a competition, in which the proposed cooperation between a minimum of three partners, at least one of them being a university, was evaluated on the basis of the core principles stated above. Universities and polytechnics were to cooperate with partners from science, industry, and politics. Jointly, they were to offer students and graduates entrepreneurship education, as well as services and support in the entrepreneurial processes. More than 200 universities were involved in submitting 109 proposals for regional networking. In March 1998, five plans for regional cooperation were awarded as regional areas of excellence and received extensive support from the BMB+F.It could be expected that the high numbers of applicants and the low number of funded projects was disproportionate and that the rejection of many high-quality proposals would be counterproductive by de-motivating the regional partners. However, a study by the Fraunhofer Institute Karlsruhe, in charge of evaluative research on the EXIST initiative, found that many proposed projects were realized despite the neglected funding (Stahlecker, 2001). Also, the process spurred the universities to integrate their research more tightly with regional activities (Koschatzky, 2001), which is of importance, as the knowledge transfer from universities to their regions had been repeatedly judged as being too low (see discussion in Grupp, 2001). The regional EXIST networks facilitated collective learning processes, mobilizing unused innovation resources (see Koschatzky, 2001, p. 11). On the downside, focusing on regional activities can reinforce the already low levels of labour mobility by tempting university graduates to remain in the region. In Germany, approximately 70 per cent of entrepreneurs found their ventures at a maximum distance of 25 km to their home towns or universities (Schmude, 1994, p. 79). In view of global-scale competition, it could be argued that supporting regionalizing forces might be counterproductive for achieving international competitiveness.In addition to these regional activities, the BMB+F funded two cross-regional initiatives, EXIST-SEED and EXIST-HighTEPP. EXIST-SEED supported business ideas and concepts of higher education students, graduates within five years past graduation as well as young staff from higher education institutions. This initiative provided incentives to commercialise research results of master or PhD theses by reducing the personal financial risks usually involved in founding a start-up company. For the maximum of one year the costs of personal living were covered by the program. In addition, it provided professorial mentorship and made resources available by the participating universities. The second cross-regional program will be further discussed in the following section.\nEXIST High Technology Entrepreneurship Postgraduate Program: Most university graduates in Germany do not take self-employment into consideration when evaluating career prospects (Gorisch, 2001). Thus, an opportunity exists for entrepreneurship education to increase the number of potential and future entrepreneurs. This was one of the starting points of the EXIST High Technology Entrepreneurship Postgraduate Program (EXIST HighTEPP). The other reason for the BMB+F to fund EXIST HighTEPP was to support the start-up of new high-tech companies in growth industries.The EXIST HighTEPP program was based on the close interdisciplinary cooperation between the three participating fields: entrepreneurship, information and communication technologies (ICT), as well as biotechnology (with the latter two representing high-growth industries). In addition to enhancing the knowledge base in entrepreneurship, EXIST HighTEPP aimed at developing scholars knowledgeable in the state of the art of the dominant technologies and technological developments.At the core of the postgraduate program were three professors, staffed with one post-doc position and six PhD students each, all funded by the BMB+F. (In a second round of the program, eight additional PhD positions were funded). Initially, each PhD student received a full scholarship for two years to cover living expenses, the post-docs received three years of funding. The duration of these periods could be extended. (In Germany, tuition for doctoral students consists of a nominal registration fee only.) The shear size of the project was a major step on the path towards building critical mass in the fields of entrepreneurship research and education in Germany.Entrepreneurship research activities\nDiscussion and conclusions: which lessons can be learned?: To summarize, the following key features differentiated EXIST HighTEPP from other programs:* The program was based on cooperation between entrepreneurship scholars and natural scientists. This academic group was in close contact with renowned established and start-up firms, and the governmental agency sponsoring the program.* Intensive cooperation with companies facilitated empirical work, and established contacts and networking[8].* The program's participants worked on research projects and business plans for start-up companies, enabling them to gain practical and research experience in the field. Practical experience in entrepreneurial activities contributed to enhancing their credibility and perceived legitimacy as entrepreneurship teachers.* The support of the start-up activities of technology-based ventures by members of the program contributed to the regional development of Thuringia (Jena) and Bavaria (Bamberg and Regensburg), with 17 new companies coming into operation.* The participants went through a variety of educational modules to obtain additional knowledge in other areas (such as biotechnology knowledge for PhD students in entrepreneurship).* The program contributed to the existing courses on new venture creation at the three participating universities.In hindsight, several success factors and challenges become obvious. In total, 20 students finished their PhDs (and three more are to finish shortly), of which 17 were on entrepreneurship. Thus, the program contributed substantially to the knowledge development in the field. Six of the program participants continue to work in academia in post-doc or tenured positions, helping to fill the gap of well-trained entrepreneurship scholars. In addition to doctoral dissertations, some 20 articles have been accepted for publication in peer-reviewed academic journals so far, and earlier versions of these papers have been presented at international research conferences (such as the Academy of Management, Strategic Management Society or Babson conferences).The interdisciplinary approach was a clear advantage of the program. It conveyed relevant know-how in important areas, and allowed people to enhance their interdisciplinary team-working skills. Conducting workshops in which people took on different roles facilitated the learning processes. The aim was not to become experts in other disciplines, but to \"speak the language\" and improve the ability to cooperate, as well as for example the ability to judge the quality of business plans stemming from that field.The coaching of 25 start-up projects by program members has led to ten prizes in regional business plan competitions. A total of 17 new companies went into operation.More formalized PhD course work would have further improved the quality of the program. Due to the general lack of entrepreneurship education in Germany, the PhD students did not have a background in this field. Also, more extensive methodology training would have most probably contributed to producing even higher quality theses. The program leaders did respond to this need by holding a number of methodology- and theory-based workshops, but more extensive training would have been beneficial.The large number of different actors involved in the network carried the risk of heterogeneous expectations and goals, which could have caused dissatisfaction with the program. But, in the case of EXIST HighTEPP the three professors made it clear from the beginning that they and their teams constituted the core of the network, while other actors had more of a support and learning function. Thus, the heterogeneity of goals did not become problematic. A challenge was the fact that contacts to the network companies were usually organized through one key person in that company. Therefore, some contacts became instable when that person left the company.Finally, the financing of such a PhD program dedicated to entrepreneurship is a crucial issue. But the prospect of developing a well-trained group of scholars with enough practical insights to be able to credibly teach entrepreneurship hopefully is a good reason for some governments to provide funding. After all, most countries are in dire need of a larger number of start-ups in high-growth industries - a crucial element in creating new jobs.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - To date, entrepreneurship education mainly targets pupils of different age groups as well as undergraduate and graduate students. Despite a growing interest in entrepreneurship there are few doctoral programs solely dedicated to it. Doctoral education is a crucial element to develop qualified scholars in the field, especially in countries without a strong tradition in entrepreneurship education. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to present and discuss a doctoral program in high-tech entrepreneurship in Germany as a good-practice case for establishing such programs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper is based on a single-case study. Both authors were involved in the program in different roles. One played a leading part in designing and running it, the other was recruited into it. Empirically, the case is based on program documentation, personal accounts, as well as communication with other people involved in the program.\nFindings: - Success factors for establishing a postgraduate entrepreneurship education program include cooperation between different academic institutions, entrepreneurial and established companies, as well as government agencies.\nResearch limitations/implications: - This paper draws heavily on the authors' personal experiences and reflections. Thus, a potential point of criticism is possible bias. Yet, the personal involvement provides unique insights which would otherwise have been difficult to obtain.\nPractical implications: - Some success factors as well as challenges in setting up and running similar programs are provided.\nOriginality/value: - The value of this paper lies in a detailed account of the case of putting in place a unique high-technology postgraduate entrepreneurship program. The paper broadens the focus of the entrepreneurship education literature.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Hospital disaster management's understanding of built environment impacts on healthcare services during extreme weather events
|
[
"Hospitals",
"Learning",
"Resilience",
"Disaster management",
"Built environment",
"Extreme weather events"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Extreme weather events (EWEs) are caused by an individual climate variable such as temperature or rainfall that \"exceeds a particular threshold and deviates significantly from mean climate conditions or when there is a critical combination of different variables\" (Linnenluecke and Griffiths, 2010, p. 2). The increasing impact of EWEs on critical infrastructure such as roads, water and power supplies is well documented (Field et al., 2012). The impact of hospital infrastructure is less well understood (Loosemore et al., 2012), and the recent EWE experiences around the world highlight their vulnerability to such events. For instance, some hospitals were completely destroyed during 2004 Hurricane Katrina in the USA (Rodriguez and Aguirre, 2006) and in Australia many hospitals have been damaged and cut-off from surrounding communities during severe cyclones, storms and major flooding events in the recent past (Hunter New England Health, 2007; O'Brien, 2009; Schulenberg, 2009). Research shows that these vulnerabilities arose from many design-related and organisational factors and were exacerbated by the complexity of hospital operations, the large number of stakeholders involved and the interdependency of hospitals with external emergency services such as the emergency services (Achour and Price, 2010; McGeorge et al., 2011).\nReconceptualising resilient hospital infrastructure: There has been a considerable amount of health facility-related research into how hospitals manage the risks of EWEs. For example, Carthey et al. (2008) assessed the adaptive capacity of hospitals to cope with EWEs, Chow et al. (2012) used a systems dynamics approach to model the impact of EWEs on hospital facilities, while McGeorge et al. (2011) used rich picture diagrams to do the same. Loosemore et al. (2010, 2014) explored EWEs from a hospital risk management perspective and Loosemore et al. (2013) explored the inter-agency risks of managing a hospital response to an EWE in Australia. Research on organisational learning in hospitals and on hospital resilience has also been undertaken. For example, Chandra and Loosemore (2010, 2011) explored the process of cultural learning during the briefing of hospital projects using cognitive mapping methods, although not in an EWE context. Achour and Price (2010) explored healthcare resilience strategies in two major hospitals in the UK and Taiwan using semi-structured interviews with emergency officers to clarify the strategies setup to respond to emergencies. Their findings showed that despite the robust emergency planning, many problems arose due to the failure of not working closer with multi-disciplinary experts, who provide technical and tactical help and lessons learned from international best practices. The study also suggested that climate change must be addressed comprehensively through fusing resilience and sustainability strategies into a more comprehensive strategy of adaptation. However, while it is clear that both learning and resilience theories can provide important new insights into the management of health facilities in high risk contexts, no research has as yet sought to integrate these theories in conceptualising and understanding how hospitals can better support healthcare outcomes during EWEs.\nThe HRLC: A HRLC framework (Figure 3) integrates learning and resilience theories for the first time, providing new insights into the learning processes underpinning hospital responses to EWEs. Each phase of the HRLC model is described below in the context of hospital responses to EWEs.\nMethodology and method: The social process of learning and adaptation described in the HRLC model were explored using a constructionism ontology which implies that the construction of knowledge in hospitals is shaped by social processes and shared interactions amongst hospital stakeholders (David and Sutton, 2011). This in turn leads to an interpretive epistemology which recognises the need to use qualitative methods of data collection to identify the multiple social constructions of the phenomena of learning and adaptation during an EWE (Young and Collin, 2004).\nDiscussion of results: Before progressing to discuss the results, it is important to note that this research took place in Australia, a context which may limit the generalisability of the findings to other contexts. First, Australia faces unique types of EWEs and related health implications which other countries might not face. The nature of these challenges impact directly on the types of lessons which hospitals in different countries would have to learn, even though the cognitive mechanisms by which this happens are universal. For example, Hughes and McMichael (2011) found that EWEs have potentially serious consequences for Australian's health. More frequent and intense heatwaves can result in more heart attacks, strokes, accidents, heat exhaustion and death. Storms, floods and cyclones can result in more injuries, deaths and post-traumatic stress. More fires from heatwaves can increase cases of smoke-induced asthma attacks, burns and death. Other less predictable health impacts from EWEs include more exposure to air pollutants and air-borne allergens, such as pollens and moulds, exacerbating respiratory illnesses, such as asthma, hay fever and longer term heart and lung diseases; increases in the spread and activity of disease transmitting mosquitoes and increasing the chances of food-borne infections; a higher prevalence of mental health problems and lower morale in rural communities; reduced supply and increased prices of some foods, resulting in reduced nutrition; displacement of people from within and outside of Australia and community-wide negative effects on social and economic wellbeing. All of these impacts they concluded will put increased pressure on health systems and emergency responses, delaying effective delivery of healthcare. While other countries around the world might face similar challenges, it is important to note that our results are presented in the context of these direct EWE threats. Furthermore, the way that Australian health professionals might react is likely to be influenced by the Federal system of government in Australia, where the central Federal Government requires individual states to develop their own DMPs. Individual hospital disaster planning in each state then falls under the State Health Plan and DMP. As Loosemore et al. (2013) found, this complex multi-layered governance structure presents uniquely overlapping structures and processes which might hinder learning about EWEs. Once again, this governance system differs in various parts of the world. The Federal Department of Health and Human Services in the USA oversee the national public health and medical emergencies through their national committees/agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, frameworks (e.g. The National Response Framework) and programme (The National Healthcare Preparedness Programme). state, territory and local municipal hospital disaster preparedness comply with the national policies and response is escalated to Federal if the local/state disaster response resources are exhausted. The National Healthcare Preparedness Programme also provide grants and cooperative agreements between healthcare and emergency response bodies to form health coalitions and work collaboratively towards improving their capacities to deal with disasters (Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 2010; Office of the Assistant Secretary for preparedness and response (OASPR), 2012). In the UK, the Federal Department of Health is the lead agency for health emergencies that develops plans and policies and sets disaster response actions and activities across all jurisdictions (Department of Health UK, 2015).\nConclusion: The aim of this paper was to explore the extent to which hospital stakeholders' appreciate the role of built infrastructure in delivering effective healthcare services to the community during EWEs. By integrating theories of learning and resilience for the first time, it presented a new conceptual model which was tested using documentary analysis of DMPs and a focus group with professionals involved in disaster management planning and response. The findings indicate that there is a highly variable focus on built facilities in current health DMPs in Australia. In some hospitals there is no detectable focus at all. They also highlight a widespread assumption in the health disaster planning community that hospital built infrastructure will be unaffected by the EWEs and is already resilient in responding and adapting to any challenges it may face. This complacency means that many hospitals will be unaware of the risks that their buildings pose to the delivery of healthcare services to the community during an EWE and how to manage those risks effectively when something goes wrong. Given ongoing research which continues to point to an increasing incidence of EWEs into the future, this is a worrying finding. It is particularly worrying given the accumulating research that also points to the vulnerability of hospitals, both new and old, to EWEs.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the extent to which hospital disaster planners and managers understand the role of built infrastructure in delivering effective healthcare services during extreme weather events (EWEs). There is substantial evidence to indicate that many hospitals are vulnerable to EWEs. This is alarming given community reliance on hospitals during times of natural disaster and the predicted increase in the frequency and intensity of EWEs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In this paper, resilience and learning theories are combined to produce a new conceptual model which illustrates how hospital disaster managers learn about the relationship between health outcomes and built infrastructure during EWEs to build future hospital resilience. In this paper, the first part of the conceptual model, concerning the development of disaster management plans is explored and refined using a thematic content analysis of 14 Australian hospitals' disaster plans and supplementary plans.\nFindings: The findings indicate high variability of understanding about the role of built facilities in health outcomes during an EWE. There appears to be a widespread and highly questionable assumption in the health disaster planning community that hospital built infrastructure is highly resilient to EWEs. This means that many hospitals will not be unaware of the risks that their buildings pose in the delivery of healthcare services to the community during an EWE and how to manage those risks effectively.\nResearch limitations/implications: The theoretical framework presented in this paper provides new insights which will enable hospital infrastructure resilience to be better integrated into health service disaster risk planning and preparedness. The findings can help hospital disaster managers learn about and adapt their built environment to changing healthcare needs during EWEs.\nOriginality/value: By integrating learning and resilience theories in a built environment context, this paper provides new insights, both theoretical and practical, into the important role of hospital infrastructure in planning for EWEs.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Impact of remittances on economic performance in consideration of institutional quality: Evidence from Asian developing economies
|
[
"Asian developing countries",
"GMM",
"Economic growth",
"Institutional quality",
"Remittances",
"C23",
"F24",
"O43"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The significant and constant growth of cross-border migration, an important outcome of globalization, has raised many issues and questions in the fields of economics and business. There are various factors that lead to the expansion of global migration. One of the major causes is the significant income gap between the origin and the destination countries. According to the World Bank's Migration and Remittances Fact book 2016, more than 250 million people, or 3.4 percent of the world population, live outside their countries of birth. Migration is often viewed as an opportunity to improve people's standards of living. It is evident that those living and working abroad in developed countries can earn more than they could in their home (developing) countries.One important feature associated with migration is the flow of remittances. Particularly this feature has attracted the attention of many scholars and policymakers since 2000, because of its considerable size for many developing countries, which exceeds, in many cases, the volume of foreign aid. The World Bank estimated that global remittances, which include flows to high-income countries in 2018, reached $689 billion, which is more than three times the size of official development assistance in the world (World Bank, 2018). Given the increasing amount and importance of remittances in total international capital flows, a study on the links between remittances and growth, especially how local financial sector development influences a country's capacity to take advantage of remittances, shows that remittances boost growth in countries with less developed financial system where financial sector does not meet the credit needs of the population by providing an alternative way to finance entrepreneurs and their investment (Giuliano and Ruiz-Arranz, 2009). Despite the growing vulnerability of migrants, remittances have remained stable during and after the global economic downturn. Moreover, remittances have proven to be a more sustainable source of foreign currency for developing countries than other capital inflows such as foreign direct investment (FDI), public debt, or official development assistance. However, the nexus between remittances and development remains complex.Exploring various facets of high migration and remittances in the case of Nepal, Sapkota (2013) shows remittance-induced Dutch disease effects and policy laxity to improve investment climate in Nepal. He suggests that they should learn to live with the remittances and to gradually channel them to productive usages if they want to avoid the costly scenario of sterilizing the impact of remittances each year and to boost productivity. Chitambara (2019) finds out the positive relationship between remittances and growth in a panel of 26 African countries over the period of 1980-2014. The growth in these countries is enhanced by the presence of strong institutions. Another recent study conducted by Shukralla (2016) examines the remittance growth nexus of 55 developing countries with consideration of institutional roles. Although he provides little link between remittances and growth, he finds that the impact of institutions on the remittance growth nexus depends on how the institutions are organized and work in each country. In an appropriate institutional setting where the policy roles are toward the effective regulation of markets, the remittances can lead to desirable results. In short, in the presence of effective policy, the wise use of remittances toward economic development can be expected.We find, through the literature review, that the previous studies produce contradictory outcomes regarding the impact of remittances on the economic performance. This inconsistency in the existing results can be another motive for conducting our research on the relationship between remittances and economic performance in consideration of institutional quality.But, instead of taking into account as many countries as possible with numerous differences in their developmental phases, locations, and the like, we consider only 16 countries mostly located in the Asian continent, including five countries of South Asia (Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka), eight countries of ASEAN (Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam), and three countries of Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan). Most of these countries can be characterized by low income as well as low level of economic development. These countries also exhibit a similar development phase and can be categorized into three separate clusters, South Asia, ASEAN, and Central Asia, thus having relatively similar cultural and social attributes, respectively, which may, in turn, facilitate our empirical analysis. In addition, remittances contribute a significant portion of GDP in the majority of these countries, with comparatively lower institutional qualities than those of the developed countries.To the best of our knowledge, this study may be the first that exclusively focuses on developing Asian economies. Another novelty of this study can be that it analyzed empirically the impact of institutional factors on economic performance. Since institutional factors have played only a minor role in the literature on remittances so far, this study is trying to fill the gap. Hence, this research is aimed to examine remittances and their impact on growth, with special consideration of interaction effects of remittances and institutional quality in emerging Asian economies. Panel ordinary least squares (OLS) and systemic generalized method of moments (GMM) are used as methodology to analyze the impact of remittances on the economic performance.\n2. Remittance trends in terms of facts and figures: Figure 1 shows that most of the remittances were received in India, which accounted for 20 percent of the total remittances received in 2016. India was then followed by China, the Philippines, Mexico, and Pakistan, all of which comprise the top five. In 2016, India received total remittances of around $62.7 billion. However, this figure was smaller than $68.9 billion India received in 2015. Again, in 2017, the remittance inflows to India increased by 9.9 percent in 2017. Global remittance, which includes flows from high-income countries such as U.S.A and Saudi Arabia, grew from US$573 billion in 2016 to US$613 billion in 2017, which means 7 percent increase (see Figure 2). This strong recovery can be due to the economic growth in Europe, Russia, and the United States (World Bank, 2017).Remittances to the East Asia and the Pacific region increased by 5.8 percent to $130 billion in 2017 despite the decline of 2.6 percent in 2016 compared to the previous year of 2015. Remittances to Central Asia grew by 21 percent to $48 billion in 2017. Remittances to South Asia also grew by 5.8 percent to $117 billion in 2017.Figure 3 shows the countries with the highest remittance-to-GDP ratio. Nepal was on the top of the list in 2016 in terms of remittance to GDP ratio and followed by Kyrgyzstan, Haiti, Tajikistan, and Liberia. All these countries make up the top five. Among Central Asian Countries, the Kyrgyz Republic and Tajikistan were the highest remittance recipients in 2016 when accounted for in terms of GDP. However, ASEAN countries could not make it to the list (see Figure 4).Figure 5 compares the remittances received by the Central Asia, SAARC (South Asia), and ASEAN regions. As is evident from the following figure, South Asia enjoys more remittance inflows in comparison to the Central Asia and ASEAN regions. This may be due to the availability of greater youth population in the South Asian region migrating abroad for earning purposes. Although South Asia was home to almost a quarter of the total population of the world (as of World Bank Data 2016), it received only approximately 20 percent of the total remittances in 2016. Central Asia has a record of the least remittance inflows in the region, whereas ASEAN lies between SAARC (South Asia) and Central Asia in terms of the volume of remittances flowing into the region. In comparison to other regions, ASEAN has maintained a consistent level of remittance flows.\n3. Theoretical framework: 3.1 Concept of remittances\n4. Methodology: 4.1 Model specification\n5. Empirical analysis: 5.1 Basic statistics\n6. Conclusion and policy implications: The increased flow of remittances in the Asian economies has divided scholars and policymakers regarding their conclusions about the effects of remittances on various social and economic variables. The flow of remittances alone cannot ensure economic development; it must be channeled through the financial system, and this is only guaranteed by the existence of an efficient and effective institutional framework.The major findings of this study include:(1) Remittances have statistically significant effect on economic growth. (2) The institutional quality of nonfinancial institutions also plays an important role in the growth of the Asian economies, which is evidenced by the growth of the developed nations. The institutional quality poses positive as well as significant impact on the economic growth. (3) It has been found out that South Asian countries, East Asian countries, and Central Asian countries have been receiving remittances for decades long, but these remittances have not contributed directly to the growth. (4) Remittances-financial interaction coefficient was found positive and significant. (5) The impact of remittances does not depend on the level of ICT.As the results show, the presence of a sound and smooth institutional framework can facilitate the various investment activities and ultimately contribute to the long-run growth process. The result of this study in case of Asian developing regions resembles the results of the studies done by Mijiyawa (2013) and Anyanwu (2014) where they found out that the government effectiveness affects Africa's economic growth.There has been increasing flow of remittances to developing countries over the last decade, but so far there has been no uniformity in the result of the research studies based on the remittances. Still, there are contradictory findings. Catrinescua et al. (2009) found out the contribution of remittances to growth will be more plausible in countries with quality institutions and economic policies. This study also obtained similar results that sound institutional quality acts as a catalyst for remittances to help contribute to the growth of the Asian developing nations. The essence of this result is that remittances alone cannot materialize the growth of the countries. Sound institutions play a vital role in the growth of these Asian countries.Policy implications of this study can be that, as witnessed in the results, nonfinancial institutional quality as well as financial institution has an important role in the way remittances contribute to growth process of Asian countries. Furthermore, the savings from remittances when intermediated through the formal financial channels will in fact produce positive allocation and distribution of resources that eventually become important sources of growth. However, one precondition for the greater growth is that the remittances need to be well utilized and properly used by the financial sector.The remittance recipients when using the formal channels can also have the opportunity to use other financial products and services enhancing the credit channels, which also tend to impact the monetary policy goals. Countries with stronger institutional quality can utilize remittances more effectively and convert them to growth better than those with weaker institutional system. Policies that favor the formation of quality institutions, which can facilitate investment activities and make the flow of remittances more convenient, should be made and implemented. In addition, the policies that aim at reducing the cost of remittances are also needed. A reduction of costs for sending remittances would encourage senders to use the formal channels, which eventually will increase the flow of remittances and achieve increased growth in the long run. Instead of relying on ODA, the countries of the three regions can increase productivity if they can make the best use of their own available resources.There are limitations to this research as well. Due to the unavailability of data, few Asian countries had to be removed from this study. Because of the same reason, cultural aspects were not considered, which when included would otherwise produce more reliable and concrete results. The cost of sending remittances might be an important variable for this study. However, the data on this variable from the reliable source is almost impossible to gather. Therefore, this variable is also not included in this research.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to empirically assess the impact of remittances on the economic performance of the 16 Asian developing countries, taking account of their institutional qualities.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A panel of 16 Asian developing countries (Central Asia, South Asia, and ASEAN) over the period of 2002-2016 is employed in the analysis. To assess the impact of remittances on economic performance in consideration of institutional quality, OLS estimates as well as GMM are used.\nFindings: The effect of remittances on economic growth is statistically significant. In addition, they also impact economic growth when they interact with institutional or financial development variables. For the long-run growth process of Central Asian, South Asian, and ASEAN countries, a sound and smooth institutional framework appears to be indispensable. Also, it was found that more fragile economies tend to achieve bigger growth than less fragile economies, as this kind of growth is triggered by more remittances flowing into fragile economies. However, the impact of remittances on growth does not depend on the level of ICT. FDI and financial development have positive impact on growth.\nResearch limitations/implications: There are limitations to this research as well. Due to the unavailability of data, several countries had to be removed from this study. The cost of sending money might be an important variable for this study. However, the data on this variable from reliable sources are almost impossible to gather. Therefore, this variable is also not included in this research. The savings from remittances when intermediated through formal financial channels will, in fact, produce a positive allocation and distribution of resources that may eventually become an important source of growth. However, one precondition for larger and greater growth is that remittances need to be well and properly utilized by the financial sector. Therefore, quality institutions should be formed first, which can facilitate investment activities and make the flow of remittances more convenient.\nOriginality/value: This paper exclusively considers the case of Asian developing countries (Central Asia, South Asia, and ASEAN) to assess the impact of remittances on the economic performance of these countries, with special consideration of the interaction effects of remittances and institutional quality in these emerging Asian economies. The previous studies on the effect of remittances on growth do not conform to one concrete conclusion. This study is undertaken in a bid to get the best possible result on the impact of remittances on the growth of the selected countries, majority of which attract substantial chunk of remittances into their economies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Does the crowd mean business? An analysis of rewards-based crowdfunding as a source of finance for start-ups and small businesses
|
[
"Entrepreneurial finance",
"Small business",
"Financial sources",
"Reward-based crowdfunding"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Start-ups and small businesses represent a hub for innovation and growth in many economies (Beck and Demirguc-Kunt, 2008; Agenor et al., 2014; Brancati, 2015). One of the most commonly cited obstacles for start-ups and small businesses is raising sufficient funding to finance their business plans and exploit growth and investment opportunities (Kortum and Lerner, 2000; Gompers and Lerner, 2004). Against this backdrop, a consensus has started to emerge among practitioners and academics that reward-based crowdfunding represents a crucial new source of entrepreneurial finance (Bruton et al., 2015; James, 2014; Mollick, 2014; among others).\n2. Background to crowdfunding: Although crowdfunding itself is not a fundamentally new concept, the rapid growth of the internet has been a catalyst for its emergence. Starting as a means of raising funds for artistic and creative projects, crowdfunding now encompasses a much broader range of activities, from small charitable endeavours to businesses seeking hundreds of thousands of dollars in return for equity (Freedman and Nutting, 2015). The notion of crowdfunding is rooted in the broader concept of crowdsourcing, which involves gathering ideas, feedback and solutions from a large volume of contributors (\"the crowd\"). By extension, crowdfunding is a means by which individuals and organisations can raise funds by aggregating relatively small donations from large numbers of funders. So far, the most widely accepted formal definition has come from Belleflamme et al. (2014), who suggest that crowdfunding represents:[...] an open call, mostly through the Internet, for the provision of financial resources either in form of donation or in exchange for the future product or some form of reward to support initiatives for specific purposes.\n3. Theory and literature: Start-ups and small businesses resort to different sources of finance to fund their activities and growth opportunities, such as family and friends, bank and government loans and angel and venture capitalists, among others (Berger and Udell, 2006; Beck and Demirguc-Kunt, 2006). Nevertheless, financial market imperfections, such as information asymmetry, transaction costs and contract enforcement costs, significantly limit entrepreneurs and small businesses accessing finance due to them lacking collateral, credit history, reputation or connections necessary to acquire it (Beck et al., 2007). For instance, large banks and financial institutions may find it prohibitively costly to monitor the activities of small businesses (Korosteleva and Mickiewicz, 2011), while venture capitalists may find the funds required by start-ups to be too small to justify their involvement. Therefore, constrained access to finance is widely recognised as a key challenge for start-ups and small businesses in both theory and practice (Kortum and Lerner, 2000; Gompers and Lerner, 2004).\n4. Data: Our data sample was obtained from directly accessing the database compiled by the Crowd Data Center (www.thecrowdfundingcenter.com). The Center uses specialist software to automatically extract all publicly available data on a number of leading crowdfunding platforms. We focussed our analysis exclusively on data from reward-based platforms, excluding any data from models such as equity crowdfunding. Our data set contains comprehensive, intra-daily information on a total of 205,659 campaigns listed between 1 January 2014 and 30 June 2015. For each project, a range of data was collected, including the type of project, category, platform, target, the amount raised and the number of backers. When aggregated, this allowed us to analyse broader patterns of demand and supply in reward-based crowdfunding for both North America and the UK, while also allowing us to investigate issues at a micro-level, such as comparing the performance of different types of crowdfunding campaigns and platforms.\n5. Analysis: The broad overview of our data set provided in the previous section indicates that the amounts raised by crowdfunding projects are typically relatively small. In order to further explore our primary research question, we now focus on the performance of \"Business\" campaigns, which explicitly attempt to raise funds in order to support the business functions of start-ups and other small business activities. Table III contains a summary of the distribution of each campaign in our data sample according to their fundraising category. It can be seen that a total of 9,502 campaigns are listed in the \"Business\" category, accounting for 4.62 per cent of the total number of observations within the sample. The average proportion of campaigns in each category is only 2.5 per cent, suggesting that business-related projects are fairly well-represented in reward-based crowdfunding. Indeed, \"Business\" campaigns constitute the eighth most represented category behind film (12.59 per cent), music (10.32 per cent), community (8.49 per cent), technology (7.38 per cent), art (6.66 per cent), publishing (5.66 per cent) and food (4.88 per cent). However, the data also show that the success rate for these campaigns is much lower than the average observed across other categories. Only about 4.6 per cent of business-related reward-based crowdfunding campaigns meet or exceed their original targets, compared to the 23 per cent average success rate observed across the whole data set. In aggregate, business-related crowdfunding projects are shown to raise an average of $1,000, with an average of $10,000 observed among projects that successfully achieve their funding goals.\n6. Discussion: Managerial and practical implications\n7. Conclusion: This study presents unique evidence on the current state of reward-based crowdfunding activity and has resultantly made a number of unique contributions to the emerging literature on the subject. We are the first study to analyse data on the performance of projects hosted across a sample of reward-based crowdfunding platforms. The data used in our study have been collected on a consistent and systematic basis over the course of an 18-month period between January 2014 and June 2015 in order to establish the nature and pattern of activity across the sector. To our knowledge, no other study to date has attempted to provide such a broad perspective on reward-based crowdfunding activity, instead limiting their enquiries to data obtained from a single platform (usually Kickstarter). We also uniquely focussed our analysis on the relative performance of business projects in order to determine the extent to which reward-based crowdfunding leads to widespread access to seed funding for start-ups and small enterprises.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which rewards-based crowdfunding really does provide financial support for start-ups and small businesses relative to other types of activity such as creative and cultural projects.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper reports findings from a series of multiple regression on a unique data set covering around 205,000 rewards-based crowdfunding projects across a number of leading platforms in the USA, the UK and Canada.\nFindings: The authors report two main findings. First, rewards-based crowdfunding is highly inequitably distributed and that success is concentrated within a relatively small number of platforms and campaigns. Second, crowdfunding campaigns explicitly related to business perform relatively poorly compared with those in other categories; particularly those in creative areas such as music and dance.\nOriginality/value: These findings call into question the extent to which rewards-based crowdfunding really is a means by which significant numbers of start-ups can bridge gaps in the provision of finance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Cross-country analysis of price levels and dispersion in online and offline environments: an empirical analysis in France and Germany
|
[
"Pricing",
"Statistical dispersion",
"France",
"Germany"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction and research questions: In spite of the initial predictions about the \"frictionless effect\" of the internet (Bakos, 1997) in the last few years a growing number of theoretical and empirical studies have found that price dispersion is persistent among e-tailers and is no lower online than offline (Scholten and Smith, 2002); the same is for price levels, which in many cases could be higher online than offline (Ancarani and Shankar, 2004). Moreover, with the emergence of the internet as a significant channel, retailers increasingly compete in multiple channels and competition arises among three types of retailers: pure-play internet e-tailers, bricks-and-mortar or traditional or offline retailers, and bricks-and-clicks or multichannel retailers, which sometimes coexist for most product categories (Zettelmeyer, 2000). Moreover, comparison of prices with shipping costs is different from that of posted prices, thus showing the critical role of shipping costs in price differentiation for online retailers (Ancarani and Shankar, 2004).Prior research on price levels has examined price differences between both pure-play internet e-tailers and bricks-and-mortar retailers and has also compared all the three types of retailers at the same time: the typical level of the above-mentioned studies, however, is one single country. As a consequence, with the exception of few studies (Baye et al., 2003), possible differences across countries are not accounted for; moreover, Baye et al. (2003) focus on only one e-tailer, namely Kelkoo. Recent research on international cross-country price comparison, mainly connected with the Euro (EUR) changeover, has not focused on the online world; a review of previous studies (Allington et al., 2005) suggests that many causes can act against the so-called Law Of One Price (LOOP), i.e. the process of convergence of price levels and dispersion in a single currency area. Among the obstacles, transportation and shipping costs play an important role, as well as cross-border search costs and lack of price transparency. The internet is supposed to reduce these frictions and to drive prices towards the direction of LOOP: is this the reality?In the present research, differently from previous research on online price comparison, we take into account the country effect and compare price levels and dispersion across different countries. Differently from previous research on cross-country price comparison, we take into consideration online v. offline comparison.Some competing hypothesis may emerge.Retailer prices and price dispersion by retailer type may be similar across countries, because the different European countries are undergoing a process of gradual economic convergence (Halliburton and Hunerberg, 2004). The boundary-less feature of the internet can have a positive influence on similarity of retailer price levels and dispersion across countries (Sinha, 2000). But retailer prices and price dispersion may also be different in different countries (Muller-Lankenau et al., 2006). In fact, internet adoption is diffusing at different rates in different countries, consumer behavior with regard to use of internet may be different across countries, price sensitivities may differ across countries and retail competition may be different in different countries. Moreover, cross cultural differences may affect prices (Ackerman and Tellis, 2001; Kaynak and Jallat, 2004).By knowing the relative levels of prices and price dispersions in the online and offline world, we can gain insights into the nature of competition across countries, thus adding a new dimension in price comparisons in online and offline environments.In this paper, we address the above questions and gaps in prior research and we present our empirical analysis based on data in one product category - compact discs (CDs) for the two largest Continental European markets, namely France and Germany.\nReview of relevant literature and hypothesis development: In the following paragraphs we will briefly review two streams of literature; the stream of literature on the effects of the internet on price levels and dispersion and the one on cross-country price comparison.Study on the effects of the internet on price levels and dispersion\nData, measures and methods: In order to test our hypotheses we developed a research design that covers:* different channels (online versus offline);* different pricing modes (list price versus list price plus shipping costs); and* different countries (France versus Germany), adopting the same currency.As regards products, we choose CDs for our empirical analysis since this category:* has been widely studied by other researchers; and* allows comparison of completely homogeneous products.Over a period of five weeks in 2003 we conducted weekly price observations and collected price quotes by following the structure as indicated in Table I.France and Germany were selected as survey countries since the two markets are the most important in Continental Europe in terms of size and development and are generally considered as somewhat similar with respect to legal constraints and some habits of consumption.For each country we created a list of the current 20 top selling CDs on the market. Radio stations, music magazines and also retailers regularly publish rankings of that kind and our study revealed a high degree of congruence between different sources of information. Although the two lists of CDs were not identical for the two countries, we regard the two of them as fulfilling and serving the same need for consumers in each country and thus appropriate as an object of comparison for our purpose in the paper[1]. Dealers have been selected according to the \"market share criterion\" (Brynjolfsson and Smith, 2000), offline or online, thus excluding niche retailers. As had to be expected the list of dealers again is not identical for the two countries. However one dealer, namely Amazon, appears on both. From this observation we draw even more support for our basic proposition of investigating cross country effects on price levels and dispersion among retailer types.As far as price modes are concerned, four different price quote types are included in our study: store prices for CDs from offline dealers, and for online dealers' pure list prices, prices including shipping costs when one item is ordered, and prices including shipping costs when three items are ordered.This design leads to 800 price quote observations in our study for each country. For France not all CD titles remained on each retailer's shelves or product list over the complete period of our study. This led to a loss of altogether 54 price quotes for the country. However, we consider this as still acceptable and not reducing the general validity of our study. For Germany, all 800 price quotes from the sample structure were available.\nResults: The data set as resulting from this survey accommodates for multiple ways of comparing price quotes. As a first step we calculated mean prices over all titles and all observation dates for each channel and respective pricing mode in the two countries. Results are depicted in Table II.An average store price at offline dealers of EUR18.10 per CD versus an average list price of EUR17.31 at online dealers in France supports hypothesis H1. ANOVA test for the two concerned sub-samples of price quotes in fact reveals that this difference is significant at a sufficient level (F 6.477; df 365; sig. 0.011). The same picture emerges for Germany where the level of significance is even more supportive (F 70.752; df 399; sig. <0.001).When alternating the point of reference for our comparison from pure e-tailer list prices to e-tailer prices including shipping cost for a single item, however, the order changes with online being more expensive than offline for consumers. ANOVA results for the German data set thus support H2 clearly (F 148.191; df 399; sig. <0.001). For France adjusted online prices are also higher than offline store prices with the level of significance for this difference as calculated from ANOVA being still sufficient but slightly weaker than for Germany (F 4.638; df 365; sig. 0.032).These results support H1 and H2, in that list prices are lower online than offline, but become higher when adding shipping costs.For the second step of our data analysis we switched from within country comparisons of mean price levels to an across countries data analysis. Table III discloses the central findings.For the two retailer types, online as well as offline, and all pricing modes as they apply to the respective dealer type, we discover a clear country effect with mean prices being consistently lower in Germany as compared to France. ANOVA for the different sub-samples indicates a strong significance for this finding. Thus, with F-values between 11.04 and 91.81 and levels of significance at 0.001 or below our hypothesis H3 receives clear support (see Table III).Standard deviation was used as the measurement for price dispersion. We calculated standard deviations for altogether eight data subsets and results are shown in Table IV. In order to identify statistical significance for differences in standard deviation we used the Levene statistic as implemented in SPSS 16.0. A first look at the values for standard deviation reveals for Germany as well as for France a higher degree of online price dispersion than offline. With respect to statistical significance we meet good standards for the German data sub-set and receive support for hypothesis H4 and hypothesis H5 (F 4.175; df 796; sig. 0.006). For the French data set significance standards are not met (F 0.031; df 742; sig. >0.010).A cross countries comparison for standard deviation as measurement for price dispersion reveals clear and statistically significant differences between the two sample countries. This accounts for both dealer types and over all pricing modes, with an increased level of price dispersion in France when compared to Germany. In all cases the significance of findings is very strong with values below 0.001, and F-values (Levene statistic) range between 22.023 and 50.526. Thus, we can conclude that hypothesis H6 is supported clearly by our data.\nDiscussion: Our results on online v. offline price levels and dispersion comparison extend prior research (e.g. Pan et al., 2002a; Scholten and Smith, 2002; Ancarani and Shankar, 2004) by showing that:* list prices are lower online than offline in the two countries and the difference between online and offline list prices is very small in the two countries;* when shipping costs are included, on the contrary, prices are higher online than offline in the two countries;* price dispersion is higher online than offline in the countries, with or without shipping costs;* dispersion is persistent in online markets across countries; and* dispersion increases online merely by bundling a completely homogeneous product with a reasonably homogeneous service (shipment service), regardless of the country.Moreover, by focusing on two different European countries in the same economic area and using the same currency, our results extend prior research in the following respect:* regardless of the process of convergence of economies and currencies, price levels are still different in the two different countries, even with a reasonably homogeneous sample of products and retailers created with the same methodological approach; and* regardless of the process of convergence of economies and currencies, price dispersion is still different in the two different countries, even with a reasonably homogeneous sample of products and retailers created with the same methodological approach.Many are the possible causes of cross-country differences in price levels and price dispersion online.One first set of explanations could be related to the different structure of the internet market in the different countries. The number of internet users is different (30 millions in France, 43 in Germany, source: EIAA), as well as the penetration rate, which varies among European countries (41 percent in France, 56 percent in Germany, source: National Statistics). The same holds true for the size of the internet market and for the percentage of online sales on total retail sales (1 percent in France, 2.7 percent in Germany, source: Eurostat and BCG). The growth of online markets is different across countries, even if definitely more convergent (3.3 percent in France, 3.4 percent in Germany, source Eito). Moreover, bandwidth connections as well as bandwidth usage vary significantly across countries (7,000,000 connections in France and 28,250,000 connections in Germany, source Eito and ECTA). Also costs of bandwidth connection vary significantly across country (from EUR14.90 for an average monthly rate in France to EUR22.99 in Germany).One second set of explanations could be related to consumer attitudes towards the internet. Whereas in some countries consumers prefer searching for information online while buying offline, in other countries consumers are more ready to buy online. In some countries, moreover, there is a sort of reluctance to use the credit card in online transactions.One third set of explanations could be related to different retail market structure. In spite of the European Union convergence process (Halliburton and Hunerberg, 2004), retail markets in many countries are still very different from one another (Muller-Lankenau et al., 2006) and this has an important impact on price competition in online as well as offline distribution channels. Germany is, after the Scandinavian countries, the European market where the market share of large retailers (and discount retailers) is the biggest in Europe (5 percent against 2 percent France). Moreover, Germany has the cheapest index of prices in the European Retail Market (83), as compared to France (86) (source: A.C. Nielsen).\nManagerial implications: Our study may be interesting for practitioners, policy makers and managers in mainly two respects.Considerations related to online v. offline comparisons and multichannel opportunities\nLimitations and directions for future research: The current study has many limitations, thus opening space for further research.The study is referred only to one product category (CDs) in two European countries. In further research perspective, it can be extended to more product categories and more countries, including the USA and Asia. In particular, since we analyze only one product category, our findings can be difficult to generalize and more work is needed to check if the same results hold true for other product categories. Besides, the study is focused on best selling products, thus opening the problem of a \"loss leader\" bias. In further research perspective, it could be useful to create mixed samples of best selling products and other randomly selected products.The study shows interesting results of persisting differences in prices - either price level or price dispersion - (online and offline) for the two countries. This is only a descriptive result; it could be useful, in a further research perspective, to understand formally the drivers of differences of online and offline price levels and price dispersion across countries. In this respect, we searched for available data on structural differences between countries; more comparable data and primary data would be useful to estimate the impact of such drivers on price levels and price dispersion between countries.More subtle considerations based on international comparisons would be needed as well. A more sophisticated study of cross-country differences in price levels and dispersion should be adjusted for service quality across the two types of retailers (Pan et al. 2002b) and an analysis of market share outcomes for the two types of retailers would be useful.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this research is to take into consideration the country effect in online and offline environments and compares price levels and dispersion online v. offline across the two largest Continental European markets, thus adding a new dimension in price comparisons and multichannel pricing strategies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Based on an empirical analysis of data collected in one product category (CDs), our findings for France and Germany show that price levels -including shipping costs - are always higher online than offline in each country and price dispersion is persistent across markets. Calculating mean prices for the two countries, ANOVA tests reveal significant differences among the two sets of data. Using standard deviation as the measurement for price dispersion, Levene statistics reveal a higher degree of online price dispersion than offline and statistically significant differences between the two sample countries.\nFindings: - Even if our approach need to be extended to more product categories and more countries, our article may be interesting for practitioners, policy makers and managers. It clearly shows that the \"frictionless capitalism and cost transparency hypothesis\" has proven to be wrong most of the time even if many retailers still believe they must sacrifice the possibility of pricing up when they go on the internet. As demonstrated by our findings, retailers can take advantage of online relative indifference to price to capture some margin premium and enjoy excellent results.\nOriginality/value: - Our results also demonstrate that, even if results show some similarities and common trends, differences among France and Germany still remain important. As a consequence, marketers should continue to approach the European marketplace with full awareness of its diversity.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Financial indicators, informational environment of emerging markets and stock returns
|
[
"Emerging markets"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The financial statements are intended to provide their users with relevant information about the entity which is being reported. Such information should be useful to existing and potential investors, creditors and other stakeholders when making a decision regarding the provision of funds (Accounting Pronouncements Committee, 2012).\n2. Theoretical framework: 2.1 Market efficiency and expected returns\n3. Method: 3.1 Delimitation of the research sample\n4. Results: 4.1 Factor analysis\n5. Final considerations and recommendations: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of institutional and country factors on the interaction between financial variables and stock returns of companies located in emerging countries. The basis for this concern emerged from the analysis of the level of opacity of the country's reported earnings, which are measures based on the study developed by Bhattacharya et al. (2003), and of the use of international accounting standards.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the influence of the informational environment on the relevance of accounting information in companies traded in stock exchanges of emerging markets.\nDesign/methodology/approach: For this purpose, the authors calculated indicators based on figures derived from the financial statements and variables that sought to capture the influence of the economic and institutional environment. The sample consisted of publicly traded companies from 20 countries classified as emerging by Standard & Poors. Macroeconomic information was obtained through the International Country Risk Guide database. The analysis period ranged from 2004 to 2013, excluding missing data, variables considered as outliers, besides the exclusion of data from companies that presented negative equity.\nFindings: It was observed that the financial variables presented signs consistent with the literature, except for the price-to-book variable and the asset change variable. The inclusion of variables related to the accounting informational environment offered evidence that the more opaque the accounting environment in the country, the lesser the ability of the profits to portray the variations of stock returns. The variable that captured the adoption of international standards was consistent with expectations, i.e. the adoption of international standards would increase the quality of accounting information, showing a positive signal. Moreover, the variable aggressiveness of the earnings was statistically significant and negative, consistent with the literature.\nResearch limitations/implications: The variables earnings smoothing and aversion to losses did not show the expected behaviour though, highlighting the possible limitations of these proxies used to capture the opacity of the earnings.\nOriginality/value: When institutional moderators were included, it was observed that the adoption of the IFRS standards positively affected the relationship, which is more relevant when the accounting figures were under its aegis. Recently, countless nations' transition to international accounting standards has been justified by the need to use high-quality reporting standards. The research sought to contribute to strengthen this dimension, presenting evidence that the dummy variable included to capture the adoption of international standards had a positive effect on the relationship.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Toward a reverse adaptation view in cross-cultural management
|
[
"Knowledge flow",
"Global talent management",
"Reverse adaptation"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With cross-border business growing rapidly, the associated diversity and adaptation of culture represent a fertile ground for research (Adler and Graham, 1989; Boyacigiller and Adler, 1991; Schwartz, 1999; Tung, 1993, 2014). As foreign markets have grown more numerous and diverse, the appeal of capturing the magnitude of such diversity and adaptation has grown concomitantly. At the same time, the multinational business world is changing drastically. The rise of the multi-polar world is constantly reshaping our perspectives. The growing importance of emerging markets means that their impact is felt broadly, around the world. As well, rapidly growing emerging economies are producing business giants of their own at a staggering rate. By 2020 the combined economic output of three leading emerging economies alone - Brazil, China and India - will surpass the aggregate production of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the UK and the USA (United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), 2013).\nWhat is reverse adaptation?: Departing from and contrasting with the dominant local adaptation perspective, I submit in this paper a reverse adaptation view toward cross-cultural and strategic management of MNEs. I define reverse adaptation specifically as a situation in, extent to, or process by which an MNE's host country subsidiaries and their local employees learn, assimilate and modify their personal behavior (e.g. values, norms, habits) and professional competence (e.g. standards, goals, language, knowledge, capabilities) in order to fit the MNE's global mindset and culture and to meet the MNE's requirements for being internationally reassigned to work elsewhere. It reverses adaptation from \"foreign to local\" (foreign companies adapting to local/host country culture and environment) to \"local to foreign\" (local employees adapting to global mindset/culture and global competence for international reassignment).\nWhy reverse adaptation?: So why is reverse adaptation needed today? First, the business world is undergoing increasing globalization of markets for talent and business services, as well as increasing integration of talent management within a globally coordinated human resource system. Local talent, especially those with high potential or A players (using GE's vitality curve approach, which differentiates between the top 20 percent or A players, the middle 70 percent or B players, and the bottom 10 percent or C players) are selected to become global talent. They are promoted to work at the MNEs' regional or corporate headquarters, or are internationally assigned to join the top management team in units located in other countries. A major advantage that global companies have over local competitors is the ability to offer recruits the opportunity to work elsewhere in the world. Noted executives who have moved from leading positions in emerging markets to a global leadership roles include Ajay Banga, President and CEO of MasterCard Worldwide, Indra Nooyi, Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo, Harish Manwani, COO of Unilever and Duanduan Zhang, Managing director of Samsung Group Worldwide.\nReverse adaptation in practice: Reverse adaptation can generate numerous advantages and benefits for the MNE, including enhanced global knowledge and capability, increased worldwide talent availability, stronger global culture and global coherence, accelerated global growth of brainpower, superior cross-border communication, learning, sharing and cooperation, improved internal consistency across globally dispersed units, sharpened balance global mandate and cultural embeddedness and better alignment between global strategy and organizational behavior.\nResearch agenda on reverse adaptation: Reverse adaptation poses a myriad of research issues and even puzzles for international management scholars. Some of these issues may challenge existing theories in international business, global strategy and cross-cultural management. First, it is important to know what is necessary for cultivating local talent to be well versed in global mindsets and international competitiveness so that they are ready for international reassignment, and to know how best to accomplish this. Cultivating and transforming local talent to become global talent necessitate bringing together a multitude of efforts by organizations, units and the employees themselves. Neither the ethnocentric approach (to send corporate foreign talent to key local positions) nor the polycentric approach (to hire locals for local positions) can separately meet reverse adaptation needs. The glocalized approach - selecting, nurturing and improving local talent's competitiveness for international assignments within a MNE's centrally planned and globally coordinated talent management system - is imperative if the MNE is to foster implementation of reverse adaptation. This means that recruiting, training, promotion, appraisal and monitoring criteria for local employees should be revamped and expanded to include more yardsticks measuring global mindsets and global competencies (Osland et al., 2006; Tung, 2014). Future research should explore concrete steps, measures, programs and policies at both the MNE parent and subsidiary levels that are designed to encourage and nurture local employees to advance their global vision, experience and capabilities.\nConclusion: Reverse adaptation is a promising area of research for international management scholars, because it provides the opportunity to enrich and extend mainstream theories and literatures in a number of areas. Global organizations need to act at both local and global levels in a way that recognizes the interdependence between the two. Indeed, these organizations need distinctive local insights and capabilities. But they also need to maximize the return on their global assets, ranging from brand equity and economies of scale to the ability to internalize geographically dispersed businesses and to take a global view on talent. Too often global companies have approached their local talent needs in an uncoordinated way. This paper presents a view of reverse adaptation, suggesting that MNEs from both mature and emerging economies can - and should - create a competitive advantage by taking a global approach to talent. Cultivating and transforming local talent to become global talent necessitates endeavor from a wide range of corporate, subsidiary and individual levels, in cultural (e.g. global mindset), professional (e.g. technical competence), structural (e.g. rotation across regions, functions and businesses, as well as interactions between global and local managers), informational (e.g. smart use of technology and digitization to support information sharing and talent management) and organizational (e.g. effective global talent management policies, international assignment practices and global leadership programs). Developing such an infrastructure may take years to build and fulfill expectations. Yet this is the most significant advantage possessed by MNEs that local competitors simply do not have large, diverse and mobile talent pools, accelerated rates of access to stimulating and demanding jobs across a global network that includes access to regional or even global leadership roles, and a steady flow across borders of world-class capabilities from other parts of the businesses.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Contrasting local adaptation, which focusses on foreign multinationals learning about and adapting to local (host country) culture and environment, reverse adaptation refers to the case where an MNE's local employees learn, assimilate and modify their personal behavior (e.g. values, norms) and professional competence (e.g. standards, goals, language, knowledge, capabilities) in order to fit the MNE's global mindset and global competence set so that they can be internationally reassigned. The purpose of this paper is to take the first step toward addressing this nascent phenomenon and practice.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study uses combined inductive and ethnographic methods to explore the importance, process and practice of reverse innovation. This study defines reverse adaptation, illustrates the major driving forces underlying reverse adaptation, and suggests how MNEs should prepare for it. As reverse adaptation is a promising area for research, this paper also proposes a research agenda for international management scholars.\nFindings: MNEs need to act at both local and global levels in a way that recognizes the interdependence between the two. Too often global companies have approached their local talent needs in an uncoordinated and unproductive way. Reverse adaptation view suggests that MNEs can create a competitive advantage by taking a global approach to talent. Cultivating and transforming local talent to become global talent necessitates endeavor from a wide range of corporate, subsidiary and individual levels, in cultural, professional, structural, informational and organizational aspects.\nOriginality/value: Reverse adaptation is a promising area of research because it provides the opportunity to enrich mainstream theories and literatures in a number of areas. This nascent phenomenon has not yet been studied, and this paper represents the first effort to do so. From both academic and practice viewpoints, reverse adaptation has a significant impact on global talent management, knowledge flow across borders, capability catchup and global integration design. Today's glocalized business world, with heightened integration of world economy, creates an expectation for the continuing growth of reverse adaptation.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
An integrated approach for identifying the efficiency-oriented drivers of electronic markets in electronic business
|
[
"Data envelopment analysis",
"Bootstrapped Tobit regression analysis",
"E-market",
"Efficiency study"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Electronic markets (e-markets) are virtual marketplace enabled and facilitated by the advance of information and communication technologies in which buyers and sellers are brought together for exchanging goods, services or information (Duan et al., 2012a; Duan and Deng 2016). They have been becoming increasingly popular due to their benefits to organisations including strengthened customer relationships, ease of reaching the targeted market, improved efficiency and reduced costs, and greater competitive advantages, and to individuals including improved flexibility for shopping, reduced transaction costs, and increased choices for more products and services (Standing et al., 2010; Duan et al., 2012b). The evidence of the popularity of e-markets can not only be found in the rapid growth of e-market product and service offerings, but also in the wealth of literature resulting from the active research in this area. A simple online search shows that there are over 7.5m active e-markets in the world (Internet Retailer, 2017), targeting more than 4bn people across different industries and geographical regions (Internet World Stats, 2017).\n2. Related works: 2.1 E-market performance evaluation\n3. An integrated approach: This study aims to propose an approach to identify the efficiency-oriented drivers for the development of individual e-markets. To achieve this objective, there are two main research questions that have to be answered as follows:\n4. An empirical study: To demonstrate how the integrated approach works, an empirical study is conducted on 43 e-markets. The e-markets that are included in this study for DEA analysis conform to three criteria. First, the e-market should differentiate itself from other internet-based companies such as any company websites or search engines by generating the revenue through the online sales. Second, the financial information of the e-market should be available from www.sec.gov or finance.yahoo.com. Third, the number of monthly visitors and the page rank should be available from trafficestimate.com and prchecker.com respectively. As a result, 57 e-markets are selected out of the 685 dot-com companies whose financial information is available. A total of 14 e-markets do not have the information of monthly visitors, and thus excluded from the sample, resulted in the 43 e-markets with all the required inputs and outputs information.\n5. Conclusion: Understanding the critical drivers for the efficiency is of strategic importance to e-markets. This paper presents an integrated approach for exploring the efficiency-oriented critical drivers on the development of e-markets. DEA is adopted in the first stage to investigate the efficiency of e-markets with respect to their respective overall efficiency, technical efficiency and scale efficiency, leading to the identification of the efficient e-market and the underlying source of inefficiency in existing e-markets. Bootstrapped Tobit regression analysis is employed based on the outcome of the DEA analysis to identify the critical efficiency-based drivers. An empirical study of 43 e-markets has been carried out to exemplify the applicability of such an integrated approach for evaluating the performance of individual e-markets. The integrated approach enables existing e-markets to improve their efficiency by focusing on the efficiency-based critical drivers and provide new players in e-markets with guidelines for developing their efficient e-markets.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Effectively evaluating the efficiency of individual e-markets for better understanding the efficiency-oriented critical drivers for individual e-markets is of great significance to the development of electronic business. The purpose of this paper is to develop an approach through adequately integrating data envelopment analysis (DEA) and bootstrapped Tobit regression analysis for identifying the efficiency-oriented critical drivers on the development of e-market in electronic business.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A review of the related literature is conducted for adequately formulating the e-market evaluation problem. DEA is appropriately used for assessing the efficiency of available e-markets, leading to the identification of the efficient e-market. Tobit regression analysis is then employed to examine the outcome of the DEA analysis for identifying the efficiency-oriented critical drivers in the development of e-markets in electronic business.\nFindings: A better understanding of the operations of individual e-markets with respect to their overall efficiency in electronic business can be achieved with the use of the developed approach. Such understanding is built on the identification of the efficiency-oriented critical drivers on the development of e-market in electronic business.\nOriginality/value: This paper develops a novel approach for better understanding of the operations of individual e-markets with respect to their overall efficiency in electronic business. The adoption of this approach helps existing e-markets improve their efficiency by focussing on the efficiency-oriented critical drivers and provide new players in e-markets with guidelines for developing their efficient e-markets.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Informal learning in the workplace: evidence on the real value of work-based learning (WBL)
|
[
"Workplace learning",
"Learning methods",
"Employees",
"Perception"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Two substantial research projects funded by the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC) in the UK have enabled us to understand the role of informal learning in the workplace. The first project focused on mid-career workers (Eraut et al., 2000), the second on early career workers. They covered three professional areas: Business and Accounting, Engineering and Healthcare. The main questions were the same for both projects:1. What is being learned at work?2. How is learning taking place?3. What factors affect the amount and direction of learning in the workplace?The first project was based on two interviews, six to 12 months apart: 120 started and 88 were available for the second interview. We discerned nine sources for learning:1. H1. Working for qualifications.2. H2. Short courses.3. H3. Special events.4. H4. Materials.5. H5. Organized learning support.6. H6. Consultation and collaboration within the working group.7. H7. The challenge of the work itself.8. H8. Consultation outside the working group.9. H9. Life outside work.Although the first four sources are clearly formal, they are often supported by informal sources and timing. Sharing with colleagues on the course or more knowledgeable people in their workplace made a considerable difference; and the timing of short courses and special events showed that they were rarely effective unless they were \"Just in Time\". Other materials (H4) such as manuals and reference books were welcomed, as were materials linked to formal qualifications from professional bodies. Usage of manuals, however, appeared to be confined to a minority who thrived on learning from manuals; while the others did all they could to avoid them.\nModes of learning at work: We found that our participants learned much more through their work than through formally organized learning events, even in accountancy which includes a substantial program of formal training and examinations. So we distinguished between working processes, like working with clients, working with colleagues or tackling challenging tasks, from which they learned as they went along, and specific learning processes, like being coached or taking a course, for which they stopped normal working. Within both types of process there were short activities, which contributed to learning, like asking questions or receiving feedback; and these are also included in Table I.Our conclusion was that, given favorable conditions, learning in the workplace can be enhanced by improving opportunities for productive engagement in a wide range of work processes. Moreover, working alongside a colleague for a while enables someone to learn by asking questions and receiving feedback about shared activities and events as and when they happen. It also allows the learner to see how a colleague reads situations, monitors them and takes decisions. These activities are largely tacit and difficult to explain. Working in groups with people who have different kinds of expertise helps one to understand the nature of that expertise and make better use of it.\nFactors affecting learning at work: We found that support and feedback were critically important for confidence, learning, retention and commitment, especially during their first few months when they were best provided by the person on the spot. In the longer term, more normative feedback on progress and meeting organizational expectations also became important. Equally important for developing confidence after the first few months was the right level of challenge. Newly qualified nurses were over-challenged physically, mentally and emotionally by their sudden increase in responsibility and the unceasing pressure of work in most ward environments. While some engineers progressed through a series of challenging assignments with remarkable rapidity, most of them were under-challenged and many of them were seriously under-challenged. Nearly all the accountants, however, were appropriately challenged for the majority of their traineeship.Factors affecting participants' commitment to work, to colleagues, and to their employers included the quality of their support and feedback, appreciation of the value of their work and their personal sense of importance, which was not necessarily aligned with their employer's priorities. These learning factors and their interactions are depicted in Figure 1, together with a second triangle, which mirrors the first triangle but focuses on the contextual factors that influence the learning factors.\nFactors affecting learning at work: the two-triangle model: The allocation and structuring of work was central to our participants' progress, because it affected the difficulty or challenge of the work, the extent to which it was individual or collaborative, and the opportunities for meeting, observing and working alongside people who had more or different expertise, and for forming relationships that might provide feedback and support. For novice professionals to make good progress a significant proportion of their work needed to be sufficiently new to challenge them without being so daunting as to reduce their confidence. Their workload needed to be at a level that allowed them to respond to new challenges reflectively, rather than develop coping mechanisms that might later prove ineffective. Thus managers and/or senior colleagues had to balance the immediate demands of the job against the needs of the trainees to broaden their experience.Only one problem was common across all our partner organizations. Our findings on appraisal showed that participants' concerns about meeting both their own and their employers' expectations of their performance and progress arose from inadequate feedback of a normative kind, and that this weakened their motivation and commitment to their organization.\nWhat is being learned?: Given the complexity of these occupations, it was sometimes difficult to describe what our participants learned. We envisaged them as progressing along several learning pathways at once; and allocated each type of pathway into one of eight main categories, as shown in Table II. Both the significance and the importance of these categories changed significantly over the three years, as the nature of the work changed. These changes were:* Dealing with more difficult and complex problems, e.g. sicker patients, larger sections of an audit, more flexible use of protocols, designing discrete components, use of formal knowledge.* Widening their range of competence, e.g. budgets, value for money, liaising with clients, other professions or agencies, secondments, giving presentations.* Acquiring greater responsibility, e.g. being \"in charge\", becoming a team leader or manager, dealing with personnel, supporting other people's learning.We treated our pathways as learning trajectories to accommodate the discontinuities of lifelong learning, whereby:* Explicit progress was being made on several trajectories.* Implicit progress could be inferred and later acknowledged on some trajectories.* Progress on yet other trajectories began to stall or even regress through lack of use.This research confirmed that newly qualified professionals have remarkably varied profiles across most relevant learning trajectories, as a result of both their individual interests and the different opportunities offered by the learning contexts through which they passed. Using learning trajectories both encourages continuity of learning and counteracts the widespread delusion that a professional qualification properly represents a person's capability. Since it is unusual for an episode of work to use knowledge from only one trajectory, the seamless integration of personal knowledge from several trajectories is an important additional learning challenge. Thus the complexity of expertise is best represented by combining accounts of holistic performance episodes with trajectories of different types of knowledge.The \"points\" on these learning trajectories are best considered as windows on episodes of practice, and should include information about:* The setting in which it took place, and features of that setting that might have affected the performance.* The conditions under which the performance took place, e.g., degree of supervision, pressure of time, crowdedness, conflicting priorities, availability of resources.* The situation that gave rise to the performance.* The other categories of expertise involved.* Any differences from previously recorded episodes.* Indicators of expertise in the domain of the trajectory having been maintained, widened or enhanced.This section on learning trajectories is particularly relevant to managers, both for their own work and for those whom they manage (Eraut and Hirsh, 2007).\nConclusion: Both research projects showed that, over a wide range of professions and workplaces, informal workplace activities provided between 70-90 percent of the learning; but informal learning was treated as only an occasional by-product. Hence most discussions of learning dealt only with formal, organized events; and appraisals lacked collaborative dialogue.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper seeks to understand the role of informal learning in the workplace by observation of samples of professional workers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The research started by shared descriptions of the work being followed before asking about the roles of other people whom they met at work, and then asking about what the observer might have seen on another occasion. This was followed by discussing the nature of the researched person's work with significant others in the workplace.\nFindings: - The most important theoretical finding was that most people did not describe informal learning as learning. The study managed to handle this by talking about learning as a by-product. Then both working and learning could be talked about at the same time. Most of this learning came from people working together in a range of work activities.\nResearch limitations/implications: - Support and feedback were critically important for confidence, learning, retention and commitment, and the right level of challenge. Factors affecting participants' commitment to work, to colleagues, and to their employers included the quality of their support and feedback, and appreciation of the value of their work.\nOriginality/value: - The paper highlights the importance of giving more attention to who is doing what, and finding opportunities for people to learn naturally by being present in situations where they can be helpful and recognized. If learning is crucial for working, much greater learning occurs.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Examining the suitability of industrial safety management approaches for information security incident management
|
[
"Management",
"Safety",
"Organizational development",
"Information security"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Information and communication technologies (ICT) are facing the trend of larger connectivity and increased integration. Dependability on ICT systems is increasing as well, for individuals, organizations and society at large. Hence, attacks and/or malfunctioning of ICT systems may have serious consequences for business, in particular societal critical infrastructures. Although many different preventive measures exist, and usually are in place, to protect against information security incidents, such incidents still happen. The number and types of threats are ever-changing, creating challenges for protection in such a dynamic risk picture. An efficient incident management process - the ability to appropriately prepare for, and respond to, information security incidents - is thus important to maintain the functioning of systems (ISO/IEC, 2011).\n2. Information security incident management: The ISO/IEC 27035 standard on information security incident management (ISO/IEC, 2011) describes the complete incident management process. It complements the requirements stated by ISO/IEC 27001 (ISO/IEC, 2013). The incident management process comprises five phases as illustrated by Figure 1:\n3. Information security management and industrial safety management: Loss prevention is the main purpose of both information security and industrial safety. There are thus many similarities, but still some differences between the two areas. Nevertheless, as both aim at a systematic prevention of loss, there should be a potential for learning from each other. One obvious difference is what they aim to protect. Information security is about preserving the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information, while industrial safety is concerned with controlling hazards of any kind that may lead to losses (humans, material, environment) in the organization. Furthermore, industrial safety and information security have different terminologies. A safety breach may be denoted a fault or an accident, while security breaches are usually denoted incidents. A safety hazard may correspond to a security threat. Furthermore, there are differences between the two areas concerning the risk picture and management approaches.\n4. Dealing with expected and unexpected events: adaptive management strategies: The emergence of adaptive management strategies to industrial safety management is a response to the inadequacy of conventional safety management approaches with regard to complexity and dynamics in socio-technical systems (Woods and Hollnagel, 2006). Such adaptive approaches are thus necessary supplements to conventional approaches. There are mainly two related fields that describe adaptive management strategies: resilience engineering (Hollnagel, 2011) and high reliability organizations (LaPorte and Consolini, 1991; Weick and Sutcliffe, 2007). In this paper, we limit our elaboration of adaptive management strategies to resilience engineering rather than high-reliability organizations (HRO), as the former focuses more on management, action and control.\n5. Addressing information security incident management challenges with adaptive industrial safety management approaches: The previous sections described the rationale and purpose of adaptive industrial safety management. In the following, we discuss theories and techniques of adaptive industrial safety management that could address current challenges in information security incident management, as presented in Section 2.\n6. Concluding remarks: Information security incident management and industrial safety management share several of the same challenges. In Section 2, major challenges for information security incident management were presented: creating plans for incident handling, gaining senior management commitment, involving all employees, coping with existing tools and their lack of usability, quality of incident registration, collaboration among teams and across disciplines, practicing incident management in outsourcing scenarios, motivation learning activities and sharing lesson learning. The same challenges could have been listed for industrial safety management as well. However, the field of industrial safety management has different approaches for addressing these challenges than the field of information security management. In this paper, we have examined the suitability of industrial safety management approaches, in particular resilience engineering, for solving challenges for information security incident management. Six out of the nine major challenges could be addressed by the suggested approaches.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to discuss whether recent theoretical and practical approaches within industrial safety management might be applicable to, and solve challenges experienced in, the field of information security, specifically related to incident management.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A literature review was carried out.\nFindings: Principles, research and experiences on the issues of plans, training and learning in the context of industrial safety management would be suitable for adoption into the field of information security incident management and aid in addressing current challenges.\nResearch limitations/implications: There are a number of reasons why approaches from industrial safety management have something to offer to information security incident management: the former field is more mature and has longer traditions, there is more organizational research on industrial safety issues than on information security issues so far, individual awareness is higher for industrial safety risks and worker participation in systematic industrial safety work is ensured by law. More organizational research on information security issues and continuous strengthening of individual security awareness would push information security to further maturity levels where current challenges are solved.\nPractical implications: This paper shows that the field of information security incident management would gain from closer collaborations with industrial safety management, both in research and in practical loss prevention in organizations. The ideas discussed in this paper form a basis for further research on practical implementations and case studies.\nOriginality/value: The main audience of this paper includes information security researchers and practitioners, as they will find inspirational theories and experiences to bring into their daily work and future projects.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
From bricks-and-mortar to bricks-and-clicks: Logistics networks in omni-channel grocery retailing
|
[
"Typology",
"Omni-channel retailing",
"Exploratory study",
"Grocery retailing",
"Logistics networks",
"Retail logistics"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This paper analyzes logistics network structures for grocery retailing via multiple channels, i.e., where retailers offer their products not only in bricks-and-mortar stores, but also online in a \"bricks-and-clicks\" approach. Focusing on the product flow, the products can be picked up at the store, at pick-up stations or delivered to the customer's home. Enabling the different delivery and pick-up modes across channels is a recent phenomenon, particularly in grocery retailing. Retailers may operate all types of networks from isolated product flows - where direct-to-customer shipments and store supply are operated independently - to unified systems with comprehensively conflated front- and back-end logistics (Hubner, Wollenburg and Holzapfel, 2016). Bricks-and-clicks retailers therefore need to address the question of how to operate logistics networks to serve customers across channels.\nConceptual background and research question: In OC retailing, neither the customer nor the retailer distinguishes between physical store and the internet channel anymore (Brynjolfsson et al., 2013; Bell et al., 2014; Verhoef et al., 2015). In the context of logistics, OC retailers apply information exchange, joint operations, warehousing and inventories across channels, which leads to a conflation of the fulfillment processes (Hubner, Wollenburg and Holzapfel, 2016).\nMethodology: This section details the research process. This study follows an exploratory approach (Flynn et al., 1990; DeHoratius, 2011). We applied a case study design as this is particularly suitable for exploratory qualitative research (Seuring, 2005; Pagell and Wu, 2009; Yin, 2014).\nEmpirical findings: This section presents the empirical findings of the conducted exploratory study. In the following section, each OC grocery logistics network type identified is described and analyzed individually before the last section develops toward a generalization of OC retail network design.\nDiscussion: In this section, the main findings are discussed in the light of literature in three areas. First, differences in OC grocery and OC non-food logistics are highlighted. Second, the interrelation of different subsystems is discussed (e.g. warehousing and last-mile delivery). And third, we discuss the patterns and development options identified. The patterns and development options identified are as follows:\nConclusion and future areas of research: The dynamic of the OC phenomenon means that it is \"necessary to continuously investigate new developments to understand it\" (Bernon et al., 2016). We therefore apply a supply chain-wide view to OC logistics network structures in the field of grocery retailing that has not yet been explored. This paper contributes to the area of OC grocery logistics by providing a typology and contingency factors for logistics execution. Our heterogeneous sample reveals that grocery retailers use different warehousing, picking, internal transportation and last-mile delivery systems depending on product, customer, market and retailer specifics. Whereas in the field of OC non-food retailing, logistics integration is mostly seen as beneficial (e.g. Verhoef et al., 2015; Hubner, Wollenburg and Holzapfel, 2016), a definitive answer cannot be given for OC grocery logistics.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The advent of grocery sales through online channels necessitates that bricks-and-mortar retailers redefine their logistics networks if they want to compete online. Because the general understanding of such bricks-and-clicks logistics systems for grocery is still limited, the purpose of this paper is to analyze the internal logistics networks used to serve customers across channels by means of an exploratory study with retailers from different contexts.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A total of 12 case companies from six European countries participated in this exploratory study. Face-to-face interviews with managers were the primary source for data collection. The heterogeneity of the sample enabled the authors to build a typology of logistics networks in grocery retailing on multiple channels and to understand the advantages of different warehousing, picking, internal transportation and last-mile delivery systems.\nFindings: Bricks-and-mortar grocery retailers are leveraging their existing logistics structures to fulfill online orders. Logistics networks are mostly determined by the question of where to split case packs into customer units. In non-food logistics, channel integration is mostly seen as beneficial, but in grocery retailing, this depends heavily on product, market and retailer specifics. The data from the heterogeneous sample reveal six distinct types for cross-channel order fulfillment.\nPractical implications: The qualitative analysis of different design options can serve as a decision support for retailers developing logistics networks to serve customers across channels.\nOriginality/value: The paper shows the internal and external factors that drive the decision-making for omni-channel (OC) logistics networks for previously store-based grocery retailers. Thereby, it makes a step toward building a contingency and configuration theory of retail networks design. It discusses in particular the differences between grocery and non-food OC retailing, last-mile delivery systems and market characteristics in the decision-making of retail networks design.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A proposal of a new paradigm for national quality certification systems
|
[
"ISO 9000 series",
"Quality management",
"Quality assessment",
"Incentives (psychology)"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Since its introduction in 1987, the ISO 9000 series of quality standards has spread all over the world. An indirect sign of the popularity of these standards is the large number of articles in the scientific literature that are addressed to them. Some of the most relevant concern:* analysis of the motivations for certification (Poksinska et al., 2002; Douglas et al., 2003; Magd and Curry, 2003; Williams, 2004; Heras, 2006; Heras et al., 2006);* analysis of the benefits of certification, the evolution of organisations' perceptions of these benefits, and obstacles/drawbacks to certification (Gotzamani and Tsiotras, 2002; Llopis and Tari, 2003; Tari and Sabater, 2004; Casadesus and Karapetrovic, 2005a; Boiral and Roy, 2007; Zeng et al., 2007; Karapetrovic et al., 2010);* the impact of quality certification on the organisational and financial performance of companies (Alvarez et al., 2002; Chow-Chua et al., 2003; Conca et al., 2004; Casadesus and Karapetrovic, 2005b; Dick et al., 2006);* possible integration and/or competition between quality certification and TQM (Dwyer, 2002; Martinez-Lorente and Martinez-Costa, 2004; Karapetrovic et al., 2006); and* analysis and forecasting of the diffusion of certification (Franceschini et al., 2004, 2006; Albuquerque et al., 2007; Franceschini et al., 2008, 2010).A large number of studies concerning these topics are mentioned and discussed in detail in the recent review paper by Sampaio et al. (2009). On the basis of a worldwide analysis, two distinct tendencies emerge:1. In recent years, the number of certified companies in some Eastern countries, such as China and India, has increased very rapidly - even more rapidly than occurred in some European countries at the end of the last century (Corbett, 2008). A representative example is Pakistan (Malik and YeZhua, 2006).2. A tendency to saturation and/or decline has been seen in countries where certifications were traditionally more diffuse in terms of the percentage of certified organisations (COs) (International Organisation for Standardisation, 2009). For example, in the UK, Ireland and Denmark, in the last five to six years this tendency has degenerated into a reduction of the total number of certified companies. This phenomenon is known as \"decertification\". In future, a similar tendency will probably occur in other European countries where certifications are popular and largely diffused, such as Belgium, France, Germany and Sweden (International Organisation for Standardisation, 2009; Franceschini et al., 2010).Some of the possible reasons for this initial decline include:* the perception of little incentive towards improvement;* the bureaucratic burden in the application of ISO 9000 standards; and* the apparent lack of advantages for organisations with a well-rooted quality culture.These (and other) aspects contribute to the so-called \"erosion of perceived benefits\" related to ISO 9000 certification. For a detailed explanation, we refer the reader to the relevant literature (Casadesus and Karapetrovic, 2005a, b; Marimon et al., 2009; Karapetrovic et al., 2010).The goal of this paper is to suggest a new incentive model to ISO certification that is capable of favouring those COs and certification bodies (CBs) that operate seriously and blamelessly. The basic elements of this model are:* creating the conditions for the autonomous growth of diffusion and credibility of the quality certification system;* creating an interest in certification in those countries where it seems to have decreased; and* favouring the effective implementation of quality within COs.This model, which is based on incentives and penalties, is inspired by the MIL STD 105E standard (Duncan, 1994; Montgomery, 2009). The criteria used to incentivise/penalise COs and CBs respond to three primary characteristics:1. objectivity;2. transparency; and3. non-manipulability.The remainder of the paper is organised into three sections. Section 2 summarises the major benefits and criticalities of the current quality certification system. Section 3 presents and discusses in detail the new incentive model, showing an example of application based on realistic data. Section 4 contains further comments and reflections on the potential benefits and drawbacks derived from the practical application of the model. Finally, the conclusions are given, summarising the original contribution of the paper and future research directions.\n2. Strengths and criticalities of the national certification systems: The following subsections summarise the strengths and weak points of the current national certification system. These considerations are derived from the large scientific literature on the matter. A typical national certification scheme is represented synthetically in Figure 1 (Rodholma and Drora, 1993).2.1 Benefits of certification\n3. Proposal for an incentive model: Here we present an incentive model, which is aimed at encouraging:* a re-increase of the value of ISO 9000 certificates;* the diffusion of a culture of quality;* the real and constant implementation of good quality practices within organisations; and* the autonomous development of the whole system of quality.At the same time, it should favour CBs that operate with zeal and rigour, and penalise those that release certificates \"too accommodatingly\". In order to reach this ambitious goal, we conceived a dynamic/adaptive model, which is inspired by the MIL-STD-105E standard (Weber, 1991; Juran and Gryna, 1993; Duncan, 1994; Montgomery, 2009). This standard is used to support the design of acceptance sampling plans for controlling the quality of lots of products. Three inspection levels with different severity/discrimination power (i.e. reduced, normal and tightened) are alternated, depending on the result (i.e. lot defectiveness) of previous inspections. When the results are good, the inspection severity decreases; when the results worsen, the inspection severity increases, along with inspection time and costs. The switching procedures are illustrated in Figure 2.A similar adaptive logic can be \"exported\" to the national quality certification framework. The following subsections illustrate two inter-connected incentive sub-models, promoting the growth/development of COs and CBs, respectively. We point out that, at the present time, the values and parameters of the model should be considered purely as a rough guide.3.1 Sub-model for COs\n4. Further reflections on the proposed model: The suggested model is aimed at combining the personal interest of COs and CBs in a joint course towards the progressive growth. Also, it may improve many of the critical aspects discussed in section 2. In particular, it could:* encourage COs to give greater importance to the actual implementation of quality practices;* discourage \"bad behaviours\" of COs and CBs and stimulate their improvement; and* increase credibility of COs, CBs and the whole certification system.Major benefits, with particular reference to the traditional certification procedure, are summarised in Table III.Concerning the logic and the practical effects of the model, it is worth noting the following aspects:* Virtuous organisations (in VCO) enjoy an economic incentive, consisting of the non-payment of periodic certificate renewal fees to CBs. The state, \"in return\" for the tax allowances for virtuous CBs, receives the benefit of having more growing organisations that do not recur to social safety valves and tend to create an increasing number of jobs. On the one hand, organisations that are in the CCO state apparently seem to favour CBs, due to the increased cost for their periodic certificate renewal. In the long term, conversely, these organisations will tend to penalise CBs and to make them switch to the CCB state. The aim of the model, consequently, is to encourage the pursuit of long-term advantages for a global system consisting of certified organisations, CBs and states. In view of the benefit produced, this model does not reasonably burden the state and does not represent a type of undisputed \"charity\" for virtuous CBs. In addition, the model is relatively agile and does not significantly increase bureaucracy. One of the most important effects is that CBs and auditors would be strongly discouraged to release their certification \"too easily\".* In this preliminary analysis, the attention is focused on the philosophy behind the suggested model, rather than the precise and complete definition of the corresponding parameters and switching rules. In future, specific analyses and simulations will be carried out so as to identify the optimal parameters and switching rules to balance the whole model. For example, some indicators could be modified or replaced by others that prove to be better. This aspect will be essential for the possible adoption and acceptance of the model by the actors involved in it.* The two sub-models are very different in terms of switching rules: the first focuses on the performance of a specific CO, while the second focuses on the group performance of the COs certified by a specific CB. The link between the two models is that the \"survival\" of a CO depends on its own practical performance, while the one of a CB depends on the practical results achieved by the organisations that it certifies.* A possible criticism of the proposed model is that criteria for incentivising/penalising COs (recourse to social valves, lay-offs, etc.) are not necessarily correlated to the organisations' compliance with ISO 9000 certification requirements. We believe that this potential objection can be turned into a practical improvement of the current system of certification. In fact, one of the most common criticisms of ISO 9000 standards is that COs do not necessarily implement quality because of the lack of a link between potential quality (conformance to certification requisites) and real quality (real implementation of quality procedures and good practices) (Wade, 2002). Consequently, the fact that the model considers some aspects beyond ISO 9000 standards is not a limit, but rather a new way to enhance and complete the whole certification system.* Another possible criticism is that there are several reasons why both COs and CBs could change their state, whether or not they are committed to quality; for example, general economic crisis, financial speculation, favourable economic environment, new investments, etc. However, we believe that in the medium to long term, COs that are committed to quality are reasonably intended to be healthy and to contribute to the wealth of their own country, independently of the causes of external influences.* With some modifications to the switching procedures and indicators in use, similar models could be created for other certification systems, such as ISO 14000 certification, EFQM, the Malcolm Baldrige Award, etc. (Pyzdek, 2003). For example, regarding ISO 14000 standards, switching rules should be focused on indicators of the environmental impact of the organisation.* The new model and MIL-STD-105E (i.e. the standard that inspired it) are totally different in terms of application context. Despite this, a parallel between them can be drawn. MIL-STD-105E introduces a mechanism by which the severity related to the sampling inspection of lots received from a supplier may change depending on the result of previous inspections. This makes the inspection system flexible and encourages suppliers to provide products of good quality. Similarly, the new model incentivises COs that really improve, as well as CBs that do not release certifications \"too easily\".\n5. Conclusions: The reflections included in the first part of the paper provide an interpretation of the current trends concerning the diffusion of national quality certifications. While, on the one hand, the recourse to certifications is increasing in the Eastern countries, on the other hand, it tends to saturate in some countries of the \"Old Continent\". The case of the UK is emblematic and makes you think. It seems that once a certain reputation and market share are gained, the role of certification tends to decline. In some cases, the benefits of certification do not respond to expectations, especially for organisations with a consolidated culture of quality. In other (worst) cases, the importance of certification is not at all perceived, to the point of being considered as a superfluous burden.To contrast this phenomenon it is worthwhile reacting. The greatest challenge is to identify a proper way to combine the interest and expectations of CBs and COs into a unique \"virtuous circle\" for improving the real implementation of quality management. The introduction of a model based on incentives/penalties is aimed at encouraging the autonomous growth of the actors involved in the national quality system (COs, CBs and state), focalising the attention on the advantages that a correct implementation of quality may produce for them.The suggested model consists of two interconnected sub-models, relative to COs and CBs, respectively. Each sub-model includes different states with different incentives/penalties. The switchover from one state to another depends on the practical results, recorded in the last years by the CO/CB of interest. The link between the two models is that the \"survival\" of a CO depends on its own practical performance, while that of a CB depends on the practical results achieved by the organisations that it certifies.Switching rules are based on a set of objective, transparent, and non-manipulable indicators. In future, on-site analyses and simulations will be carried out so as to identify optimal switching rules to balance the whole model.To conclude, we think that the suggested model could represent the missing link between potential quality (conformance to certification requisites) and real quality (real implementation of quality procedures and good practices). Moreover, its implementation would not require significant additional effort from the state and the authorities accrediting and controlling CBs.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The goal of this paper is to suggest a new incentive model that is capable of creating the conditions for the autonomous growth of diffusion and credibility of the ISO 9000 national quality certification system.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The first part of this work contains some considerations about the general interest of organisations in quality certification systems, emphasising the advantages and the drawbacks in being certified. Next, the attention shifts to future scenarios. Specifically, a new model is proposed that is capable of encouraging certified organisations (COs) and certification bodies (CBs) that operate blamelessly and seriously, while at the same time penalising those that do not.\nFindings: - The suggested model consists of two inter-connected sub-models relative to COs and CBs, respectively. Each sub-model includes different states with different incentives/penalties. The switch-over from one state to another depends on the practical results recorded in recent years by the CO/CB of interest. The switching rules are based on a set of objective, transparent, and non-manipulable indicators.\nResearch limitations/implications: - On-site analyses and simulations are necessary so as to tune optimal switching rules to balance the whole model.\nPractical implications: - The (possible) future implementation of the model could have great impact on COs' and CBs' modi operandi, promoting the real implementation of quality management practices but - at the same time - not requiring significant additional effort from the state and the authorities accrediting/controlling CBs.\nOriginality/value: - The proposed model is absolutely new and may represent a proper way to combine the interests and expectations of COs and CBs into a unique \"virtuous circle\" for improving the real implementation of quality management.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Purchase of branded commodity food products: empirical evidence from India
|
[
"Purchase behaviour",
"Commodity food products",
"Brand awareness",
"India",
"Consumer behaviour",
"Brands"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In India, the 1990 s saw a significant shift in economic policy, away from state-led, and towards market-led development. Faster economic growth has seen the expansion of the middle class. Aspirations for consumption of personal care products, electronics, motor vehicles, resort vacations, and house furnishings have changed dramatically in the last decade, as have their availability and relative affordability for India's middle classes (Singh, 2005). According to a McKinsey study, average per household spending on food will grow from India rupees 34,552 in 2005 to Indian rupees 61,569 in 2025. Urban India accounts for only one-third of total food consumption today. Also, the Indian food industry is still at a nascent stage of development. Only a third of the food processing and packaging industry is organised, and less than 10 per cent of the food market is branded. Fast growing incomes, falling poverty, changing lifestyles and preferences, companies racing to capture India's new consumers - all will cause the food market to evolve dramatically in the coming years. Total consumption of food and beverages is expected to grow at 4.5 per cent over next two decades1. By 2015, the Indian food industry is estimated to grow to $258 billion, up from the current level of $181 billion, according to a report by Ernst & Young India and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI)2. While urban spending will grow twice as fast as that in rural areas at a 6.3 per cent compound annual growth rate (making it one of the fastest-growing global food markets), total food consumption over next two decades will be largely in rural India due to huge rural population base. The middle class in urban India will account for more than three-quarters of urban spending on food by 2025. This segment will increase their spending on \"higher-value\" items in terms of variety and quality1. Consumers have now started preferring quality food intake and are becoming more conscious in terms of nutritional diet, health and food safety issues (Rimal et al., 2001, cited in Ali et al., 2010). As a result of growing necessity and affordability, a new perception that \"packaged is hygienic and high quality\" is resulting in rapidly growing sales of branded and packaged foods. A good example of this growth is Indian Tobacco Company's (ITC) branded packaged-foods division. Launched in 2001, the business has seen investments of over $22 million, and grown at 87 per cent over the past year. In 2002, ITC introduced its \"Aashirvad\" atta line (\"Atta\" referring to processed wheat flour used daily in most Indian households) which has already become the market leader with 45 per cent share1. The branded commodity food industry is one of the emerging markets in India today. In the past, people used to send wheat, corn, mustard seeds to the local \"chakki\"/\"kohlu\" (a local equipment used for grinding/processing of wheat commonly used in India) for milling into flour/oil. Due to changing lifestyle, increasing health awareness, rising income levels, paucity of time, and entry of multinational companies in food sector, consumers are willing to pay price premiums for higher quality products. Traditional kitchen systems have given way to the modern kitchen lifestyle in the last ten years due to the emergence of nuclear families. Consumers look for quality products now so that they do not want to miss on the required nourishment despite shortage of time. The branded food industry fulfills these requirements of consumers in this changing lifestyle. Products like branded rice and flour, frozen french fries, peas and meat, all of which are hygienically produced and conveniently located under single roof, provide convenience, quality, and value for money to consumers. Consumers are willing to buy these branded products despite being priced somewhat higher.\n2. Branding of commodity products: Now, the question arises why brands are important for as undifferentiated products as commodity food products like rice, sugar, wheat flour, etc. Inherently, brands exist because of the perceived risk. If the risk perceived by the buyer disappears, the brand has no longer any benefit. It is only a name on a product, and it ceases to be a reference mark, a guide or a source of added value. The perceived risk is greater when the unit price is higher or the repercussions of a bad choice are more severe (Kapferer, 1997). For example, with respect to food, there is a considerable amount of risk involved whenever we ingest something. The brand's function is to overcome this danger which explains the importance of brands in the food market This is the reason why in Europe, the markets for tinned vegetables, milk, orange juice, frozen pizzas, mineral water, kitchen roll, toilet paper are dominated by the distributors' brands. For these products, the consumer usually does not want to take any risks be they physical or psychological (Gandhi and Mani, 1994). Hill et al. (1998) concluded that in commodity-goods markets, price is usually the only differentiator, but if we brand those goods and bundle them with services, even bricks and sand can command premium prices. Lau and Lee (1999) showed that trust in a brand is positively related to brand loyalty. Dolak (2005) reported that commodity selling is a challenge that presents unique opportunities for creative marketing. When marketing and selling commodities, the companies must resist the urge to cut prices, instead, seek ways to protect their price by offering more value, finding unique ways to differentiate their products, and creating powerful brands that foster price inelasticity. Previous research has evaluated the concept of commodity branding and its various challenges like lack of customer awareness, lesser ability and willingness to pay and unarticulated and latent wants. Anandan et al. (2006) presented a strategic framework for building strong brands in commodity products and provided various strategies to increase brand awareness and create a loyal customer base.\n3. Research objectives: The present study has been undertaken to answer the following research questions:\n4. Research methodology: For the present study, the population consisted of all the consumers of rice and sugar in Ludhiana city. Out of this population, a sample of 200 respondents, in equal proportion, was selected from three different residential localities in Ludhiana (Punjab), India on the basis of convenience. Judgmental sampling9 technique was used to select the localities. These localities were selected on the basis of the plot size (less than 100 sq. yards, 100-250 sq. yards, and greater than 250 sq. yards) of houses in the city. The localities were selected on plot size to give approximately equal representation to respondents on the basis of income in the sample as it was postulated that respondents having low income would be residing in a house having plot size less than 100 sq. yards, respondents having moderate income would be having a house of size between 100-250 sq. yards, and respondents from high income category would be residing in a house of size more than 250 sq. yards area in India. The respondents were contacted at their households and the data were collected by personally interviewing the selected respondents with the help of a structured questionnaire. The collected data were analysed using various statistical tools like mean score, standard deviation, and analysis of variance. For the questions containing rating of various factors such as price, brand image, easy availability, attractive display, retailer's recommendation, references from friends/relatives, packaging, availability of nutritional information, information about expiry date, respondents were asked to rate the attributes/factors over a five-point Likert scale (\"5\" means \"most important\" and \"1\" means \"least important\"). In case of questions, where respondents provided the rating on a five-point Likert scale, assumed mean of the population (m) was taken to be 3. Level of significance taken for the study was p<0.05.\n5. Measures: Various parameters to analyse the attitude of consumers and factors influencing the purchase of branded commodity food products were developed on the basis of previous research studies like Woodside and Taylor, 1978; Watanabe et al., 1999; Grunert et al., 2000; Deodhar and Intodia, 2001; Orth et al., 2004; Smith and Wright, 2004; Felzensztein et al., 2004; Jang et al., 2005; Tsiotsou, 2006; Lodorfos and Dennis, 2008; Suwannaporn and Linnemann, 2008; Espejel et al., 2008; Utami, 2010; Ali et al., 2010; Akgungor et al., 2010; Ates and Ceylan, 2010; Tikkanen and Vaariskoski, 2010; Wang, 2010; Yun and Pysarchik, 2010; Markovina et al., 2011; Cerjak et al., 2011; Wu et al., 2011; and McNeill and Wyeth, 2011.\n6. Results and discussion: The profile of the respondents with respect to demographics like age, gender, occupation, family income, qualification has been provided in this section. Findings (as shown in Table I) reveal that 36 per cent of the respondents were in the age group of 25-40 years whereas approximately 32 per cent of respondents were in the age group of above 40 years and approximately 31 per cent were in the age group of 18-25 years. On the basis of gender, approximately 54 per cent of the respondents were male. Also, about 37 per cent of the respondents were housewives, and approximately 29 per cent of respondents were businesspersons, 26 per cent respondents belonged to service category. Eight per cent of respondents were students. Findings also reveal that that 76 per cent of the respondents, who were living in less than 100 sq. yards house, had an income less than Indian rupees 1.5 lacs (I1). Approximately, 66 per cent of the respondents, living in a plot size of 100-250 sq. yards, had an annual income between Indian rupees 1.5 lakh and 3.5 lakh (I2), and about 95 per cent of the respondents living in more than 250 square yards house, had an annual income of more than Indian rupees 3.5 lakh (I3). On the basis of education, 30 per cent of respondents were graduates, and about 14 per cent respondents were post graduates.\n7. Conclusions and managerial implications: The concept of branding in commodity food products is relatively new in India. The study was conducted to provide insights into brand awareness and perceptions of consumers towards selected branded commodity food products and to understand the factors which influence the purchase of these products. It was found that a large majority (90 per cent) of the respondents were aware of branded rice while only 51 per cent of the respondents were aware of branded sugar. More number of respondents were aware of branded rice and branded sugar in higher income categories as compared to lower income category. Brand recall was very poor for branded rice and branded sugar. About 77 per cent of respondents were not able to recall any brand of sugar. Also, brand recall was highest in higher income category. \"Friends/relatives/reference groups\", \"point-of-purchase display\", \"retailer's recommendations\" were the important sources of awareness for branded rice and branded sugar. Respondents perceive \"free from adulterants\", \"free from pesticides and harmful chemicals\", \"social status\", \"certified product quality\", \"better taste/flavour\", \"nutrition\" as important parameters of branded rice and sugar.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The study was conducted with the aim of understanding brand awareness among consumers and analyzing the attitude of consumers towards selected branded commodity food products. An attempt was also made to examine the factors influencing the purchase of selected branded commodity food products.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The products selected for the study were branded rice and branded sugar. A sample of 200 respondents was selected from different localities of a city in India.\nFindings: Major sources of awareness, for branded rice and branded sugar, are friends/relatives/reference groups, point-of-purchase display, and retailer's recommendations. Respondents perceive free from adulterants, free from insecticides/pesticides/harmful chemicals and social status as the most important parameters of branded rice and branded sugar. The most important factors influencing the purchase of branded rice and branded sugar were found to be flavor, aroma, free from insecticides or pesticides and free from adulterants.\nResearch limitations/implications: Further studies can be conducted with a larger sample size. Importance of brand equity with respect to commodity products can be analyzed.\nPractical implications: Marketers could frame strategies for different market segments based on demographics. Brand awareness needs to be given adequate focus by the marketers.\nOriginality/value: This paper has made an attempt to study purchase behaviour with respect to commodity products. Not many studies have been undertaken to analyze brand awareness, and consumers' attitudes towards branded commodity food products in developing countries like India.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The long run industrial growth of Veracruz state, 1955-2008
|
[
"Convergence",
"Mexico",
"Long run industrial growth",
"Stochastic frontier",
"Veracruz",
"Cobb-Douglas technology"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: As one of the top origin regions of Mexican immigration to the USA (Roberts and Hamilton, 2005). Veracruz state economy's growth or lack of it has ramifications well beyond the region's borders. With Mexico's largest port, only nuclear reactor, Latin America's largest oil refinery and a historic economy dating back thousands of years to the Olmec culture, the region presents a microcosm of many of the development issues faced by Mexico with the exception of a NAFTA impact found further north (Baylis et al., 2012; Braun and Cullmann, 2011). With the import substitution era ending in 1985, the closed economy period (1960-1985) can be compared with the more open era including the political opening of the 2000 elections and greater access to credit through semi-formal institutions replacing federal subsidies (Paxton, 2007). Unlike recent work using Veracruz municipio data (e.g. Brock, 2013), we compare a historic closed era decade (1960s) with the most recent decade (1998-2008) as well as the entire period providing one of the first intra-regional growth studies of Mexico over a long period. Such long run analysis can provide further understanding of why Veracruz did not achieve the necessary economic growth called for to lower poverty (World Bank, 2002) despite a possible rise in crime from growth in the 1990s (Blanco and Villa, 2008).\n2. Data and method: In the 1955 economic census of Veracruz state (Secretaria De Industria Y Comercio, 1959), only the municipios of Camerino Z. Mendoza, Cordoba, Cosamaloapan de Carpio, Orizaba, Rio Blanco, Xalapa, Veracruz are shown individually which was superior to earlier statistical handbooks that did not even provide these data (e.g. Secretaria de Economia, 1950). The remaining municipios are grouped as \"all other\" (Table I). These seven are therefore taken as the historical core of the state's economy. Four of the seven (Veracruz, Xalapa, Cordoba, and Orizaba) have become large urban centers while the other three remain similar to other municipios. To alleviate heterogeneity in the sample, we eliminate the urbanized four as being historically and economically unlike any other municipios. Recent work (Brock et al., 2014) suggests that what little spatial autocorrelation exists across the 212 localities in 2000 is related to these urban four so eliminating them also avoids statistically significant spatial autocorrelation in our regressions such as that found in other studies of Mexican municipalities (Baylis et al., 2012) and municipalities in other countries (e.g. De Vreyer and Spielvogel, 2005). Therefore we focus on the non-core areas of Veracruz state where there is an agricultural crisis (Plaza et al., 2008) and which are almost never studied in analyses of Mexico's economy (Paxton, 2006). These areas which constituted about 60 percent of the state's industrial economy in 1955 now compose more than 75 percent of it (Table I). A recent study of Veracruz coffee agriculture takes a similar approach of using some municipios with efficiency analysis to create policy recommendations for the overall state (Vedenov et al., 2007).\n3. Results: Production function results yield a well-behaved SPF that is robust to using a value added instead of a gross output measure (Table IV). In either version, land area is statistically significant, but the macro-region is not with both kept in the regressions as controls. Most variation is in the one-sided error term that is truncated normal[2]. Mean technical efficiency across all years and in any particular year (Table V) is near the 70 percent level found for over 2000 municipios in a 1988, 1998, and 2003 sample for all of Mexico (Braun and Cullmann, 2011). While we confirm their results, the finding that historically there was 70 percent efficiency in the industrial sector of Veracruz as well suggests that the rise in technical efficiency across Mexican states over the long run may not be occurring at the local level as well-suggesting inter-regional growth is different from intra-regional growth. The opening of the Veracruz economy does not improve the maximum technical efficiency level (88 percent) but did result in at first a much lower minimum (1998, 2003) followed by a much higher minimum (2008).\n4. Conclusions: In the industrial sector of 149 municipios in Veracruz, an underlying neoclassical CD production technology fits well over the long run. OLS is rejected in favor of a more general SPF form due to technical inefficiency in the sector that persists over the long run (Brock, 2013). Mean technical efficiency is similar to one prior study of Veracruz municipios and appears to remain the same over almost 50 years despite the opening of the overall economy. Very recently (2003-2008) there appears to be a slight improvement in the mean efficiency suggesting the combination of recent economic and political (Pfutze, 2012) reforms may be improving efficiency in the industrial sector similar to other countries (e.g. Orazem and Vodopivec, 2009). The \"entry without exit\" experience in the formerly socialist countries (e.g. Ickes and Ryterman, 1993) where inefficient firms remain in operation well in to an economic reform era until institutional and political reforms happen that enable their closure appears to be the case for Veracruz as well.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Has the Mexican inter-regional growth and convergence experience also occurred within single regions? Using the important southern region of Veracruz, the purpose of this paper is to examine this question over a 48-year period within a single Mexican state.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Growth is examined using a standard two input stochastic production function (SPF) that creates a measure of technical efficiency. Convergence is measured using a convergence equation from the literature but which also included the results from the SPF analysis to incorporate not only initial levels of inputs but also the ability of a municipio to utilize these inputs. Data collection in Mexico and online included a long run database of 149 municipios in Veracruz from 1960 thru 2008.\nFindings: A stochastic Cobb-Douglas technology is found to fit the long run growth of Veracruz province well. In the 1960s, 2000s and the long run (1960-2008), weak evidence for the municipios in Veracruz appear to be converging with a relatively higher level of technical efficiency resulting in slower growth of industrial labor productivity is found. Some very recent improvement in technical efficiency may be the result of institutional as well as economic reforms finally allowing an exiting of inefficient firms that has kept the levels of municipio industrial technical efficiency stagnant for decades at about 70 percent.\nResearch limitations/implications: Data were limited to 149 municipios because of the need to track long run trends. Data were also limited by the need to use what was available in 1960 in a direct comparison with 2008. The design of the study was to use the technical efficiency index as a proxy for much of the missing data on institutions in the historic period. Panel data were used because the economic census is not done every year plus the turmoil in the Mexican economy in the 1980s thru the end of the 1990s make imputation of missing years at the local level quite difficult.\nPractical implications: The paper provides a baseline to analyze the long run intra-regional economic growth of other Mexican states which have a large number of municipios. It begins the exciting possibility of looking at Mexican long run growth from the municipio level which has historically played an important role in Mexico.\nOriginality/value: This is the first study to examine long run growth within a Mexican state at the municipio level using both the production function and convergence literature. Results suggest several avenues for further research inside Veracruz and across Mexico.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Employment protection and gender gap: Evidence from a reform of the Italian labor market regulation system
|
[
"Labour market outcomes",
"Gender gap",
"Employment Protection Legislation",
"Linked employer–employee data",
"J16",
"J31",
"J71"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: One of the most discussed measures related to Employment Protection Legislations (EPL) is the one concerning redundancy procedures that bind employers to provide severance payments in case of dismissals. A large literature examines the effects of EPL on employment levels, labor reallocation and other labor market outcomes. The legislative complexity regarding employment protection has also been widely investigated by a branch of the comparative law literature on EPL. The attention has been focused on the identification of national regulatory styles or modes of regulation and conclusions have been drawn about whether a given regulatory style tends to promote or retard economic and social development (Freyens and Verkerke, 2017). However, there is scarce evidence on the impact that employment protection regulation may have on gender disparities. The target of this paper is to evaluate the effect on women's employment outflows and wages of a reform that in 1990 introduced in Italy more stringent legislation for dismissals.\n2. The institutional frame: 2.1 The background\n3. Data: The present empirical analysis is based on administrative LEED containing several information on workers and firms' characteristics. This data set is an unbalanced panel covering a 1:90 random sample of Italian employees. We use the part of the survey covering dependent workers in private sector providing information concerning individual characteristics such as gender, age, starting and final date of employment spell, number of days worked, occupational qualification, type of contract, maternity episodes and unemployment benefits. For each worker, we can also observe the characteristics of the firm in which he/she is employed like plant dimension, industry, starting and final date of activity, localization at regional level and collective agreement code. The available data contain annual information and for each individual we can observe if he/she has a stable economic relationship or if he/she moves from a firm to another or if he/she gets out from the employment status. Variables are defined in Table I, while some summary statistics of the sample are provided in Table II.\n4. Identification strategy: 4.1 Employment outflows\n5. Results: 5.1 Employment outflows\n6. Robustness checks: 6.1 Endogenous sorting\n7. Conclusions: The design of employment protection and its evolution over time is an important topic in the institutional approach to labor markets, which considers not only the impact of regulations on aggregate employment and unemployment but also the effect on labor market prospects of disadvantaged and marginal groups in the labor force. This study aims at evaluating the effect of EPL variation on women's employment outflows and wages. Exploiting the Italian reform of 1990 which raised dismissals costs for firms with up to 15 employees we show that women in small firms after the reform reduce their risk of job separation vis-a-vis their male colleagues. Our results also support a lower reduction of wages for women after the reform of about 1.6 percent with respect to their male counterpart. The coefficients of interest are statistically significant when women are no more than 45 years old.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the impact of more stringent Employment Protection Legislation on employment outflows and wages of women compared to those of men.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors exploit the Italian labor market reform of 1990 that raised firing costs for firms with less than 15 employees leaving unchanged existing rules for larger firms. The authors setup a natural experiment using this firm size threshold to examine if an increase of severance pay in small relative to large firms has a different impact on labor flows and earnings by gender. Using administrative linked employer-employee data, the authors find a significant reduced flow out of employment of women with respect to men in small relative to large firms after 1990.\nFindings: The results also indicate a reduction of the gender wage gap after the reform of about 1.5 percent. These findings are statistically significant for women in fertility age and disappear if we consider older women.\nOriginality/value: The findings are consistent with the idea that employment protection may help in reducing gender disparities.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Leonardo: why the inventor failed to innovate
|
[
"Creative thinking",
"Innovation",
"Responsibilities",
"History"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: To be understood, a thing must first be seen as it really is (Sherwin Nuland (2000), on Leonardo's strategy).\nHow best to sum up?: Leonardo knew both friends and adversaries in his native Italy, but his artistry and inventiveness also attracted the keen interest of the French crown, a relationship that began during military occupation of Milan by France under Louis XII at the end of the fifteenth century. Leonardo became a Francophile and, at the invitation of King Francis I, successor to Louis XII, spent the final years of his life as the illustrious occupant of a royal property still extant among the castles of the Loire Valley. Why then were so many of the reconstituted artefacts on display today in France not realizable 500 years ago, while they have remained accessible in Leonardo's prolific notebooks and sketchpads? \"[T]hose who came into contact with the living Leonardo knew that he was something special. Perhaps it is this that helped patrons put up with his erratic delivery of finished products\" (Kemp, 2004, p. 223).With the benefit of both hindsight and the recent two and a half centuries of truly remarkable industrial revolution - for which the world had to await another 250 years after Leonardo's death, we can venture some responses to our question:* with spreading literacy and numeracy, those who were curious found their intellectual horizons broadening and deepening;* the technologist was an evolving specimen of humanity, suddenly departing, as Leonardo did, from ancient manual handicrafts whose skills had been numbingly repetitive, generation after generation, century after century;* for the first time mathematics was applied to the skills of the artisan;* religious doubts were spreading in the West's Christian world; dogma was losing some of its grasp, and the inquisitive wanted to know more about the human body and its failings (hence the anatomists);* the exploration of anatomy and physiology helped explain certain mechanical forces such as levers and fulcra, hinging and rotation, lifting and lowering of loads: all motions transferable to non-animal entities;* the enquiring craftsman, whether artist or manual worker, began experimenting with new or combined or exotic substances: the dawn of today's complex materials science;* experiment often led as much to failure as to success; error created new substances and devices, and serendipity played its inevitable role in the process of innovation; and* success, however, is its own achievement and spurs the search for further success and occasionally mastery of the totally unknown.Leonardo was thus a man far ahead of his age. He was a sensitive pathfinder, an experimenter, a true pioneer in the field of evolving technology.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - Aims to demonstrate how a foremost \"Renaissance man\", Leonardo da Vinci, an artist who also fathered inventions by the score, was destined to have his conceptions remain largely either on paper or in his head.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Describes the creative work of a major polymath of the Italian Renaissance: Leonardo was painter, sculptor, designer, geometer, architect, natural scientist, anatomist, physiologist, diarist and sometime chronicler.\nFindings: - Leonardo was more than a painter and sculptor: he was a prolific inventor of tools, instruments, public works, even spectacles and occasionally entire festivals. Yet the author of so many novel contraptions, devices, systems and events left virtually no material trace of his inventiveness.\nOriginality/value: - An analytical portrait enables the author to proffer some answers to the question of why Leonardo's non-artistic bequest to civilization remains so intangible.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Younger workers' metastereotypes, workplace mood, attitudes, and behaviors
|
[
"Satisfaction",
"Stereotypes",
"Mood",
"Age diversity",
"Impression management",
"Younger workers"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Young workers are subject to \"all manner of negativity, maligning, scape-goating, and criticism\" (Keene and Handrich, 2010, p. 1). This is not a new phenomenon beginning with the current generation of younger workers (Millennials/GenY); when Baby Boomers entered the workforce in their twenties, they were disparaged as \"hippies\" and 20-something GenXers were called \"slackers.\" Yet, very little attention is paid to stereotypes of younger workers (Finkelstein et al., 2013); the focus of research is on biases facing older workers (Posthuma and Campion, 2009). The current study answers critical questions: \"Do younger workers feel stereotyped (because of their age)?\" and, \"If yes, how might that impact the way they feel, think, and behave at work?\"\nMetastereotypes: The metastereotype literature illustrates that people not only question, \"what do they think of me?\" but wonder by extension, \"do they see me stereotypically?\" Such concerns can induce anxiety, deplete cognitive resources, and disrupt interpersonal interactions (King et al., 2008) all of which are problematic at work. This research investigates how two metastereotype factors - the content of metastereotypes and self-consciousness about being judged according to those stereotypes - operate and the extent to which they influence mood, attitudes toward older coworkers, and workplace impression management behavior.\nConsequences of metastereotypes: Proximal outcome: negative mood\nMethod: Participants and procedure\nResults: Structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis approach\nDiscussion: We found that younger workers do feel self-conscious about being stereotyped because of their age at work, affecting how they feel, think, and behave. The results highlight the importance of metastereotype consciousness and the role of mood in the relationship between metastereotypes and work outcomes.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of age-related stereotyping processes on younger workers' mood, attitudes, and impression management behaviors at work.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using survey data from 281 younger workers, the hypothesized model was tested using structural equation modeling.\nFindings: As younger workers are more self-conscious about being age stereotyped, they are less likely to be satisfied with older co-workers, which is partly explained by negative mood associated with that metastereotype consciousness. Also, chronological age, age-group identification, and age prejudice, were critical influences on the emergence of metastereotype consciousness.\nResearch limitations/implications: Unexpected findings point to: experiences of younger workers which may not follow the same patterns found with older groups and unique operation of age as a dynamic social category that may not parallel findings regarding other social categories.\nPractical implications: There is clearly potential for younger workers to be concerned they are viewed \"stereotypically\" and this metastereotype consciousness influences how they feel, think, and behave at work. Organizations should be aware of the potential antecedents and consequences, as well as the nature of metastereotypic perceptions, to better facilitate positive and productive interactions across age groups at work.\nOriginality/value: This research contributes to an understanding of younger workers' experiences at work, highlights the role of mood in the operation of metastereotypes on attitudes and behaviors in age-diverse contexts, and improves our understanding of social biases and inequality associated with age-based groups.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Ethical strategic alliances for the sustainable recovering of a territory
|
[
"Sustainable development",
"Case study",
"Mafia",
"Depressed territory",
"Ethical strategic alliances",
"South of Italy"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Strategic alliances among organizations have grown dramatically during the past two decades and are supposed to grow in the near future (Elmuti and Kathawala, 2001).\nLiterature review: The research can be included in the stream of strategic alliances literature that links value creation of networks to shared, maintained and developed network resources (Hervas-Oliver and Albors-Garrigos, 2007; Gretzinger and Royer, 2014). The paper assumes thus a resource-based view (RBV) perspective (Wernerfelt, 1984), which posits that a firm achieves a sustainable comparative advantage and earns superior profits by owning or controlling its strategic assets, both tangible and intangible (Barney, 1991). The RBV experienced a flourishing period, attracting the attention of scholars and practitioners during the 80s (Wernerfelt, 1984) and 90s (Barney, 1991).\nMethodology: As the research question of the paper is context-specific, it has been addressed to investigating a case study. A case study approach, in fact, is appropriate when a researcher needs to conduct a holistic and in-depth analysis of a complex phenomenon in its real-life context (Yin, 2003; Berry and Otley, 2004). Moreover, the case study methodology offers the possibility of investigating issues from a practical rather than from a theoretical perspective. The use of case study also allows researchers to use different methods of collecting data, thereby giving them a rich source of data from real settings (Yin, 2003). As such, the case study method is particularly suitable for exploring practices related to the ethical and business management issues from an inside-out perspective.\nThe GOEL Group: an overview: GOEL strategic alliance, located in the South of Italy (Calabria region), was selected for the case study. The choice of GOEL is integral with the territory in which it operates, which is the right context to address the research question related to the capability of an ethical network to recover a depressed territory. Calabria, a region plagued by several economic and social problems, is the least-developed Italian region (Svimez, 2014).\nThe GOEL Group: activities and outcomes: To answer RQ1, the GOEL Group activities have been analyzed under a sustainable profile, without ignoring the economic aspect. In fact, as the GOEL Founder Monsignor Bregantini declared in a recent interview (Terragni, 2015):\nConclusions: The paper deals with a novel research question, which is whether a network driven by ethical values in a depressed region can achieve advantages for both the network and the territory surrounding the network.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze a case study of an ethical strategic alliance operating in a depressed territory belonging to the South of Italy, with the aim to investigate whether an alliance guided by ethic principles could be effective in recovering a territory while pursuing, at the same time, economic aims for the alliance itself and for the whole territory.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper uses a case study approach. The analyses of the case data, including in-depth interviews and documentary evidence, interpreted by the authors and supported by literature review, allow for the main research question to be addressed: \"Could ethical networks contribute to recover a territory?\".\nFindings: The case analysis delivers new insights into the relationships between business and ethics. The findings also provide evidence that it is possible, even in a depressed area, to conjugate ethics and business with reciprocal advantages for the organizations and the territory, in the light of the creed of the Magna Grecia, kalokagathia (the good and the beautiful).\nSocial implications: The findings of the GOEL strategic alliance provide evidence of the role that could be played by networks in supporting social innovations, thus highlighting clear implications for policy makers, as there is still scarce empirical evidence available to inform governments on how they can influence, support and facilitate the formation of networks.\nOriginality/value: This is one of the few studies adopting an ethical perspective in studying alliances and, to the best of the authors' knowledge, the first study pursuing the aim to investigate how and whether an ethical network can succeed in recovering a depressed territory.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Predicting information credibility in time-sensitive social media
|
[
"Information credibility",
"Online social networks",
"Model transfer",
"Time sensitiveness",
"Social media prediction"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Microblogging is a well-established paradigm for interaction in online social networks. In a microblogging platform, users post short messages which are shown to their followers (or users which subscribe to them) in a real-time fashion. These short messages are known as microblog posts, status updates, or tweets - a term referring to the popular microblogging platform, Twitter[1]. This communication format is ideal for posting from mobile internet devices, and indeed a majority of users (54 percent) access the service from their phones[2].\n2. Related work: The literature on information credibility is extensive, so in this section our coverage of it is by no means complete. We just provide an outline of the research that is most closely related to ours.\n3. Case study: twitter during a crisis event: The earthquake that hit Chile on February 2010 provided the initial motivation for this work. This section summarizes some observations presented in Mendoza et al. (2010) about the use of Twitter during this event. Specifically, we compare a sample of posts containing false rumors with a sample of posts containing confirmed news.\n4. Modeling newsworthy and credible information: The main focus of our research is on credibility of time-sensitive information, in particular on current news events. It is important to note that both goals, that of estimating the newsworthiness of a discussion topic, and that of determining its credibility, are equally important to us.\n5. Prediction model creation: In this section we present the methodology we use to create the models involved in automatic newsworthiness and credibility prediction for topics on Twitter. For this, we use the labels and features described in Section 4. It is important to recall, that we use information cascades as a research unit. Therefore, we train our classifiers only on the features which represent aggregated values for a topic, discarding the use of features calculated at user or message level.\n6. Conclusions: Our main conclusion is that newsworthy and credible information can be found in a microblogging platform using supervised learning methods over a set of appropriate features. In order to achieve this, we have described an approach in which initially the messages are collected into \"topics,\" then an automatic classifier finds the newsworthy topics, and a second classifier finds the credible topics among the newsworthy ones.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Twitter is a popular microblogging service which has proven, in recent years, its potential for propagating news and information about developing events. The purpose of this paper is to focus on the analysis of information credibility on Twitter. The purpose of our research is to establish if an automatic discovery process of relevant and credible news events can be achieved.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper follows a supervised learning approach for the task of automatic classification of credible news events. A first classifier decides if an information cascade corresponds to a newsworthy event. Then a second classifier decides if this cascade can be considered credible or not. The paper undertakes this effort training over a significant amount of labeled data, obtained using crowdsourcing tools. The paper validates these classifiers under two settings: the first, a sample of automatically detected Twitter \"trends\" in English, and second, the paper tests how well this model transfers to Twitter topics in Spanish, automatically detected during a natural disaster.\nFindings: There are measurable differences in the way microblog messages propagate. The paper shows that these differences are related to the newsworthiness and credibility of the information conveyed, and describes features that are effective for classifying information automatically as credible or not credible.\nOriginality/value: The paper first tests the approach under normal conditions, and then the paper extends the findings to a disaster management situation, where many news and rumors arise. Additionally, by analyzing the transfer of our classifiers across languages, the paper is able to look more deeply into which topic-features are more relevant for credibility assessment. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper that studies the power of prediction of social media for information credibility, considering model transfer into time-sensitive and language-sensitive contexts.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A multi-attribute ranking method for bridge management
|
[
"Bridges",
"Decision making",
"Analytical hierarchy process"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The highway transportation system is a major component of most civil infrastructure systems, and can be considered one of modern society's critical foundations. In particular, bridges are an important item of the transportation system; because of their distinct function of joining highways as the crucial nodes, they are the most vulnerable element. In addition, bridges are exposed to aggressive environmental conditions and increasing traffic volumes and truck loads.Maintaining the existing bridge infrastructure has become a major social and economic concern, since bridges must be kept within acceptable limits of safety and serviceability. At the same time, maintenance, repair and replacement (MR&R) of bridges are very expensive items that involve large investments which are not always available to transportation agencies. These agencies are required to go through a complex decision making process for selecting and prioritizing projects to implement the actions that are required to maintain a bridge network.\nRanking and prioritizing procedures: Ranking and prioritizing projects provide the insight needed for the decision making process. Ranking and prioritizing procedures have been widely used by several departments of transportation to evaluate and select bridge projects. Capital budgeting decisions at the network level are commonly based on ranking procedures.Bridge management systems are required to produce the ranking of various projects in a network. Pontis, the most widely used bridge management system in the USA, provides this functionality and can rank projects according to a benefit-to-cost ratio, the average health index or the sufficiency rating for each project (American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, 2005). The following is a discussion of these procedures, including an overview of their major drawbacks.Benefit-to-cost ratio analysis\nMulti-attribute utility theory (MAUT): Realizing the drawbacks of the available ranking methods, an alternative innovative method for bridge ranking and prioritizing is proposed in this paper. Eleven interviews with bridge engineers and decision makers from two ministries of transportation and two private companies were performed as a part of the research information collection. One of the objectives of the interviews was to collect the requirements for an innovative ranking method for bridge management. The main requirement identified from these interviews was the flexibility to enable decision makers to include multiple and conflicting criteria and to incorporate qualitative and quantitative measurements in the ranking process.The available decision theories were analyzed and MAUT was identified to address the above requirement. The basic principle of the MAUT is based on estimating performance using attributes that are concrete, measurable and representative of the degree of satisfaction with the various aspects of each alternative. The attributes of each alternative specify the characteristics of that particular alternative and can serve as scales against which the levels of achievement of that alternative are measured. The foundation of MAUT is the use of utility functions, which are utilized to quantify the preference of the decision maker by depicting the degree of satisfaction, as the attribute under consideration takes values between the most and least desirable limits.The purpose of the utility functions is to transform the measures of the different attributes into a common dimensionless scale ranging from 0 to 1. The utility functions can transform objective data such as the alternative measurable number of units or subjective knowledge such as expert judgment into a utility score. Having a representative set of utility functions, alternatives can be scored and ranked in a systematic way given that the value of the various attributes (objective and subjective) are readily available. To evaluate an alternative, the utility values of its attributes can be aggregated to estimate an overall utility or degree of satisfaction. The preferred alternative is normally the alternative with the highest overall utility score.The most challenging step in implementing MAUT is the development of the utility functions. Several procedures have been proposed to this end. Keeney and Raiffa (1993) discussed the most elaborate methods to develop these functions. The utility values are often defined on a normalized scale as the attribute changes between its lower and upper bounds and the function is usually evaluated by the certainty equivalence method developed by Keeney and Raiffa (1993). However, it has been recognized that using the convergence procedure to assess a certainty equivalent is time-consuming and complicated (Pan and Rahman, 1998).Benefiting from the guidelines established by Keeney and Raiffa (1993) and from the intuitive eigenvector approach embedded in the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) developed by Saaty (1980), a novel procedure to develop the utility functions is developed and discussed in the next section.Procedure to develop utility functions\nDevelopment of the ranking method: The ranking method is based on MAUT. The first step toward the development of the ranking method is breaking down the problem under consideration into a hierarchy structure. Decision making elements are collected during interviews with bridge engineers from two ministries of transportation and two private companies. These elements are organized into a four-level hierarchy structure, which captures the main elements of the problem under consideration. The natural top-down approach is used to develop the structure. This approach starts with identifying the overall goal and proceeding downward until all the measures of value are included.The first level of the hierarchy is the overall goal of the ranking exercise. The second level contains the objectives necessary to achieve the overall goal. The third level of the hierarchy holds the criteria to be used for evaluating the objectives. The alternatives are added at the bottom level. Figure 3 presents the hierarchy structure developed in this research. Each objective or criterion has a specific weight reflecting its importance. The weights are defined based on the experts' judgments extracted during the interviews. The hierarchy structure development and discussion of the various elements in the structure are presented in details in Abu Dabous (2008).The utility functions measure the level of attainment of the various attributes of each bridge with respect to the evaluating criteria. These functions are developed using the procedure presented earlier. The utility functions for the different criteria under consideration are developed and provided in Abu Dabous (2008).\nExpected utility value: Upon constructing the decision hierarchy and selecting the appropriate utility functions, a utility model can be used to aggregate the utility values for the various attributes. Since the elements in each level of the hierarchy structure are considered to be independent, the additive utility model can be used as a simple and practical approach to aggregate utilities (Keeney and Raiffa, 1993). In such a model, the overall relative utility is expressed as follows: Equation 4 where ki is the weight for attribute i, and ui is the utility value for attribute i.The utility scores obtained from the utility functions are aggregated using equation (2) to estimate the utility associated with each objective. Then, the utilities of the various objectives are aggregated using the same equation to evaluate the overall utility of the bridge. All bridges in the network or sub-network can be ranked based on the overall utility values.\nCase study: In order to demonstrate the application of the developed ranking method, a sample sub-network consisting of eleven bridge projects is considered. Data for these bridges is extracted from reports provided by the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario. Some data is not available in the provided reports, such as the load carrying capacity. This was compensated by requesting an expert from the industry to provide his assessments for the missing data. Sample data for three projects is shown in Table III. The attribute values are transformed to utility values using the corresponding utility function of each criterion.The expected utility value for each project in the network is estimated using equation (2). The utility values for the various attributes of each project are aggregated using the weights of criteria and objectives. The weights for attributes and criteria are provided in Figure 3. For example, the expected utility value for Bridge 10 is as follows: Equation 5 Projects in the sub-network can be ranked according to the overall expected utility, where bridges with higher overall expected utility must be prioritized for action. It is clear that Bridge 30 has the highest priority, followed by Bridge 10 and then Bridge 20.\nConclusion: Ranking and prioritizing projects are essential steps in bridge management. The current methods for ranking and prioritizing bridge projects are associated with various drawbacks. This paper proposes an innovative ranking method for bridge networks, based on the MAUT. This theory provides flexibility for the decision makers in expressing their degree of satisfaction with each bridge attribute. In addition, MAUT enables the decision makers to include multiple and conflicting criteria and to incorporate qualitative and quantitative measurements in the ranking process. The paper also presents an innovative technique to develop the necessary utility functions. The proposed method is validated using a case study.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - A bridge network is a major capital asset that requires continuing investment in order to maintain the network within acceptable limits of safety and serviceability. Ranking and prioritizing procedures have been widely used by several departments of transportation to select bridges for intervention and to distribute the available funds among competing projects. The available ranking and prioritizing procedures have various drawbacks, and an improved, rational ranking and prioritizing procedure is needed. The paper aims to address these issues.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The requirements and characteristics of an innovative ranking and prioritizing method are identified during interviews with professionals involved in bridge management. Based on these requirements, multi-attribute utility theory (MAUT) is selected to develop the method. A technique to develop utility functions based on the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) is discussed. A hierarchy structure that captures the decision-making elements is presented. A case study is used to demonstrate the applicability and the validity of the proposed ranking method.\nFindings: - The research findings have identified the decision objectives and the criteria essential to rank and prioritize bridge projects, and these are included within a framework to rank and prioritize bridge projects while incorporating experts' input in the process.\nPractical implications: - The proposed framework includes weights for the various objectives and recommends utility functions to evaluate the different attributes. In addition, the framework provides flexibility to adjust the weights and to modify the utility functions to reflect network-specific characteristics. This method can be used by departments of transportation to rank bridges in a network, even incorporating conflicting criteria, and it can be integrated within an already implemented bridge management methodology.\nOriginality/value: - Ranking and prioritizing projects are essential steps in bridge management. Current methods for ranking and prioritizing bridge projects are associated with various drawbacks. This paper proposes an innovative ranking method for bridge networks, based on MAUT. This theory provides flexibility for the decision makers in expressing their degree of satisfaction with each bridge attribute.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
An inspection maintenance strategy using the inspection factor
|
[
"Inspection",
"Hazards",
"Breakdown analysis",
"Maintenance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: As affirmed by (Bloch and Geitner, 1983; Ramakumar, 1993), an inspection maintenance strategy can reduce the downtime for equipment subject to random failure. The negative exponential distribution has been recommended in the models developed by (Jardine, 1973; Dhillon, 1988; Kececioglu, 1991; Locket, 1989; Wild, 1995). The model proposed by Jardine (1973) defines the hazard rate as follows: Equation 1 The hazard rate is shown as being inversely related to a constant frequency of inspection \"n\" and directly related to \"k\". \"k\" is numerically equal to the arrival rate of breakdowns \"p\" over unit time. However, \"k\" includes a factor such that the units for h(t), \"p\" and \"n\" are appropriate. The variations in the models developed by the other researchers lie in redefining the value of \"k\".The chief limitation in this distribution is the implication that over its entire life the equipment has a hazard rate that is largely constant. Particularly in the wear out stage, the equipment can be expected to have a steadily increasing hazard rate. Hence, an optimal model for frequency of inspection needs to be time dependent. This ensures that the frequency of inspection n(t) can respond to variations in the hazard rate h(t) over time.The Bath Tub Curve has generally been accepted as being representative of the hazard rate for equipment over time (Ascher and Feingold, 1984; Andrews and Moss, 1993; Blischke and Murthy, 2000; Pulcini, 2001; Xie et al., 2002; Murthy et al., 2003). Factors such as equipment design, usage, harshness of environment and aging of materials would all influence the hazard rate, (Kumar and Klefsjo, 1994). The usefulness of hazard modeling for maintenance, has been recognized by many authors, (Anderson, 1991; Baker, 1991; Bendell et al. (1991); Cerone, 1991; Jardine et al. 1987; Love and Guo, 1991a,b).\n2. Model development for variation with time: The model for the frequency of inspection should satisfy the following conditions:* The frequency of inspection should be time dependent.* When plotted against time, the slope of the function should be negative in the decreasing hazard rate (DHR) stage, constant in the constant hazard rate (CHR) stage, and positive in the increasing hazard rate (IHR) stage. This would indicate that any change in the hazard rate is reflected appropriately in the frequency of inspection also.* There should be no discontinuity at the transition stages in time at T1, when DHR changes to CHR and also at T2, when CHR changes to IHR.For convenience and logical simplicity, a shape factor (th) is introduced, such that a negative value for (th) yields a negative slope, a zero value a constant slope and a positive value a positive slope. To satisfy the third condition one needs to introduce a new variable TT, for transition time as shown in the list below.One can define the model for inspection frequency as a function of time as follows: Equation 2 subject to the parameters below:T1 =Time of transition from negative to zero slope.T2 =Time of transition from zero to positive slope.TT =Transition time variable.th =Shape factor.(MTBF)0 =MTBF for CHR stage when no inspection is performed.N =(MTBF)0-1.For the negative slope stage: 0<t <= T1; th<0; TT = T1.For the zero slope stage: T1<t<T2; th = 0; TT = (MTBF)0.For the positive slope stage: T2 <= t; th<0; TT = T2.\n3. Model using variation with time and inspection factor (IF): The inspection frequency n(t) has a dynamic relationship with the hazard rate h(t) (Jardine, 1973; Dhillon, 1988; Kececioglu, 1991; Locket, 1989; Wild, 1995). As inspection is performed and the frequency of inspection n(t) increases, the hazard rate h(t) decreases correspondingly. The relationship between inspection frequency n(t) and the hazard rate h(t) can be defined by introducing the term inspection factor IF. Hence, if the hazard rate in the case where no inspections are performed is H(t)NI, then it is modified by an inspection factor IF, as shown below. Equation 3 In order to develop an effective policy, maintenance management must first of all know the hazard rate h(t) of the equipment at a given point of time. Second they must also know how changes in inspection frequency n(t) can affect the hazard rate h(t) at that point of time. Several variations in defining IF are now examined.Case 1 - The inverse law\n4. Downtime cost minimization: The optimal inspection frequency has been defined as the inspection frequency that minimizes the Downtime ratio. This approach has been used by several researchers (Bentley, 1993; Gnedenko and Ushakov, 1995; Zhao, 2003; Tsai et al., 2004). Cycle Time may be defined as the sum of the time the equipment is incapable of operation because of repair or maintenance and the time it is capable of operation. The Downtime ratio may be defined as the ratio of the time the equipment was incapable of operation because of repair or maintenance or inspection, to the Cycle Time.The problems with this approach are as follows:* It assumes that the total cost associated with inspection is the downtime due to inspection. In fact inspection may have other significant associated costs such as hire of equipment, consultants, training. These also need to be factored in.* Several forms of inspection such as condition monitoring, on line monitoring, thermal imaging can be performed without any downtime required for inspection. In the Downtime Model, these would not have any cost, which is not correct.* In the Downtime Model, two inspection procedures that have the same time inspection downtime are shown as having the same cost. However, because of the different costs of equipment and skill levels employed this need not be the case, even though the inspection downtime happens to be the same.The suggested approach to overcome these problems is as follows. Using a cost factor CF, the downtime cost is determined instead of the downtime. Similarly inspection costs are used instead of inspection time. These would include the inspection downtime costs together with any other associated costs, such as equipment leasing, cost of consultants, specialists and training. The downtime costs would be plotted against inspection frequency. The optimal inspection frequency is decided by the intersection of the inspection cost lines with the downtime cost plots: Equation 8 The downtime costs would be examined for the four cases of inspection factor through the DHR, CHR and IHR stages (see Figures 1-3).\n5. Numerical results: Figures that approximate those actually used at Ford's casting plant at Geelong, Australia have been assumed. For planning purposes a cycle time of four weeks on a two-shift basis is used. For this analysis this is shown as one unit of time. The cost factor CF of $200,000 gives an hourly load center rate of $ 625. This compares well with the rates being used at Ford. The MTTR at Ford is in the region of 2-3 percent per cycle time. An MTTR of 0.03 or 3 percent per cycle time has been assumed here. The costs per inspection also compare favorably with those being used at Ford. However it must be cautioned that these are only demonstrative figures. Maintenance management would need to determine their own unique cycle time, cost factor, MTTR and inspection costs to arrive at optimal inspection frequencies unique to their equipment and operations:* The cycle time is assumed as one unit of time.* The cost factor CF is assumed as $ 200,000.* The mean time to repair MTTR is assumed as 0.03 unit of time.Two types of inspection are examined. One inspection is assumed to be more detailed than the other. Consequently it is expected to cost more. Cost per inspection in one case is $1,000. In the second case the cost per inspection is $500.A Weibull distribution has been assumed for the hazard rate of the equipment: Equation 9 Equation 10 Equation 11 Equation 12 Equation 13 The optimal inspection frequencies for all the combinations are shown summarized below in Table I. The plots have provided a wide band of hazard rates within which the maintenance manager needs to find the best fit for the equipmen:. Equation 14\n6. Conclusions: One can conclude that the results are consistent with earlier findings that an appropriate inspection strategy influences the equipment hazard rate in a beneficial manner. The conclusions are as follows:1. An optimal inspection frequency exists and is subject to the following conditions:* The inspection frequency n(t) is time dependent.* The inspection frequency reflects the variations in the hazard rate through appropriate values for the shape factor (th). In the CHR stage where (th) equals zero, the inspection frequency has a constant value of N.* There is no discontinuity at the transition stages T1 and T2. At the first transition stage as t approaches T1, (t/TT) approaches one. Hence n approaches N. Similarly, at the second transition stage as t approaches T2, (t/TT) approaches one. Hence in this case also n approaches N.2. The drawbacks of the inverse law relationship between the hazard rate h(t) and the inspection frequency n(t) can be overcome using variations of the negative exponential law.A goal of this investigation was to develop models that could relate to manufacturing operations and be useful to maintenance management. One may conclude that these models provide maintenance management with an effective method for planning maintenance. Optimal inspection frequency and its various models provide a powerful tool which maintenance management can incorporate in their maintenance strategies.Further research into this, in a collaborative effort with the equipment manufacturers is required. The goal should be that based upon research and the database of equipment supplied, the manufacturer should be able to supply a band of hazard rate curves, transition points and Inspection Factors within which the actual figures can be expected to lie. Eventually these figures could be tabulated for industry type, usage and equipment size. This would greatly ease the work of maintenance management.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to model an inspection maintenance strategy that is superior to existing strategies and which incorporates the inspection factor.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - An appropriate inspection maintenance strategy can help prevent breakdown failure and reduce breakdown and repair costs. However, every inspection also incurs costs. The optimal model for an inspection maintenance strategy would be such that the inspection frequency closely follows the hazard rate of the equipment over its lifetime.\nFindings: - A model with a three-layered structure needs to be developed. Over time, equipment can be expected to demonstrate a hazard rate that is decreasing, constant or increasing with time. In the first stage a model for inspection frequency is developed that is time-dependent and can address this requirement. Second, the hazard rate has a dynamic relationship with the inspection frequency, i.e. as the inspection frequency increases, the hazard rate is known to decrease. In the second stage this is incorporated into the model, using the inspection factor. In the last stage a model for costing is superimposed for cost optimization.\nOriginality/value: - The model developed in this paper provides maintenance managers with a powerful practical tool for determining the optimal inspection frequency for equipment over its lifetime.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Individual and managerial predictors of the different forms of employee voice
|
[
"Employee voice",
"Trust",
"Job satisfaction",
"Psychological safety",
"Management attitude"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Participation of employees considered as \"voice behavior\" which is conceptualized as \"speaking out and challenging the status quo with the intent of improving the situation\" (LePine and Van Dyne, 1998, p. 853). When Hirschman (1970) first offered the term, the sole trigger of voice came from dissatisfaction. Studies analyzing voice elaborate it as a self-focused variable at first based on personal dissatisfaction, then other-focused as \"prosocial behavior\" (Morrison, 2011). Until today, employee voice research has mostly highlighted its constructive aspect, which takes the voice as \"prosocial behavior\" (Morrison, 2011). For instance, Van Dyne et al. (2003) assert that employee voice held with the intention of organizational improvement; employees offer suggestions not because they are obliged to because they want to. Thus, employees recognize something wrong concerning work issues and try to solve it by offering constructive ideas and suggestions to their managers or coworkers.\n2. Theoretical background of different forms of voice behavior: Voice is defined as \"any attempt at all to change rather than to escape from an objectionable state of affairs\" (Hirschman, 1970; p. 30). Thus, he highlighted the reason of voice as \"personal\" dissatisfaction. Employees who are dissatisfied with their current situation prefer to speak up or remain silent depending on their level of loyalty to their company. Furthermore, Freeman and Medoff (1984) studied voice in respect to union representation and their articulation of concerns on behalf of \"collective action.\"\n3. Hypothesis development: 3.1 Quality of the managerial relationship and voice\n4. Research methodology: 4.1 Sampling\n5. Data analysis and results: Data analysis of the survey was done by using descriptive, correlational and inferential statistics in SPSS 20 and Process macro to test the hypothesized model. We also used structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the hypothesized mediational model by using Mplus7. Principle component analysis and multiple regression analysis were used.\n6. Discussion and conclusion: To adapt into competitive/changing business world, the need for executives and leaders who are open to listen and practice the ideas and opinions of employees is getting increased (Morrison and Milliken, 2000). This also necessitates a human resource, which compose of intellectual capital who are able take initiative and responsibility, and shares new ideas/opinions (Nikolaou et al., 2007). Thus, voice is one form of participation in decision making. In this sense, any positive/negative ideas or opinions of employees are contributive input for the organization. Studying the incentives behind employee voice behaviors will also contribute in increasing different ideas/opinions inside organizations. Besides, quality of managerial relationship is an important variable to observe while understanding employee voice concept. When the supervisor-employee relationship is in good condition, employee perceives the environment as psychologically safe. Thus, level of PPS of employees related with managerial relationship, while expressing/sharing their voice especially to avoid DESVs.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Analysis of employee voice has focused on the reasons and managerial issues regarding the available environment to speak up. The purpose of this paper is to understand the effect of management attitude on employee voice with the mediating effect of individual's perceived psychological safety (PPS). Besides, the role of job satisfaction (JS) and being individualist/collectivist as moderators over the effect of psychological safety on employee voice are analyzed.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors constructed a framework based on Maynes and Podsakoff's (2014) view that identifies four different types of voice behavior (supportive, constructive, defensive and destructive). In total, 286 questionnaires were collected from employees working in telecommunication industry.\nFindings: Based on analysis, positive management attitude facilitates supportive and constructive voice (CV) and reduces destructive voice (DESV). PPS mediates the relationship with management attitude and DESV. JS level facilitates supportive CV and reduces DESV. Collectivism level of employees moderates PPS and DESV. Path analysis results showed a similar model for mediation effect of safety, and showed a better model fit and explanation for trust mediation between LMX and supportive, constructive and DESV. Supported assumptions would be discussed-based social exchange theory and signaling theory.\nResearch limitations/implications: The sample is relatively small which limits the external validity of the findings.\nPractical implications: Results revealed the managerial attitude over employee voice through perceived work environment (psychological safety) and trust.\nOriginality/value: This study is one of the first that integrates not only constructive but also DESV into the model.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Availability and cost analysis of an engineering system involving subsystems in series configuration
|
[
"Reliability",
"Availability",
"Mean time to failure (MTTF)",
"Profit function"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Nomenclature\n1. Introduction: As far as planning, design and operations of any complex system are concerned the reliability measures are the foremost concern. Reliability measures are very effective and efficient tool for probabilistic risk assessment in system design, operation and maintenance. The determination of the reliability measures of a complex system composed of a number of interconnected subsystems has received much attention over the years. Gupta and Sharma (1993), Singh and Goel (1996), Jain et al. (2002, 2004), Rehmert and Nachlas (2009), Ghasemi et al. (2010), Singh et al. (2011) developed different mathematical models and computed various reliability measures such as availability, mean time to failure (MTTF), reliability of complex engineering system with different assumptions. In many cases, it is not always possible to have an immediate repair facility. Gopalan and Naidu (1982) discussed reliability system in which the repair facility exists at random interval of time as it is not immediately available after detection of failure. Pirie and Bendell (1984) have extended the study on the model taken by Bendell and they proposed that failures are assumed to be dependent on the actual operating time as well as elapsed calendar time. The model was applied in the situation where all the system components are regularly switched between the \"on\" and \"off\" position. Pan (1997) discussed two types of imperfect switching system: a non-repairable system with only one standby component, one switch and one sensor. A non-repairable system with two standby components, one switch and one sensor. They considered three modes of switch failure: failure under energized condition, failing open, failing closed.\n2. Mathematical model details: 2.1 Model description\n3. Some particular cases: 3.1 Availability, reliability and unreliability\n4. Conclusion: Figures 3 and 4 provide information about the changes in availability and reliability of the complex engineering system with respect to time when failure rates are fixed at different values. It is clear from the data presented in Table I that availability as well as reliability of the system decreases as t increases and it becomes steady after a sufficient long interval of time, so the future behavior of a complex system is easily predictable for any given set of parametric values.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate various reliability measures like availability, reliability, mean time to failure and profit function.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The authors present a novel method for availability analysis of an engineering system incorporating waiting time to repair. The considered system consists of two subsystems, namely, A and B connected in series. The subsystem B has two identical units in standby arrangement. Each unit of the subsystem has two modes, i.e. normal efficiency or failed. The two standby units of the subsystem B are connected by an imperfect switching. The system is analyzed by supplementary variable technique, Laplace transformation and Gumbel-Hougaard family of copula.\nFindings: Numerical examples with a way to highlight the important results have been appended at last. Numerical calculation shows that availability and reliability of the system is decreasing with respect to time when failure rates are fixed at different values. Finally, cost analysis of system reveals that the expected profit decreases with increase in service cost.\nOriginality/value: This paper presents a mathematical model in which an important aspect of switching has been taken into consideration, which is consistent with actual failures of switching by assuming two different types of failure between adjacent transition. It is evaluated with the help of the Gumbel-Hougaard family of copula.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Acceptance and use predictors of fitness wearable technology and intention to recommend: An empirical study
|
[
"Technology adoption",
"Diffusion of innovation",
"Intention to recommend",
"Extended unified theory of acceptance and use of technology",
"Fitness wearable technology"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The wide penetration of smartphones and wearable devices has enabled consumers to monitor, store and transmit information about their physical activities, such as heart rate, temperature, calories burned and time elapsed since their last physical activity. Fitness wearables range from fitness trackers, electronic activity monitors, smart wristbands, Fitbit, Jawbone and smart watches, among others. These devices provide visual dashboards of users' activities and can be added with other healthy lifestyle applications, such as dietary tracking and medical follow-up. It has become an exciting area of technology innovation that has received sufficient attention over the past few years, but a reality check is necessary regarding user acceptability (Subramanian, 2014).\n2. Background: Smartphone use continues to grow at an unprecedented pace. As smartphone technology continues to evolve, there has also been an increase in the use of complementary information technology (IT) and content, such as mobile applications and syncing devices (Nielsen, 2014). In China, fitness wearables had a market of $163m in 2015, and it was expected to reach more than $900m in 2017 (CCTV, 2016). With the market for FWT devices continues to grow, researchers have responded with a new wave of research, focusing mainly on demand aspects of the technology.\n3. Research model and hypothesis development: 3.1 Research model\n4. Research methodology: 4.1 Item development\n5. Data analysis and results: The partial least squares method, a statistical analysis technique based on structural equation modeling (SEM), was used to test and validate the proposed model and the relationships among the hypotheses in the research model. SEM is a widely accepted approach to measure the validity of theories with empirical data (Gotz et al., 2010). In addition to being utilized in business (Richter et al., 2015) and marketing (Hair et al., 2012), SEM is also a standard analysis technique in IS research (Williams et al., 2015). SmartPLS 3.2.6 software was used for statistical analysis in this study.\n6. Discussion and conclusion: 6.1 Discussion\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify the key facilitators and inhibitors of fitness wearable technology (FWT) adoption and the intention to recommend this technology.\nDesign/methodology/approach: An innovative and integrated research model was developed by combining constructs from two well-established theoretical models, the extended unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) and diffusion of innovation (DOI). The proposed research model was empirically validated using data collected from 392 respondents in China. The data was analyzed using the partial least squares method, a statistical analysis technique based on structural equation modeling.\nFindings: The results indicate that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, habit, compatibility and innovativeness have significant direct and indirect effects on FWT adoption and the intention to recommend it. The significance of people's intention to recommend FWT to others in social networking sites (e.g. Facebook, Weibo, and WeChat) is also confirmed.\nPractical implications: The findings may facilitate the design and implementation of FWT products, applications and functionalities that can achieve high consumer acceptance and positive recommendations in social networks.\nOriginality/value: This study is among the first to investigate FWT adoption from behavioral, social and environmental perspectives. It also highlights the importance of social marketing campaigns and suggests directions of future wearable technology adoption research.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Why talented athletes drop out from sport? The Portuguese and Czech case
|
[
"Motivation",
"Drop out",
"International realities",
"School context",
"Sports practice",
"Sports public policies"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Sport, in its different modalities, is associated with an international social phenomenon that assumes a fundamental dimension in the life of the citizens (in a dynamic of involvement in the sports communities) and in the socio-financial reality of the countries (by the mobilization of economic and social resources). However, its importance in research and public policies as an educational space and as a community for socialization and sense of belonging has been overlooked (Martinek and Ruiz, 2005; Beiner, 1995; Marivoet, 2003). As societal microsystems, they also generate dynamics of involvement in a significant number of civil society organizations, emerging as the most typical associational context for both young people and adults in many European countries. Within the European context, Portugal and the Czech Republic have been increasing their participation in sport, with a greater impact on young people and specifically on those who attend school (demonstrating the importance of the school in the socialization of sports' culture and values) (Foley et al., 2004).\nConceptual framework: Motivation and sport\nMethodology: This study uses a qualitative methodology in data collection and analysis, reflecting the meanings attributed by the target population of the study in the analysis of a thematic they felt as fundamental: the reasons that led to their exit from the sporting context.\nResults: Motivational factors related to drop out\nDiscussion: This research has demonstrated, like previous ones (Fonseca et al., 2010), that there are multiplicities of factors that can lead to the exit of the sport.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to perceive the perspective of Portuguese and Czech' talented athletes regarding: the main reasons pointed to drop out of sport, putting into analysis motivational factors; the conciliation of School and Sport, and how the organization of schools and sports contexts are articulated in relation to the training and promotion of students, athletes and citizens; and the contributions (positive/negative) of sports to daily life and society.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This study uses a qualitative approach to interview eight talented athletes from different sports that had to drop out the practice of sport and explores their narratives regarding experiences and the relational dynamics between sports contexts and schools.\nFindings: Athletes identify factors that led to drop out: the coach profile or the methodology and dynamics of practicing/training; time consuming; and the impossibility of reconciling sports with school/job. Athletes can identify the sport's culture, self-development and health being as positive contributions of sports, whereas injuries were referred as the main negative factor of sport. As proposal of changes, athletes referred to the need of a more professional organization of the sport contexts and to more proximity between school policies and sport policies allowing conciliating both.\nResearch limitations/implications: One limitation that could be pointed to this research is the difference between the Czech and Portuguese socio-cultural and political situation, not only in the concept and organization of sports activities (since scholar years) but also in the general society. This difference could have more visibility when interpreting the data that led to this fact referred above.\nPractical implications: It is recommended a more proximity relationship between researchers and the contexts of practice (sport contexts) being that it is important that these contexts should have feedback from the investigations carried out. Only in this way coaches, federations and confederations can be aware of the motivational factors that lead to talented athletes drop out, and make a greater investment in initial formation of the coaches and propose policies that try to establish partnerships with schools or professional contexts which could help the management of athletes' times outside of sport.\nOriginality/value: Departing from the athletes' feelings, concerns and motivations related to sport and the reasons that led to their drop out, we argue for the definition of public policies, in both countries, that promote non-discrimination of young people who wish to maintain a path linked to sports in articulation with other areas of their lives.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A measurement instrument for implementing total quality management in Greek primary and secondary education
|
[
"Quality of education",
"Total quality management",
"Greek education system",
"Measurement instrument",
"Primary and secondary education"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Education is an important asset for the evolution of society, a public good that is valuable to both individuals and society as a whole (Bloom et al., 2007; Viaene and Zilcha, 2013). It contributes significantly to economic growth and social development, and it is an important element in national prosperity and welfare (Lu, 2018). Total quality management (TQM) is a widely recognized management philosophy that improves customer satisfaction and organizational performance; in this approach, all members of an organization are actively involved in improving processes, products and services, as well as its overall culture (Deming, 1986). The success of TQM in the manufacturing sector appealed to academics and practitioners, and thus TQM has been adopted in various service organizations (Al-Marri et al., 2007; Bouranta et al., 2017; Farrington et al., 2018; Lam et al., 2011) including educational institutions (Bayraktar et al., 2008; Manatos et al., 2017; Owlia and Aspinwall, 1997).\nTQM in education: TQM focuses on customer satisfaction through the continuous improvement (CI) of products or services; it focuses on people and incorporates employees at all levels of an organization (Evans and Lindsay, 2010; Mehra et al., 2001). TQM may be able to provide a remedy for the increased pressure and demand for quality that education is currently encountering, due to its recognition as a management philosophy with applicability to any organization (Kumar et al., 2011). As Mehta et al. (2014) maintain, TQM can cope both with the challenges of the market and stakeholders' expectations. This is in accordance with Lunenburg's (2010) notion that TQM applies not only to manufacturing and service organizations, but also to P&SE schools. This is also confirmed by Diaz and Martinez-Mediano (2018) and Galvez et al. (2016), who explain that in Spain and other countries the adoption of quality management systems began in universities but was then applied also to P&SE schools. In this context, Soria-Garcia and Martinez-Lorente (2014) developed and validated an instrument applicable to secondary schools to measure quality of management dimensions.\nMethodology: Measurement instrument\nDiscussion of the results: Despite TQM's recognized value, scholarly literature has largely explored TQM in education in HE, and even there, usually from a theoretical perspective and lacking empirical evidence (Soria-Garcia and Martinez-Lorente, 2014). TQM initiatives have been little explored in P&SE, with only a limited number of applications, despite the importance of P&SE in social and economic terms. This limitation illustrates the need for further research and implementation. Indeed, this study marks one of few attempts to introduce TQM in P&SE from a holistic perspective, not only discussing it and its potential in this specific sector but also developing a validated tool for its implementation.\nConclusions: Despite the acknowledged contribution of P&SE to society, in general, existing literature offers limited evidence of TQM implementation in this sector, and that available focuses more on theory rather than on empirical evidence. Scholars of education have not yet reached consensus on the dimensions required for successful TQM implementation. The instrument the present study proposed has seven distinct dimensions, based on the review of the literature and discussion with experts, and is intended to bridge this gap, embracing factors identified in different TQM frameworks formed in education studies. Not only that, this instrument measured education professionals' perception of TQM implementation, both at present (NOW) and in the future (SHOULD BE); it treated TQM as a holistic management approach and not as a problem-solving mechanism for certain immediate problems. This follows Soria-Garcia and Martinez-Lorente (2014), who urge the use of multiple measurement scales and treatment of TQM as a strategic approach. The results of the PCA and CFA indicated that the measures of the instruments were reliable and valid, confirming the initial selection of TQM dimensions. In addition, to the best of the author's knowledge, this is the first look at TQM in P&SE that develops a validated implementation tool that is examined in the context of a country (Greece) facing long-standing economic difficulties, with limited financial resources for education.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Primary and secondary education (P&SE) is fundamentally important for achieving a high-quality education system. P&SE delivers more extensive social returns than higher education and is perhaps the most important locus where core values are established and the foundation for educational super-systems. The purpose of this paper is to develop a structured approach for the implementation of total quality management (TQM) in P&SE and validate it empirically.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A 7-dimensioned and a 66-itemed instrument was developed and administered to education professionals at Greek P&SE institutions to measure TQM implementation at present and its potential for the future. The measures were tested for validity and reliability.\nFindings: The findings confirmed that the instrument developed is both valid and reliable. The factors of TQM identified for P&SE were leadership, student focus, continuous improvement, process control and involvement, education and training, measurement and evaluation, and change management.\nPractical implications: P&SE institutions can employ the instrument developed to guide their implementation of TQM practices. Researchers and practitioners can use it to build models to relate facilitating practices to quality performance while enhancing social empowerment and contributing to economic growth, particularly at times of economic difficulty.\nOriginality/value: The present study adds value to the existing literature by investigating the unexplored field of TQM in P&SE at a time of economic downturn by offering researchers and practitioners a starting point to identify areas that require further support and improvement or have potential efficiency gain.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
When demographic differences exist: an analysis of service failure and recovery among diverse participants
|
[
"Service failures",
"Gender",
"Ethnic groups",
"Demographics",
"Service levels",
"Customer service management"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this article.\nThe service failure and recovery literature: In recent years, the services marketing literature has experienced a significant increase in articles pertaining to failure and recovery-related issues (Zhu and Sivakumar, 2001). Past research has focused on: general types of service failures across industries (Bitner et al., 1990); customer expectations for service recovery (Ringberg et al., 2007); and strategies relating to servicescape failures and recovery (Hoffman et al., 2003).Despite the rapid growth of service failure and service recovery-related research, there are very few studies (cf. Chung-Herrera et al., 2004; McColl-Kennedy et al., 2003; Palmer et al., 2000) that specifically examine service failure and service recovery incidents involving diverse participants (individuals that may be different on overt physical characteristics such as age, sex, and race). The studies that have been done have been very limited in scope in that they only examined one demographic variable or they were limited on focus (equity perceptions in recovery, having voice in recovery, etc.). Hence, the primary objective of this study is to examine the influence of three demographic differences (race, age, and gender) between service providers and customers in regards to a number of service failure and recovery issues. More specifically, this study attempts to answer two main questions:1. Do demographic differences between service providers and customers impact the types of failures that occur, the perceived severity of the service failure, and/or the attributions for why the failure occurred?2. Do demographic differences between service providers and customers impact the type of recovery strategies offered to resolve failures, the perceived effectiveness of the recovery strategy, and/or the attributions for why the recovery strategy was selected?In the sections that follow, we first discuss theoretical underpinnings from the social psychology literature that helps us to understand why we categorize people into groups and make assumptions based on group categorization. Then we go on to discuss research from the sales literature and service failure and recovery literature as it relates specifically to each of the demographic variables of interest.\nTheoretical underpinnings: Social identity theory is based on the premise that belonging to a group determines self-identity and behavior (Taijfel, 1982). Distinct group behaviors form which lead to group solidarity, the conformance to group norms, and to discrimination against out-groups (Dwyer et al., 1998). An important aspect of social identity theory is the process of self-categorization where individuals recognize and emphasize the similarities and differences with those with whom they interact. Messick and Mackie (1989) propose that self-categorization is often based on social categories such as age, gender and ethnicity.Self-categorization leads to identification with the in-group and can trigger stereotyping of the out-group. Stereotyping is a major contributory factor that is linked to discriminatory practices where individuals are perceived, evaluated, and treated as members of a group as opposed to individuals with their own unique needs and wants (Comer et al., 1998). Research has linked stereotyping to a variety of behaviors such as in-group favoritism, inter-group discrimination, differentiation, conflict, and affective preference for the in-group over the out-group (Hogg and Abrams, 1988; Pelled, 1997; Williams and O'Reilly, 1997).Age, gender and ethnicity are overt characteristics that assist individuals with the self-categorization process of social identity theory and are often used in the formation of first impressions (Jones et al., 1998). First impressions are of paramount importance and are enduring (Luchins, 1957; Pennington, 1982). Moreover, first impressions are believed to often establish or deny relationships within the first four minutes of contact (Zunin and Zunin, 1972). In general, the literature supports the notion that individuals are often categorized and defined by these three variables.In the following sections, we provide background research primarily from the sales and social psychology literature that supports exploratory hypotheses regarding service failures and recovery. However, we duly note that there are very few direct studies of service failures and recovery that explore race, gender and age as main variables of interest; therefore, we are making a small theoretical leap of sorts in applying the research from other fields to service failures and recovery. Nevertheless, we believe that the leap is warranted in that the same processes that lead to in-group/out-group favoritism in a sales encounter should equally apply to service failures and recovery incidents.Age\nThe study: Critical incident technique\nResults: Given the exploratory nature of this study, our analysis focused on answering two broad questions:1. Do demographic differences between service providers and customers impact the types of failures that occur, the perceived severity of the service failure, and/or the attributions for why the failure occurred?2. Do demographic differences between service providers and customers impact the type of recovery strategies offered to resolve failures, the perceived effectiveness of the recovery strategy, and/or the attributions for why the recovery strategy was selected?Diverse participants and failure type, severity, and attributions\nPost-hoc analysis: Despite the findings of our initial study that little evidence exists that supports the notion that different groups of respondents were the recipients of different levels of service, we continued to be intrigued by the number of cases indicating that demographic differences had indeed played a role in the service failures and/or service recovery strategies experienced. Given the attention paid to diversity issues and the growth of gender-specific, ethnic and youth markets in today's business world, we felt that examining this specific group of people and gaining insights for managerial purposes would be invaluable.In essence, the objective of this post-hoc analysis is to focus on two contrasting groups of respondents who experienced service encounters where demographic differences existed:1. Those who believe that their demographic differences with service providers contributed to the service failure and/or service recovery (contributory respondents).2. Those who believe that their demographic differences did not contribute to the service failure and/or service recovery (noncontributory respondents).Table IV presents the number of incidents where demographic differences existed, and where the demographic difference contributed to the service failure and recovery effort.Paralleling the main study, we explored, in two research questions:1. Do contributory and noncontributory respondents experience different types of failures, perceive different failure severity levels, and/or attribute failures to different parties?2. Do contributory and noncontributory respondents experience different types of recovery strategies, perceive different recovery effectiveness, and/or attribute the recovery strategy selected to different parties?A summary of results discussed below is provided in Table V.Age and failure type, severity, and attributions\nDiscussion: Results from hypotheses\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to explore whether demographic differences between diverse customers and service providers impact service failure and recovery perceptions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The critical incidents technique was used to gather data on service failures and recovery. Chi-square test of independence and analysis of variance was used to test the hypotheses.\nFindings: - Results from the main study provide little support to the notion that different service failure types or service recovery efforts are being applied when demographic differences exist. However, a post-hoc analysis focusing on respondents who felt that their demographic differences had impacted their encounter revealed that ethnic differences impacted service failure and recovery perceptions the most.\nResearch limitations/implications: - One limitation is the use of quota sampling that may limit the generalizability of the results. However, due to the exploratory nature of the study and the need for representative cases, this technique was viewed as an effective sampling technique for the purposes of the study.\nPractical implications: - The post-hoc results suggest that future diversity training should include employee-customer diversity, especially in the case of age and ethnicity. Further, that managing perceptions is important so that customers do not feel that they are treated any differently based on a visible demographic variable.\nOriginality/value: - In general, the exploration of customer-employee demographic differences in the services marketing literature is still somewhat nascent. This paper is unique in that it specifically examines several demographic differences between customers and employees in terms of service failure and recovery perceptions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The influence of risk and uncertainty on teachers' responses to professional learning and development
|
[
"Uncertainty",
"Vulnerability",
"Social capital",
"Educational change",
"Perceptions of risk",
"Professional learning and development"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Change in education is reliant on teachers engaging in and sustaining changes to their everyday practice. Teachers are commonly labelled resistant to change to explain their apparent lack of engagement and why \"most change initiatives fail\" (Senge et al., 1999, p. 5). This may appear an issue of willingness, yet framing non-engagement in change as resistance overlooks the uncertainty or risk involved as teachers' futures become \"suddenly much less secure\" (Marris, 1986, p. 148). Is resistance to change an accurate and sufficient explanation of non-engagement in change, especially from the teachers' perspective? This paper provides an alternative explanation by focussing on the concept of risk.\nChange as uncertainty: This research into teachers' perceptions of risk in change situations is based on the broad premise that change involves uncertainty, ambiguity and emotion (Gioia and Chittipeddi, 1991). When PLD creates expectations of change, perceptions of risk arise.\nMethods: This research is a qualitative exploratory case study of teachers' perceptions of risk in professional learning for change. It is based on in-depth interviews with 21 teachers across three schools, supported by interviews with 14 leaders and four facilitators (professional developers). Specifically the research question asked:What is the influence of perceptions of risk on teachers' sensemaking of professional learning and their subsequent actions?\nFindings: This section summarises the findings under four headings: sources of uncertainty, feelings of vulnerability, responses and actions to perceived risk, and the impact of perceived risk on learning. This paper does not directly address the impact of others or the school and wider culture, although both are implicit in the reported findings.\nDiscussion: These findings provide insight into and increase our understanding of the different sources of uncertainty identified by teachers in their PLD environment thus advancing our knowledge and understanding of teachers' responses to educational change. In addition, a risk perception process model that connects the findings is proposed.\nPractical applications: The findings of this research have implications for leadership and facilitation practices in PLD. The proposed risk perception process model highlights the connection between perceptions of risk and learning as risk taking. It provides educators with a conceptual model or compass to navigate perceptions of risk in educational change. The model makes explicit previously unseen or unconnected factors into a framework that can be used to highlight sources of uncertainty and risk in the PLD context. This has implications for educators working in a range of contexts and roles.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore how perceptions of risk influenced teachers' sensemaking and actions during a professional learning and development (PLD) initiative where teachers were expected to change their practices.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A risk perception lens, focussed on uncertainty, was used to capture the on-going experiences of teachers as they participated in PLD. The PLD, delivered by one organisation, focussed on developing teacher use and understanding of formative assessment practices. Data for this three-school qualitative exploratory case study of teachers' perceptions of risk primarily utilised qualitative interviews.\nFindings: Findings identified that teachers perceived risk and experienced feelings of vulnerability as a result of their on-going assessment and evaluation of the uncertainty in the professional learning context. The perceived risk informed teachers' responses and actions, ultimately impacting on teachers' learning.\nPractical implications: The risk perception process model developed from the findings and conceptual framework provides a tool for educators to navigate and reduce perceived risk and enhance learning in change.\nOriginality/value: This research advances the conceptualisation of perceived risk in PLD. It challenges the current concept of teachers' resistance and instead considers the role of their perceptions of risk, broadening the understanding of responses to educational change.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
An analysis of the delivery challenges influencing public-private partnership in housing projects: The case of Tanzania
|
[
"Project management",
"Questionnaire survey",
"International practice"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Many African countries, such as Tanzania, continue to lack suitable policies for housing development, and this has largely contributed to the growth of informal and poor housing conditions. Since independence in 1961, Tanzania like many African countries, for example, has experienced a large increase in population from 12.3 million in 1967 to almost 45 million today. Coupled to this is a raise in the urban population from 5.7 per cent in 1967 to 29.1 per cent in 2012. The overall trend in population growth averaged nearly 3 per cent annually, while urbanisation grew by 5 per cent annually (Smith, 2015). The result is that the available social facilities and services have been significantly strained. This is an African-wide problem with most of the cities in Africa finding themselves needing to accommodate an extra 40,000 to 50,000 people every day because of this rapid population growth (UN-HABITAT, 2011).\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Various forms of PPP procurement arrangements\n3. Research methods: As the main objective was to obtain different but complementary data to answer a single research question, a convergent parallel (concurrent) mixed method approach was adopted. From the level of interaction perspective, the data were collected and analysed independently. As opined by Molina-Azorin et al. (2007), both the quantitative and qualitative approaches had equal priority status. Simply put, different methods are used to assess the same phenomenon towards convergence and increased validity (Cameron, 2009). This method is similar to that of Nguyen and Chileshe (2015) and Kurniawan et al. (2014) and included the following six steps: literature review (see Table I); pilot survey; questionnaire survey; interviews; statistical analysis; and content analysis. Drawing upon the study by Nguyen and Chileshe (2015), the justification for adopting the mixed methods approach is well established in literature, and furthermore, this provides the opportunity for increasing the reliability of the research (Easterbrook et al., 2008). It has also been known to offset the weakness of each tool considering the sample nature, time and accuracy of data (Kothari, 2004). More so, as highlighted by Jogulu and Pansiri (2011, p. 690), in concurrent mixed methods, qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques are undertaken at the same time for the analysis of the data. In our study, as recommended by Holt and Goulding (2014), both approaches, qualitative (semi-structured interviews) and quantitative (questionnaire survey), were applied concurrently with equal status. Finally, this concurrent approach enabled the usage of the results of one method to corroborate the findings of the other about a single phenomenon (Halcomb and Hickman, 2015).\n4. Survey and interview results: 4.1 Reliability analysis\n5. Model development approach: The model development approach followed an efficient methodology and tools to aid the process comprising the following three stages: literature review; questionnaire survey; and interview survey:\n6. The proposed framework model: In developing the PPP housing framework model, the adopted approach was based on the project life cycle approach. This involved designing systematically and customising to address the vital stages that need careful attention throughout the life cycle of the project with respect to weaknesses identified. The key features of the model will address major constraints thwarting the delivery of adequate housing in Tanzania. In contrast to other developed PPP framework models by Trangkanont and Charoenngam (2014b) and Tutesigensi and Mohammad (2008), the proposed model consists of five major phases, featuring five key aspects: skills, planning, procurement, monitoring and controlling. Through a critical analysis of the problems, inadequacy of these features was determined as the main cause of the challenges. Hence, unlike other models, the proposed model aims at providing systematic guidance while addressing the challenges to enhance the delivery of PPP housing projects. Previous PPP models address risk management in PPP low-cost housing (Trangkanont and Charoenngam, 2014b) and initiation of PPP in the construction industry (Tutesigensi and Mohammad, 2008). The proposed framework is shown in Figure 3.\n7. Contributions, recommendations and implications: 7.1 Contributions\n8. Limitations and further research: While a number of contributions to PPP theory such as Gidden's structuration theory, contingency theory, relational and equity theory, and practice emerge from this study, the following limitations related to the geographical setting, sample size and model validation are noted.\n9. Conclusions: In order to facilitate creative and innovative approaches in stimulating the private sector, it is widely accepted that engagement of PPP is a viable option. Furthermore, governments in both developed and developing economics normally require bidders to compete on the basis of developing unique and creative approaches to the delivery of many physical infrastructure facilities. Despite the importance and role of PPPs, research on the challenges affecting the delivery of PPP in housing projects remains underexplored.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to identify and rank the challenges influencing the delivery of the housing public-private partnership (HPPP) in Tanzania; and second, to suggest solutions in the form of a conceptual public-private partnership (PPP) framework model that will address the identified challenges and boost the chances of success.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Using a convergent parallel (concurrent) mixed method approach, data were collected from 28 stakeholders involved with HPPP projects in Tanzania using a hand-delivered and e-mail survey and 13 semi-structured interviews with public and private sector respondents. The quantitative data included subjecting the 19 challenges as identified from the literature to parametric tests such as one-sample t-tests and descriptive statistics tests such as measures of central tendencies and frequency analysis through Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS 22.0). Qualitative data employed content analysis. The research was further underpinned by a number of theoretical perspectives such as Gidden's structuration theory, contingency theory, relational and equity theory.\nFindings: The top five ranked challenges influencing the delivery of HPPP were \"inadequate PPP skills and knowledge\"; \"poor contracting and tendering documents\"; \"inadequate project management\"; \"inadequate legal framework\"; and \"misinformation on financial capacity of private partners\". The least six ranked and most significant challenges based on the one-sample (single) t-tests were as follows: \"Poor risk allocation\"; \"inexperienced private partner\"; \"unequal qualification and contributions of expertise\"; \"poor enabling environment to attract competent partners\"; \"inadequate mechanisms for recovery of private investors' capital\"; and \"high costs in procuring PPP projects\". The qualitative study further confirmed the challenges and cited the reason for the failure of joint venture projects as the lack of motivation for undertaking similar PPP projects. Despite the increased awareness of PPP projects and associated marginal benefits, the main impediment to the uptake and delivery of PPP housing projects remained the lack of skills and expertise.\nResearch limitations/implications: The proposed framework model is not yet tested, but since this paper is part of the ongoing research, the next stage involves the testing and validation of the model. Future studies could test the applicability of the proposed framework in other HPPP projects in Tanzania, and in other similar developing countries. Second, the validated framework can contribute towards addressing similar challenges as well as providing guidance. The proposed framework model is not yet tested, but since this paper is part of the ongoing research, the next stage involves the testing and validation of the model. Furthermore, recommendation for future research is to test the alignment of the identified challenges to the proposed remedial solutions across the five phases within the proposed PPP framework with a number of case studies.\nPractical implications: The identified challenges were used to form the basis of the framework presented in this paper. Furthermore, these provide useful information, thus leading to increased awareness to enable successful delivery of HPPP in Tanzania. Similarly, both the government and policy makers could use the findings as the basis for re-examining the existing PPP policy and regulations, and reflecting on the existing situation with a view to improving the delivery of future HPPP projects.\nOriginality/value: The empirical study is among the first that identifies and ranks the challenges of PPP for housing projects delivery within the Tanzanian context. The identification of the challenges enabled their ranking, resulting in the mapping out of the most critical challenges. Furthermore, using the Gidden's structuration theory, the study illustrates how institution mechanisms (structures) address these delivery challenges, thus influencing the implementation of HPPP in Tanzania, and how individual stakeholders (human agents or agency) are able to make choices (advocated solutions) in dealing with the challenges. More so, these constraints (challenges) as identified and viewed through the contingency and equity theoretical lenses form the foundation for developing the PPP conceptual framework. The proposed framework would thus serve as a mechanism for providing practical solutions as well as reducing the level of severity of the identified challenges.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Learning strategies at work and professional development
|
[
"Workplace learning",
"Professional development",
"Learning strategies",
"Workplace characteristics"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Management of human capital has become increasingly important for organizational survival. Continuous learning and professional development are valued aspects of human capital. They differentiate organizations and promote competitiveness. Professionals who develop competencies increase their employability. How does professional development evolve from workplace learning? Do individuals' learning strategies at work matter? If so, how are they predicted?\nMethod: Participants\nResults: Psychometric analysis\nDiscussion: The purpose of this study was to investigate associations between workplace learning and perceived professional development. Specifically, it sought to examine to what extent formal learning (training hours) and informal learning (learning strategies) predict one's own growth. Further, it aimed to explore associations between these learning strategies and individual and contextual characteristics.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to investigate the prediction of current and evolutionary perceptions of professional development through five learning strategies at work and through training and how individual and job characteristics predict those strategies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Variables were measured in a cross-sectional survey, with 962 individuals. Relationships were tested through linear regression analysis and structural equation modeling.\nFindings: The criterion variable current professional development is positively associated to three learning strategies: intrinsic and extrinsic reflection, seeking help from others and trial and error. The relationship between this latter learning strategy and that criterion variable is moderated by work experience. Hours of training also predict that criterion variable. Seeking help from others and educational level predict perceived evolutionary development. Socio-cultural and technical-organizational work environment variables predict those five strategies.\nResearch limitations/implications: The cross-sectional research design yields potential for monomethod bias. Longitudinal, multilevel and multiple collection design studies should be conducted in the future.\nOriginality/value: A wide range of occupations and organizational contexts was investigated by using two different measures of professional development as criterion variables. A larger effect size was found for one of them, given just three learning strategies as antecedent variables. Training and formal education had smaller effects. The importance of taking into account different characteristics of workplace learning environments is highlighted.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Paradigms and paradoxes: the futures of growth and degrowth
|
[
"Innovation",
"Sufficiency",
"Imaginaries",
"Lock-in",
"Degrowth",
"Rebound",
"Growth paradigm"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. The storylines of growth, innovation and degrowth: With the publication of the seminal work The Limits of Growth (Meadows et al., 1972), the relation between growth and ecological degradation has become a key societal concern. A decade later this concern came to be articulated in terms of \"sustainable development\" (Brundlandt et al., 1987). Next to growth and ecology, the role of technology has been added as a decisive issue by some authors, as technology contributes to environmental degradation and also promises to conquer it (Beck, 1992; Hajer, 1994). The precise character of the relations between economic growth and ecological quality has been a topic of debate ever since, while the role of technology is not always reflected upon systematically. This paper will discuss three distinct frames that have developed over time building forth on contrastive starting points on how to reduce the ecological impact of economic activity in relation to technological development. These frames are usually expressed as theoretical paradigms (cf. Kuhn, 1962), to which researchers add theoretical refinements to a stable core of assumptions. However, one may also regard them as storylines about how the future will unfold itself as a confrontation between our attempts to actively shape the world and the unruly character of both social and natural reality (cf. McCloskey, 1983; Callon, 2010; Soros, 2013). With that, storylines transcend the domain of science, as they entail to narratives, codifications, reflections and reactions to sociocultural practices that structure future orientations of societal, economic and political actors: they instruct which types of decisions are considered to be legitimate in a certain context.\n2. The sustainability of growth?: The spell of economic growth may not so much be a conscious choice that can be changed at will, instead we are \"locked-in\" to mechanisms of growth, be it cognitively, culturally or economically (Spangenberg, 2010; Loiseau et al., 2016; Fuchs and Lorek, 2005; Storm, 2009). This lock-in situation means that we are incapable of choosing not to grow, either politically or mentally (Van den Bergh, 2012; Berg and Hukkinen, 2011). This lock-in diffused from the domain of industry to government and the domain of consumption, and find its roots in the institution of ownership, as brought forwards by Thorstein Veblen (1994, originally published in 1904) more than a century ago (Van Griethuysen, 2010).\n3. Innovation and its rebounds: The storyline of innovation builds strongly on the work of Joseph Schumpeter, who featured innovation as an evolutionary process that did not align with the starting point of equilibria as is maintained by conventional economic theory (Godin, 2012; Freeman, 2007). With that innovation became an endogenous factor, contrasting with the neoclassical dogma which features technology as a \"residual\" factor that is not understandable \"as a systemic part of the [growth] model itself\" (Solow, 1994). The Schumpeterian view is that capitalism is a form of \"creative destruction,\" in the sense that industrial entrepreneurs try to gain competitive advantage by innovating their production processes and their products so to destroy their commercial antagonists. It may be the case that Schumpeter has not been consistent regarding which firms are the designated producers of innovation, be it new or incumbent firms (Dolfsma and Van der Velde, 2014; Malerba, 2002), but his ideas have given rise to the approach of evolutionary economics which portrays entrepreneurs not as merely taking new technologies off the shelf, as neoclassical approaches suggest, but as exploring new directions, basing themselves on previous experiences (Nelson and Winter, 1974, 1977). Hence, technologies are developed by pre-empting on future situations that build on extrapolations and beliefs that are based on current technology and society (Nelson, 1995; Van Lente and Rip, 1998).\n4. Does degrowth suffice?: Approaches to sustainability can be sketched out in two main variants, the first aiming to reform existing social structures and institutions and the second pursuing the societal transformation (Rees, 1995). The solutions for sustainability proposed by storylines of growth and innovation can be seen as embracing reform while maintaining their \"expansionist worldview,\" but one may also find economic approaches that seek for transformation (Hopwood et al., 2005; Kennet and Heinemann, 2006). Of these approaches, the notion of degrowth has received an increasing amount of support, especially since the economic crisis that started in 2008 (De Saille and Medvecky, 2016; Asara et al., 2015). The values that are forwarded in the degrowth (or \"post-growth\") discourse can be seen as a fundamental re-ordering of values that are in many cases straightforwardly opposed to the values that are credited by many to have led to the crisis: austerity instead of greed, solidarity instead of greed, trust-based localism instead of impersonal globalism (Fournier, 2008; D'Alisa et al., 2014).\n5. Pluralizing futures: The three storylines on growth that have been presented here are often forwarded in theoretical terms, apparently aspiring the status of a scientific paradigm. What has been argued is that following the logic of these storylines, we inevitably run into trouble. Maybe, this does not compel a new theory with universalistic pretentions, but demands a reorientation toward the efficacy of these storylines. Instead of portraying them as excluding each other, they can also be featured as alternative pathways that may co-exist.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to introduce three storylines that address the relation between economic growth, technical innovation and environmental impact. The paper assesses if and how these storylines as guiding visions increase our range of future orientations.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper first explains its general outline and then explores different strands of literature to arrive at its analytical conclusions.\nFindings: Pursuing the three storylines in a paradigmatic articulation creates paradoxes. The growth paradigm focuses on economic growth as its main goal. To overcome environmental degradation, products have to be substituted by environmentally friendly alternatives, but the continuous substitution of finite resources seems unlikely possible. The storyline of innovation sees technological development as a driver of economic progress, and holds that innovations allow the decoupling of economic growth from environmental impact, a claim that is compromised by the occurrence of rebound effects. The degrowth storyline holds that economic growth has to be stopped altogether, but is unclear how this can be done.\nOriginality/value: By articulating paradigmatic perspectives as storylines, a new understanding on how these perspectives can be figured as a constructive repertoire of guiding visions and not as mere theory-based descriptions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Copyright theft
|
[
"Copyright law",
"Photocopies",
"Intellectual property",
"Crimes",
"Theft"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This paper sets out to inform and educate individuals and managers within organizations who prepare and create consultancy material, Power point presentations and who work in the learning and development profession. Copyright infringement is not a subject covered in most management development programs, as a result it can be a real shock when the court summons appears on the HR Directors desk for breach of intellectual property rights.This paper provides structure, debate and discussion around the subject of intellectual property. The aim is to alert senior managers that they need a copyright strategy. Legal compliance is not an option especially with the recent changes in copyright legislation. Ignorance and transgression could result in civil prosecution, heavy fines and worse case scenario - criminal prosecution.Several well known authors such as Max Landsberg, Bruce Tuckman, Thomas Kilmann, John Adair and Belbin Associates have contributed to this research.They have shared their views on copyright and how they want their work attributed and referenced. In addition Belbin Associates have kindly shared their recent court case victory highlighting the extent they will go to if \"We\" do not abide by their copyright wishes.\nBackground: Management Consultants and L&D Professionals work for demanding clients. They rightly expect professional presentations and high quality workshops - that include all the latest theory and underpinning knowledge.Effort spent originating, designing and creating new material is time consuming - some may even find it challenging. As consultants we need to show research that will appear credible, present arguments in a logical structured manner and create diagrams or models that succinctly summarize and simplify the key issues in a way that is transferable to their business situation.*Q: Why re-invent the wheel?*Q: Who will ever find out?*Q: Everyone else does it!This paper aims to remind you of the choices you have. The ethics you believe in and the values you demonstrate to the stakeholders who interact with you. Nobody can force you to break the law - it is your choice. Be reminded that in any employment it is illegal and a breach of contract for a manager to ask you to perform an illegal act. Copyright infringement is an illegal act.\nDefinitions/terms and expressions: What is copying?\nUnlawful activities: Handbooks\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to help educate and advise the learning and development (L&D) or training community about the common and statute laws they must follow when selling, storing and publishing and delivering their training material.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper has been assembled by desk top research reviewing current statute legislation and Regulations that are enforceable within the UK. In addition key authors of popular HR models have been contacted for their views and opinions as to how they want to retain and protect their intellectual property rights. In addition legal experts who specialize in the litigation of cases involving copyright theft, intellectual property storage and the \"passing of material\".\nFindings: - The findings conclude L&D Training Managers do not fully understand their liability and responsibility for complying with Copyright Legislation. Blatant \"passing off\" plagiarised training material as their own is commonplace. Course hand books sold commerically that include reproduced models without the original author's permission, no bibliography or list of references appear to be quite commonplace. In addition these training companies believe they can electronically store these models on their intranet and then call it their own intellectual property.\nOriginality/value: - This paper has brought several key authors together to review the problem and to take more assertive action. It has helped HR directors and chief executives realize that their training departments could be exposing their share holders to undesirable litigation. For commercial training companies it has raised the fact that ignorance of copyright law is no defense and it is only a matter of time before these transgressors are caught and prosecuted.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Interorganizational knowledge sharing in a science and technology park: the use of knowledge sharing mechanisms
|
[
"Science and technology parks",
"Knowledge sharing",
"Knowledge sharing mechanisms"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Globalization has increased the competition between organizations, resulting in their need to improve their logistics, inventory, schedule, quality, and operations (Dey et al., 2010). An alternative for organizations is to differentiate themselves from their competitors through the application of knowledge (Lawson et al., 2009; Spinello, 1998). Knowledge is a primary strategic organizational resource (Alavi and Leidner, 2001; Naim and Lenkla, 2016) that fosters the creation of organizational value (Davenport and Prusak, 1998; Mohanty, 2003). Organizations that actively seek new knowledge can identify opportunities that can lead to the entry into new markets with greater efficiency (Villar et al., 2014).\nKnowledge sharing in a science and technology park: the use of knowledge mechanisms: Knowledge is a rationalistic entity and is a process (Hannabuss, 2001) that combines information with experience, context, interpretation and reflection (Davenport et al., 1998). It is \"the understanding, awareness, or familiarity acquired through study, investigation, observation, or experience over the course of time\" (Bollinger and Smith, 2001, p. 9). Knowledge exists at all organizational levels and is an intangible that is very difficult to imitate (Alavi and Leidner, 2001; Wasko and Faraj, 2005). Knowledge pertinent on organizations can be of two types: managerial, regarding functional areas such as sales or human resources (Gomes et al., 2018); and technical, related to the core of the company, such as project details, scope, requirements, lessons learned, technological details, product or services development (Joe et al., 2013; Gomes et al., 2018; Steffen, Oliveira and Balle, 2017). Knowledge can come from different sources, such as the employees of the organization, the customers and the suppliers (Darroch, 2003). Organizations can use knowledge to differentiate itself with aggregate value in today's globalized market, developing exclusive, complex and innovative products and solutions (Raudeliuniene et al., 2016). Therefore, organizations need to have well-developed knowledge management: a series of processes that take place in organizations (Bagnoli and Roberts, 2013) with the objectives of increasing competitive advantage (Schultze and Leidner, 2002). Organizational knowledge strategies and competitive strategies should be aligned to achieve the best fit and pursue the best results (Bagnoli and Giachetti, 2015).\nMethod: The first methodological step of this research was a structured literature review. A search was made in the Web of Science database with the terms \"knowledge sharing\" AND (\"mechanisms\" or \"science and technology parks\") in the abstracts of articles published between 2014 and 2018 to identify articles with the current state on the topic of research. A total of 93 articles were identified. The abstracts of the identified articles were read, some articles were excluded because their subject was not according to the subject of this study. After that, 58 articles were added through references. With this, 86 articles were analyzed for the literature review.\nAnalysis: To start, we examined the transcriptions of the interviews with a thematic content analysis. This step was necessary to uncover the types of knowledge and the mechanisms through which the organizations shared them. After this examination, we identified two different knowledge types: managerial knowledge (e.g. knowledge on call notices, product management, general management and opportunities) and technical knowledge (e.g. knowledge about process, product and services and technical knowledge in general), following the knowledge types indicated by Gomes et al. (2018). Regarding the sharing mechanisms, the analysis identified both technological and non-technological mechanisms, as previously defined by the literature (Bollinger and Smith, 2001; Centobelli, Cerchione and Esposito, 2018a, 2018b). So, the first group obtained by selective analysis was:\nConclusion: This study examines the combinations of mechanisms that lead to interorganizational knowledge sharing in STPs. It focuses on the paths that lead to managerial knowledge sharing and technical knowledge sharing among organizations in an STP. There are more alternative configurations that lead to managerial knowledge sharing than lead to technical knowledge sharing. Further, the two configurations for technical knowledge sharing also exist for managerial knowledge sharing. These two pathways are used to share both types of knowledge (Paths 3 and 4 in Table III and Path 1 and 2 in Table IV). As a result, such pathways lead to knowledge sharing regardless of the type of knowledge that is involved. However, there are two more paths by which to share managerial knowledge than to share technical knowledge, that is, there are more possibilities of sharing managerial knowledge than technical knowledge. In addition, all the consistency indexes are highly consistent, which provide ample support for the conclusions (Ragin, 2007).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to uncover the combinations of knowledge sharing mechanisms that organizations in a science and technology park in Brazil use to share managerial and technical knowledge.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This research adopts a qualitative approach that uses a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis to analyze data that are gathered from 51 managers of organizations in a science and technology park.\nFindings: The results show that knowledge sharing happens regardless of the type of knowledge. There are more alternative paths that lead to knowledge sharing than to its absence. Regarding the type of knowledge shared, there are more alternative configurations that lead to managerial knowledge sharing than to technical knowledge sharing. Only the older organizations in the science and technology park abstain from knowledge sharing.\nResearch limitations/implications: Due to the qualitative nature of the study, no generalization is possible. Additionally, the study's limitation is that it involves organizations from a single science and technology park.\nPractical implications: The results offer managers of organizations in science and technology parks to choose from alternative combinations of mechanisms to either boost their knowledge sharing or to promote knowledge protection.\nOriginality/value: The paper provides an original contribution by identifying the combinations of mechanisms that organizations in a science and technology park use that leads to the sharing of specific knowledge types. The findings also identify the combination of mechanisms that older organizations use that prevents them from sharing knowledge.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Interaction of intercultural service encounters: Personality, intercultural communication and customer satisfaction
|
[
"Personality",
"PLS",
"Malaysia",
"Retailing",
"Customer satisfaction",
"Intercultural communication"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Culture influences the priorities customers place on certain activities, consuming features and perceptions of services and/or products (Polsa et al., 2013). Therefore, understanding the cultural differences of culturally diverse customers is an essential outline for understanding customer behaviour in an intercultural marketing context. Understanding themes and concepts based on a multicultural perspective has gained the attention of marketing researchers as a means to explain the attractive features, price perceptions and service satisfaction among customers (Huang et al., 2016; Ihtiyar and Ahmad, 2015; Polsa et al., 2013).\nLiterature review: An integrated framework\nExploring theoretical background: This review of literature will focus on the theoretical background of the research, which focusses on role theory, interdependence theory and cognitive consistency theory. It will also explain the research determinants of the proposed research framework by understanding its embedded theory and past literature. Then, it will suggest the research propositions that explain the interrelationships between the determinants.\nIntercultural communication: IAC\nPCD: Dissimilarities or familiarities about the cultural background of culturally diverse customers indicate significant changes in their expectations and/or perceptions of service or goods and shopping experiences (Sharma et al., 2012). In the literature of sociology, social psychology, positive psychology and associated fields, dissimilarities or familiarities of individuals have been investigated under cultural distance. Most studies utilise cultural distance using various indexes. For instance, Hofstede's cultural dimensions are uncertainty, avoidance, individualism-collectivism, masculinity-femininity and power distance (Sharma et al., 2012). Instead of this general approach, the present study will consider applying Sharma et al.'s (2012) method entitled \"perceived cultural distance\" to measure overall differentiation among individuals from different cultures.\nPersonality: Theories of personality concentrate on the dimensions of human characteristics that can be categorised under cognitive and affective patterns such as thoughts and emotions for explaining the behavioural aspects of human beings (Ihtiyar and Ahmad, 2015; Boag and Tiliopoulos, 2011). According to traditional definitions of personality, it is a self-motivated psychophysical system that creates an individual's characteristic patterns of behaviour, thoughts and feelings and these patterns give direction to the individual's life (Boag and Tiliopoulos, 2011). The popular trait psychology approach materialised a theory called the five factor model with determinants of neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness (Hofstede and McCrae, 2004). Although the model has been researched from numerous scholars in various fields, there are debates concerning its limitations in explaining \"how culture shapes personality\", \"how personality traits and culture interact to shape the behaviour of individuals and social groups\" (Hofstede and McCrae, 2004) and \"what extent do the culture and sub-cultures in which people are immersed shape their personality?\" (Dumont et al., 2010). Contrary to the conventional perspective on personality and the subsequent criticism, the study suggests understanding personality through cultural indicators.\nCS: CS is one of the most examined topics in the marketing literature. A review reveals that the interrelationship among service evaluation, loyalty and topics related to culture has become a competitive power for intercultural marketers (Vesel and Zabkar, 2009). For instance, CS has been found to reduce costs for attracting new customers and dealing with poor quality, defects and complaints (Ahmad et al., 2014; Michel and Meuter, 2008). This study concentrates on conceptual and managerial thinking and articulates these linkages and assumes that ICC, IAC and IRC may affect CS, specifically the buying experience of customers in a multicultural atmosphere.\nResearch framework and methodology: Research framework\nEmpirical results: Assessment of measurement model\nConclusion: The most significant contribution of the study is that it is a theoretically and empirically integrated model developed from social psychology, sociology of culture and marketing communication and consumer behaviour in marketing. The boundaries of these disciplines provide a comprehensive framework for understanding antecedents and the impact of customer behaviour in grocery retail marketing in Asia. The study has extended the understanding of major and confirmed the relationships among these constructs and the proposed hypotheses.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to better understand the impact of intercultural communication and personality on customer satisfaction and loyalty in grocery retailing. In this endeavour, this study illustrates the unique context of intercultural communication to highlight several improvements in the literature and to encourage the advancement of the intercultural communication in the literature.\nDesign/methodology/approach: To initiate the research, a survey approach was taken. In total, 681 questionnaires were returned out of 1,100 that were distributed within selected grocery retailers in Klang Valley, Malaysia. The measurement of the constructs and their interrelationships is examined based on partial least square-structural equation modelling.\nFindings: The findings validate the proposed framework with statistically significant relationships among all constructs. Furthermore, it exposes additional insights into some practical and conceptual solutions for addressing the intercultural communication of culturally diverse encounters in the Malaysian grocery retail industry. These contributions postulate an impetus for future research in various service settings.\nOriginality/value: Based on role, interdependence and cognitive consistency theory, this study assesses the role of the personality of grocery retail consumers on intercultural communication competence (ICC) and its impact on inter-role congruence (IRC) and interaction comfort (IAC). It is anticipated that by filling this knowledge gap, the research will assist in strengthening retail communication strategies, which require intercultural communication adjustments in a multicultural business environment. The ICC is expected to improve the retail industry competitiveness when it positively influences IRC and IAC among customers.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Tacit knowledge sharing: techniques for putting a powerful tool in practice
|
[
"Tacit knowledge",
"Meetings",
"Local government",
"Mentoring"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Managers may be overlooking a valuable organizational resource - workers' tacit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is expertise that exists only within an employees mental map; it is not formally recorded or passed along to others (Mayfield et al., 2008). Such knowledge (often how to accomplish tasks well) is crucial for organizational functioning, and should be developed by managers. While always necessary, worker tacit knowledge becomes more crucial as firms move toward greater service and innovation orientation. Fortunately, techniques exist to increase knowledge sharing, and reap attendant benefits. This paper provides suggestions for encouraging workers' tacit knowledge sharing by providing a brief overview of tacit knowledge, discussing its benefits, and explaining methods to encourage its practice.\nTacit knowledge sharing - overview and benefits: Tacit knowledge sharing occurs when knowledge is transmitted between organizational members: when workers share their experience. By definition, tacit knowledge is not formally recorded, but it is often vital in implementing effective workplace activities (Sense and Clements, 2006; Von Krogh et al., 2000). Case in point, take a scenario where understanding a major client's focus on product quality and delivery time helps focus a sales presentation. Yet often only one salesperson knows such information. As such, if that salesperson leaves the organization the firm-client relationship can suffer and sales decline. Therefore, organizations benefit if such knowledge is shared.As organizations become more service and innovation oriented, tacit knowledge becomes increasingly important to meet emerging environmental trends. And sharing tacit knowledge between workers is more crucial with today's mobile work force; with worker turnover, organizational memory is lost unless knowledge is dispersed among multiple workers (Mayfield et al., 2008; Thomas and Allen, 2006). Furthermore, as requisite employee skill sets transform to technology transfer and custom service, effective tacit knowledge sharing promises competitive advantage at all organizational levels.\nTechniques for increasing worker tacit knowledge sharing: While many tacit knowledge sharing techniques exist, this section presents some of the more useful and easy to implement methods. These methods can be implemented separately, but they are mutually reinforcing and more effective when introduced jointly as part of a knowledge management strategy.Wikis\nConclusions: Organizations can unleash untapped value from implementing these tacit knowledge sharing methods. Worker performance will increase through healthy exchange about more effective and efficient work methods. As a result, management can expect to see increases in worker morale and commitment. Organizations can also discover previously hidden innovations through worker knowledge sharing. Perhaps most importantly, well-managed tacit knowledge preserves organizational memory and reinforces productive organizational learning in the face of turnover.To fully realize these advantages, organizations must commit to increasing tacit knowledge sharing. This step embraces training and rewarding workers, a comprehensive knowledge management strategy, and visible top management enthusiasm for worker knowledge sharing. Such methods are mutually reinforcing - no one approach can capture all knowledge. Therefore, well-integrated, multiple techniques that support an overall knowledge management program will be most valuable. In sum, these initiatives can generate a self-sustaining learning loop that greatly contributes to performance.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to outline techniques for developing and encouraging tacit knowledge sharing.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - These techniques are drawn from research and practical experience in improving worker knowledge sharing.\nFindings: - Some highly useful and broadly applicable ways to increase tacit knowledge sharing - when supported by an organizational reward system - are organizationally developed wikis, town hall meetings, and mentor programs.\nOriginality/value: - This paper provides specific suggestions on tacit knowledge sharing methods for increased organizational performance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Startups and open innovation: a review of the literature
|
[
"Literature review",
"Open innovation",
"Startup"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Startups play a key role in innovation processes (Colombo and Piva, 2008; Davila et al., 2003; Mustar et al., 2008). According to the well-known definition by Steve Blank (2010) a startup is a company, a partnership or temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. Through the startup phase, new ideas are brought to the market and transformed in economically sustainable enterprises. New firms are artefacts for transforming entrepreneurial judgement into profit (Spender, 2014). Existing research indicates that forming relationships with external partners is a priority for the success of startups (Teece, 2010; Pangarkar and Wu, 2012; Kask and Linton, 2013).\nMethodology: The study was designed to provide an explicit method for the review (Pittaway et al., 2004; Rousseau et al., 2008). The aim was to select and analyse relevant papers, which dealt at the same time with both themes: startups and OI. Through this study, it was possible to provide a description and an evaluation of the current body of knowledge on the intersection between these two topics.\nResults: This section presents the results of our analysis on startups and OI based on the full texts of the 41 papers selected for this review.\nConclusion: This review of the literature represents the first attempt to organize the scientific knowledge related to the intersection between the startups and OI phenomena. By using an explicit method for the review (Pittaway et al., 2004) we selected a set of papers, which cover the whole knowledge domain object of this study. At the same time, any scholar interested in verifying or expanding our study has been given the means to do so. As a consequence, this study represents a solid first step in building a map of the state-of-the-art knowledge of the \"startups in an OI context\" phenomenon (Table III).\nImplication for research: The theme of this review is relatively new: most of the papers were published after 2009; several papers are based on qualitative studies with a theory building purpose. On the other hand, the interest of scholars is steadily growing, as shown by the analysis of the year of publication of the papers.\nImplication for practice: Based on the scope of this literature review, four main types of actors can support new entrepreneurs in opening up the innovation process all along the startup lifecycle: incubators, ventures capitalists, large corporations, and universities. Being able to manage the relations with these actors is a necessary competence for startuppers. Therefore, \"networking\" should be part of all the education programmes for entrepreneurs. However, a more in-depth analysis of mechanisms and best practices for managing these relations is required.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Startup companies represent a powerful engine of open innovation (OI) processes. The purpose of this paper is to represent a first step in building a map of the state-of-the-art knowledge of the \"startups in an OI context\" phenomenon. Through the selection and analysis of relevant literature, this study aims at deepening our understanding of the theme and at providing directions for future research.\nDesign/methodology/approach: By using an explicit method for the review (Pittaway et al., 2004) the authors selected a set of papers, which cover the knowledge domain object of this study. In total, 41 articles about \"startups and OI\" have been selected and the full papers have been analysed.\nFindings: The analysed literature has been synthesized in seven sub-topics, which have been evaluated as the most relevant in explaining the phenomenon of startups in relation to OI. Implications for research, for managers and for policy makers conclude the paper.\nPractical implications: The review produced valuable knowledge for both managers and policy decision-makers. The paper allows a better understanding of the role of startups in OI processes. This improved understanding can help managers of large firms as well as policy makers involved in OI in making their decisions. Besides, implications of OI strategies for startup managers have been singled-out.\nOriginality/value: Startup companies are intrinsically open organizations, necessarily engaged in innovation processes. Research at the intersection between the themes of OI and startups is gaining momentum. This review of the literature represents the first attempt to organize the scientific knowledge related to the intersection between the startups and OI phenomena systematically.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Applying the "cloak of invisibility" technology to security and privacy in the hotel industry
|
[
"Privacy",
"Closed circuit television",
"Hotels"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction to a scientific breakthrough - a cloak of invisibility: Literally, invisibility is a fantasy fiction term used to describe the state where objects are made unseen by magical means. This effect has recently become a reality.Material has been developed by scientists that could funnel light and electromagnetic radiation around an object and renders its invisibility (Pendry et al., 2006; Schurig et al., 2006; Leonhardt, 2006). Pioneering works headed by researchers in the UK and the US have provided a description of how the invisibility could be achieved. The meta-materials, which are the engineered mixtures of metal and circuit board materials, respond to electromagnetic fields in a highly controllable way by ushering light around an object inside it in a manner that an observer would not see the object but what is behind that object. Theoretically, an object could be seen because the object scatters light that strikes it and reflects some of the light back to the human eye and hence produces shadow behind the object. These two effects simultaneously enable the objects being detected. The cloak that is made of meta-materials reduces, if not totally eliminates, the reflection and the shadow, renders the object invisible. Following the same concept, the material can make it possible for a person to become invisible as what is predicted by scientists. The breakthrough represents a first step toward the development of functional materials for a wide spectrum of possible applications in military and medicine. This article makes an initial attempt to analyze the potential applications of the technology to the hotel industry. On the basis of in-depth open-ended personal interviews with eight hospitality practitioners, consumers, and academic researchers, the next two sections present the current practice, concerns and limitations of security and privacy related issues and potential applications of the technology to the hotel industry.\nSecurity and surveillance practice in the hotel industry: Terrorist attacks can occur in worldwide travel destinations. Examples of the recent cases include the 9/11 attack in New York City (September 2001), bombing in Bali (October 2002), Jakarta (August 2003), Egypt (July 2005), and City of London (July 2005). These cases have brought public awareness. The issues of safety and security have thus become important to policy makers and practitioners in the hospitality and tourism industries. Given the turbulence of world events and the necessity to implement and plan for crisis management, the concern of security has also drawn the attention of many hospitality researchers (Saied, 1990; Enz and Taylor, 2002; Groenenboom and Jones, 2003). Although some hospitality practitioners may see the turbulence as more of a marketing tool than a concern, hotel properties have been focused on safety and security more than ever. In response to these terrorist attacks, hotels have enhanced their crisis management plans, focused on emergency awareness, and promoted attentiveness among their employees on any unexpected occurrences that could happen in their properties.According to the interviewees, some of the common security measures adopted by hoteliers are manned security, closed circuit TV (CCTV) systems, and sufficient lighting. In spite of their own merits, these measurements are also associated with limitations.It is generally agreed that armed security guards are one of the strongest deterrent forces against crime and violence. As such, many hotels have trained and recruited their own in-house security guards or even rely on police or security consulting companies in providing armed officers in their properties. However, as indicated by the interviewees in this study, the presence of manned security may not serve the best purpose in a hotel setting, as an intrusive security measure may instead detract from creation of a hospitable environment and generate guests concerns and doubts on inadequacy of safety and security in the hotel. The interviewees' comments are inline with the findings of Feickert et al. (2006). Such a concern could deter possible patrons and may drive guests away unnecessarily. The same has been noted by Sallows (1989) who studied the role of police armed forces in major tourist events. For this reason, some hoteliers believe that the success of a hotel's security lies in its invisibility. In these hotels, their day-to-day hospitality operations should not be disturbed, and customer service cannot be compromised by intrusive or tightened security surveillance. Hotel managers thus try their best efforts to maintain security measures that would not result in unpleasantness in guest service experience.Security is an utmost concern to travelers. In a recent survey of 930 hotel guests, Feickert et al. (2006) found that although hotel guests generally appreciate implementation of security measures, most guests dislike any intrusive security efforts such as security guards.Interviewees in this study commented that most hotels, particularly the large scaled ones and casino hotels have installed CCTV systems as another security measure to supplement the physical manned security. With hundreds of guest rooms, a great variety of casino games and a large number of game tables, shops and restaurants, casino hotels present a daunting array of security challenges. To protect their assets and patrons, these hotels have to adopt different security approaches, other than armed security officers, through strategies of surveillance. To sufficiently keep close monitoring in these areas, the surveillance of casino hotels rely heavily on costly CCTV cameras located throughout the casino hotel floors directed at the game activities, shops, recreation facilities, and parking areas.In spite of the associated costs, CCTV systems are frequently used to document activities, particularly the skeptical once that have been committed rather than to serve as a preventive measure which allows security staff to follow a potential problem in the public area of a hotel. A major drawback of CCTV systems is in the alignment of CCTV surveillance with the back office. With a large number of cameras in place, the chance of detecting a crime or a scam from the continuous feeds from all cameras on the TV screens at the back office could be limited. Moreover, timely and efficient communications to send in security officers immediately to the spot once the doubtful activity is being detected, might also be a concern. Not being able to spot thieves or delays in communicating for appropriate actions could lead to criminal activities.Another security measure employed by hoteliers is to have a good lighting system. Good lighting in corridors and parking areas is a common theme as it can improve CCTV vision and security control, and to deter crime and theft from happening. However, dim illumination might instead be more appropriate to create soft ambiance, especially in resort settings.\nPrivacy concerns in the hotel industry: Celebrities and dignitaries are valuable customers to all hotels. Not only do they directly generate high revenues, but their endorsement also creates important positive word-of-mouth and publicity for the hotel. For the hotels aiming to serve these very important people (VIPs), security and privacy is of primary importance. It is crucial that they should push the message of security and privacy as an important operating tool. These hotels should reassure the VIPs of their security with sufficient safety procedures and adequate staff training. As noted by the interviewees in this study, hotels usually called upon security consulting companies to provide the high-risk security services to ensure personal safety of these VIPs. Particularly these VIPs are closely protected by a team of bodyguards whose presence, unfortunately, not only creates anxious atmosphere for other hotel guests and intrudes on guests' enjoyment of hotel facilities, but also simultaneously draws public attention and focus on the VIPs. As a consequence, the VIPs' privacy is being disrupted. As luxury hotels are competing for valuable VIPs, in order to retain repeating business, it is critical that these hotels can provide the VIPs with feeling of safety and exclusivity while they enjoy a seamless stay without concerns about potential invasion of privacy and confidentiality.The need for privacy by VIPs while staying in the hotel is revealed in a related study conducted by Tse and Ho (2006) on professional athletes. The study showed that privacy is an important characteristics required by the VIPs when selecting a hotel. Specifically, the sport elites required privacy, quietness, safety, and isolation from other guests and stressed on the importance of privacy and security system that a hotel provides in keeping out media and fans.Other than VIPs, other hotel guests also seek for a certain level of privacy. Otto and Ritchie (1996) found that privacy is one of the most important psychological measures of hotel guests' satisfaction on service experience. Hotel guests' need for privacy is particularly apparent in a restaurant setting. In an earlier study conducted by Archea (1977) that examine privacy-regulating behavior in public settings, empirical findings showed that for a setting that is occupied for a short time, such as a seat in a restaurant, individuals and groups often choose architectural features such as wall to define their personal territory and hence regulate privacy. Creating a setting that offers privacy is thus a crucial issue to the yield management of a restaurant, as privacy will positively relate to comfort of customers. This, in turn, leads to a higher possibility for repeating business as well as new business through positive word-of-mouth. In light of increasing consumers' need for privacy, many restaurateurs have thus responded to the demand by providing private dining space using curtains, walls, and partition to subdivide the dining area. While providing privacy, these practices, nevertheless, might not be the best solution for the guests who simultaneously seek privacy and good ambience in a restaurant as the partitions would cut off the private space from main dining area. In this case, the \"private space\" might become a claustrophobic rather than an intimate and exclusive dining area. To enhance guests dining experience, some restaurants, particularly luxurious hotel restaurants have provided seats next to windows with a spectacular view. However, the number of these window seats is normally limited.\nPossible future applications of cloak of invisibility in hotel industry: Given the alarming need for security and increasing demand for privacy, to remain competitive, hotel operators have adopted various measurements, which are nonetheless of limitations as previously described. New strategies and solutions are yet to be explored. The invisibility devices that have just been introduced by the physical scientists can bring new lights to this exploration. For instance, a cloak could be developed for the armed security guards to make them appear invisible to others and leave no concerns and unpleasantness to the guests who might perceive armed security as an intrusive security measure. The physical presence of cloaked security guards could also help alleviate the difficulty concerning timely security actions after spotting a crime from the CCTV system. Their presence will also leave a strong lighting that might compromise soft hotel ambiance unnecessary.Although a VIP stay can generate publicity for the hotel, the publicity could be at the expense of privacy of the VIP, and counterproductive if not being handled properly. Keeping undisclosed about celebrity guests can benefit the hotel in terms of its professional reputation in the celebrity world. More importantly, this can protect the hotel from unnecessary crowdedness from press and fans. For the hotels that continue to cater to celebrities, a cloaking device can therefore be used to maintain privacy for celebrities, and possibly other guests who seek privacy. The cloak could be put on to a celebrity guest who seeks utter anonymity and does not want to be seen by the public.In terms of restaurant diners' privacy, the need for exclusivity and good restaurant ambiance could be served with the availability of the newly invented meta-materials. Diners who are enclosed in a large dining panel that is made of meta-materials could fully experience the ambiance of the restaurant and see what is beyond the panel. In addition to offering privacy to those in the enclosed area behind the dividing panels, the panels thus made would not obstruct other diners from the spectacular view from the windows, which would otherwise not be seen with traditional dividing panels.\nConcluding comments: This article has offered an initial, yet important, discussion on the current practice of security and privacy measurements in the hospitality industry and pointed out the related limitations. The article makes no attempt to discuss the scientific aspects of the invention. Instead, it serves the purpose of bringing a scientific theory into practice and raises the awareness of the possible future applications of such scientific break-through to the hotel industry. Preliminary interviews with hotel managers, consumers, and researchers on the concerns of limitations of security and privacy showed that the invention has promising future applications. Albeit it may take years for scientists to fully develop a cloak of visible light, with a cloak for microwave having developed, such a cloak of visible light that hides objects from prying eyes might not be much further off. Hotels, which are able to react quickly to gain the first-mover-advantage in leading the industry on the application of such technology, will certainly gain tremendous publicity. More importantly, these forerunners will be the first to create an utmost level of confidence in the market on the security and privacy strategies, leading to the enhancement of competitiveness.While this article sheds new lights to the security and privacy operations in hotels, several issues and questions concerning the application of the cloak in a hotel setting are raised for future investigations. The first question relates to the involved cost. To grasp the first mover advantage, a hotel establishment might have to collaborate with scientists to follow closely the development of feasible coat-liked cloaks and dividing panels that are light and handy to deploy. This might involve a huge amount of start-up cost, which should be justified through a thorough cost and benefit analysis. Besides the start-up cost, continuous investments on maintaining the device should not be neglected. Besides, technical feasibility could be another hurdle. The technical issue regarding mobility of the person, particularly a security guide wearing the cloak should as well be looked into. For the security guide to patrol a hotel property and efficiently communicate with central security unit for actions once doubtful activities are spotted, the electronic devices mounted onto the cloak for such communication ought to be wireless. Given the sophisticated yet complicated technical aspects of the advanced cloaking device, not only the engineering department has to be well trained, the security guides who use the cloak and the restaurant operators who deploy the dividing panel should also be technologically literate. Lastly, hoteliers should examine the challenge in gaining social acceptability of the application of the cloak. Security and privacy, which the cloak aims to promote, are considered as one of society's most important values. The perceived values could have significant impacts on implementing security measures while remaining anonymity of hotel guests. It is generally agreed that the need for national security and privacy are often conflicting with each other and yet inter-related in many different ways. Therefore it is essential for authorities at national and international levels to achieve a right balance between the two when drawing up legislation and implementing regulations concerning the application of the cloak in public and private settings. To summarise, the careful implementation of the cloak would potential bring safety and anonymity to an unprecedented level at hotels.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to bring a new scientific theory into practice in the hotel industry.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - In-depth open-ended interviews were used with eight hospitality practitioners, consumers, and academic researchers.\nFindings: - The article lays out current practices of security and privacy measurements in the hospitality industry and points out the related limitations. More importantly, it provides insights to hotel operators on possible future applications of a new scientific invention and how it could help alleviate the limitations found in the existing security and privacy measures.\nPractical implications: - The paper raises the awareness of a new scientific breakthrough that sheds new lights to security and privacy strategies in hotel operations. Hotels, which are able to react quickly to gain the first-mover-advantage in leading the industry on the application of such technology, will certainly gain tremendous publicity, and more importantly will be the first to create a new level of confidence in the market on security and privacy strategies implemented in their daily hotel operations.\nOriginality/value: - This paper communicates a recent scientific development and its possible applications in the hotel industry. In this way, it bridges the gap between a scientific invention and its real-world application. It is expected to provide insights for hoteliers who are interested in technology applications.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Mental fitness in higher education: Intervention Mapping programme design
|
[
"Mental health",
"Physical activity",
"Education",
"Higher education",
"Mental health promotion"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The inception of the State of Mind UK programme (2011) sought to increase awareness of mental health issues, and wellbeing among professional rugby league players, and their communities in England (Lawlor et al., 2015). More recently, the State of Mind Ireland (SOMI) programme was established in 2015, as an organically evolving development from State of Mind UK. SOMI has the primary aim of highlighting issues surrounding mental health in sporting communities across Ireland through enhancing mental health literacy (Lawlor et al., 2015). SOMI has been identified as a skill-enhancing programme, aimed to increase levels of \"mental fitness\" in young adults (Breslin et al., 2018; Lawlor et al., 2015). The term \"mental fitness\" is accepted as emotional agility to stressful life events, defined as the \"the modifiable capacity to utilise resources and skills to flexibly adapt to challenges or advantages, enabling thriving\" (Robinson et al., 2016, p. 89). Ongoing and existent SOMI research with a selected student-athlete population deem \"mental fitness\" as approachable terminology, and it is specifically seen as less stigmatising for student-athletes in higher education (Breslin et al., 2018). This SOMI research, specific to higher education student-athletes, determines that sport-specific mental health programmes can increase the effectiveness of mental health help-seeking behaviours, and to a lesser extent, knowledge of mental health disorders (Breslin et al., 2018; Breslin et al., 2017). In light of the present article, it is important to contextualise that SOMI research has since targeted the general population of higher education students in Ireland, specifically as a long-term strategy to address the mental health, and wellbeing climate of students within the higher education environment (Houghton et al., 2011; Karwig et al., 2015; Murphy et al., 2016).A nationwide study on young people in Ireland has previously revealed that approximately 40% of young Irish adults experience elevated levels of anxiety and depression (Dooley and Fitzgerald, 2012). Murphy et al. (2016) further described that the number of students in Ireland attending higher education with a formally declared mental health problem is as an \"overwhelming tsunami\". Higher education has significant potential to positively impact the mental health of young adults, through the provision of mental health knowledge, and the skills of wellbeing for large cohorts of young adults (Hunt and Eisenberg, 2010; Karwig et al., 2015). However, academic demands have also been found to be a contributing factor to mental distress among students higher education world-wide (Thorley, 2017; Usher, 2019). Several studies show rising levels of anxiety and depression among higher education students when compared to secondary school contexts (Bewick et al., 2010; Dooley and Fitzgerald, 2012). It has been proposed that Higher Education Institutions (HEI's) play an important role in responding to the mental health needs of students (Hunt and Eisenberg, 2010; Thorley, 2017).Mental health promotion interventions for young people can have significant positive effects on students' emotional, and behavioural wellbeing, including reduced depression, anxiety and improved coping skills (Barry et al., 2013; Doyle et al., 2017; Winzer et al., 2018). In a study investigating the recognition of depression, help-seeking intentions, beliefs about interventions and stigmatising attitudes, Reavley et al. (2012) highlighted that there is a need for mental health literacy interventions, specifically targeting higher education students in Australia. Low mental health knowledge and help-seeking are reported among younger age groups, with student males less likely to recognise depression and most likely to associate with stigmatising attitude to mental health problems (Reavley et al., 2012). The study concludes that interventions need to address stigma and not merely educate on the symptoms of depression in order to reduce barriers to help-seeking. Other research suggests that skills orientated programmes are effective in demonstrating the benefits for wellbeing, and have successfully improved students' social and emotional skills, by enhancing their self-perceptions, and reduced subsequent levels of emotional distress, including depression, anxiety, and stress (Conley et al., 2013; Karwig et al., 2015). Murphy (2017) recommends that the promotion of mental health be included as part of compulsory induction programmes to higher education, while also advocating for the delivery of support services for all students be provided. In supporting research addressing the barriers to responding to students with mental health difficulties in higher education, Murphy (2017) further advocates that \"whole college\" approaches are required, specifically to ensure equity of participation for all students. Thorley (2017) maintains that buy-in and direction from senior leadership are a particularly integral component when considering the wellbeing and mental health needs of students in higher education.State of Mind Ireland as a national programme recognises the well-established, and strong positive associations between mental health and physical activity (PA) (Hegberg and Tone, 2015; Malcolm et al., 2013; Mikkelsen et al., 2017; Peluso and Guerra de Andrade, 2005; Portugal et al., 2013). Participation in regular PA for higher education students has proven to enhance wellbeing (Malcolm et al., 2013), increase resilience through protective factors (Hegberg and Tone, 2015), and alleviate symptoms of anxiety, depression and stress states (Mikkelsen et al., 2017) through a number of factors, which include biological, social and physiological health improvements. The most recent Student Activity and Sports Study Ireland (SASSI) report found that 71% of males, and 58% of females, attending higher education were categorised as highly active, when compared to the 36% (29% male: 42% female) who were identified as insufficiently active in terms of meeting the recommended PA guidelines for health (Murphy et al., 2016). Studies continue to show that sustained PA engagement among young adults in higher education can improve subjective wellbeing in young adulthood, despite the transitional nature of this stage of life (Cekin, 2015; Murphy et al., 2018).The purpose of this study is to provide an innovative, research-based approach in the re-design and development of an existing mental health and PA education intervention for higher education students in Ireland. This article documents the evidence-based process, and protocol associated with the Intervention Mapping (IM) technique, as used through a case-study approach in a large, higher education university context in the Republic of Ireland (Bartholomew Eldridge et al., 2016). The article will guide the reader through the key features of quality associated with the revised SOMI programme for higher education students. Using IM, the programme has been designed for the general higher education population, and has been specifically developed to influence the complex determinants of mental health issues experienced by the priority population. IM may be well suited for designing higher education interventions, as the process is a multi-faceted practical approach tailored to the needs of a specific population, and has been used in similar contexts previously (Ammendolia et al., 2016; Boucher et al., 2015). SOMI will be referred to as SOMI-Higher Education (SOMI-HE) for the remainder of this study to distinguish the previous research undertaken in SOMI (Breslin et al., 2018).\nMethodology: Participants and recruitment - prior to the IM process\nData analysis: The multi-stage, mixed methods data collection described in step one and the design of SOMI-HE (steps two to six) were completed over a fifteen-month period (November 2016 to February 2018). The first stage of data collection in the IM process as parts of the needs assessment, the literature review, was completed using empirically robust and peer-reviewed sources only. Key themes from the literature review were identified through summarising studies relative to the mental health and PA levels among higher education students. Furthermore, the data from the first and second round of the Delphi process were analysed using a thematic approach (Braun and Clarke, 2006; Maguire and Delahunt, 2017). Thematic content analysis is effective for Delphi research studies in mental health education (Sharkey and Sharples, 2001). To ensure the trustworthiness of the qualitative data in both rounds, themes identified were reviewed by the two other senior researchers. Additionally, further validity in terms of the thematic content analysis was sought from members of the expert panel. The semi-structured FG interviews were recorded via Digital Dictaphone (Olympus Digital Voice Recorder WS-852), transcribed verbatim, and anonymised. An inductive thematic analysis was used to identify themes, organise, describe and interpret data in rich detail (Braun and Clarke, 2006). The analysis followed a six-step procedure as outlined by Maguire and Delahunt (2017). Finally, the SOMI evaluation survey was analysed descriptively using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). The open-ended questions from the evaluation form were analysed using similar thematic approaches, as applied in the Delphi Method and the semi-structured FG interviews. The data retrieved from step one of the IM exercise specifically informs the results for the design and implementation of the SOMI-HE programme to follow.\nResults: Outcomes from the IM process for SOMI-HE are described in this section, according to the previously identified six steps of the (Bartholomew Eldridge et al., 2016) protocol. Step one of the results from the IM process provides data from the needs assessments and the design of the logic model of the problem (see Figure 1). Each of the remaining IM steps (two to six), are then informed by the results from step one of the IM process for SOMI-HE.IM step one: needs assessment, and the logic model of the problem results\nDiscussion: This study documents the research-informed IM process for the re-design and development of a mental health and PA promotion intervention programme for higher education students, known as SOMI-HE. The systematic steps of IM used as part of the SOMI-HE programme have successfully drawn on a variety of pedagogical approaches, through using evidence-based decision-making protocol, identified at each stage of the programme design (Bartholomew Eldridge et al., 2016). Through the research-informed process of IM, the alignment of the SOMI-HE programme to the objectives, methods, and evaluation strategies has allowed for the creation of a rigorous and robust programme, aimed specifically at the targeted higher education student population. The research employed as part of step one in IM involved an extensive investigation into the modifiable determinants, regarding the low levels of mental health and PA participation among young adults (students) in higher education. The most prominent modifiable determinants for mental health and PA, selected as part of this study, include knowledge, attitudes, barriers, skills, motivation, outcome expectations, self-efficacy, and the perceived environment. These specific determinants concur with previously acceptable international wellbeing intervention studies (Ammendolia et al., 2016).IM as part of the revised SOMI-HE programme compelled the research team to foster innovative problem solving, however, the lengthy duration required in each of the steps in the design stage, particularly step one was of concern in terms of fluid research dissemination. The IM process, as part of the revised SOMI-HE programme, took approximately sixteen months for research design, development time, and the evaluation procedure as part of step six in the IM process is currently ongoing. This extended timeline for programme design and evaluation has been identified as a challenge by other researchers in the field, using IM (Ammendolia et al., 2016; Mceachan et al., 2008; Van Stralen et al., 2008). In response to this lengthy duration of IM, the research team endorses that the process helped to minimise error, and fulfill a rounded, ecological perspective of the health problem, as part of the revised SOMI programme.IM acknowledges that humans and human behaviours are part of a complex system (Kok, 2014), therefore, there are specific limitations within the environmental conditions of meaningful and sustainable behaviour change. An effective environment, or organisational level response for higher education students is to integrate the intervention within university/college courses, specifically as means of improving the outcome, as previously done within the PA-promotion construct (Plotnikoff et al., 2015). In the current study, however, the research team did not have an association with the environmental agents of higher education for organisational change. In combat to this barrier, the revised SOMI-HE programme utilised an array of multi-theoretical approaches for intended personal behavioural changes (Kok, 2014), and worked locally to evaluate the programme.In terms of sustained behavioural changes to mental health and PA participation for young adults, this IM process has found that the revised SOMI-HE programme could have been lengthened in terms of duration and dosage of frequency to improve the programme's potential impact to influence positive behavioural change. For example, within the field of mindfulness (a component of the revised SOMI programme), research suggests that even 3-4 brief sessions of mindfulness training can buffer negative mental health ill effects (Creswell, 2017). The current revised SOMI-HE intervention is only in a position to offer an experience of learning mindfulness twice, and therefore, has a low dosage of intervention exposure.At this stage of the IM process, it is not possible to draw conclusions about the effectiveness of the revised SOMI-HE programme, however, the process is firmly rooted through a theoretically designed and research-informed approach. In terms of viability, the ratio of time spent designing the revised SOMI-HE programme, in comparison to the dosage and delivery time is exceptionally disproportionate in the context of higher education. Although the research team found the IM process to be exceptionally thorough and research-informed, specific stages, such as step three's creation of the matrices were challenging.\nConclusion: In this study, the authors provide a detailed description of how HEI's can use IM to develop a mental health, and PA programme, which specifically seeks to respond to the wellbeing needs of young adults in higher education. IM provides an opportunity to theoretically support intervention programmes for large cohorts of young adults in HEI's. This SOMI-HE three-hour programme is an innovative learning pathway for students, specifically the rigorous planning undertaken, research-derived protocol, and theoretically, novel pathways created between problems experienced by the target population, and their proposed solutions. The final product detailed in this study of the IM process is a blueprint to a programme known as SOMI-HE, which is created through intelligent design and content development, by various and relevant multi-sectoral stakeholders, invested in the wellbeing of young adults. The subsequent actions to follow include step five's implementation plan to create a method of effectively disseminating SOMI-HE, and step six's evaluation plan for examining the effectiveness of SOMI-HE. This will most likely require \"buy-in\" from senior leadership for the prioritisation of student wellbeing as an integral component of university strategic planning and policy, as previously flagged in the literature (Murphy, 2017; Thorley, 2017).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Higher Education Institutions observe that many students are experiencing mental health issues, such as high levels of anxiety and stress. Young adults are recognised as a vulnerable group who carry the burden of mental health problems worldwide. Mental health interventions can be effective in positively influencing students' emotional and behavioural wellbeing.\nDesign/methodology/approach: In the current study, the principles of Intervention Mapping (IM) were applied to guide the development, implementation, and evaluation of a specifically tailored mental health programme for a selected student cohort in a large Higher Education Institute in Ireland. Mixed qualitative (Delphi technique and focus group discussions) and quantitative (survey) data were gathered to gain a broad perspective of mental health concerns and learning needs among a sample of higher education students (n = 99).\nFindings: Existing evidence guided by theoretical frameworks were blended to create a specifically tailored mental health programme to meet the needs of higher education students in Ireland. Results indicate that the established six-stages of IM provide an empirical process that has the potential to effectively respond to the mental health needs of students in higher education. IM identifies the priority needs of students in higher education and ensures that suitable behaviour change techniques for mental health are addressed. 10;\nOriginality/value: IM is a suitable method to critically and collaboratively develop a mental health intervention for the overall wellbeing of the general higher education student population, both nationally and globally. 10;\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Assessing the role of product category involvement and relationship proneness in the satisfaction-loyalty link in retailing
|
[
"Satisfaction",
"Purchase intention",
"WOM",
"PLS-SEM",
"Relationship proneness",
"Product category involvement"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The importance of creating and enhancing strong customer relationships has long been recognized in the marketing literature (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2002). Relationship marketing aims to create loyalty among customers (Sheth and Parvatlyar, 1995) so that profitable and sustainable long-term relationships can be built and maintained (Miquel-Romero et al., 2014). Companies try to achieve this through a variety of activities designed to develop strong bonds with their customers, and thereby build loyalty (Ravald and Gronroos, 1996; Homburg and Giering, 2001). Research has pointed out that there is a higher probability for customers with high satisfaction to demonstrate loyalty to the company, and thus tend to maintain the relationship (Fornell, 1992; Andreassen and Lindestad, 1998).\nLiterature review and research hypotheses: Loyalty\nMethod: Sample and data collection\nEmpirical analysis and results: Measurement model\nDiscussion: Theoretical implications\nConclusion: The relationship between satisfaction and loyalty is not simple and straightforward but rather mediated by product category involvement and relationship proneness. Despite the importance of product category involvement and relationship proneness in explaining customer relationships, we know little about their roles in the formation of loyalty in retailing. Individual consumer traits and preferences are critical to the success of relationship marketing. Surprisingly, the relationship marketing literature largely overlooked such individual differences. This study filled this void by exploring the mediating role of product category involvement and relationship proneness in the satisfaction-loyalty link in a retail setting. Our findings reveal that both product category involvement and relationship proneness partially mediate the positive impact of satisfaction on purchase intention and WOM in retailing. That is, while we concur with previous studies that satisfaction has a direct positive effect on the two prominent loyalty dimensions, we also contend that mediators pertaining to relationships and engagement emerge as important constructs that provide further insights into this well-established relationship. In other words, retail marketers need to consider product category involvement and relationship proneness when developing strategies to build loyalty, and to maintain long-term relationships with their customers. It is our hope that the present study will pave the way for future studies that delve into the long-standing research stream of direct and indirect determinants of loyalty in retailing and other service industries.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Product category involvement and relationship proneness are crucial in explaining relationship outcomes. Nevertheless, the authors know little about their roles in the formation of loyalty, especially in the retail industry. Individual consumer traits and preferences are likely to play a critical role in the success of relationship marketing. Yet, relationship marketing studies have fallen short of considering such individual differences. The purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating effects of product category involvement and relationship proneness on the relationship between satisfaction and loyalty in retail clothing stores.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Data were obtained using a survey of 220 consumers. Partial least squares structural equation modeling was employed to test the proposed theoretical model.\nFindings: The results show that satisfaction significantly affects product category involvement and relationship proneness, which, in turn, significantly affect purchase intention and word-of-mouth (WOM). The results also show that product category involvement and relationship proneness partially mediate the impact of satisfaction on purchase intention and WOM.\nResearch limitations/implications: Product category involvement and relationship proneness play a critical role in explaining the satisfaction-loyalty link. Future research could consider the role of potential moderating variables.\nPractical implications: Retail managers should not only focus on improving customer satisfaction to achieve customer loyalty, but should also consider the importance of product category involvement and relationship proneness, and their role in the formation of customer loyalty both in traditional and online environments.\nOriginality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to explore the mediating effects of product category involvement and relationship proneness on the relationship between satisfaction, purchase intention and WOM in the retail industry.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Market orientation and export performance: the moderation of channel and institutional distance
|
[
"Performance",
"Market orientation",
"International marketing",
"Export performance",
"Institutional distance",
"Export channel"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: There has been consensus that market orientation (MO) capabilities can lead to a firm's superior business performance (Ellis, 2006; Kirca et al., 2005). Companies from emerging markets like China have used MO for competitive advantage and better performance (Murray et al., 2011; Song et al., 2015). MO focuses on learning from customers, competitors and the external environment, processing that information internally and utilizing it to achieve success (Day, 1994; Kohli and Jaworski, 1990; Sinkula, 1994). Recent scholarship also reveals that MO capabilities are particularly important within the context of exporting as MO helps firms learn about the foreign market and adjust strategies and products to better conform to market demand (Boso, Cadogan and Story, 2013; Brettel et al., 2008; Cadogan et al., 2002; Chung, 2012; Dong et al., 2013; Ellis, 2007; Julian et al., 2014; Madsen et al., 2015; Murray et al., 2011). How to maintain competitive advantage when rivals also turn market oriented becomes a challenge to businesses (Kumar et al., 2011), especially international firms that face complicated domestic and foreign environments. This research seeks to address this challenge by proposing and testing such a mechanism that deploying MO capabilities in suitable structures including export channel and market in terms of institutional distance from home can further boost export performance.\n2. Theory and hypotheses: MO becomes an important source for competitive advantage for organizations in emerging markets (Li and Zhou, 2010; Song et al., 2015). Research on MO has focused largely on domestic activities (Kirca et al., 2005) examining the antecedents and measurement of MO (Kohli and Jaworski, 1990; Narver and Slater, 1990; Slater and Narver, 1994), the links between MO and performance (Dong et al., 2013; Ellis, 2006; Kirca et al., 2005; Narver and Slater, 1990), as well as exploring how MO can be implanted and defused within an organization (Day, 1994; Gebhardt et al., 2006; Kumar et al., 2011; Lam et al., 2010). These studies indicate that the MO provides firms with a specific advantage that can lead to superior firm performance.\n3. Methods: To test our hypotheses we collected data from Chinese firms. Chinese firms provide an appropriate sample for this study for several reasons. First, exporting is the dominant mode of international market participation for Chinese firms (Zhao and Zou, 2002). Second, like other emerging market firms, Chinese firms typically do not have well-recognized global brands or other resource-based advantages and lack the financial prowess, international market experience, resources and managerial expertise needed to customize products for export markets (Steensma et al., 2005). Finally, recent research suggests that Chinese firms tend to rely on MO as a means to compete in foreign markets (Wei and Lau, 2008). Thus, Chinese exporters provide an excellent context in which to test our theory.\n4. Results: Prior to testing our hypotheses we examined correlations between variables. Table I shows the means, standard deviations and correlations for all our constructs. Although we note high variability, there is no indication of multicollinearity. We examined the variance inflation factors (VIF) scores for the regression models and noted no VIF score larger than 3.49, suggesting that multicollinearity is not an issue with our data.\n5. Discussion: Previous scholarship has identified a link between MO and performance (Ellis, 2006; Kirca et al., 2005; Narver and Slater, 1990). Yet when firms export to foreign markets, they need to consider the structure through which these MO capabilities are deployed and how differences/similarities in the institutional environment, between home and export market, may impact the value of these capabilities. Building on the RBT's resource-structure-performance perspective and institutional theory, we develop a unique perspective investigating the moderating impact of export channel and institutional distance on the MO-export performance relation. Our analysis indicates that firms possessing strong MO capabilities will perform better in the export market if they deploy these capabilities through hierarchical export channels. Furthermore, we show that MO provides even greater value in institutionally distant markets, allowing firms to learn and adjust strategies to align better with export market demands. Thus, our study presents further evidence that MO provides a firm with a source of competitive advantage; one that is fungible and can be exploited in foreign export markets, but also contingent on important contextual factors associated with resource deployment and institutional distance to a foreign market.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Market orientation (MO) has been shown to provide a valuable resource-based advantage in domestic markets. How internationalizing firms from emerging markets can benefit from this capability is more complex while facing institutional distance. The purpose of this paper is to develop and test a theory to suggest that although MO capabilities can enhance export performance, the structure where they are deployed, namely the export channel a firm uses and the market in terms of institutional distance from home, can affect the benefits derived from MO.\nDesign/methodology/approach: With a sample of Chinese exporters and data collected via questionnaire survey, this research uses a multiple regression model to test the hypotheses.\nFindings: It finds that firms with stronger MO capabilities can improve export performance by using hierarchical channels and by exporting to more institutionally distant markets where MO provides greater value.\nOriginality/value: This research claims to make several important contributions to the literature by providing a better understanding of how firms can successfully deploy MO capabilities when exporting.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Intuitive and explicit reactions towards "new" food technologies: Attitude strength and familiarity
|
[
"Attitudes",
"Explicit knowledge",
"Genetic modification",
"Organic foods",
"Brand awareness"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nImplicit and explicit attitudes toward organic and genetically modified food production: attitude strength and familiarity: While shopping or watching commercials on television, we keep seeing advertisements for new brands of peanut butter, new kinds of candy bars or for better tasting types of soy. Many of these food innovations are distinctive because of the way they are produced (e.g. organically grown vegetables and meats, genetically modified food). One way of investigating people's attitude towards new food technologies would be to just ask people what they think about the technologies in question, i.e. measuring their attitude on a cognitive and conscious level. Another way is relying more on gut reactions: measuring people's attitudes on a more affective and unconscious level. Despite the fact that new food technologies are of increasing importance, not a lot of research into how people react implicitly to these technologies has been conducted (Spence and Townsend, 2006).Explicit attitudes are believed to predict deliberate, well-contemplated behaviour, whereas implicit attitudes are believed to predict spontaneous behaviour (Perugini, 2005). Therefore, behaviour is better predicted by both explicit and implicit attitudes than by explicit attitudes alone. When correlations between explicit and implicit attitudes are high, they are believed to be highly predictive of behaviour. In contrast, when correlations between explicit and implicit attitudes are low or none existing, they are believed to be less predictive of actual behaviour (Spence and Townsend, 2006).The study of Spence and Townsend (2006) was the first ever study to examine implicit attitudes toward GM food. The study showed neutral implicit attitudes (in the context of organic food) and neutral explicit attitudes towards GM foods. The authors found no significant correlation between people's implicit and explicit attitude towards GM food. According to Hoffmann et al. (2005) such a non-existing correlation between explicit and implicit attitudes is due to a lack of introspective access to implicitly assessed representations.We argue that such lack of introspective access is present when people have no experience with a new object or concept. Therefore the current study investigated whether the absence of a relation between implicit and explicit attitudes towards food technologies can be explained by the novelty of the food technology in question. This could provide further insight into whether attitudes towards food technologies are predictive of behaviour. First we will explain what attitudes are and how they can be explicitly and implicitly measured.Attitudes\nMethod: In order to select two food technologies for our sample of production methods, we conducted a pilot study in which several food production technologies were compared with each other in terms of familiarity and embeddedness.Pilot study\nResults: Method of analysis\nDiscussion: The present research aimed to investigate both explicit attitudes and implicit evaluative associations with different food technologies. The main finding of this study is the presence of a significant correlation between the implicit and explicit attitude towards OP and the absence of a significant correlation between the implicit and explicit attitude towards GM. This main finding could provide insight into how attitudes towards new technologies are formed. It suggests that the attitude towards OP is highly predictive of behaviour, whereas the attitude towards GM is not predictive and open to change.The current study showed that the participants perceive GM implicitly as more negative and OP as more positive. The explicit measure showed that the participants are neutral towards GM on a conscious level. This latter finding is in contradiction with our finding in the pilot test. The participants in the pilot test reported a slightly negative explicit attitude towards GM. On the other hand, participants appeared to have a positive explicit attitude towards OP. Moreover, the results showed that participants perceive OP explicitly as more positive than GM; at the same time the participants are less ambivalent, have a more committed and more central attitude towards OP compared to GM. Besides this, people have more subjective knowledge about OP than about GM. These latter results replicated the findings of the pilot test.The centrality of attitudes reflects how well attitudes are embedded, whereas commitment to attitudes reflects the accessibility of an attitude. The results of the current study suggested that people's evaluation of OP has been often accessed, maybe because people are more familiar with this technology, with the result that people's attitude towards OP is well embedded, easy accessible and therefore more strong. Because a significant correlation between the implicit and explicit attitude towards OP was found, we suggest that the attitude towards OP is strong. Because of this relatively strong attitude, we believe that people can infer their opinion towards OP more automatically than towards GM.Although we found a clearly negative implicit evaluation towards GM in general, this seems, however, based on ambivalent and not on very strong convictions, probably related to the lack of subjective knowledge. People do not have an articulated opinion about GM and attitudes towards GM are therefore relatively open to change. We found no significant correlation between the implicit and explicit attitude towards GM. This latter result is in accordance with the finding of Spence and Townsend (2006) that no correlation between implicit and explicit measurements towards GM is present. We believe that this finding can be explained because people's attitude towards this relatively novel food technology is not well embedded and not easy accessible and therefore people's attitude towards GM is not (yet) strong. This result is in line with the suggestion of Hoffmann et al. (2005) that such non existing correlations between explicit and implicit attitudes are due to a lack of introspective access to implicitly assessed representations.Within OP, attitude centrality, attitude commitment and people's amount of subjective knowledge appear to moderate the correlation between the implicit and explicit measurements, which is absent within GM. It appears that this significant correlation between implicit and explicit measurement is only present in case of high attitude centrality, high attitude commitment and high amount of subjective knowledge towards OP. This latter finding suggested that the implicit and explicit attitude are similar when an attitude is well embedded and easy accessible, which is the case when the food technology is well known.One of the criticisms of this study could be the possible influence of the fixed order of the measurements. An implicit priming effect could have impacted on responses to the explicit measurement. We judged that it was better to administer the implicit measurement first because carryover effects of explicit measures on implicit measures appear to be larger than vice versa (Bosson et al., 2000).Furthermore, there are some issues with our sample. It could be argued that the relatively small sample size could have biased the results. On the other hand, the study of Spence and Townsend (2006) was executed with a sample size of 60 participants and they found similar results. It could also be argued that the overrepresentation of female participants could have biased the results. A study of Cuite et al. (2005) showed that women were less likely to approve of GM foods. Thus, when the sample would be more representative for the population, a more positive explicit attitude towards GM could be expected. On the other hand, the sample used in the study of Spence and Townsend was more representative for the population (58 per cent females versus 42 per cent males) and this study also showed a neutral explicit attitude towards GM. It could also be argued that the education level and age of the participants in our sample may have biased the results. Cuite et al. (2005) showed that people who have a higher education level and people who are younger are more likely to approve of GM foods. In contrast, Noussair et al. (2004) showed that people with higher education levels are likely to be more negative towards GM. Apparently there is no consensus about the influence of gender, age and education level towards GM acceptance. Future research could focus on the effect of gender, age and education level towards explicit measurements and implicit measurements.Another limitation of this study could be that we only studied two food technologies. Future research might focus on other food technologies and specific food products.The current research suggests that the implicit measurement next to the explicit measurement provides insight into how well a concept is embedded in people's cognitive structure and whether the attitude is predictive for behaviour. By investigating implicit and explicit measurement one could determine the extent in which food technologies can be influenced and changed. More research is needed into how explicit and implicit attitudes relate to each other and how their combination might predict behaviour. This research validates the use of implicit measurements but at the same time it shows that there can be discrepancies between intuitive and explicit reactions that indicate that attitudes towards novel food technologies are not (yet) strong structures.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - New food technologies are of increasing importance but not a lot of research into how people react to these technologies has been conducted. The purpose of this paper is to provide insight into how implicit measurements in addition to explicit measurements give insight into how well an attitude towards a food concept, in relation to its familiarity, is predictive for behaviour.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - An implicit measurement (EAST) and an explicit questionnaire were used to investigate people's attitudes and attitude strength towards two food technologies (genetic modification and organic production). Correlations between the two measurements were calculated to determine whether familiar food technologies are more predictive for behaviour than relatively unfamiliar food technologies.\nFindings: - Implicit measurements showed negative associations with genetic modification. Explicit measurements showed neutral associations with genetic modification. In contrast, implicit and explicit measurements showed positive associations with organic production. When a food technology is well known (e.g. organic production), significant correlations between the two measurements were present suggesting that attitudes were predictive for behaviour. In contrast, when a food technology is not well known (e.g. genetic modification), significant correlations were not present suggesting that attitudes were not predictive for behaviour.\nOriginality/value: - This is the first study to examine the relation between intuitive and explicit reactions in relation with the novelty of food technologies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Emotional awareness amongst middle leadership
|
[
"Middle leadership",
"Emotions",
"Neuroscience",
"TDM",
"DMN"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Silva (2016) stated that leadership is one of those concepts that are very hard to define. More than four decades ago, Stogdill (1974) affirmed that \"there are almost as many different definitions of leadership as there are persons who have attempted to define the concept\" (p. 7). However, since the 1950s two distinct leadership roles have emerged, the task leader and the socio-emotional leader has been well documented in the leadership literature (Bales, 1958). These two roles have been conceptualised into theories such as transformational and transactional leadership (Bass, 1990). Transformational leadership principally focussing on building relationships with those whom leaders work. Whereas transactional leadership critically focusses on task achievement.Leadership theorists such as McClelland (1961), Wofford (1970), Jago (1982), Vroom and Jajo (2007) and Henkel et al. (2019) have all become interested in developing strategies that would enable leaders to integrate these two fundamental leadership roles. For this paper, these will be referred to as task-oriented and relationship-oriented leadership in order not to attribute the approaches to one particular leadership theory. This ability of individuals to move effectively between task- and relationship-orientated activities is critical if leaders are to be adaptable and responsive to organisational challenges.Hargreaves and Fink (2008) suggested that the challenge of functioning in either a task- or relationship-orientated role are compounded by the increasingly complex nature of educational leadership, changing student expectations and increased organisational financial constraint. These issues create a deficit of individuals who want to be leaders within schools and colleges. Frearson (2003) suggested that this void has been made worse by an ageing population, while Davies and Davies (2011) stated that the desire for a better work-life balance is also contributing to the lack of individuals seeking senior leadership. Both Gronn (2003) and Lynch et al. (2012) posit that leadership in education is greedy of an individual's time. While Gronn and Lucey (2006) state leadership occupies an ever-expanding space and requires sustained 24/7 levels of individual engagement.In this paper, we will test to see whether an individuals' ability to recognise emotions is influenced by a range of factors, some of which are beyond their direct control. Most notably their position within the organisational hierarchy. This is compounded by the human brain's ability to switch on and off processing functions depending on the whether task- or relationship-orientated activities are being undertaken. However, it is beyond the scope of this paper to explore this as it would require functional imaging techniques to be employed.\nLiterature review: Emotional recognition and its importance\nMethodology: The objective of this paper was to examine the extent to which those who work in education can recognise emotions. The sampling unit was schools in England. Eighty-three individuals from a range of schools (primary and secondary) participated in an emotional recognition test (ERT). Participants were self-selecting through emails to schools based on a convenience sample (Plowright, 2011) and held a variety of roles within from teachers, head of department, assistant or deputy headteacher and headteacher. Access to the survey was only distributed to individuals who expressed some form of interest in participating in this exploratory study emotions.An important point to note is that the number of respondents is small, 83. This was deliberately done to get a set of data from which to explore whether there are any differences in individuals' ability to recognise emotion and whether a further larger study should be conducted. This initial study would provide details of whether a larger scale study should be conducted. It is also worth noting that while the findings of this study as this stage may not be generalisable due to the limitations of sample size.All participants completed the Geneva Emotion Recognition Test (GERT) to identify their levels of ER. This particular test was used as it provides a larger number of emotions for participants to select from. The GERT test consists of 14 emotions (six positive and eight negative), portrayed by 10 actors (five men and five women) of different ages who depict these emotions in short audio-video clips (dynamic multimodal stimuli). Unlike other ERTs which commonly use either 5 (Scherer and Scherer, 2011), 7 (Matsumoto et al., 2000) or 10 (Banziger et al., 2009) emotions, the GERT system uses 14 emotions affording greater flexibility in emotion choice than classical test theory. This reduces the chances of consistency motif whereby a consistency propensity between participants is sought (Podsakoff et al., 2003).Hall et al. (2009) found that sensitivity in social interactions (encompassing an individual's ability to successfully infer and interpret another person's emotions) is positively correlated with social skills, the ability to adjust to new or foreign cultures, effectiveness in the workplace and the quality of relationships that can be built. With regards to EI, Mayer et al. (2000) have suggested that ER is an elementary part of the ability EI model.\nFindings and discussion: The preliminary data set comprised 83 individuals, 54% of the participants were female (n = 45) and 46% were male (n = 38), the mean average age of participants was 37.4 years and individuals had spent an average of 5.5 years within their current role.Table 2 shows the average percentage of correctly recognised emotions (ER score) of classroom teachers was 42.53%, based on a sample of 42. The confidence interval (at 95%) for the population mean of all teacher would be between 41.31 and 43.75. This suggests that individuals are able to differentiate between a greater range of emotions, such as a blend of more complex emotions. This relates to level 4/5 on the Subic-Wrana et al. (2011) model of the LEA. A total of 23 heads of departments (middle leaders) took part in the study and their score was significantly lower than any other groups within the study, with an average score of only 21.57%. They were less able to recognise complex emotions but were able to successfully identify single emotions (level 3 of the LEA model). The average score of the Deputy and Assistant Heads group was 38.31% - still lower than the classroom teachers (Figure 1). Despite there only being seven headteachers who participated in the study, they had an average score of 46.59%, a + 4% difference from classroom teachers. Additionally, there was a statistically significant difference between groups as determined by one-way ANOVA (F(3,16) = 2,899, p = 0.00001). However, all participants of this study scored lower than members of the public, scoring an average of 67%, (Schlegel et al., 2014).Initially, the average score of education practitioners lessens as classroom teachers move into instructional [middle] leadership roles (the data suggest that the average ER scores halve to 21.57%). As middle leaders move into more senior positions, Assistant Headteacher and Deputy Headteacher roles, their score improves. Further improving as they move into Headteacher roles. If the scores of those entering the profession are similar to those at the top of the organisational hierarchy, then it is possible that it is not the individual's ER ability which changes. Instead, the combination of external influences (outside of an individual's control), and internal demands including the expectations placed on instructional leaders act as contributory factors in the reduction in test scores. This suggests that individuals can move between levels within Subic-Wrana et al. (2011) model rather than is being a linear progression as previously suggested.Research by Brown et al. (2000) states that a major problem facing middle leaders is a lack of time to complete all of the managerial tasks in addition to the responsibilities they have towards their own lessons. Middle leaders, as the title suggests, are sandwiched between those working in the senior leadership team (SLT) and their colleagues, and sometimes former peers, within their departments. A sense of loyalty to both, or either of these groups, may compound the difficulties that middle leaders face.McKinney et al. (2013) suggested that middle leaders are overloaded with work, undertrained and on the edge of burning out. It is the lack of training that Constable and McCormick (1987) note, suggesting that a majority of individuals entering management positions have little in the way of training. Turner and Bolam (1998) pointed out that middle leaders do have room for manoeuvre and will proactively conceptualise their role and not merely act as a conduit through which the decisions of the SLT will be communicated. At the same time, research by Brown et al. (2000) showed that middle leaders are unsatisfied with having to subordinate their vision in favour of that of senior staff members, and their departmental vision was often undervalued, and their professional judgment insufficiently recognised by senior managers, governors and external bodies.Kubit and Jack (2013) state that it is possible to switch between networks and possible roles. However, they go onto suggest that leaders cannot simultaneously attend to these two distinct roles, hence conflicts are likely to arise if leaders get \"stuck\" in one role. The prolonged suppression of one of the networks and associated roles subsequently decreases an individual's ability to switch between the two networks. Some scholars have noted this trade-off. For example, Yukl (2008) notes that \"efforts to improve one performance determinant may have an adverse effect on another performance determinant. When leaders are preoccupied with responding to external threats (task), there is less time for people-oriented concerns such as being supportive and developing member skills\" (pp. 711-714).Given the task-orientated nature of the middle leader role, it is unsurprising that their level of emotional recognition has diminished. However, it appears to increase again as individuals move into more relationship-orientated roles as senior leaders (assistant- and deputy headteacher) when the level of TDM is likely to reduce and the normal cycling between TDM and DMN is restored. This is evidence in the results of this study which found that those individuals in more senior roles and which were relationship-orientated were better able to recognise emotions.One possible solution would be the differentiating the leadership role. For example, having a role such as middle leadership which is predominantly positioned within one neural state (TPN) allows a leader to spend the majority of their time in one of the two neural networks (TPN or DMN) and reduces the need to cycle between them. Yet traversing between the two networks is associated with good mental health and higher intelligence quotient. Whereas a lessening of the cycling between networks could potentially increase an individuals susceptibility to a variety of mental health disorders, as described by Andrews-Hanna et al. (2010); Anticevic et al. (2012); Whitfield-Gabrieli and Ford (2012), including what Broyd et al. (2009) describes as a power-stress syndrome.A more effective approach would be to train and develop leaders so that they possess a higher level of competency in enacting both the task and relationship leadership roles, alongside the ability to switch between them. This needs to be done with an awareness of appropriate cues and contexts for doing so. While the actions to invoke a change of role are within a leader's purview, where this is not possible they might be able to ensure that time and space is created for individuals to transverse between the two associated networks. For example, where a leader who is heavily into a task-orientated role (and therefore TPN activation) they could, for example, each day coach another person within the organisation. By deciding to and committing to coach a person each day, either formally or informally, over coffee or lunch, the leader commits to switching into the relationship role at least once a day and thus activating the DMN in both themselves and the other person. Over time and practice, the switching between the task and relationship roles would likely become easier and help the leader develop more cues as to when one role is more appropriate or possible than the other.\nConclusion: While the idea that a task can be classified as either analytical or social is useful for theoretical purposes as with most dichotomies is an oversimplification and rarely as clear-cut in practice. In reality, and particularly in leadership, all tasks have both a relational component and an analytical component. Therefore, the greater ability a leader has to switch between these two modes of reasoning the more effective they will be as a leader. We suspect that minimising the suppression of the opposing network will make it easier, faster and less costly for the leader to switch between the two networks. The ability to switch between the two opposing networks may require a reduction in the intensity of the dominant network to facilitate leaders in making the switch between modes easier.In this paper, we explored the challenges that middle leaders experience in recognising emotions. It would appear that this is a temporary loss which is most probably as a result of the task-orientated nature of being a middle leader. While one could posit that this is purely a situation which arises because of the disposition of the middle leadership role, it transpires that this is complicated by the brains' inability to function effectively in both task- and relationship-orientated modes.To minimise the unresolved tension that leaders face in developing their roles to attend to both the task requirements and the relationship requirements as a result of the antagonism between the TPN and the DMN. This paper proposes that middle leaders should make a conscious effort to function in the DMN mode, which could be achieved by coaching a member of staff.What is clear that further work is needed to ascertain whether this is unique to education or whether those in middle leadership roles in other sectors experience the shame challenges in recognising emotions, based on position within the organisational hierarchy. Also, the question as to how the emotionless middle leader impacts others within teams that they lead needs addressing.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this viewpoint paper is to explore middle leaders' ability to recognise emotions in the context of workplace research, and to propose measures that might support them in their role.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper combines a contemporary literature review with reflections from practice to develop more nuanced understandings of middle leadership. This paper applied the Geneva Emotional Recognition Test (GERT) to explore the level of emotional recognition of 86 individuals (teachers to headteachers (equivalent to school principals)).\nFindings: The preliminary findings suggest that teachers and headteachers have higher levels of emotional recognition than middle and senior leaders. This paper subsequently argues that the task-orientated nature middle leadership compounds an individual's ability to engage effectively in relationship-orientated tasks. This explains why middle leaders scored lower on the GERT assessment. This is further inhibited by the anti-correlation in the brain's ability to deal with the task-positive network (TDM) and default mode network (DMN) processing functions where individuals operate in one neural mode for long periods.\nResearch limitations/implications: The viewpoint paper proposes a number of implications for middle leaders and suggests that middle leaders should proactively seek out opportunities to be engaged in activities that support the DMN function of the brain and subsequently the relationship-orientated aspects of leadership, for example, coaching other staff members. However, it has to be recognised that the sample size is small and further work is needed before any generalisations can be made.\nOriginality/value: This paper offers a contemporary review of the role of middle leaders underpinned by a preliminary study into individuals' ability to recognise emotions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Issues of e-learning standards and identity management for mobility and collaboration in higher education
|
[
"Information management",
"E‐learning",
"Standards",
"Higher education",
"Europe"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: With new requirements for authentication, authorisation and identity management for web applications, most higher education institutions implement several solutions to address these issues. At the first level, the adoption of directory servers like LDAP, Active Directory and others, solve some problems of having multiple logins and passwords for authentication. The growing of web applications like learning management systems, portals, blogs, wikis, and others, need a more effective way of identity management, providing security and accessibility. Web Single Sign-On (SSO) resolves some of these issues of identity management, because the authentication is managed centrally and the user can navigate through different web applications using the same session. One example of a Web SSO system is the central authentication systems (CAS). The SSO systems provide an effective way to manage authentication and authorisation inside institutions, but are restricted to the administrative domain of each institution.\nIdentity and access management: The rapid growth of information technologies inside higher education institutions to support learning, management, research and library services, has led to the appearance of software islands, without the possibility of communication between these pieces of software.To tackle the problem of integration of information systems, several institutions adopt new approaches to share information between the systems, centralising the information systems using a data warehouse approach.Data integration in higher education institutions has several advantages in the optimisation of resources and promotion of a culture of shared access to information in order to support the institutions strategic goals. The integration of data and applications require the integration of identity management systems in order to provide a more effective way to manage access to applications.Access management is the term used to describe the process of permitting access to protected online information. It describes the administrative process to allow access to online resources (e.g. web sites or web applications) for any individual based on the provided identity.In this context identity and access management are defined, described and handled using several key concepts, including:* Authentication - the process of verifying the identity of any individual that is requesting access to any resource.* Authorisation - the process of determining what kind of access that should be granted to the user based on his/her credentials.* Attributes - information about the user, like membership or role.* Trust - the agreement between different parties and systems for sharing identity information.* Access management - the processes and technologies for controlling and monitoring access to protected resources. It includes authentication, authorisation, trust, and security auditing.* Federation - a special kind of trust relationship between distinct organisations that agree to share identity information beyond internal network boundaries.These new requirements for authentication, authorisation and identity management originated mainly from the growth of web applications in higher education institutions. Most web applications are role based, which means that the authentication of the users is mandatory to provide the authorisation based on the user profile. Web applications that normally require user authentication are virtual learning environments, academic and institutional portal, virtual research environments, wikis, blogs, libraries, etc. The variety of web applications that require authentications implies that the user needs to introduce their credentials in each application. The adoption of single sign-on for all the campus web applications is the common solution to provide a better user experience.Web SSO\nE-learning standards: With the continuous growth in number of virtual learning environments and authoring tools, there arises a necessity to provide mechanisms of interoperability between tools and systems in order to support the portability, reusability and independence of contents and systems.E-learning standards provide common data structures and communication protocols for e-learning objects and cross-systems workflows. The main organisations developing e-learning standards are:* International Standards Organisation (ISO);* IEEE Learning Technology Standards Committee (LTSC);* European Centre of Normalisation (CEN);* IMS (IMS Global Learning, Inc.);* Aviation Industry CBT Committee (AICC);* Alliance for Remote Instructional Authoring and Distribution Networks for Europe (ARIADNE); and* Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL).In Figure 1 is represented the process of standardisation, where AICC, IMS, ADL and ARIADNE produce the specifications that are proposed to IEEE LTSC for standardisation. IEEE LTSC with ISO/IEC/JTCI/SC36 evaluates the specification to propose as a standard to ISO.The adoption of standards is crucial for the development of e-learning, because it permits the interoperability of systems and the reuse of contents. The standards that are more relevant at the moment are SCORM and IMS Learning Design.SCORM\nPromoting the sharing of contents and services in higher education: Federations are an effective way to promote a deeper collaboration between higher education institutions in or to promote the mobility of students and faculty within Europe. This is very important to Europe in order to respond to the new challenges of the knowledge-based societies where the knowledge is the foundation of the economy and development.To structure content for sharing is very important to adopt standards like SCORM and IMS Learning Design. SCORM permits the sharing of learning objects between institutions and their reuse in several learning activities and Learning Design used to describe any learning scenario. The main characteristics of learning objects are reusability, accessibility, portability, interoperability and durability. Learning objects can be modified and versioned for different courses, can be indexed for easy retrieval using metadata standards, operated in different systems independently of the hardware and software and can remain intact through upgrades to the hardware and software. The reusability is an important feature of learning objects permitting the construction of learning sequences based on distributed learning objects that can be produced in several institutions. To facilitate the discovery and reuse of learning objects, it is necessary for the adoption of federated identity management systems to share contents and services within Europe. There are several initiatives of learning objects repositories to promote free access to online resources, the most known are:* MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW);* Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative (OLI) project; and* Multimedia Educational Resource for Online Learning and Teaching (MERLOT).* Jorum - national learning object repository in UK.OCW is a free publication of MIT course materials that reflects almost all the undergraduate and graduate subjects taught at MIT. The project started in 2000, and the first proof-of-concept site was available in 2002, containing 50 courses. By November 2007, MIT completed the initial publication of virtually the entire curriculum, over 1,800 courses in 33 academic disciplines. Going forward, the OCW team is updating existing courses and adding new content and services to the site. Based on OCW experience, the OCW Consortium is a collaboration of more than 100 higher education institutions and associated organisations from around the world creating a broad and deep body of open educational content using a shared model. The mission of the OCW Consortium is to advance education and empower people worldwide through OCW.The OLI project, developed at Carnegie Mellon, is working on the provision of a free, widely available and effective online education. OLI grew out of collaboration among cognitive scientists, experts in human computer interaction and seasoned faculty who have both a deep expertise in their respective fields and a strong commitment to excellence in higher education. The project adds to online education the crucial elements of instructional design grounded in cognitive theory, formative evaluation for students and faculty, and iterative course improvement based on empirical evidence.MERLOT is a web-based open resource primarily for faculty and students in higher education that aims to alleviate the problem of locating relevant materials of high quality on the world wide web. MERLOT is a wide repository to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning by expanding the quantity and quality of peer-reviewed online learning materials that can be easily incorporated into faculty designed courses. It includes links to thousands of learning materials, sample assignments, evaluations of the learning materials by other individual users and panels of faculty and links to people with common interests in a discipline and in teaching and learning. MERLOT has more than 19,580 resources in several areas.Jorum is a free online repository service for teaching and support staff in UK further and higher education institutions, helping to build a community for the sharing, reuse and repurposing of learning and teaching materials. It supports access to over 2,500 learning resources for download for direct use in the classroom and within virtual learning environments (VLEs). Recently Jorum became an open repository, named JorumOpen, where lecturers and teachers will be able to share materials under the Creative Commons license framework: this makes sharing easier, granting users greater rights for use and re-use of online content and easier to understand.Open access repositories are at the moment the focus of e-learning, providing a more effective learning experience with high quality materials. In Europe, several higher education institutions are creating their learning objects repositories for faculty reuse of materials. The project Promoting Multimedia Access to Education and Training in European Society (PROMETEUS) was funded by European Union to apply and integrate the IEEE LTSC and learning standards in the European contexts and cultures, with a clear underlying ideal to promote access to knowledge, education and training for all European citizens-regardless of their age, work situation, geographical location or social status. PROMETEUS has brought together hundreds of public and private sector organisations. The issues addressed by PROMETEUS project were:* optimal strategies for multicultural, multilingual learning solutions;* new instructional and training approaches and new learning environments;* affordable solutions and platforms based on open standards and best practices; and* publicly accessible and interoperable knowledge repositories.Another European project to promote e-learning repositories is the foundation for the European Knowledge Pool (ARIADNE). ARIADNE is an European Association open to the world, for knowledge sharing and reuse. The core of the ARIADNE infrastructure is a distributed network of learning repositories. It was based on results of ARIADNE European projects, which create tools and methodologies for producing, managing and reusing computer-based pedagogical elements and telematics supported training curricula.ARIADNE and PROMETEUS projects were the most relevant initiatives to promote collaboration and the sharing of contents across Europe. It was not the aim of these projects to create a European repository. The European higher education area, in which students can choose from a wide and transparent range of high quality courses and benefit from smooth recognition procedures, provides a great opportunity to implement new polices to respond to the challenge of how to improve the attractiveness of European higher education area and how to implement the Lisbon strategy in order to improve the competitiveness of the Union knowledge-based economy. To address and achieve these aims, collaboration and the sharing of contents and services across European higher education institutions are mandatory. The creation of an European Federation and an European Learning Objects Repository are two essential steps to improve the knowledge of European citizens. The main issues related to the implementation of a European repository include:* How to change the educational paradigm, from a teacher centred paradigm to a distributed paradigm, where the knowledge is produced and transmitted collaboratively.* What type of ontology should be used to describe learning objects to be effectively organised in courses.* How to stimulate the adoption of SCORM and Learning Design standards.* How to develop multilingual and multicultural learning objects.The adoption of e-learning standards and the separation of presentation layer and information layer, based on XML technologies, can contribute to a more effective collaboration in the development of learning objects, based on the open source paradigm, under the Creative Commons license framework, in order to collaborate, share, use and re-use online content.The adoption of a European identity federation is important even for open access repositories, because it makes it possible to personalise the delivering of contents and services for lecturers and students, track the student progress and to control the quality of learning materials based on student learning experience.\nConclusions: SSO systems provide an effective way to manage authentication and authorisation inside institutions. However, they are restricted to the administrative domain of each institution. With the implementation of Bologna Process more students, lecturers and staff will be on mobility programs within European higher education institutions. The creation of identity management federations is mandatory to provide the mobility of users and to permit the exchange of contents and services between institutions. The creation of identities federations across Europe has been in discussion by the Trans-European Research and Education Networking Association (TERENA) to provide a service federation like the EDUROAM WI-FI network that permits the mobility across Europe.To share contents and services within Europe, the adoption of standards is mandatory. IEEE LTSC, IMS and ADL are standards organisations that publish a set of standards to promote the interoperability, reusability and integration of e-learning contents and services. The most important standards that promote the sharing of contents and services across Europe are SCORM and IMS Learning Design. to the adoption of SCORM model to create reusable earning Objects and the IMS Learning Design to define learning activities are the main standards in discussion in order to create collaborative learning objects repositories to promote a more effective learning experience and a more competitive European space for higher education, with respect to the require to the knowledge based societies.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper seeks to investigate and report on the status of identity management systems and e-learning standards across Europe for promoting mobility, collaboration and the sharing of contents and services in higher education institutions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The present research work examines existing e-learning standards and the tools and processes applied to managing the identity of learners registered for programmes of study in higher education. The paper draws on recent developments and argues that the creation of identity management federations is mandatory to provide the mobility of users and to permit the exchange of contents and services between institutions.\nFindings: - It is revealed that it is crucial to create identity management federation to provide for ease of mobility and facilitate collaboration and sharing information amongst staff and students in higher education.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The challenges arising from language, culture and differences in systems for the regions require consideration. Future work intends to incorporate some of these issues, to examine and report on them from the diverse perspectives, taking into account, the impact of globalisation.\nOriginality/value: - This paper presents the main features of e-learning standards and how they can be used in conjunction with identity management systems to create collaborative learning objects repositories to promote a more effective learning experience and a more competitive European space for higher education, with respect to the requirements of knowledge-based societies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Metaphors in strategy
|
[
"Management strategy",
"Metaphors"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: \"I must emend an observation I once made. Long ago, I told you we must all choose our metaphors. I was wrong. We do not choose our metaphors.\" He stopped to give the reworked epigram a little bit of drama. \"Our metaphors choose us\" (Allen Kurzweil, A Case of Curiosities).\nHow metaphors work: Although many have drawn business lessons from other disciplines, often from the military or biology, most managers do it badly. They merely use rhetorical metaphors like \"business is war\" for reference to the competitive element in business or \"viral marketing\" to depict the spreading of information toward a certain group of customers.Rhetorical metaphors are stale; everyone knows what they mean. They create recognition, but do not encourage further thinking. Cognitive metaphors, however, foster creativity. They are not immediately obvious and need an intellectual push to uncover potential insights.There are two primary uses of a cognitive metaphor. First, as they are not directly connected to the business topic, they can create an artificial environment where concerns are raised and issues addressed more freely than in a board meeting dealing with the \"hard facts\". Shakespeare used his Italian comedies as a satire of Elizabethan England and gave the characters in the plays British traits but Italian names and Italian settings. Similarly, a metaphor about trust and gift giving among the native Americans of the Pacific Northwest can encourage management to talk more openly of challenges to be found, for example, in a post merger integration.Well-chosen, fresh metaphors offer new access to business examples, offering new associations previously unthought-of. They make important issues easier to discuss by masking the direct topic. As Oscar Wilde similarly put it: \"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.\"Second, a metaphor can only be pushed so far, then the comparison tends to collapse. Tiha von Ghyczy, in \"The Fruitful Flaws of Strategy Metaphors\" (von Ghyczy, 2003), calls this point the fault line. If the parallel were perfect, it would be a model, not a metaphor. To unpack the value of a cognitive metaphor, the fault line needs to be crossed. Then the unusual, the creative, has a chance to emerge.For example, some comparisons between a business and the singer-actress Madonna are easy to make. She is adaptable and companies should be adaptable. She knows her market and how to reach them, as companies should. But it might seem unclear at first glimpse what Madonna might have to do with product life cycles. In addition, Madonna is an individual, not an organization. There might be no immediately apparent connection and that might puzzle us. And it is in such unsettled states of mind that we are most open to new ways of thinking.An additional benefit to a cognitive metaphor is that it shows the originality and depth of thought of the person offering it and, when explored effectively in a group, encourages similar thinking in others. As Allen Kurzweil says in our epigraph, \"Our metaphors choose us.\" They reflect the unique connections that only we, at the outset, can see.In the following, we will examine two cognitive metaphors and their relevance to business strategy.\nWilliam the Conqueror and post-merger integration: In 1066 William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, invaded England with an army of armored knights and defeated the Anglo-Saxons and their king Harold in the battle of Hastings. On Christmas Eve 1066, William was crowned king of England in Westminster Abbey. He was the only person ever to invade England to have a long term impact, lasting for nearly 1,000 years. Feudalism, chivalry and the foundations of the house of Windsor and the British monarchy can be traced back to William.His success in conquering England and also maintaining power in his Norman dukedom is based on three principles that are equally important in every takeover or post-merger integration. Although the medieval world has nearly nothing in common with our world, pushing beyond the fault line of the metaphor and discovering the secrets of William's success may give you surprising insights into today's business challenges.Understand the culture\nMadonna and product life cycles: Madonna has done it yet again: Hard Candy, her new studio album hit the stores in April and she has hit the headlines, as she has done so many times before. Madonna has been the unrivalled superstar of the pop music scene for 25 years now and we may well ask, \"How does she do it?\" Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone (her full name) is not an extremely talented singer, actress, dancer, or composer. She does not have the voice of a Whitney Houston or an Anastacia nor does she dance like a Janet Jackson. She is undoubtedly attractive, but is no breathtaking beauty either.In the following we will analyze the key success factors that have secured Madonna astounding popularity and the fanatical loyalty of her fans. There are four pillars to her easy-sounding but hard-to-implement goal. And that goal is: become a superstar - and stay a superstar! In the following we will examine her strategy how to achieve this goal in the four subheads below.Understand your market\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This article seeks to distinguish between rhetorical and cognitive metaphors and argues in favor of \"pushing past the fault line.\".\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Too much of strategy is locked in a toolbox approach that often makes solutions appear much easier than they are. One way of broadening the way one thinks about strategy is to bridge the gap between business and other disciplines. Ideas from the world outside business can be made useful for the strategist via metaphorical associations. This paper discusses William the Conqueror and Madonna as strong candidates for useful metaphors.\nFindings: - Metaphors are a powerful tool in business to understand partners, customers, and market participants.\nPractical implications: - The goal is to encourage metaphorical exploration, both in thought and practical use, by the readers.\nOriginality/value: - It furthers the concept of interdisciplinary thinking by offering specific ways to use metaphors in business.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Labor unemployment insurance and firms' future performance
|
[
"Firm performance",
"Labour economics",
"Unemployment insurance",
"Volatility of firm performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: This paper investigates whether labor unemployment insurance (hereafter, UI) influences firms' future performance. Extant literature in accounting, economics, and finance has examined the implications of UI on social outcomes, corporate financial structure, and corporate reporting and disclosure decisions. In their seminal work on efficient UI, Acemoglu and Shimer (1999) posit that an economy with risk-neutral workers achieves maximal output without any UI, but an economy with risk-averse workers needs a positive level of UI to achieve output maximization. They argue that UI induces firms to increase investments, which raises output.\n2. Literature review and hypothesis development: 2.1 Unemployment risk and UI\n3. Data and summary statistics: Data are collected on state UI benefits published from 2003 to 2012 on the website of the USA Department of Labor. The Department of Labor publishes the \"Significant Provisions of State Unemployment Insurance Laws\" on January 1 and July 1 every year, which disclose the details of UI benefit provisions of each state. To proxy for total UI benefit generosity, a methodology similar to that in prior studies (e.g. Agrawal and Matsa, 2013; Ji and Tan, 2016) is used. First, UI benefits are calculated for both July 1 and January 1 as the maximum UI benefits available for each state, which equals (maximum weekly UI benefit amount x the maximum number of benefit weeks).\n4. Research design and hypothesis testing: 4.2 UI benefits and firms' future performance\n5. Conclusion: This paper examines the association between UI benefits and firms' future performance as well as the association between UI benefits and volatility of firms' future performance. The results support the notion that UI benefits are positively associated with firms' future performance measured by industry-adjusted earnings and industry-adjusted cash flows averaged over a period from t+1 to t+3. These findings suggest that the benefits of UI, i.e., lower compensation premiums demanded by and higher labor output provided by workers, dominate the costs of UI, i.e., lost business opportunities resulting from missed timely investments in human capital, product development, or sales activities. Further, evidence of a negative association between UI benefits and volatility of firms' future performance is found, suggesting that the risk mitigation effect of UI dominates the leverage effect of UI.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the association between unemployment insurance (UI) benefits and firms' future performance as well as the association between UI benefits and volatility of firms' future performance.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Quantitative analyses are used to perform empirical testing, and the variables in this study have been selected from previous literature. Empirical data consists of UI benefits data published from 2003 to 2012 on the US Department of Labor website, accounting data from Compustat, and stock return data from CRSP.\nFindings: Unemployment benefits are positively associated with firms' future earnings and cash flows. Also, unemployment benefits are negatively associated with volatility of firms' future earnings and cash flows. Finally, the positive association between unemployment benefits and firms' future performance is more pronounced for firms with larger changes in labor force, and the negative association between unemployment benefits and volatility of firms' future performance is more pronounced for firms with higher labor force volatility and capital structure volatility.\nResearch limitations/implications: To the extent that other correlated omitted variables exist, the readers are asked to interpret the findings in this paper with caution.\nOriginality/value: This study contributes to prior literature on labor economics, finance, and accounting. The findings may be of interest to academic researchers and policy makers.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Effects of telecom service providers' strategic investments on business performance: A comparative study of US-Korea
|
[
"Technological innovation",
"Business performance",
"Marketing strategy",
"Market convergence",
"Operating expenditure",
"Telecommunication service providers"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The telecommunications market is fast approaching the saturation point in developed countries. As the market has few new customers, competition among telecommunication service providers (TSPs) is becoming fierce as they try to invade each other's customer base. Improving or sustaining their current market position is a real challenge for TSPs (Gnyawali et al., 2010; Lee et al., 2011; Knutson, 2014). For example, in 2014, Verizon Communications experienced a decrease in the number of wireless customers for the first time, as its rivals, T-Mobile, AT\n2. Literary reviews: 2.1. ICT industry studies\n3. Hypotheses development and research method: 3.1. TSPs' investment structure\n4. Results and discussion: 4.1. Descriptive statistics\n5. Conclusion: 5.1. Summary and implications\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify the structure of strategic investments and the effect of each investment category on business performance in two leading information and communication technology (ICT) countries, the USA and South Korea.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This is a longitudinal comparative study of the relationship between strategic investments and organizational performance of major telecommunication service providers (TSPs) in the two leading ICT countries, the USA and South Korea.\nFindings: The study found that a sufficient amount of strategic investments in technological innovations is the driving force for TSPs' business performance. However, strategic investment structures differ among TSPs, depending on their market position, whether the first mover in the market or a follower, and on their country's market characteristics. Moreover, even though both countries' TSP markets are oligopolistic in nature, the market is more saturated in Korea and thus competition appears to be fiercer there than in the USA. The stronger oligopolistic market in Korea has lead TSPs to compete primarily on their marketing strategies, while TSPs in the USA do so based on technological innovation.\nOriginality/value: The findings of the study shed new insights that can help both TSPs in developing their competitive strategies and government policy makers in assuring healthy competitive telecommunication markets in their countries.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The impact of intellectual capital on start-up expectations
|
[
"Structural capital",
"Intellectual capital",
"Human capital",
"Relational capital",
"Binary logistic model",
"Start-up expectations"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Intellectual capital (IC), defined as the set of intangible assets from which ventures can derive their competitive advantage, enhance profit and create value, continues to attract widespread attention (Bontis, 1996, 1998, 2001; Sveiby, 1997; Petty and Guthrie, 2000; Hormiga et al., 2011). Most scholars investigate IC from a managerial perspective, i.e. in reference to established ventures that, by definition, compete in the markets in order to grow and develop.\n2. Literature review and research hypotheses: Since 1969, when Galbraith introduced the concept of IC by assuming that it stood for an intellectual contribution offered by individuals in order to ensure the success of knowledge-intensive ventures (Khalique et al., 2015), management scholars have always been interested in it. Even if the concept of IC can be applied to several disciplines, from corporate strategies to the production of measurement tools (Petty and Guthrie, 2000), there is general agreement on the fact that IC is instrumental in the creation of value by knowledge-intensive ventures. Khalique et al. (2015) clearly express this by assuming that IC is made up of intangible resources. These resources need to be combined and effectively managed in order to create value and attain a sustainable competitive advantage.\n3. Research methodology and design: This study is based on a longitudinal survey design (from 2005 to 2010) and refers to Italy. The last data available on the GEM website in 2015 refer to the year 2011, but Italy is not included in this last survey.\n4. Results and discussion: The results of regression models for each year show that IC does indeed affect the start-up expectations of aspiring entrepreneurs in Italy. However, in order to present the findings more clearly it is appropriate to proceed by considering each of the six models.\n5. Conclusions: This paper presents one of the first attempts at achieving improved understanding of the importance of IC in reference to start-up expectations. The results, obtained through the use of logistic regression models and referring to Italy over the years 2005-2010, show that IC does affect the start-up expectations of aspiring entrepreneurs. In other words, IC (comprising human, structural and relational capital) is relevant to the creation of new ventures as well.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: According to an emerging research trend, which seeks to apply the concept of intellectual capital (IC) to the field of entrepreneurship, the purpose of this paper is to test whether IC can affect the start-up expectations of aspiring entrepreneurs.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Binary logistic regression models, based on empirical data derived from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor website and referring to Italy over the years 2005-2010, are used to test the influence of IC (comprising human, structural and relational capital) on start-up expectations.\nFindings: Binary logistic regression models reveal robust results. Human, structural and relational capitals affect start-up expectations in Italy. Only in 2010 did structural capital fail to do so.\nResearch limitations/implications: This study has three main limitations. The first concerns the need for further research to confirm the influence of IC on start-up expectations. The second concerns in-depth, more exhaustive analyses that cannot be carried out due to the use of second- hand data. The third deals with the reference only to Italy, over a limited time-span (2005-2010).\nOriginality/value: To the best knowledge of the author, this is one of the first empirical studies that investigate whether IC can affect start-up expectations. Results revealed by the regression models might steer other scholars' interest toward this research path (linking IC and entrepreneurship) that has not yet been properly considered.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Total quality management and performance: The role of organization support and co-worker support
|
[
"Total quality management",
"Performance management",
"Organizational performance"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The core ideas of total quality management (TQM) were introduced in the mid-1980s by, most notably, W. Edwards Deming, Joseph Juran and Kaoru Ishikawa (Hackman and Wageman, 1995). Whilst it is acknowledged that TQM is not a clear-cut concept (Hackman and Wageman, 1995), TQM is generally understood as an integrated organization strategy for improving product and service quality (Waldman, 1994). Since the mid-eighties TQM has been (over) sold as a near-universal remedy for a range of organizational problems, including improved organization performance. This is remarkable considering academics have acknowledged for many years that universal principals cannot be successfully applied to organizations. Contingency theory with its \"no one best way\" dictum, asserts that high performance is a function of the alignment between organization systems/processes and various context factors. Indeed, empirical research addressing successful TQM implementation is \"crying out\" for a contingency theory approach: while most studies report a positive relationship between TQM and performance (e.g. Brah et al., 2002; Hendricks and Singhal, 2001; Kaynak, 2003; Terziovski and Samson, 1999), some studies report a negative relationship between the two variables (e.g. McCabe and Wilkinson, 1998; Yeung and Chan, 1998). The identification of contextual factors effecting the successful TQM implementation has thus recently emerged as an important research agenda (Douglas and Judge, 2001; Sadikoglu, 2004).Within the context of successful TQM implementation, there is increasing recognition of the importance of human factors in quality management (Brah et al., 2002; Chen, 1997; Fok et al., 2000; Golhar et al., 1997; Montes et al., 2003). Many of the basic elements of TQM involve people, such as teamwork, participative management, creativity, effective communication, customer feedback, employee involvement and empowerment, employee and management trust and support (Guimaraes, 1994). For an organization to realize the benefits of TQM, the consideration of human factors is critical for the successful implementation of TQM. Human factors previously identified in the TQM literature include management (leadership) style, type of employees, departmental interaction, management commitment, employee's attitude toward change, authority to empower employees, rewards/recognition for innovation and citizenship behaviours (Mann and Kehoe, 1995; Montes et al., 2003) This study examines two human (or behavioural) factors: co-worker support and organization support These two support variables are consistent with the view that employees' perception of tolerance, support, cohesion and the intrinsic acknowledgement of employees organizational contributions are important factors in the successful implementation of TQM (Montes et al., 2003). TQM implemented within a supportive organization environment is more likely to motivate employees to work harder and smarter in achieving quality outcomes for the organization (Hackman and Wageman, 1995) The purpose of this study is, therefore, to firstly examine the association between the implementation of TQM practices and organization performance, given past equivocal results; and secondly, to examine the moderating effect of co-worker support and organization support on the TQM/performance relationship, consistent with a contingency theory approach.\nTheoretical development and hypotheses: TQM and performance\nResearch methods: Sample and data collection\nResults: Means, standard deviations and correlations are reported in Table I. There are significant positive correlations between performance and each of the independent variables, providing preliminary support for the research model. In particular one should note the high correlation between TQM practices and organizational performance (r = 0.63, p < 0.01). Organization size (number of employees) was included as a control variable (see Douglas and Judge, 2001; Sadikoglu, 2004); however, size was not significantly correlated with performance or any of the independent variables thus size was not included in the regression models to follow.Moderated regression analysis using ordinary least squares was employed to test the studies hypotheses. Tests on the adequacy of the regression models employed indicate that the assumptions of the models were satisfied by the data. We have assumed that, consistent with the practice of prior management researchers, Likert-type scale data closely approximates interval-level data (Berry and Feldman, 1985). All regression results are reported in Table II. H1 was tested by comparing the increase in variance (increase in R2) explained between Model 1 and Model 2, where Model 1 represents the regression of the independent variables (co-worker support and organization support) on the performance variable and Model 2 adds TQM practices. The results indicate that the degree of TQM practices implemented is positively associated with organization performance (p < 0.01), and indeed the addition of the TQM variable increases the R2 by 0.09. Therefore the data supports H1.To explore the moderating influence of co-worker support and organization support postulated in H2 and H3, Models 3 through 6 were created. Firstly, Models 3 and 4 are used to test H2 by showing the increase in explained variance after adding the first-order interaction between co-worker support and TQM practices. The results in Table II show that the interaction term (TQM x co-worker support) was statistically significant (p < 0.01) and adds 0.06 to the explanatory power of the model. This result provides empirical support for the moderating impact of co-worker support on the relationship between TQM practices and organization performance (H2). Similarly, Models 5 and 6 are used to test H3 by showing the increase in explained variance after adding the first-order interaction between organization support and TQM practices. The results indicate that the interaction term (TQM x organization support) is statistically significant (p < 0.01) and further this term adds 0.05 to the explanatory power of the model. This result provides empirical support for the moderating effect of organization support on the relationship between TQM practices and performance.To further understand the exact nature of these moderating relationships identified in Table II, additional interpretive analysis was conducted. Using standard graphical techniques, we found that organizations characterized by an environment of relatively high support (from both co-workers and the organization) exhibited a stronger relationship between TQM practices implemented and organization performance; whereas organizations characterized by an environment of low support did not demonstrate a significant relationship between TQM and performance. Figure 1 displays the graphs for these contingent effects. These findings offer new and practical insights into the role of supportive organizational environments and the effectiveness of TQM implementation, as discussed in the next section.\nDiscussion and conclusions: Theoretical implications\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between the extent of total quality management (TQM) implementation and organization performance, and the moderating effect of co-worker support and organization support on the TQM/performance relationship.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - A questionnaire survey was developed and distributed to a sample of firms selected from the motor vehicle parts and accessories industry.\nFindings: - Analysis of the data supports a strong positive relationship between the extent of implementation of TQM practices and organization performance. This study also found that co-worker support and organization support moderated the relationship between TQM implementation and organization performance\nResearch implications: - This study has important implications for managers. First, it motivates managers (and provides a justification) to invest in the time and resources to implement TQM programs. Based on the results of this study, the implementation of TQM practices is associated with enhanced organization performance. Second, evidence from this study signals the importance of developing an environment or \"culture\" of support to further enhance the performance outcomes of TQM implementation. If employees do not feel there is acknowledgement and support from the organization and from work colleagues, then the implementation of TQM programs may be sub-optimal.\nOriginality/value: - There is increasing recognition of the importance of human factors in successful TQM implementation. Within this context, no previous research has empirically examined the synergistic moderating effect of co-worker support and organization support on the relationship between TQM and performance.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
A profitable new definition of health
|
[
"Advertising",
"Medical care",
"Pharmaceutical products"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Since the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) allowed the consumer-oriented marketing of prescription drugs, the continuing criticisms of pharmaceutical companies question whether direct-to-consumer promotion provides consumers with information for improved health awareness or merely increases demand for expensive medications. At the same time, independent marketing researchers have stopped short of looking at some of the underlying questions associated with DTC advertising. Beyond asking about how the information is provided or what risks or side-effects are included in an advertising message, the bigger question is whether it is in consumers' best interests to allow pharmaceutical companies to define health through their marketing programs?\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this article is to question pharmaceutical companies in their efforts to define the problems for which they are providing solutions. It addresses the impact of DTC advertising in making drug companies one of the most profitable industries in the country and how these profits can influence marketing decisions that leave consumers vulnerable.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - This article identifies some possible conflicts of interests in the pharmaceutical industry.\nFindings: - Marketing practices of the drug companies are shaping consumers' definitions of health through the expansion of medical definitions and potential markets followed by the mass advertising of these messages. Other conflicts of interests between academic medicine and the pharmaceutical industry also exist with for-profit sponsorship of medical research compromising the impartiality of the researchers.\nPractical implications: - When discussing public policy issues related to DTC advertising, it is important to look beyond the characteristics of the messages themselves and understand the foundations on which they are built before determining the benefits or harm that result.\nOriginality/value: - Questioning the intentions of the drug companies and the other players in pharmaceutical marketing is the only way to ensure that consumer interests are protected.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Exploring rhetoric: alcohol and Absolut Vodka advertisements
|
[
"Advertising",
"Rhetoric",
"Alcoholic drinks"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Rhetoric in advertising has been used by many creative directors since the 1800s, as a tool to persuade the consumer and also help the consumer perceive images quickly. One of the earlier definitions of rhetoric is brought to us by Wenzel (1990, p. 555) who expressed rhetoric as an \"approach to systematize\". Indeed, Barthes (1998) believes it is merely \"a clever arrangement of signs\" (Barthes, 1998, p. 21). Greenwald and Levett (1984, p. 581), on the other hand, suggest that creative directors use rhetoric as a motivational tool, because \"... consumers are under no compulsion to start reading the headline, finish reading the headline, or continue on to read the rest of the ad. ... rhetorical figures [therefore] motivate the potential reader.\" McQuarrie and Mick (2003) continue with this suggestion by stating that due to the swerve from \"the usual\", readers of an advertisement, collaborates with the creative director to \"find\" the hidden meanings. The distinctive feature of advertising; is that they rely on visuals to supply information about the product in a highly symbolic form (Scott, 1994). Creative directors use a whole host of rhetorical figures in alcohol advertisements even though they are burdened with the restrictions of the Advertising Standards Authority (available at: www.asa.org.uk/asa/codes, accessed 6 April 2006). Post-modern advertisements, therefore, use images that need to be cognitively processed using complex verbal and pictorial schemata. Indeed advertisements which are multifarious are enjoyed more, as the reader becomes highly motivated to \"understand\" the messages contained within it (DeRosia and Batra, 2002). Therefore, complex advertisements, such as those presented by Absolut Vodka, produce greater pleasure and may produce a more favourable attitude towards the advertisement (Toncar and Munch, 2003; Tom and Eves, 1999; McQuarrie and Mick, 1999).Over the years, greater efforts have contributed to research associated with the success of different forms of rhetoric as a tool (Ahluwalia and Burnkrant, 2004; Phillips and McQuarrie, 2003; McQuarrie and Mick, 1993; Scott, 1994). Gibbs et al. (1994) states that often the primary focus, when studying rhetorical figures, deals with individual elements, rather than the collective whole. An additional view, by Morgan and Reichert (1999) is that some elements are simple or complex or as they refer to the phenomena; concrete or abstract. Concrete metaphors are useful for audiences as they can rely on their five senses to literally transfer meaning from one object to another. Solomon (2002) refers to them as \"Sensory Stimuli Receptors\" and defines the senses as sight, sound, smells, taste and textures. However, abstract metaphors refer to something which is intangible and deals with visceral experiences, such as deep feelings of joy, anger, love and superiority (Morgan and Reichert, 1999). Whilst there clearly is a need to break rhetoric down into manageable elements, McQuarrie and Mick (1996) suggest attempts to systemize rhetorical figures are hindered by the...[...] taxonomic categories being too vague or too coarse grained, the categories are not linked to consumer responses, or the focus is on outcome rather than persuasion (McQuarrie and Mick, 1996, p. 425).In order to overcome these issues, McQuarrie and Mick (1996) consulted Corbetts' (1990) literature on \"rhetorical drawing\". Following this, primary research was conducted using a sample of magazine advertisements. This allowed McQuarrie and Mick to develop a comprehensive and economical framework, capable of reflecting the vast range of rhetorical figures, with a tight focus on those rhetorical figures that appear in advertisements. It is from this research that the \"Taxonomy of Rhetorical Figures in Advertising\" was developed (see Figure 1).The taxonomy introduced by McQuarrie and Mick (1996), and later presented in a modular format in 1999, is the foundation for rhetoric in advertising. The model, shown in Figure 1, is over ten years old but it has been referenced in peer reviewed academic journals on 54 occasions (as of 8 February, 2006). Therefore, to date, no other model has surpassed it.The taxonomy model (Figure 1), takes the form of three levels, ranging in complexity from figuration through to figurative and finally rhetorical operation. These operations are presented on a scale of deviation including rhetorical de-stabilisations. The framework highlights underlying concepts that consumers encounter when processing advertisements. The taxonomy model puts emphasis on the four main rhetorical operations that underlie individual figures, including: repetition, reversal, substitution and destabilization. Using the framework the authors present their own text-interpretive analysis of alcohol advertisements.\nRhetorical figures in alcohol advertisements: Repetition\nTypology of visual rhetoric: Many post-modern advertisements show a visual representation of a product, with only a logo or product image to give identification to the image. Therefore, scholars such as DeRosia and Batra (2002), Phillips (2000) and Scott (1994) have led the way in identifying that \"learned\" exposure to visual imagery can also lead to a highly cognitive understanding of advertisings pictorial messages. Phillips and McQuarrie (2004) have provided a typology of rhetorical figures that differentiates the pictorial strategies that are available to creative directors.The typology, of nine distinct kinds of visual rhetoric, is designed to show that there are various ways with which any given rhetorical figure can be analysed. Similarly, to McQuarrie and Mick's (1996) \"Taxonomy of Rhetorical Figures in Advertising\" (see Figure 1); this typology suggests a scale of \"richness\" which complements the previous idea that there are many \"visual artful deviations\". Figure 2 shows the typology and demonstrates that there are two main elements. The first element considers the visual structure which refers to the way elements are visually depicted through juxtaposition, fusion or replacement. The second element presents the meaning operation, which refers to cognitive processes needed to interpret the visual image. The meaning operations are connection, comparison for similarity and comparison for opposition. The authors offer their second reading of rhetoric; concerning the visual rhetoric shown in Absolut Vodka advertisements. As stated in the verbal rhetoric analysis, visual rhetoric use a variety of rich and complex rhetorical images from - juxtaposition and connection to fusion and opposition - which showed weak deviation to highly ambiguous elaboration. Figure 2 shows McQuarrie and Phillips' 2004 typology. In Figure 3 Absolut Vodka advertisements are shown and described as exemplar (Figures 3-7).The authors have evaluated a selection of Absolut Vodka advertisements. The readings have been structured with the aid of McQuarrie and Phillip's Typology of Visual Rhetoric. Again, the analysis has shown that visual images in advertisements can be differentiated into a meaningful structure, rather than considering the visuals to be just rhetorical images.The above readings, by the authors, have demonstrated the use of rhetoric in alcohol advertisements. The analysis has been done using text interpretive technique by the authors (Kenyon, 2006). The following section will detail the investigation conducted with audiences.\nReader response analysis to the Absolut Everything TV advertisement: Overview and aim\nDiscussion of findings: This paper has summarised the concepts of verbal and visual rhetoric from notable scholars such as McQuarrie and Phillips (2004), McQuarrie and Mick (2003) as Morgan and Reichert (1999), McCabe (1998) and Scott (1994). The authors have presented two readings to demonstrate that the concepts are highly transferable onto alcohol advertisements. Both verbal and visual rhetoric has been investigated in a systematic manner and placed within the taxonomies and typologies currently available. Similarly, the use of rhetoric, by creative directors, can be analysed by informants. However, the more complex the deviation, the more cognitive activity takes place and the less likely the reading will be consensual. Further studies should take place, using Phillips and McQuarrie's Typology of Visual Rhetoric, across a range of product and service advertisements. It would be interesting to discover which product or service categories use highly deviant rhetoric in advertisements and which categories are low in complexity. Visual and verbal rhetoric are often combined and support each other. However, visual rhetoric is becoming so commonplace that it would also be interesting to consider the product and service categories that only use visual rhetoric. Consumers should be asked their opinions of verbal rhetoric to consider recall and enjoyment of the challenge of \"discovering\" highly deviant rhetoric. This would provide creative directors, with evidence to continue playing with the norm and rearrange the logical.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to review current thinking about visual and verbal images used in advertising. It also aims to critique a range of current alcohol advertisements and provides practical analysis of the visual and verbal rhetoric contained within them.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The article provides three empirical readings of alcohol advertisements. The first reading, presented by the authors, evaluates alcohol advertisements using the taxonomy of rhetoric, introduced by McQuarrie and Mick in 1996. They then offer a second reading of visual rhetoric, shown in the Absolut Vodka \"Everything\" advertisements, using the Phillips and McQuarrie's typology introduced in 2004.\nFindings: - The first two qualitative readings of alcohol and Absolut Vodka advertisements show that there is high deviance in advertisements. However, with the introduction of taxonomies, detailed textual interpretations can be made, categorised and commented upon using socio-cultural cues. In terms of the third empirical reading, of the Absolut \"Everything\" television advertisement, informants displayed a collective understanding of visual rhetoric that is low in deviance, but a wide variety of interpretations where highly complex rhetoric is used.\nResearch limitations/implications: - The first two readings were completed by the authors, using their own interpretive practice skills, therefore, future research could be completed with informants that are in the target audience and informants that are outside the target audience. The empirical research invited informants that are in the target audience and informants not in the target audience. Future research could be conducted with different audience types and different research methods to gain a rounded picture.\nOriginality/value: - Taxonomies of rhetoric have been created and developed over the years. The introduction of the visual rhetoric typology has given scholars the opportunity to categorise the signs and codes used in advertisements. This paper has used verbal and visual rhetorical taxonomies to highlight the wicked deviations shown in alcohol advertisements. It explores the perceptions of the scholars, with their own deep readings and the perceptions of scholars through depth interviews. This paper's examination of alcohol advertisements does not offer a fixed view of the interpretations that can be gained from rhetoric, it does, however, present insights into the concepts and methodological process for future studies.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Public procurement reform in the EU: start of a new era?
|
[
"Policy",
"Effects of relationships",
"Public purchasing"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: In April 2016, the European Union (EU) introduced a reform of its framework of directives and rules for public procurement. The reform resulted in a number of changes in the framework, some of which are specifically aimed at improving the level of innovation achieved through public procurement. As the stance toward EU's framework for public procurement commonly held by IMP researchers typically has been critical for their lack of interest in the importance of long-term relationships - mainly due to the alleged low level of innovation friendliness associated with competitive tendering procedures - the latest reform and its (partial) focus on innovation should be of interest to IMP researchers. Hence, the main purpose of this paper is to conceptually analyze the changes resulting from the reform in view of the critical arguments usually brought forward by IMP researchers. We are concerned with two key questions, which approach this purpose from two opposing angles: (1) Do the changes in the reform effectively address these arguments? And, (2) Are the critical arguments used in past IMP research still valid in view of the developments that have taken place in developing and reforming the framework?\n2. Public procurement, its impact and the EU directives: We may define public purchasing as any acquisition made by a public organization and agency where public money is spent to acquire goods and/or services from non-public suppliers. Economically speaking, public purchasing is of great importance in most developed countries. Recent research published by Loader (2015) claims that it constitutes on average 12.8 percent (roughly one-eighth of the total) of GDP in OECD countries, while Matthews (2005) reports that government purchasers account for over 20 percent of GDP in the USA, and Thai (2001) estimates between 10 and 30 percent of GDP. It is important on a local level as well, as Arlbjorn and Freytag (2011) reports that large Danish municipalities typically have purchasing budgets over 2 billion DKK.\n3. A review of the literature critical to EU directives for public procurement: This literature review is divided into two parts. First, we describe the industrial marketing and purchasing (IMP) approach, and the way that researchers referring to that school describe the importance of relationship. The part ends with a description of the IMP approach to purchasing. The second part describes the empirically based articles and summarizes how they challenge or confirm the way the public purchasing directives actually work today.\n4. A brief summary of the most recent EU public procurement reform: In this section, we briefly describe how the overall EU framework of rules and regulations has changed as a result of the recent reform. Our main source for this section is the official homepage[1] of the EU dedicated to public procurement reform. This section is intendedly descriptive and serves as the input for the discussion section in which we shall analyze the changes in the EU directives in terms of the models by Gadde and Snehota (2000) and Araujo et al. (1999) and vis-a-vis the criticism from relationship researchers presented in Section 3. Since the reform is still very fresh, there is no relevant research on effects yet. It takes time before the changes adopted at central EU level have been ratified and implemented in the various member states and other participating countries. Thus, we have mainly used the official EU databases and documents for this part. These official documents describe in rather clear terms how the new procedures are supposed to work.\n5. Discussion: what does the reform imply for traditional criticism from relationship researchers?: In this section we will start preparing the answers to the two questions set out in the introduction section: Do the changes in the reform address the critical views from relationship researchers? and Is the critical view held by relationship researchers still justified, given the reform? To this end, we shall use theoretical contributions by Gadde and Snehota (2000) and Araujo et al. (1999) that we discussed in Section 3.\n6. Conclusions, avenues for future research and policy implications: In this section, we will now return to the two central questions posed in the introduction of the paper.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study the reform of public purchasing directives initiated by the European Union (EU) and discuss them in light of the criticism against existing public purchasing directives.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A literature review of empirical articles is critical to existing public purchasing directives to summarize the main directions and categories of their criticism, and a thorough reading of the proposed reform of the public purchasing directives is carried out to see if the changes will answer some or all of the criticism directed toward the public purchasing directives.\nFindings: The reforms seem to be a step in the right direction, particularly with respect to public organizations possibility to support innovation and new product and service development, but little change in the possibilities for development of strategic, long-term relationships.\nResearch limitations/implications: The reform has just been introduced, and so the analysis of the possible effects of the reform is not based on empirical data (since such data do not exist yet), but mostly on the authors experience in the field and through a comparison with selected literature.\nOriginality/value: An early assessment of the possible effects of the reform regarding public procurement directives in the EU area is introduced.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Facilities management education in the Four Asian Dragons: a review
|
[
"Research",
"Education",
"Universities",
"Facilities management",
"Teaching",
"Professional institutes"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Facilities management (FM), a discipline that integrates people, place, process and technology for efficient delivery of support services, is indispensable for every organization in the built environment. In the 1970s, FM emerged as a profession in the USA and then extended to the UK and places around the world (Best et al., 2003). In the 1990s, FM started to grow in Asia (Lomas, 1999; Moore and Finch, 2004). As the FM market continues to expand, professional organizations such as the International Facility Management Association (IFMA) headquartered in the USA, the British Institute of Facilities Management of the UK and the European Facility Management Network (EuroFM) have been established. In parallel, the increasing demand for FM professionals has intensified the need for FM education.\nMethod and materials: At the beginning, the lead author lined up three other academics (i.e. the co-authors) to form a project team for the study, with each team member coming from one of the Four Asian Dragons. Working for reputable universities, the four members are conversant with the FM sector. The key roles they play include leader of FM or FM-related education programs and president or committee of FM associations in their respective places.\nDemand and professional bodies of facilities management: Hong Kong\nFM higher education programs: Hong Kong\nComparisons between the Four Asian Dragons: The term \"facility (or facilities) management\" appears in most of the programs reviewed but, in some cases, other terms such as \"environment\" and \"property\" (e.g. in Taiwan) or \"project\" (e.g. in Singapore) also appear in the program titles. Programs that are specifically titled \"facility (or facilities) management\" are those in Hong Kong (e.g. PolyU) and Singapore (e.g. Temasek Polytechnic). Such programs, common to each other, are among the first batch of FM programs launched in Asia. On the other hand, the new IFMA-accredited program in South Korea, with \"housing and interior design\" in its title, incorporates FM as a particular track.\nConclusions: Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea, which are the Four Asian Dragons with highly developed economies in the region, all have a dense urban environment. As revealed above, the populations and building stocks of the four places have continued to increase, leading to the rising demand on the management for facilities in and around the buildings. Associated with this trend is an expanding FM industry where more and more competent professionals are needed.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This paper aims to reveal and compare the characteristics of the facilities management (FM) education programs in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea (i.e. the Four Asian Dragons) and makes suggestions for their future development.\nDesign/methodology/approach: A team consisting of academics from the Four Asian Dragons held a face-to-face meeting to discuss and define the scope and framework of the review, followed by an extensive search to identify literature and information germane to the study. Individual parts of reviews, prepared by the team members for their respective places, were cross-reviewed before refinement and consolidation into the current paper.\nFindings: The term \"facility (or facilities) management\" appears in most of the programs reviewed, but terms such as \"environment\" and \"property\" also appear in some programs' titles. The programs reviewed range from certificate level to doctorate level; those between diploma level and master level are more common. Most of the programs have obtained professional accreditations, but some are accredited by FM-related rather than FM-specific professional bodies.\nResearch limitations/implications: Further research should investigate issues such as the performance of the programs reviewed, extent to which they have met the market needs and how they compare with the counterparts in other regions (e.g. Europe, America). For such research, the process of the study reported here and its findings about the status quo of the programs can serve as references.\nPractical implications: To strengthen FM as a well-established discipline, it is imperative to have the programs accredited by FM-specific professional bodies.\nOriginality/value: Providing the first-ever international review on the major FM programs in Asia, this paper is useful to program planners, educators and researchers in the FM field.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Profitably shared delusions
|
[
"Economic growth",
"Economic reform",
"Economic change",
"Business strategy"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: In the past, as we know, we have approached the future with the sustaining beliefs of a philosophy of optimism. That is, we have always conceived of the future in terms of its benignity, its malleability, its compatibility with our hopes and desires. But if our preceding pages have had any purpose, it has been to demonstrate the inadequacy of this belief today. It is no longer possible for America to commit itself trustingly into the hands of a deity of history whose agent forces are comfortably circumscribed and comfortingly familiar. If one thing is certain it is that history's forces have reached a power utterly unlike that of our sheltered past, and that the changes those forces portend are very different from the propitious historic transformations they brought about in our past (Heilbroner, 1959, p. 173).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The purpose of this paper is to review the importance of mass shared beliefs in shaping economies, markets, nations, and business strategies.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper takes the form of an opinion column.\nFindings: - The paper reveals that it is important to factor in the malleability of mass psychology, and its changeability, when making strategy for your organization. Multiple, seemingly inconsistent scenarios may actually all \"come true\" in series.\nOriginality/value: - The paper connects a number of ideas in psychology, economics, strategy, medicine, and philosophy.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Social presence and e-commerce B2B chat functions
|
[
"Relationship marketing",
"Online chat",
"Business-to-business",
"Buyer–seller interaction",
"Sales interaction"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Online shopping continues to grow in popularity, and new online stores are constantly being established. E-commerce and new forms of computer-mediated communication (CMC) have increased the use of CMC between buyers and sellers (Murphy and Sashi, 2018) and essentially changed buyer-seller interactions in business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) sales (Arli et al., 2018). Buyers increasingly prefer online interfaces, and almost 75 per cent of B2B buyers prefer purchasing via a website than relying on salespeople, while 93 per cent of them prefer purchasing online once they have decided what to buy (Arli et al., 2018; Hoar, 2015). Moreover, within the past decade, there has been a developing interest in investigating how person-to-person interaction and social presence could be embedded into an online shopping environment (Gefen and Straub, 2004). Social presence and possibilities to interact with sellers are important in e-commerce, as shopping has always been a social activity (Lu et al., 2016) and because social presence has been shown to increase customers' initial trust in the website and customer's trust in the seller, as well as enhance customers' purchasing intentions and thereby boost firms' sales (Gefen and Straub, 2004; Ogonowski et al., 2014; Olson and Olson, 2000). Furthermore, it has been shown that social presence influences participants' enjoyment and perceived usefulness of the website (Ogonowski et al., 2014). Social presence is important in online shopping, as anonymous, asynchronous and text-based CMC can hinder the development of interpersonal trust (Sherblom, 2020) between business partners. Moreover, lacking the presence of social elements has been claimed to be one of the major weaknesses that hinders e-commerce growth (Lu et al., 2016). For all these reasons, it is highly important to investigate how social presence is embedded in CMC between buyers and sellers in different online communication channels.\n2. Theoretical foundation: 2.1 Online chat in e-commerce\n3. Method: The aim of this study is to understand how social presence is embedded in online B2B chat conversations between sellers and buyers who are at different phases of the customer relationship. Moreover, we explore what type of functions the online chat serves in the B2B sales context for buyers who are at different phases of the customer relationship. Therefore, we chose a single case study approach to gain an in-depth understanding of the phenomena (Yin, 2009). The aim of a case study is to acknowledge the uniqueness of the case and to afford an in-depth, contextualized understanding of it (Eriksson and Kovalainen, 2008; Yin, 2009). We propose the following research questions:\n4. Results: Here, we present the results from our study which are organized in Figure 1 according to the main themes that correspond to the research questions. First, the number of buyers using the online B2B chat features came to 157. These were categorized as new buyers (n = 101), existing prospects (n = 19) and existing buyers (n = 37), based on their customer relationship phase (Dwyer et al., 1987). With all the above-mentioned buyers, online chat conversations included social presence referring to interactive and affective responses. However, the results show that only with existing buyers did some of the online chat conversations include relationship maintenance responses. Furthermore, our results reveal how the functions of online B2B chat varied depending on the types of buyers. The results are shown in Figure 1 and elaborated thereafter.\n5. Discussion: 5.1 Theoretical contribution\n6. Limitations: Although our study has strengths, it has some limitations. Although the data consist of online chat conversations between 157 buyers and sellers, they were still collected from a single case company. Having data only from one case company limits the results to one type of industry. In the future, multiple case study could be conducted to investigate and compare several industries to see if there are differences in the findings. The data were collected in natural settings, which makes them more reliable than interview data (Eriksson and Kovalainen, 2008). Still, we could have combined buyer survey data or buyer interviews with our online chat data to link our results to, for example, customer satisfaction or customers' trust toward the seller. However, that can be conducted in future studies.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: Currently, online chat is in common use in e-commerce. By adding social interaction to the online context, companies hope to increase customers' purchasing intentions. However, previous studies have not investigated how social presence is embedded in online business-to-business (B2B) chat conversations between buyers and sellers. Moreover, the functions of online chat in B2B sales have not been investigated.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The data was collected at a case company over the course of four years, from which the authors analyzed 157 online chat conversations between buyers (n = 157) and sellers (n = 9) with a theory-driven thematic analysis. In addition, data from the company's customer relationship management system was collected to specify buyer types.\nFindings: The results reveal that social presence was embedded in online B2B chat via buyers' interactive, affective and relationship maintenance responses. Social presence differed depending on the type of buyer, with only existing customers having relationship maintenance responses. E-commerce B2B chat functions can be described as multiple and changing depending on the buyer-seller relationship stage.\nResearch limitations/implications: Having data only from one case company limits the results to one type of industry.\nPractical implications: The results can be used in sales training and when developing online chat services.\nOriginality/value: Results bring scientific utility to B2B sales and marketing research, as the authors build a bridge between social presence, the existing theoretical model on B2B buyer-seller relationship development and online chat as a communication medium. Other researchers may use this understanding when exploring B2B buyer-seller interaction in different digitalized communication media.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Coworker reactions to observing sexual behavior at work
|
[
"Workplace romances",
"Gender",
"Job attitudes",
"Sexual behaviour"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n__NO_TITLE__: Sexuality is a critical part of the human experience. How we see ourselves as sexual beings has implications for how we act in both public and private spheres. Work is also a key aspect of our lives. A total of 36 percent of full-time employees work on a typical Saturday, Sunday, or holidays (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2008). Despite the centrality of work and sexuality in our lives, social and organizational norms suggest that these two areas should not overlap (Lobel, 1993). Certainly, sexual harassment is a blight on the workplace, and has been extensively studied (see Fitzgerald et al., 1995). However, there is comparatively little research on sexual behavior in the workplace that is consensual and non-harassing (Powell and Foley, 1998).\nSexualized behavior at work: Sexualized work behaviors are those in which gender roles (as opposed to work roles) are in the forefront (Gutek et al., 1990). These behaviors include flirting, teasing, dressing in a sexually provocative manner, and engaging in innuendo. Sexual behavior at work does not always include a harassing element; as Berdahl and Aquino (2009) pointed out, sexual behavior and sexual harassment only partially overlap: not all harassing behavior has a sexual content, and not all sexual behavior is harassing. In the present research, we focus on consensual, non-harassing behaviors. Moreover, we limit our discussion to heterosexuals. Disclosing one's sexual orientation at work is a complex process (Griffith and Hebl, 2002); we suspect that for gays, lesbians, and transsexual and transgendered individuals, the expression of sexuality at work raises issues that are unique and deserve a more focused investigation.Our general research question is the following: What are the consequences of observing sexual behaviors in the workplace? Two sets of research apply to this question, the sexual harassment literature and the workplace romance literature. Below, we attempt to summarize both literatures to derive hypotheses about observing sexual behavior at work.\nSexual harassment and job attitudes: Sexual harassment has a negative association with job attitudes through its role as a workplace stressor (Fitzgerald et al., 1995; Gettman and Gelfand, 2007). By definition, the target of sexual harassment defines or appraises the behavior as unwanted (i.e. primary appraisal) and it taxes the target's emotional and physical resources (see Lazarus, 1991, for a discussion on stress). Role conflict for the target is considerable - the individual target of sexual harassment is caught between wanting to escape the harasser and being forced to attend work (Fitzgerald et al., 1995). Accordingly, the victims of sexual harassment report lower job satisfaction, affective commitment, and higher job withdraw behaviors. There is considerable empirical evidence supporting these relationships (see Fitzgerald et al., 1995, 1997; Willness et al., 2007).The negative consequences of sexual harassment extend to other organizational members, in addition to the direct targets of this behavior. Glomb et al. (1997), while studying ambient sexual harassment (the general perceived level of sexual harassment in a work group), found that indirect exposure to sexual harassment is related to employee stress. Other research by Raver and Gelfand (2005) found that team cohesion and conflict are negatively related to ambient sexual hostility. Thus, both direct targets and third-party observers experience the negative effects of sexual harassment.\nWorkplace romance and job attitudes: The workplace romance literature may also shed light onto employee reactions to sexual behavior at work. Workplace romances are consensual, sexual relationships that occur in an organizational setting (Pierce et al., 1996). Although sexual behavior at work may or may not be associated with a workplace romance, both may entail flirting and sexual conversation in the presence of coworkers. Therefore, research on workplace romance may be relevant to understand coworker reactions to sexual behaviors at work.Researchers have examined workplace romance from two perspectives:1. coworkers' reactions to a romance; and2. the job-related effects of a romance on the participants themselves.In the current study, we are interested in observers' reactions to consensual sexual behavior at work; hence, our review will focus on research regarding coworkers' reactions to workplace romances.Powell and Foley (1998) clarified that coworker reactions to workplace romance depend on several factors. First, coworker reactions are related to the perceived motives behind the romance. Coworkers tend to react positively to couples with a perceived \"true love\" motive and negatively to couples with perceived \"utilitarian\" (e.g. career advancement) motives (Powell, 2001; Quinn, 1977). For example, Dillard et al.'s (1994) research suggests that the negative reactions to a job-motivated romance poison the work group's social climate. Second, coworker reactions depend on the status and power differences between the participants of a romance. Reactions tend to be unfavorable for hierarchical relationships (i.e. boss and subordinate) and fairly neutral for relationships between peers (Jones, 1999; Quinn, 1977). Put another way, coworker reactions are negative towards relationships that are seen as disruptive or unethical;, e.g. extra-marital affairs and boss-subordinate relationships (Pierce and Aguinis, 2009).Attitudes towards sexual behavior at work may also be inferred from a stream of research investigating judgments of sexual harassment claims that result from a dissolved workplace romance (see Pierce and Aguinis, 2005). In general, this research has found that investigators' judgments about sexual harassment claims are affected if the parties were involved in a prior workplace romance (Pierce et al., 2000, 2004). For example, Summers and Myklebust (1992) found that observers judged women as less innocent and men as less guilty when there was a prior romantic relationship between the claimant and defendant. Pierce et al. (2004) found a similar effect: participants judged a female complainant as more responsible for sexual harassing behavior when she was involved in a utilitarian workplace romance.The research from both the sexual harassment literature and the workplace romance literature suggests that coworker reactions towards sexual behavior at work will be positive or neutral only when the interaction takes place between peers, is not extra-marital, and reflects a motive for companionship rather than job advancement. Sexual behaviors in the workplace often fall in a grey area and may not be easily placed into these categories. For example, the perceived motives behind sexual behavior at work may be unclear or ambiguous to observers (e.g. \"Does he really like her or is he pursuing a promotion?\"). Moreover, taboos against expressing sexuality at work (see Mead, 1980; Lobel, 1993) may lead coworkers to feel uncomfortable when exposed to such situations. The inherent role conflict and ambiguity associated with sexual behavior at work suggests a negative relationship between observing these behaviors (as a coworker) and job attitudes. Therefore, although sexual behavior at work may be fun in specific instances, we suspect it is generally uncomfortable for coworkers.\nSexual behavior and job attitudes: Berdahl and Aquino (2009) suggest that sexual behavior at work may have negative consequences, even if it is appraised as harmless. Across two different employee samples, Berdahl and Aquino (2009) found that workers who frequently exposed to sexual workplace behavior were more likely to experience job withdrawal. Participants' evaluation of the behavior did not moderate this relationship. Berdahl and Aquino (2009, p. 44) thus describe sexual behavior at work as a \"stealth poison\" that is unconsciously linked to unpleasant experiences such as objectification and unprofessionalism and, thus, leads to negative workplace attitudes.Specifically, observing sexual behavior in the workplace may result in negative emotions, or a negative appraisal of the work environment. This discomfort may be expressed in less job satisfaction, which is an evaluation about one's job that partially results from emotions (Weiss and Cropanzano, 1996) as well as beliefs (Eagly and Chaiken, 1993). If sexual behavior at work is indeed unconsciously linked to unpleasant experiences as Berdahl and Aquino (2009) suggest, then it may also be associated with intentions to leave the organization, thereby removing oneself from the source of discomfort.\nGender differences in perceptions of sexual behavior: We speculate that sexual behaviors at work may have different meanings for men and women. In general, women have more negative explicit attitudes towards sexuality than do men (Geer and Robertson, 2005). Women also express less favorable attitudes towards workplace romance (Pierce, 1998; Pierce and Aguinis, 2003). Several mechanisms may help explain this finding. First, female sexuality is controlled and suppressed in Western culture, whereas male sexuality is not as tightly monitored (Baumeister and Twenge, 2002). Such suppression, evidenced by cultural phenomena such as the sexual double standard, may lead women to have less positive attitudes toward sexual behavior.Second, objectification theory (Fredrickson and Roberts, 1997, p. 174) proposes that women commonly experience sexual objectification (i.e. being treated as a body or a collection of body parts), which in turn is tied to feelings of body shame and anxiety. Experimental studies have supported the hypothesis that objectification leads to shame among White women (Moradi and Huang, 2008). These negative emotions may affect women's job attitudes if sexual behavior is common in the workplace.Third, sexualized workplace behavior reflects a focus on employees' gender roles, rather than work roles (Gutek et al., 1990). Given that competency, power and agency are part of male gender roles but not female gender roles (Carli, 2001), a workplace context that emphasizes gender rather than worker roles may provoke negative emotions in women. Men, on the other hand, may not feel this way as their gender role links sexuality with potency and control. Therefore, observing sexual behavior at work may be neutral for men, but negative for women.H1a. Employees who observe more sexual behavior at work will express lower job satisfaction.H1b. Observers' gender will moderate the relationship between observed sexual behavior at work and job satisfaction such that the relationship will be stronger for women than for men.H2a. Employees who observe more sexual behavior at work will express greater intentions to turnover.H2b. Observers' gender will moderate the relationship between observed sexual behavior at work and turnover intentions such that the relationship will be stronger for women than for men.The above hypotheses suggest that observing sexual behavior at work will have a separate, unique effect (in multiple regression terms) on two outcomes: job satisfaction and turnover intentions. According to the theory of reasoned action (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975), an alternative model is possible: that the relationship between observed sexual behavior and turnover intentions is mediated by job satisfaction; that is, observing sexual behavior at work is negatively related to job satisfaction, which, in turn, is associated with intentions to quit. First, the discomfort and ambiguity surrounding sexual behavior at work may be related to less liking for one's job, as expressed by job satisfaction. Second, observing sexual behavior at work may lead to intentions to leave the work environment, given that people tend to avoid situations they find unpleasant.H3. The relationship between observing sexualized behavior at work and turnover intentions is mediated by job satisfaction.We tested these hypotheses in two separate studies of working adults.\nStudy 1: Method\nStudy 2: Method\nGeneral discussion: The goal of the present research was to identify coworker reactions to observing sexual behavior at work. Specifically, we predicted that employees who observed more sexual behavior in their workplace would have lower job satisfaction, and that this relationship would be stronger for women. Our results partially supported this question; participants who observed more sexual behavior at work were less satisfied with their jobs, although this relationship was significant for only women in Study 2. There is also some evidence that employees who observe sexual behavior at work reported more intentions to quit their jobs; this relationship was significant in Study 2. Results for H3 were weak. In Study 1, there was no support that job satisfaction mediated the relationship between observed sexual behavior and turnover intentions; in Study 2, the results suggested that job satisfaction may partially mediate the relationship, at least for women. Clearly, more research is needed regarding the causal sequence among observing sexual behavior at work, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions.In both studies, observing sexual behavior at work was not associated with positive outcomes (i.e. higher job satisfaction, or lower turnover intentions). The results add support to the notion that sexual behaviors at work are a \"stealth poison\" (Berdahl and Aquino, 2009); rather than being associated with positive feelings, they appear related to lower job satisfaction and a tendency to withdraw from work.We replicate and extend previous research in two ways. First, our result linking sexual behavior at work to turnover intentions replicates Berdahl and Aquino's (2009) finding regarding experiencing sexual behavior at work and job withdrawal. Second, we extend their findings to include job satisfaction as a relevant criterion - in Study 1, it was negatively related to reports of sexual behavior for both men and women. Job satisfaction is a predictor of turnover intentions (Tett and Meyer, 1993); by controlling for it we attempted to assess the unique relationship between observed sexual behavior and turnover intentions.This research contributes to the managerial psychology literature more generally. First, while there is an extensive body of research on sexual harassment, we studied consensual non-harassing sexual workplace behaviors. Considering recent research that links job attitudes to other workplace criteria such as contextual job performance (Harrison et al., 2006; Judge et al., 2001), these results suggest that future research on sexualized work behavior may be a fruitful area for theory development and testing.The inconsistent results between the two studies suggest that additional factors may be implicated in the relationships between observing sexual work behavior, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions. Although we attempted to control for one contextual factor (whether the participant worked in a restaurant in Study 1), other variables such as the gendered nature of the work context could be relevant. The sex ratio (or relative numbers of men and women in the workplace) and gendered nature of the work (that is, the degree to which job duties conform to gender roles) has been linked to the incidence of sexual harassment and climates related to sexual harassment (Fitzgerald et al., 1997; Fitzgerald et al., 1999). Perhaps the negative relationship between observing sexual behavior and job attitudes is stronger for women when they work in male-dominated jobs. This relationship would be consistent with the sexual harassment literature; it remains to be seen if it is relevant for consensual sexual behavior.Implications for HR managers\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The goal of the present research is to investigate the association between observing consensual sexual behavior at work (e.g. flirting, joking) and job outcomes - specifically, job satisfaction and turnover intentions.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - Questionnaires were administered about observed consensual sexual behavior and job attitudes in two separate studies of working adults. Participants in Study 1 were 113 workers from 33 workplaces in the Midwestern USA; participants in Study 2 were 242 adults working in a variety of industries.\nFindings: - In support of the hypotheses, results from Study 1 indicated that employees who observed more sexual behavior at work reported lower job satisfaction. Study 2 replicated this result, but only for female employees. Observed sexual behavior at work was positively related to turnover intentions for both genders.\nResearch limitations/implications: - In both studies, the research design was cross-sectional, which prohibits causal inferences about the data. Second, it was not possible to assess whether the observed sexual behavior occurred between friendly peers, married coworkers, or coworkers married to other people - thus it is unclear how this factor is related to employee reactions.\nPractical implications: - Human resource managers should consider formulating policies regarding consensual sexual behavior at work to guide managers in handling potentially difficult situations, such as romantic relationships between peers.\nOriginality/value: - This research is the first to explicitly link consensual sexual behavior at work with two specific job attitudes: job satisfaction and turnover intentions.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Facilitating workplace learning and change: Lessons learned from the lectores in pre-war cigar factories
|
[
"Management history",
"Human resource management",
"Workplace learning",
"Career development"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: You know what Victor Hugo say? In all towns, in every place, they have a school teacher. And in every room, the school teacher is the light. He lights the candle. But in every town the preachers, the priests, they try to blow away the light. That's why they, the church, the owner don't want the reader. The reader lights the candle. It was a good thing (Mormino and Pozzetta, 1993, p. 6).\nReview of literature: Learning has been described as a part of everyday work practices (Streumer, 2006), and according to Gustavsson (2009) and others (Li et al., 2009), it is being given increased attention. Learning in the workplace, whether formal, informal or non-formal, involves employees acquiring knowledge, skills or attitudes that change both the current and future performance or professional achievements of the learners (Doyle et al., 2008). Moreover, workplace learning emphasizes learning about the nature of work, the impacting contextual factors and the essential features of the broader social environment including time and place (Taylor, 2001). Thus, an understanding of both the workplace and the concept of learning offers a way of examining the potential for change processes (Foley, 2001; Willmott, 1997) that are exemplified in the case presented in this study.\nResearch purpose: Bierema and Cseh (2003) contend that human resource and HRD have not given significant attention to issues of workplace learning conditions, including power and diversity. Elliott and Turnbull (2003, p. 971) are concerned that:\nMethods: This illustrative case is descriptive and intended to add historical context and new perspectives to our understanding of workplace learning. Illustrative cases are primarily used to describe what phenomenon is happening and why, and can aid in the interpretation of other data or theory. Case studies offer \"a nuanced view of reality\" (Flyvbjerg, 2006, p. 223) that calls for a more inclusive definition of research validity. As Thomas (2010) notes, case study can stand on its own, but we acknowledge and agree with Ruddin (2006) that generalizing from a case study is personal in that the reader is charged with making her or his own comparisons in order to assess the transferability of findings.\nFindings: The cigar factory as both a space for learning, as well as social equity and engagement, emerged as central to the experience of the workers (Gutierez Dias, 1975; Sporn, 2007). We found that the dominant form of workplace learning was reading by the lectores, where workers were \"willing to listen for hours, days, and sometimes weeks while the reader turned the pages of the history book, a political treatise, or a novel\" (Sariego, 2003, p. 173). This deep listening transformed the daily work life of cigar rollers by occupying an intellectual space that was emotionally generative. Colon (1961, p.161) indicates that the lectora (the lecture itself) was able to, through their readings, \"enchant and instruct\", in a tone that was both \"defiant and resonant\" while creating a high degree of participation (Sariego, 2003). This form of informal workplace learning was a central part of cigar workers' life. It gave them the opportunity to learn for its own sake, rather than focusing on the demands imposed by the outside world.\nDiscussion: HRD is a field that values reflective practice (Grieves, 2003; Yorks, 2005), and the historical examination of the cigar factories' attempts at workplace learning present an opportunity to reflect on the ways in which the lectores facilitated learning by addressing, honoring and invigorating the minds of workers and working as agents of radical change in the workplace. The tension between the workplace requirements and context, the engagement and the excitement that was engendered by the lectores, selected by the workers themselves, presented a unique opportunity to examine a historical case that expands and informs our understanding of learning in the workplace.\nConclusion: This paper describes the lectores (readers) who read the world news and works of literature to workers in pre-WWII cigar factories in Tampa, Florida, and in New York City; it explores their role as facilitators of workplace learning and leaders of change. The paper addresses the need for more examination of under-researched aspects of workplace learning by presenting a more critical approach to workplace learning as a form of social change, along with focusing on the importance of learning facilitators.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This study aims to describe the lectores (readers) who read the world news and works of literature to workers in pre-World War II cigar factories in Tampa, Florida, and in New York City. The paper addresses the need for more examination of some neglected aspects of workplace learning by presenting a more critical approach to workplace learning as a form of social change. It also focuses on the importance of the lectores' role as facilitators of workplace learning and leaders of change.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The paper is based on a qualitative analysis of archival data from libraries and research centers located in New York City and in Miami, Florida.\nFindings: Through the lectores, cigar factories were a place where workplace learning, organizational and social change occurred daily. As leaders, the lectores were radical agents of change and created affordances that shaped the factory workers' workplace and personal learning. The discussion explores the dynamics between the lectores and the cigar workers.\nPractical implications: Findings from this study demonstrate that developing employees is not limited to elevating their knowledge and skills needed to increase productivity and organizational performance. As self-actualized employees are better contributors to organizations, they, along with facilitators of learning, must care about what workers intrinsically need and explicitly demand. The findings speak to the multifaceted nature of workplace learning, one that encompasses skill acquisition and one that transforms workers. In essence, learning facilitators elicit change.\nOriginality/value: The research literature on workplace learning in the early part of the twentieth century in the USA is rare. This historical data-driven examination of the lectores and their role in factories presents a unique opportunity to focus on issues of social justice that are largely absent from human resource development discourse.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Social media: communication strategies, engagement and future research directions
|
[
"Marketing",
"Benchmarking",
"Social media",
"Facebook",
"Engagement",
"Facebook Insights",
"Communication strategies",
"Social media data"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Social media has become a mainstream media platform that connects one-third of the world's population (Nelson-Field and Taylor, 2012). Communication budgets are re-adjusting as advertisers move away from traditional media and invest greater resources into digital advertising and social media. It is estimated that over 15 million brands globally are registered with the social media site, Facebook (Koetsier, 2013), attempting to reach more than 1 billion consumers (Stieglitz et al., 2014). In line with an increased focus on research exploring customer engagement (Brodie et al., 2013; Maslowska et al., 2015), particularly in the digital space (Hollebeek et al., 2014), practitioners are looking for guidance on how to build engagement using social media.\n2. Literature review: The rapid rise of social media channels over the past decade has attracted interest from both academe and industry, keen to understand its nuances and how to strategically manage for desired results. Social media has seen increased flexibility and visibility in marketing content and a change in the way individuals and organisations interact. There has been a shift in power to customers, as they move from passive receivers of marketing content to active participants in the brand message (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). Interactive customer experiences through social media act as a significant influencing factor of many consumer behaviour aspects, including information acquisition, purchase behaviour and post-purchase communication (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). Social media sites are an ideal forum for product and brand-related advocacy (Chu and Kim, 2011; Riegner, 2007), customer-led content generation (Vivek et al., 2012) and customer-created product innovations (Hoyer et al., 2010; Sawhney et al., 2005). Therefore, there is a significant amount of social and network value provided to both users and organisations through social media, as users comment, review and share information online.\n3. Research method: This study used Facebook Insights data from active Facebook brand pages in the Australian wine industry. Facebook Insights is a tool accessible by administrators of Facebook brand pages that enables high-level monitoring of the activities that occur on that page. It allows administrators to download data concerning the performance of a post, such as the number of people the post reached, the number of people who clicked the post and the number of people who liked, commented on or shared the post. If the post is a video, Insights data also shows the total number of video views, and length of video views. Insights data provides page administrators with an \"Engagement Rate\" defined as the percentage of people who saw a post (post reach) and liked, shared, clicked or commented on it (Facebook, 2015). Facebook Insights provides the post-performance metrics used in this study (see Table I).\n4. Research results: 4.1 Wine brand communication strategies on Facebook\n5. Discussion: The first research objective of this study was to identify the main communication strategies of wine brands on Facebook. To do this, we applied the four social media content categories of informational, entertaining, remunerative and relational content from Dolan et al. (2015). Over 80 per cent of wine brand posts include informational content. The most common type of informational content posted by wine brands is information related directly to the product, usually presented in the form of a photo of the product (e.g. photo of wine bottle/label), information about their websites. Over half of all posts contained a form of entertaining content, with the most common type related to the promotion of events. Further, a large number of posts included entertaining content related to food or a recipe. Despite literature discussing the use of social media to offer discounts and economic incentives (Muntinga et al., 2011; Cvijikj and Michahelles, 2013), fewer posts (less than 15 per cent) contained remunerative details. This finding indicates that wine brands are rarely using social media updates to disseminate specific information related to the promotion and sale of their products. Finally, almost 70 per cent of posts contained content with a relational focus. Wine brands most frequently posted relational content by way of asking questions to the audience and integrating discussion of holidays, events and special days into their posts.\n6. Directions for future research: This article provides a foundation for further theoretical and empirical research in the emerging area of social media, particularly with a focus on the wine industry. Within this article, we identify that wine brands adopt a broad and diverse range of social media communication strategies in their efforts to engage consumers. Despite this, the engagement rates of wine consumers are significantly low, with a majority of wine brand \"users\" remaining dormant. This finding is surprising, given the social connotations often associated with wine consumption (Charters, 2006; Mouret et al., 2013) and hence the importance of word of mouth advertising within the wine industry (Bruwer and Thach, 2013; Bruwer and Reilly, 2006). While this study provides some interesting insights into the nature of social media engagement, the findings are limited to the insights from a small number of participating wine brands. There are many avenues for further research which will lead to valuable insights for both marketing practitioners and academics. Based on our study, we offer some key future research opportunities.\n7. Conclusion: This study contributes to knowledge in social media and engagement in a number of ways. We identify the main communication strategies used by wine brands on Facebook. We provide valuable statistics and trends regarding engagement rates on wine brand Facebook pages which can be used by both practitioners and academics for benchmarking and further academic scrutiny. We explore the trends of engagement patterns across specific time periods. Finally, the paper sets out a future research agenda for social media engagement research by detailing five fundamental future research questions.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: This study aims to use social media data to identify brand communication strategies on Facebook. The analysis uncovers trends and statistics regarding engagement rates. This research leads to the development of a future research agenda for social media and engagement research.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The Facebook Insights data of 12 wine brands over a 12-month period informed this study. Descriptive analysis was undertaken to examine the social media communication strategies of these brands. The impact of these strategies on engagement metrics is also examined.\nFindings: The findings demonstrate a low rate of engagement among the users of the wine brand Facebook pages. A majority of Facebook fans rarely engage with the brands. The results demonstrate that user engagement varies depending on the day of the week and hour of the day of the brand post.\nPractical implications: Wine brands can use these findings as a guideline for effective practice and as a benchmarking tool for assessing their social media performance. The paper provides implications for marketing scholars through the development of a future research agenda related to social media, customer engagement and wine marketing.\nOriginality/value: This paper fulfils an identified need by offering practical advice to wine producers on the necessity to explore and understand social media strategy and customer engagement characteristics.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Platforms in the peer-to-peer sharing economy
|
[
"Business model",
"Network effects",
"Sharing economy",
"Platforms",
"Ecosystem",
"Peer-to-peer"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The growth of platform businesses has been fueled by the internet and mobile technologies, and rapid advances in analytics, artificial intelligence (AI) and Big Data together with changing consumer preferences and consumption patterns. Platform business models in general, and the sharing economy in particular, have produced disintermediated industries. Often, sharing economy business models facilitate people to transact directly with one another by connecting individuals in unprecedented ways (Caldieraro et al., 2018). These developments have resulted in an explosive growth of the peer-to-peer economy.\nDefining and characterizing sharing platform businesses models: The academic literature and popular press use various terms, often interchangeably, for platform business models in the sharing economy. This paper aims to clarify the confusion surrounding this nomenclature and characterizes platforms in the sharing economy. Before discussing the definitions, we delineate the important dimensions of capacity-constrained vs capacity-unconstrained assets to be shared, access provision vs transfer of ownership, peer-to-peer vs platform-provided assets, and direct and indirect network effects.\nContrasting sharing platform with pipeline business models: We reviewed the literature to identify the characteristics that make peer-to-peer sharing platforms unique and contribute to their success vis-a-vis pipeline business models. The interrelationships between these characteristics alluded to three themes along which sharing platform and pipeline business models can be contrasted: market-level characteristics, market economics and firm-level characteristics. We drew characteristics of peer-to-peer sharing platforms and pipeline business models from the literature and derived key differences as synthesized in Table II.\nValue appropriation power of peer-to-peer sharing platforms: Financial markets celebrate peer-to-peer sharing platform business models under the assumption that they can capture value over a prolonged period of time. In fact, some feel that many of these markets will be dominated by one or two platforms in a \"winner takes all or most\" manner (Akbar and Tracogna, 2018; Johnson, 2017). However, recent developments suggest that rivalry among existing competitors in sharing economy platforms can be high. Typically, once a novel sharing platform gains traction, similar platforms tend to emerge quickly. For example, following Uber's initial success in New York City, numerous similar rideshare platforms were launched (e.g. Lyft, Gett, Juno, Curb and Via), which all compete for both drivers and riders. To better understand competition in sharing economy platform markets we examine potential sources of competitive advantage, starting with network effects and liquidity in the next section.\nCustomer behavior in the context of sharing platforms: A significant body of literature has examined various aspects of sharing platform-related consumer behaviors. We synthesize, integrate and structure this literature using the three-stage model of service consumption as organizing framework whereby we deconstruct the customer journey into the pre-purchase, service encounter (i.e. consumption) and post-encounter stages (Wirtz and Lovelock, 2016, p. 53; Tsiotsou and Wirtz, 2015). See also Benoit et al. (2017) for an excellent review for consumer motives and behaviors related to collaborative consumption, which includes peer-to-peer sharing.\nService provider motivations and behaviors: Much academic research has focused on demand-side consumer motivation, but relatively fewer studies investigated the motivations of peer service providers (Karlsson and Dolnicar, 2016; Hall and Krueger, 2018). We consider service providers' main motivations and decision-making processes next.\nPolicy makers and society in the peer-to-peer sharing economy: The significant growth of the sharing economy has resulted in a new array of issues for regulators and policy makers. Sharing platforms can result in immediate tax revenue losses as demand is shifted away from traditional, tax paying, and regulated businesses, and taxing peer-to-peer platforms has proven to be a challenge (Zervas et al., 2017). Competition may be distorted if regulation applies to traditional businesses such as hotels and taxi companies, which follow taxation codes, labor laws and safety regulations, but may be circumvented by platforms players and their service providers. Furthermore, it has been suggested that home sharing platforms harm neighborhoods, distort the housing market and reduce the stock of affordable housing for residents. For these reasons, restrictive regulation on sharing platforms has been advocated by incumbent firms, workers for incumbent firms, and wary \"neighbors\" of sharing economy users (Rauch and Schleicher, 2015).\nSummary, conclusions and further research: Summary and conclusions\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine peer-to-peer sharing platform business models, their sources of competitive advantage, and the roles, motivations and behaviors of key actors in their ecosystems.\nDesign/methodology/approach: This paper uses a conceptual approach that is rooted in the service, tourism and hospitality, and strategy literature.\nFindings: First, this paper defines key types of platform business models in the sharing economy anddescribes their characteristics. In particular, the authors propose the differentiation between sharing platforms of capacity-constrained vs capacity-unconstrained assets and advance five core properties of the former. Second, the authors contrast platform business models with their pipeline business model counterparts to understand the fundamental differences between them. One important conclusion is that platforms cater to vastly more heterogeneous assets and consumer needs and, therefore, require liquidity and analytics for high-quality matching. Third, the authors examine the competitive position of platforms and conclude that their widely taken \"winner takes it all\" assumption is not valid. Primary network effects are less important once a critical level of liquidity has been reached and may even turn negative if increased listings raise friction in the form of search costs. Once a critical level of liquidity has been reached, a platform's competitive position depends on stakeholder trust and service provider and user loyalty. Fourth, the authors integrate and synthesize the literature on key platform stakeholders of platform businesses (i.e. users, service providers, and regulators) and their roles and motivations. Finally, directions for further research are advanced.\nPractical implications: This paper helps platform owners, service providers and users understand better the implications of sharing platform business models and how to position themselves in such ecosystems.\nOriginality/value: This paper integrates the extant literature on sharing platforms, takes a novel approach in delineating their key properties and dimensions, and provides insights into the evolving and dynamic forms of sharing platforms including converging business models.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
The role of rules-based compliance systems in the new EU regulatory landscape : Perspectives of institutional change
|
[
"Institutional theory",
"Financial crisis",
"Compliance",
"Institutional change",
"Investment management",
"Regulatory change"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: The financial crisis of 2007-2009 and the resultant Great Recession has highlighted how the failure of financial organizations may have dire economic and social consequences at a national and global level. Within capital markets, the post-crisis environment is distinguished by reduced margins, higher operating costs, reduced bonus payments and crucially radical changes to the regulatory environment as new obligations are introduced (\n2. Institutional change in capital markets: Institutional theory provides the theoretical basis for this research study. This theoretical body of knowledge focuses on the causes of institutionalization, the process by which organizations affirm themselves and achieve legitimization as a consequence of their alignment and compliance with the institutional contexts of their environment (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983; Greenwood et al., 2008; Meyer and Rowan, 1977) Mahoney and Thelen's (2010) work on institutional changes highlights compliance as a key factor in institutional change. Our study focuses on the role of the IMS in distributing new operational institutions for ensuring regulatory compliance. Thus, we adopt Mahoney and Thelen's (2010) four model types of institutional change to guide our analysis. The first type is termed Displacement and focuses on the removal of existing rules and the introduction of new ones. Layering is the second type and denotes the introduction of new rules alongside, or on top of, existing ones. Drift refers to the changed impact of existing rules due to environmental shifts. Last, Conversion refers to changes in the way existing rules are enacted due to their strategic deployment. Within our research context, we conceptualize two types of institutions and correspondingly two areas of institutional change. First, at the field level we view the regulations themselves as institutions undergoing changes as a result of the G20 agreements and the need to tighten regulatory systems in the aftermath of the financial crisis. Second, within organizations we view the systems and processes which enable compliance and are consequently influenced and structured by regulations as also being institutionalized and embedded within organizations. Figure 1 provides a diagrammatical representation of the phenomena to be explored. From this conceptual framework we derived the research questions outlined in the introduction and developed our research method and interview guide.\n3. Research method: To gain deep insights into the institutional effects and processes within the post-crisis financial sector we carried out field-work across nine organizations. Using a semi-structured interviewing technique, in-depth interviews were carried out at the systems vendor site, in addition to eight client sites, all of which had introduced the IMS. Our objective was to elicit views and comments from interviewees engaged in the adoption and implementation of the IMS at client and vendor sites at both the technical and industry levels. Interviewees provided rich and insightful responses to questions about the post-crisis environment in financial services and also about the use of IMS. Our adoption of a \"typical case\" sampling strategy required a search for information-rich cases which were illustrative of IMS usage in financial organizations (Patton, 1990). Sampling criteria for selecting the vendor's clients also focused on identifying replicable cases of IMS use (Yin, 2009). Primary data collection was achieved through semi-structured interviews at both vendor and client sites. Pilot interviews were held with the vendor to aide understanding of how the system functioned and to formulate pertinent questions. Table I summarizes the approach to data collection. Semi-structured interviews have previously proved successful in providing the necessary depth to explore complex and dynamic regulatory phenomena (Tsatsou et al., 2009).\n4. Findings and analysis: The next section reviews the empirical findings of the research in relation to the theoretical constructs previously outlined. The chief focus of the analysis is to understand how the IMS system, and in particular its compliance focused module, enables Mahoney's and Thelen (2010) modes of institutional change within capital markets regulation. Consequently, each mode will be considered in turn.\n5. Research synthesis: The research suggests that the new EU regulatory landscape is likely to create mass institutional change within the regulation of capital markets. It is worth highlighting that these new rules apply to Asian and American firms operating within the EU and so have a large impact on global financial institutions. The studies theoretical contribution and the implications for practice and policy will now be outlined.\n6. Conclusions: The study addressed the research question by providing analysis of the role of the IMS in enabling different modes of institutional change, by exploring how such systems are supporting the restructuring of compliance practices as a result emergent post-crisis regulation. The study shows that the new emerging regulatory landscape is causing institutional change at both the field and organizational levels.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to understand how institutional changes to the European Union regulatory landscape may affect corresponding institutionalized operational practices within financial organizations.\nDesign/methodology/approach: The study adopts an Investment Management System as its case and investigates different implementations of this system within eight financial organizations, predominantly focused on investment banking and asset management activities within capital markets. At the systems vendor site, senior systems consultants and client relationship managers were interviewed. Within the financial organizations, compliance, risk and systems experts were interviewed.\nFindings: The study empirically tests modes of institutional change. Displacement and Layering were found to be the most prevalent modes. However, the study highlights how the outcomes of Displacement and Drift may be similar in effect as both modes may cause compliance gaps. The research highlights how changes in regulations may create gaps in systems and processes which, in the short term, need to be plugged by manual processes.\nPractical implications: Vendors abilities to manage institutional change caused by Drift, Displacement, Layering and Conversion and their ability to efficiently and quickly translate institutional variables into structured systems has the power to ease the pain and cost of compliance as well as reducing the risk of breeches by reducing the need for interim manual systems.\nOriginality/value: The study makes a contribution by applying recent theoretical concepts of institutional change to the topic of regulatory change uses this analysis to provide insight into the effects of this new environment.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
War or the business of God: Sacred mission, accounting and Spanish military hospitals in the 18th century
|
[
"Accounting",
"Niebuhr",
"Spanish military hospitals",
"St John’s Order"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: The relationship between accounting and religion has attracted a rapidly growing body of research covering a wide diversity of locations, beliefs and circumstances. (Kuasirikun and Constable, 2010; Bigoni et al., 2013; Dobie, 2008a, b, 2011). The role of accounting and accountability practices conducted within religious communities, for the purposes of those communities rather than in secular pursuits external to them, has particularly attracted a growing number of studies (Carmona and Ezzamel, 2006; Kuasirikun and Constable, 2010; Parker, 2002; Booth, 1995; Cordery, 2006; Laughlin, 1988; Hardy and Ballis, 2005; Jacobs, 2005; Irvine, 2005; Quattrone, 2004; Jacobs and Walker, 2004; Irvine, 2002; Abdul-Raham and Goddard, 1998; Alvarez-Dardet et al., 2006; McPhail et al., 2005). In these studies prominence has been given to an alleged \"sacred-secular divide\" paradigm identified by Laughlin (1988) and later confirmed by Booth (1993, 1995). Laughlin and Booth argue that inevitably in religious organisations, especially the major churches, there is a clash between religious (sacred) values and profane practices such as accounting, with the latter being tolerated only if it does not interfere with the sacred mission of the Church (Jayasinghe and Soobaroyen, 2009).\nChrist and culture: Niebuhr (2001) recognises that non-religious activities can play an essential role in the fulfilment of religious mission and, therefore, that religious activities are conducted not in isolation from other human endeavours outside the physical domain of the Church but are formed by social interactions. Hardy and Ballis (2005, p. 246) note that for Niebuhr \"the story of God's action in history cannot be separated from the stories of individuals and communities [...]\". Niebuhr emphasises the links between abstract theologies, which are essential to the foundation of Christian beliefs, and how such theologies are transferred to the experience of the everyday life of the Christian (Hardy and Ballis, 2005).\nReligion and the enlightened state: Enlightenment thinkers in the modern era have often striven to separate the State from the influence of the Church, achieving this in varying ways in many European countries, including France, Portugal, Germany, Spain and England in the eighteenth century. The Enlightened thinkers sought to change the world by examining religious beliefs \"in the light of reason and morality\" (Brumfitt, 1972, p. 17). In England the Enlightenment came from below whereas in Spain it was imposed from above after Carlos III came to the throne in 1759. The relationship of the Catholic Church with the Spanish governments of the eighteenth century, the focus of the present study, was shaped by the War of Spanish Succession (1701-1714) at the time of the change of dynasty in Spain from the Habsburgs to the Bourbons and the impact of the Enlightenment (Rodriguez, 1999). The support of the Church for the Habsburg Archduke Charles of Austria during the War of Succession embittered the relationship of his rival Philip, later Philip V of Spain, with the Holy See (Rodriguez, 1999). As a consequence, Spain was ruled by an elite who saw their identity defined not by religious beliefs but by their knowledge of the world. Their suspicion of the motives of the Church and the abuses which had been perpetrated for centuries under the protection of the Church led the governing classes to be highly critical, even hostile, opponents of the Church (Sarrailh, 1992). At the same time in the period 1738-1744, to halt a long period of decline and decay the SJO had embarked upon a process of reform under the leadership of Fr Ortega, the General (the highest authority of the Order, 1737-1771), who demanded that the monks honour the expectations of their calling, most importantly to serve others (Gomez, 1963).\nThe SJO: The SJO emerged in the sixteenth century from the work of its founder, Saint Juan de Dios with the first Constituciones (Rules) of the Order sanctioned by the Pope in 1571 (Parra, 1757; Santos, 1751). The SJO believed that they were not to be under the control of the ordinary clergy to whom the Trent Council in the sixteenth century required all religious organisations to be accountable (Alvarez-Dardet et al., 2006; Quattrone, 2004). It finally achieved this in the middle of the seventeenth century when it was recognised as a religious order, who were required to render an account of their lives and work only to God and the Holy See. The SJO's spiritual mission was to alleviate suffering by caring for the sick in hospitals which they established and operated. These hospitals initially were primarily to meet the needs of the general population. However, throughout the history of the SJO it maintained a special, very unlikely relationship with the Spanish army, caring for injured military personnel at the most famous battles of the Spanish army during the Hapsburg dynasty in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Gomez, 1963). The Order's long association with the Spanish army suffered a decline in the first years of the Bourbon dynasty in the early eighteenth century (Felipe V) with the change of royal dynasty, from the Hapsburgs to the Bourbons.\nSpanish military hospitals: In 1739 the Spanish army issued the Instruction for Military Hospitals (hereafter the Instruction) which represented for the military and the State a major break with the previous management of these hospitals and attempts to reform them (Arcarazo and Loren, 2008). The Bankruptcy Decree of the Spanish Royal Treasure in 1739 which had pre-empted the Instruction meant that there was a need, as far as possible, to revise and cut the expenses of all parts of government, including the army which was the greatest cost to the Royal Treasure (Fernandez, 1977). The long experience and proven lower costs of the SJO in providing hospital services convinced the government in 1777 to contract with the SJO to service the hospital needs of the army (for the agreement between the army and the SJO see AGS, Secretaria y Superintendencia de Hacienda, box 681, Asiento de la Orden de San Juan de Dios, 1777).\nHospital accounting by the SJO: The revision of the SJO's Constituciones provided the means to meet the new accountability demands of the Instruction by requiring the comprehensive collection of many diverse pieces of information, both financial and operational. Inside each hospital, records were kept by the SJO and sent to the General (Constituciones, 1741, p. 207) which recorded any movements of the monks from one hospital to another and those who had died (Constituciones, 174, pp. 33 and 82). Although generally doctors were members of the SJO, detailed records were also kept of doctors and surgeons hired from outside the hospital and the amounts that they were paid (Constituciones, 1741, p. 29). Accounts of the sick treated in the hospital recorded their room and the number of the bed which they occupied, the date of admittance and the date of discharge or death (Constituciones, 1741, p. 136). This was supplemented by a daily book in which new admittances had to be entered, in addition to daily mortality for the purpose of managing food supply (Constituciones, 1741, p. 127). New patients could be received only if approved by the Prior of the hospital (Constituciones, 1741, p. 129).\nConclusion: This study has examined the role played by accounting in the eighteenth century in the relationship between the Spanish government, the army and the SJO in the management of military hospitals. This relationship has provided the opportunity to apply Niebuhr's typology as a means to understand the relationship between accounting and religion in a setting which has not attracted significant attention from accounting scholars, namely a commercial relationship with the State (Jayasinghe and Soobaroyen, 2009).\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to establish the importance of accounting in the management of Spanish military hospitals by the St John's Order (SJO) of the Roman Catholic Church in the eighteenth century, a time of crisis between the Church and the State. The sacred mission of the Order required that they had a significant role outside the Roman Catholic Church in the care and treatment of the sick and infirm which required them to establish hospitals throughout Spain and across the lands that it had conquered. The study establishes that accounting played a key role in ensuring the success of the unconventional commercial relationship between the SJO and the government and the military.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Niebuhr's typology is used to help understand how accounting practices were consistent, indeed essential, expectations of the sacred mission of the SJO and not something which represented a denial of the Order's religious beliefs. The paper relies primarily on documents and other material located in Spanish archives.\nFindings: The SJO accepted that secular accounting and accountability processes were relevant to their search for God's love and to showing this love to others. The need for the Order to be accountable to the State was not regarded as profane and antithetical to their religious beliefs. Adopting Niebuhr's typology of religion and society, this study concludes that the Order was an extraordinary example of Christ the transformer of the culture.\nOriginality/value: This study recognises the need to deepen the understanding of the way in which accounting practices have often played a critical role in the activities of religious organisations by examining an extraordinary example of one organisation which was engaged in an unusual, ongoing, highly complex commercial relationship with the Spanish State.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Applying ANP to analyse sensory experience in restaurants
|
[
"Analytic network process",
"Customer experience",
"Sensory experiences"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\n1. Introduction: Global food and beverage (F&B) turnover has continuously increased, and the F&B industry needs to move away from the physiological aspect of satiety to creating different experiences to attract the attention of consumers. Owing to continuous economic growth, consumers' needs will gradually shift to services and experiences after their material lives are satisfied (Ponsignon et al., 2017). A study conducted by Marketing Week (as cited in NZ Marketing Magazine, 2003) pointed out that 71 per cent of US and UK company managers believe that experiential marketing will be the main axis of future marketing. Schmitt (1999) indicated that traditional marketing considers customers to be rational decision makers who focus on functional features and benefits. The basis of experiential marketing is established on different customer experiences (Bustamante and Rubio, 2017; De Keyser et al., 2019). Lindstrom (2005) noted that the more senses are stimulated when establishing the band, the greater the memories evoked by the senses, and the stronger the relationship between consumers and brand. Krishna (2013) also suggested that companies should employ different senses to assist in creating and strengthening brand personality.\n2. Literature review: 2.1 Sensory marketing\n3. Research method: 3.1 Research framework\n4. Results: 4.1 Expert analysis\n5. Conclusions: This study aimed to use the five senses to examine consumer experience, analyse the relative importance of the five sensory experiences to the restaurant, and identify perception differences between experts and consumers. The analytic network process was used to examine the assessment of sensory experiences by experts: sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell were used as criteria for the network structural map. For the experts, the ranking of importance of five senses was taste, sight, smell, touch and hearing, in descending order. The dependent relationship research results of this study showed that taste held extreme importance among the five sensory experiences. This indicated that taste had the strongest effects on the other senses. The results also showed large differences in older consumers compared to the other age groups. In older consumers, taste and smell sensitivity tended to be lower owing to the effects of sensory degeneration. Hence, older respondents were more dependent on the intuitive feelings of touch compared to the other age groups. The results showed that the top first crucial factors for the sub-criteria were as follows: flavour of the restaurant's dishes, selection of ingredients for the restaurant's dishes, interior design of the restaurant, aromas in the restaurant and air quality of the restaurant.\n6. Implications: This study quantified the 5 criteria and 15 sub-criteria that affect the five senses in consumer experience. According to the results, restaurants can clearly understand that these factors should be prioritized when creating a consumer experience environment using the five senses. An example is the sense of taste, which accounted for the highest weight in the study results. Thus, restaurants need to first consider satisfying the taste requirements of consumers before considering the other senses, such as sight and smell. In addition, restaurants can examine the differences between experts and consumers in senses other than taste. An example is the senses of sight and smell, which needs to be further improved to enhance the entirety of consumers' sensory experiences.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the relative importance of the five types of sensory experience in restaurants and the differences between experts and customers.\nDesign/methodology/approach: Analytic network process was used to select the critical factors for the five types of sensory experiences. Expert and consumer questionnaires were compared to examine the differences between expert opinions and customer awareness.\nFindings: Restaurants consider taste and smell to be important senses, whereas hearing was considered to be the least important.\nOriginality/value: Experts paid more attention to criteria and sub-criteria that resonated with consumers' memories and emotions. Consumers paid more attention to intuitively obtaining emotional experiences during each purchase.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Islamophobia: examining causal links between the media and "race hate" from "below"
|
[
"Ethnic minorities",
"Migrant workers",
"Race",
"United Kingdom"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: This article examines the influence of the media on increasing Islamophobic tendencies in British society. Through a critical appraisal of the media, it examines the inter-relationship between the press, government policy and Islamophobia as one manifestations of race hate. The paper sets out to examine the influence of the media on representations of Muslims since recent terrorist[1] attacks in the USA in September 2001 and in Britain in July 2005. As discussed in Frost (2008), punitive anti-terror legislation and other government measures are having deeply negative influences on the way Muslim communities in Britain are portrayed and subsequently treated. Government policy in recent years has been pertinent in criminalising and demonising Muslims as terrorists and this has encouraged sections of the press to report on such issues in ways that reinforce and perpetuate the hostility Muslims face. The paper will begin by positioning the concept and practice of Islamophobia within the broader discourse of \"race\" hate in an attempt to contextualise and explain this phenomenon. It will then go on to look at the empirical evidence (with a particular emphasis on Oldham in the greater Manchester area) that suggests Islamophobia has increased in recent years. The paper will then move on to discuss a number of theoretical ideas that relate to the role of the press more generally. This will help to understand the position taken by the press in its reporting on government measures waged in the name of the \"war on terror\" in recent years and the impact of this on Muslim communities in Britain.Theoretical considerations: \"race\" hate\nConclusion: Islamophobia has been on the increase in recent years. Anti-terror legislation and other government measures have seen sections of the press reporting on such measures in ways that criminalise Muslim communities. The media more generally has also been responsible in recent years for the promotion of what might best be termed \"moral panics\" seen particularly around issues like asylum, \"race\" and crime, drugs, paedophiles, and child abductions. Moral panics breed on the cultivation of fear and insecurity within society that often goes over and above the \"threat\" that is actually presented. Thus, the media have represented Muslims as a \"collective problem\" who threaten the very fabric of British society as supporters of al-Qaida and potential suicide bombers. They are the \"folk devils\" of the twenty first century. The media also plays a powerful role in constructing and reinforcing different forms of racism within British society that presents itself in more subtle but equally powerful ways. Both forms of ideological racisms are ultimately articulated or \"played out\" on the streets in the form of race hate, violence and harassment, and in routine low-level everyday hostility. Those identified and vilified by the media then become \"legitimate\" targets for abuse and violent attack. Such attacks do not occur automatically and are dependent on complex socio-economic and political conditions as discussed above. However, the press as one form of media has a powerful role to play. The repercussions unleashed by racist, biased and irresponsible news reporting is both damaging and dangerous and does little to unite racially divided communities like those recently highlighted in Oldham (Cantle, 2006). The press has to be made accountable and responsible for what is actually reported if we are to challenge the cultivation of race hate and racially motivated crime in society more generally and particularly as this relates to Muslim communities. The campaigning organisation Article 19 - The Global Campaign for Free Expression[21], published a report (2003) which highlighted the ways in which media reporting could be more constructive and accountable in the future. These include less biased news reporting of minority ethnic communities, the avoidance of stereotypes, reporting of events that give some broader context to reported issues, that statistics and other such sources should be clearly verified, that communities should be given the opportunity to contribute to ongoing debates and have their voices heard, and that care should be taken to use appropriate and accurate terminology. Whilst the media is not singularly responsible for such developments[22], it has a key role to play and as one of many institutions that disseminates racism, it is as good a place as any to begin to challenge this role. The critical appraisal offered here is intended to challenge normative assumptions and taken for granted \"truths\" that often surround social phenomena and will hopefully stimulate further debate on such issues.\nNotes: 1. 1. See Mathiesen (2002) for a critical discussion of this concept.2. 2. A study by Oxfam (2002) into men and poverty in the UK found that those males who fail to cope with economic and social marginalisation can articulate this in a variety of ways including inflicting violence and blame on minority ethnic groups. See Islamophobia: examining causal links between the state and \"race\" hate from below by the same author in International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 2008.3. 3. White privilege brings structural advantages in terms of employment, education, wealth and power. It also means not having to navigate, negotiate and tolerate certain social situations taken for granted by the rest of society but which black and Asian people have to deal with routinely. See article one fn 6. Also Kimmel and Ferber (2003).4. 4. For a longer discussion of these issues see the late Said, (1981, 1978). It is difficult to pin point a year or time when Islamophobia as a form of anti-Muslim racism took hold. The Commission on British Muslims identified Islamophobia in a report it published in 1997 and whilst anti-Muslim sentiments like anti-Semitism can be traced way back into the very fabric of European society, its recent resurgence appears to date back to the Rushdie Affair in 1988-1989.5. 5. Daily Mirror, 19 January 2005; The Guardian, 18 January 2005.6. 6. The Metropolitan police authority adopted this definition from the Macpherson Inquiry 1999.7. 7. The British Crime Survey (2002) cited in Metropolitan Police Service, 2002.8. 8. Back in the late 1980s, Norman Tebbit's cricket test and the response of some Muslim communities to the publication of Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses led many to question Muslim's commitment and identity with Britain. Whilst the commitment of Scottish people living in England is never questioned if they choose to support Scotland against England in a football match or when African-Caribbeans and black British people support the West Indies cricket team against England (who wouldn\"t!) such actions are never questioned in the way that South Asian Muslims are. Supporting the team of one's ancestral home and other expressions of identity by minority ethnic communities are not attempts to erect barriers and self-segregate, rather they are expressions of a wider group cultural identity, often a necessary survival strategy in the face of hostility and rejection. Society has attempted to put up barriers between groups by racialising and singling out particular groups like Muslims as \"different\", \"alien\" and threatening. Such groups are then blamed for their difference, for having a \"different\" religion and even for white racism. It is but a short step from this pathologising and blame culture to dangerous over-generalisations and crude stereotyping that label all Muslims, for example, as terrorists. Also see Brah (1996) and Van Dijk (1993).9. 9. See Appendix Tables 1 and 2 in Bagguley and Hussain (2003).10. See Ritchie (2001) and Cantle (2001).11. Greater Manchester Police. Ethnic Monitoring and Hate Crime Annual Reports for 2001-2002 and 2002-2003.12. See Cantle et al. (2006).13. See Fryer (1984).14. There has been much debate on the contribution of migrants to the economy of Britain, particularly of medical professionals, low paid catering and other service sector workers, agricultural labourers and so on.15. See press for 14-15 April 2005.16. Sunday Express, 4 January 2004; The Guardian, 10 January 2004.17. See The Guardian, 4 September 2004.18. Cited in The Guardian, 4 September 2004.19. Daily Mail, January 2005. Also just two and a half weeks before the 2005 General Election Michael Howard expressed fears that unless greater immigration controls were introduced, Britain would see a repeat of the disturbances that occurred in Burnley and Oldham in 2001. See BBC News online, 19 April 2005.20. For a longer discussion of these issues see the late Said (1981, 1978). It is difficult to pin point a year or time when Islamophobia as a form of anti-Muslim racism took hold. The Commission on British Muslims identified Islamophobia in a report it published in 1997 and whilst anti-Muslim sentiments like anti-Semitism can be traced way back into the very fabric of European society, its recent resurgence appears to date back to the Rushdie Affair in 1988-1989.21. Article 19 takes its name from \"Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights\".22. See Islamophobia: examining causal links between the state and \"race hate\" from below by the same author in International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 2008 for other causes of race hate.Opens in a new window.Table I\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - The paper's aim is to examine whether there is a causal link between \"race\" hate, particularly Islamophobia (defined as anti-Muslim feeling and violence based on \"race\" and/or religion), and media treatment of Muslim communities in Britain in recent years.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The paper looks at the reporting of terror activities and examines the way the media (tabloid press) constructs racists news.\nFindings: - The article discusses some of the themes developed in a previous paper that looked at government policy towards Muslim communities by examining the media campaign directed against Muslims within this broader political context. The implications for the cultivation of \"race\" hate are considered.\nPractical implications: - The paper demonstrates that \"race\" hate and routine attacks on Muslim communities appear to be increasing and needs to be addressed by developing strategies that are inclusive of all disadvantaged communities, racism, \"war on terror\", working class.\nOriginality/value: - The paper adds to the literature on \"race\" hate by examining these theories in the light of recent and ongoing terror attacks and their impact on Muslim communities in Britain.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
How will ICTs affect our environment in 2020?
|
[
"Information",
"Communication",
"Technology‐led strategy",
"Environmental management",
"Sustainable development",
"European Union"
] |
[
{
"content": "Summarize the following paper into structured abstract.\n\nIntroduction: Information and communication technologies (ICTs) not only form an industrial sector, but also pervade all other sectors as integrating and enabling technologies. ICTs change society, and their production and use have an important impact on developments in economic, social and environmental areas. To what extent ICTs also affect progress towards an economy's environmental sustainability is still under debate. There is, however, increasing evidence that significant opportunities and threats are involved, which deserve more research and more attention in energy, climate change and technology policies.The Institute for Prospective Technological Studies of the Joint Research Centre (European Commission) commissioned a study (Erdmann et al., 2004), to explore (qualitatively) and to assess (quantitatively) the way that ICTs will influence environmental sustainability between now and 2020. This study is the first quantitative projection to be carried out on how ICTs could affect the environment in the European Union.\nMethodology: The first step was to choose a set of environmental indicators and to identify the economic sectors and ICT applications with the greatest impact on these indicators.For modelling purposes the project team adapted the indicators that were developed in response to the conclusions of the European Council in Gothenburg, obtaining the following indicators:* volume of transport to gross domestic product;* modal split of transport;* energy consumption and share of renewables;* greenhouse gas emissions;* municipal waste collected but not recycled.The impact of telecommunications (equipment and services) and information technologies (defined as the combined industries of hardware for office machines, data processing equipment, data communications equipment, software and services) on these indicators was analysed.The second step was to build up data as a basis for the project through an extensive literature review of the environmental impacts of selected ICT applications: ICT industry[1], ICT use[2], e-business[3], virtual mobility[4], virtual goods[5], waste management[6], intelligent transport systems[7], energy supply[8], facility management[9] and production process management[10].Three kinds of impact were considered:1. the impacts and opportunities created by the physical existence of ICTs and the processes involved (first order effects);2. the impacts and opportunities created by the ongoing use and application of ICTs (second order effects); and3. the impacts and opportunities created by the aggregated effects of large numbers of people using ICTs over the medium to long term (third order effects).The third step was to develop three consistent scenarios for the development of ICTs and the environment, including future uncertainties. To create three different scenarios, the partners chose highly unpredictable factors likely to influence the development and use of ICTs in the future. As each of these factors can be varied over several levels, it would be easy to create hundreds of scenarios, even from this small set of factors. In order to avoid this, scenario development seeks specific combinations of factor levels that are perceived as internally consistent. Table I shows the combination of uncertain factors for the three scenarios.The fourth and fifth steps provided results using the refined and quantified scenarios. The project team created a simulation model[11] to quantify the impact of ICTs on the selected environmental indicators. A unique aspect of the applied methodology was combining qualitative scenario making and quantitative modelling. This led to projections of future impacts and the identification of areas where policy interventions could have a positive effect. Finally, recommendations for action were elaborated and then discussed and validated by a panel of experts.\nEnvironmental indicators: Apart from trends for each of the indicators, the study reveals which parameters and external variables are strongly influencing these trends and how ICT applications can be set off to steer developments towards sustainability.1. ICT impact on freight transport performance\nResults: It is possible to estimate the isolated effects of ICTs on different indicators. However, the most relevant information is not the direct impact of ICTs on one indicator, but the whole picture, including the evolution of all the indicators in relation to the development of ICTs.Figure 6 presents the development of environmental indicators by 2020. These figures are percentage increases/decreases from the base year 2000. The length of the bars indicates the uncertainty of the findings, as a result of both future scenario variation and data uncertainty. There are two bars per indicator: the upper (dark) bar shows the results for projected ICT development, the lower (light) bar shows the results for the so-called \"ICT freeze\" simulations (i.e. ICT applications remain at the same level as in 2000). The impacts shown are aggregated values of all ICT applications considered in all scenarios simulated.This model also takes into account rebound effects, which occur when efficiency gains stimulate new demands that counterbalance or even outweigh the positive environmental gains. For example, the efficiency improvements (time, fuel, energy) made possible through technological advancements are counteracted by an increasing demand (growing consumption volumes) of energy, products, services, passenger and freight transport. In the model, rebound effects are managed by determining elasticities, quantified by assigned numbers, for example by determining what proportion of savings are counteracted by increased consumption, or vice versa. Another rebound effect is the rematerialisation effect, e.g. virtual information products such as information are accessed via the Internet and then printed out or burned onto a CD. Rebound effects should be acknowledged and addressed by all policies, and especially ICT policies, which aim to increase efficiency.\nRecommendations: 1 and 2 Freight and passenger transport\nConclusions and future research: Even if the direct impact of ICT use is negative, the overall impact of ICTs may vary between approximately -20 and +30 percent. If ICTs are to enable a decrease in absolute energy consumption, despite strong gross domestic product growth and high employment, it is necessary to find a way of promoting the environmentally positive impacts of ICTs, while inhibiting the negative ones.On the one hand, significant opportunities for improving environmental sustainability lie in the potential impact of ICTs on the rational use of heating energy, and the support of decentralised electricity production from renewable sources and its important role in the product-to-service shift.On the other hand, ICT applications that make freight and passenger transport more time efficient (cheaper or faster) will immediately create more traffic and possibly more energy consumption. There is no empirical evidence for assuming anything other than a strong price rebound effect here, which could have severe environmental consequences in energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.As a great deal of uncertainty still exists, further research is necessary for a fuller understanding of the role of ICTs in meeting environmental policy goals. In order to increase the positive impact of ICT, an holistic approach is needed encompassing the following areas:* e-materialisation: the shift from products to services, dematerialisation and rematerialisation;* intelligent transport systems' impact on increasing transport performance and promoting a shift from passenger car to public transport;* ICT equipment's electricity consumption in the domestic and tertiary sector;* efficiency in electricity production and supply;* ICT supported facility for the management of energy savings;* the use of virtual utility promoting renewable energies and combined head and power; and* ICT supported systems for recovery and recycling of municipal solid waste in general and waste from electrical and electronic equipment in particular.\n",
"role": "user"
},
{
"content": "Purpose: - This paper aims to present the results of a research project that the Institute for Prospective Technology Studies commissioned to research the possible effects of information and communication technologies (ICT) on a set of environmental indicators in 2020.\nDesign/methodology/approach: - The project adopted an innovative methodology combining qualitative scenario-building and quantitative modelling.\nFindings: - The general conclusion was that the impact of ICT is roughly between -20 and +30 percent. Therefore there are significant opportunities for improving environmental sustainability through ICTs, which can rationalise energy management in housing (or facilities), make passenger and freight transport more efficient, and enable a product-to-service shift across the economy.\nOriginality/value: - The impact of ICT should accordingly be taken into account by environmental policies in order to ensure that ICT applications make a positive contribution to environmental outcomes, and, at the same time, to suppress rebound effects.\n",
"role": "assistant"
}
] |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.